Reincarnation or Deception?
Barbara Henderson
I was watching Fox News a while back
when Jerry was getting ready for work, and there was a man interviewed who had
just published a book on reincarnation. I don’t remember his name – sorry.
Anyway, he does ‘reincarnation regression’ which is taking people back to meet
themselves in their past lives. He says if they find out they were drowned in
another life the regressions will help them overcome their current life fear of
water. Or, learning they died by falling off a castle wall, they will overcome
their fear or heights. Or, if they died by hanging they will get rid of that
neck pain. And so on. I think the poll said 26% of people in the USA believe in
it. He also said that the Catholic church and Judaism allow that belief, and
rejecting reincarnation began with Constantine who thought people would be
easier to control if they had a fear of judgment. Or, he said something like
that. It wasn’t anything new. I have heard it before. I have read it before. I
have talked to people who believe it.
The important question is really not
what percent of the world’s population believe in reincarnation.
The real question is, ‘What is the
truth?’
The Bible clearly answers that
question when it says, ‘It is appointed unto man once to die, but after this
the judgment.’ Hebrews 9:27
Something very sad about the entire
situation, besides the fact that reincarnation will lead people to hell, is
that this man was ‘proving his theory’ by stating how many people accept it as
true. A lot of people believing something doesn’t make it true, it just makes
it acceptable. I believe that is the same way Charles Darwin ‘proved’ his
theory. Other people took him seriously, so that proved to him that he was
correct.
What the victims of this false teacher
meet in their regressions is not they themselves in another life. What they
meet are lying spirits. The spirits, or fallen angles, or demons, or whatever
you want to all them, are not human. However, they are very real beings. They
are liars and deceivers like their master.
Years ago I had a conversation with my
art teacher about this. He was a fine Christian man, but he had read a book on
reincarnation. He said the people whose stories were written in the book seemed
to have credibility. He was struggling with how to put that into his Christian
faith without making a grave error.
We went over what the Bible says in
Hebrews 9:27
We also went over the story in Luke
chapter 16.
In the story of the rich man and
Lazarus, neither was able to return to earth. It is interesting that the rich
man was not repentant. And, he was still trying to set himself above Lazarus by
asking Abraham to order Lazarus to do his bidding. If he had been allowed out
of hell, he would have gone on to live another life without seeking
reconciliation with God.
I personally believe people are not
given a second chance in another life simply because they would not take it.
They would not take God’s offer even if they had already experienced hell.
Notice that Satan will be bound 1000 years during what we call the Millennium
Kingdom. At the end of that age, Satan is let out of hell. And, what does he
do? Does he fall on his knees and plead for mercy? No. He comes out just as
rebellious as when he went in. (Another thing we learn from the kingdom years
is that mankind will sin even without the influence of Satan and his followers
It would be pretty much impossible to
go over all the things that are not acceptable within the teachings of the
Bible, with reincarnation definitely being one of the false teachings that is
popular today. Seeking contact with the spirit world in any form is another.
Christians need to know and teach just
a few things that will keep younger Christians and even non-believers from many
false paths.
First, God made it all – all of
everything.
Any being in existence is a being
created by God.
Any ‘being’ or ‘feeling’ or ‘vision’
or anything else that teaches something contrary to what the Bible teaches is
coming from a created being. That being is a fallen angel, a being you can also
call a lying spirit or demon.
Reincarnation rejects the atonement
for sin made by Jesus Christ, believing instead that souls eventually work out
their own salvation/enlightenment/path-to-god through many lives. It is just
another form of salvation by works, but it takes many lives instead of one.
That’s it. For those who believe God
is telling the truth in His book, then anything that calls God a liar is not of
God. It is from the king of hell – which is Satan.
When reincarnation is mentioned, or
contact with the spirit world, or contact with the dead, or aliens, Christians
need to boldly state that there has been no real contact with anything except
with a deceiving being created by God, and fallen from heaven. You can
truthfully say ‘lying spirit’, but that may not be the best way to begin the
conversation. If you get their attention, bring on the point about Christ’s
atonement for sin. People don’t have to work for their salvation, they just
have to accept Christ’s sacrifice. After salvation, then work for Jesus because
you want others to know the true path to God.
Barbara
