Dark Side of the Supernatural

163 Pages·2009·0.82 MB·English

by  Bill Myers

ZONDERVAN
THE DARK SIDE OF THE SUPERNATURAL
Copyright © 2008 by Bill Meyers and Dave Wimbish
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the
required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of
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reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form
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ePub Edition June 2009 ISBN: 0-310-86160-8
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Meyers, Bill, 1953 –
The dark side of the supernatural : what is of God and what isn’t / Bill Myers
and Dave Wimbish. — [Rev. ed.].
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-310-27924-2
1. Occultism—Religious aspects—Christianity. I. Wimbish, David. II. Title.
BR115.O3M94 2008
261.5'13 — dc22
2008001778
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible: New International
® ®
Version . NIV . Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of
Zondervan. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other —
except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
08 09 10 11 12 • 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FOR DIANE
AN INSPIRATION FOR US BOTH.
OTHER BOOKS
BY BILL MYERS
WWW.BILLMYERS.COM
TEEN SERIES
Forbidden Doors
TEEN NONFICTION
Get Real
Hot Topics, Tough Questions
ADULT NOVELS
Blood of Heaven
Threshold
Fire of Heaven
Eli
The Face of God
The Wager
When the Last Leaf Falls
Soul Tracker
The Presence
The Seeing
The Voice
KIDS’ SERIES
McGee and Me
My Life As…
Secret Agent Dingledorf
Bloodhounds, Inc.
The Elijah Project
Imager Chronicles
Bug Parables
TABLE OF CONTENTS
COVER PAGE
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
CHAPTER 1 SUPERNATURAL HUNGER
CHAPTER 2 ANGELS—THE GOOD AND THE BAD
CHAPTER 3 DEMONS
CHAPTER 4 SATANISM
CHAPTER 5 UFOS
CHAPTER 6 COMMUNICATING WITH THE DEAD
CHAPTER 7 GHOSTS
CHAPTER 8 NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES
CHAPTER 9 REINCARNATION
CHAPTER 10 WICCA AND WITCHCRAFT
CHAPTER 11 VAMPIRES AND FANTASY GAMES
CHAPTER 12 MORE DOORS TO BE WARY OF OPENING
CHAPTER 13 WRAPPING UP
FOOTNOTES
ABOUT THE PUBLISHER
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS
CHAPTER 1
SUPERNATURAL
HUNGER
We all have it—this hunger, this yearning for something more. After all we’re
human, and humans are made of three parts…
Physical, mental…and spiritual.
And between eating and school and eating and work and eating and sports and
eating and parents and friends and…did I mention eating?…we’ve pretty well
got the first two parts of who we are covered.
But what about the third? The spiritual?
As a writer, it seems every time I turn around, someone is asking me to come
up with a story about the supernatural. And it’s not just movies. Just check out
all the psychic TV shows, talk shows, local bookstores, palm readers, or even the
Internet.
Everybody’s hungry for answers. Especially…
TEENAGERS
Every day I get e-mails from students with questions—are there ghosts? Are
séances wrong? What about the glowing figure in my room? Are Ouija boards
bad? What about UFOs? And on and on…
Some of these questions come from youth who have read my Forbidden
Doors book series. In these 12 books, a teenage brother and sister become
reluctant ghost busters and learn many of the truths about the supernatural that
we’ll be discussing here. Other e-mails come from students who have been
frightened by actual encounters. Still others come from teenagers who have
friends caught up in the stuff and want to help.
Instead of spending many hours a week answering the same questions over
and over, I figured, why not put the info into one, easy-to-use reference book—
something you can pull down from the shelf and get a quick overview and
answer?
So buckle up. In the coming chapters we’ll explore the major supernatural
beliefs and practices of today…finding out which ones are real, which ones are
bogus, and how to deal with them.
REAL OR FAKE
As an author and filmmaker, I’ve spent years researching this stuff—
interviewing witches, Wiccans, psychics, and the head of the CIA’s psychic
research department. I have observed and participated in an exorcism, hung out
with a serial killer, with those involved in ghost hunting, and with UFO
abductees. I have visited a top psychic lab; filmed miracles in third-world
countries; and of course, read thousands of accounts.
For the most part the stories of the supernatural are like mist. They vanish into
nothing when you try to verify them.
But occasionally, there are situations that defy rational explanation and hold
up under investigation…
There are haunted locations where chains rattle and disembodied voices can be heard whispering
in the night.
There are people who receive messages from “beyond” through trances, automatic writing, and
other means. There are unexplainable things seen in the sky at night.
GOOD OR EVIL
Evidence proves there is a supernatural world out there. In fact, the Bible says as
much. It also says that there’s a good side to the supernatural and an evil side—a
side that wants to help us and legitimately fill our hunger…and a side that wants
to destroy us.
Jesus Christ put it best when he said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill
and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full” (John
10:10).
Pretty intense words. Jesus was either lying or telling the truth. And if he’s
telling the truth, then there really is a thief out there—an enemy who wants to
steal from us, who wants to kill us, who wants to destroy us.
The good news is we don’t have to be afraid of the thief, because we really do
have somebody who’s on our side, somebody who wants to protect us…
somebody who will give us life.
The bad news is we have to be smart. We can’t be stupid and go running after
everything that’s supernatural. As I tell the high school and college students I
work with, “Just because it glows in the dark doesn’t make it good.”
In fact, it’s often just the opposite.
Our enemy Satan is alive and well, and he’ll use everything in his power to
draw people away from God… including supernatural “special effects.” Jesus
again put it best when he said, “For false Christs and false prophets will appear
and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect—if that were
possible” (Matthew 24:24).
And while I’m in a Bible-quoting mood, check this out: “The coming of the
lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds
of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, and in every sort of evil that deceives
those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and
so be saved” (2 Thessalonians 2:9-10).
SAME OL’, SAME OL’
Lots of times young people are attracted to the supernatural because they have
hard lives, or they don’t fit in, or people treat them like dirt. As a result, it’s only