The Bible shows that the angel Lucifer wanted to be worshipped as God but was thrown out of heaven with at least one-third of the angels. He and his demons’ great aim is to work against God and corrupt the worship of the true God; that is why he has filled the world with all kinds of false worship. Demons are supernatural creatures and very, very intelligent. They have the ability to do things that are beyond our realization, perception, or understanding. Though they generally control unbelievers, they engage in very subtle activities within churches. Even among true churches, Christ said that the devil takes away the seed of God’s word as soon as it is sown; he tempts us, and gives us worries and doubts. 1 Timothy 4:1 mentions “doctrines of demons,” so they inspire and spread false teaching so people do not come to the truth.
I used to study a lot of books on demonology; nowadays, I have no time. Sproul’s Unseen Realities: Angels and Demons, Nathan Squires’ Rock Music: The Citadel of Satan, Maloney’s Books, Alex Randall’s The Devil’s Music, Battle of the Mind, and The Veil: Invitation to the Unseen Realm all discuss this. One common thing most of the authors say is that the devil always works in places where the mind is not used. That is why the common saying is, “an empty mind is the devil’s workshop.” These authors, who have done extensive research, tell us that demons can supernaturally enter human minds, plant ideas, and control the mind. After a point, they can control their bodies. They are spirits with a lot of dirty lusts and feelings; they love to enter the body, influence the bodies, and create joyful, tingling ecstasy. One of the gifts God has given us to hinder demonic influence is the mind. It is our defense against these demonic forces.
But the more the mind is switched off, and the more you don’t use your thinking and reasoning ability, the more you will be influenced by demons. That influence will be very enjoyable initially. A “vacant” mind is an “open door” for spiritual influences. “Mindless activities” can make us vulnerable and weak to these demonic spiritual influences; they take advantage of this openness and empty mind. In Matthew 12, the Lord said when an evil spirit goes out from a man, it doesn’t find a resting place, so it comes back. When it sees the place clean and open, it brings seven more worse spirits into him.
They thrive in places where there is mindless activity. When the mind is disengaged, it’s less able to discern, evaluate, and resist negative influences. Engaging in activities that intentionally suppress cognitive function, where the mind is regularly bypassed to target high emotional feelings, is where they thrive. There are techniques if you regularly practice them to suppress the mind and critical thinking, to bypass the mind, that will make you feel an emotional high and ecstasy. Most of that is created by demons because you switch off your mind, lose your defense, and invite demons. Such regular practices impair discernment to know right from wrong, making it harder to recognize and resist deceptive or harmful influences. So, I have titled this section, “Mindless Worship Is Dangerous” because that is the next lesson we are going to learn in Leviticus.
So far in our study of Leviticus, by shocking the nation by killing two High Priest’s sons, God used a teachable moment. The first lesson: the importance of regulative worship. The God of the Bible should be worshipped as he commands, or if we offer any “strange fire” or do anything not commanded, there will be terrible, terrible consequences. The second lesson we learn by their funeral is that worship should be God-centered. If we go against that and run after man-centered worship, we saw that such worship leads to sad consequences: no communion with God, depression, bad interpersonal relationships with others, and finally, it takes us very far from God with his curses. God showed this in the very first wrong worship. What was the result of Cain’s wrong worship? He didn’t enjoy God’s communion and love; he was upset with God, which led to depression. His face fell, his interpersonal relationship was so bad he killed his brother, and then he was finally cursed by God and went far away from God.
The third lesson of worship is that God should be worshipped with all your mind. The primary command says God should not only be worshipped with all our heart, but also with all our mind. That is again a regulative command. In fact, this is the primary distinctiveness of true religion. In all false religions, you see no mind. You ask, “How can this be God? How can you follow this stupid tradition?” They say, “No; don’t ask questions; switch off your mind.” 1 Corinthians 10 says idol worship invites demons. God says my people should worship with all their mind. If you violate that and throw away your mind in the name of worship, you will be inviting demons.
So in Leviticus, the next lesson God teaches is, “I should be worshipped with clear, alert, deep thoughtfulness.” Notice after they buried Aaron’s sons, see the first command God gives to Aaron. Verse 8 says this is a unique verse because this is the first time God directly speaks to Aaron in the entire Bible. The first words to Aaron as High Priest are about worship. This kind of shows the great importance of this command and its principle. Verse 8-9: “Then the Lord spoke to Aaron, saying: ‘Do not drink wine or intoxicating drink, you, nor your sons with you, when you go into the tabernacle of meeting, lest you die. It shall be a statute forever throughout your generations.'”
Why? Is God only interested in avoiding wine so Aaron should not have bad breath? God, who said you shall worship me with all your heart and strength, also said you should worship me with all your mind. “Aaron, don’t drink; you should not be under any kind of external influence that affects your mind because I should be worshipped with clear, alert, deep thoughtfulness.” Notice it is not just given to Aaron, but to all his sons, for all coming generations, and if he disobeys, there is a serious threat: “You shall die.” A very serious command.
In those days, we know Israelites drank a lot of wine regularly; it was diluted wine. This prohibition is not given as a lifetime practice. They were not to drink alcohol when, the text says, they came into the tent. Now, this was a lasting ordinance for all priests in all generations. “Do not drink alcohol or be under its influence when you come into the tent.”
Now, what is the connection between drinking wine and Nadab and Abihu offering strange fire and dying? It is said just after their death and funeral. Some have said they offered strange fire because they were drunk; they didn’t think properly, and their mindless minds gave room to the devil’s ideas and made them offer strange fire. This is possible because when you allow your mind to be under any influence, you cannot consciously think you have to worship him right as he commands. You do whatever you feel like doing, where is the careful obedience to regulative principles? Such worship can be done only when we worship God with all our mind because for any right action, you need clear and calm thinking. That way we can say one of the root causes of offering strange fire is an unthinking, rash act without proper, logical, clear-minded reflection. In the ecstasy of a moment, they offered strange fire and brought about immediate death. We know it’s true that strong drink robs a man of his reason. He doesn’t think what he says, just blabbering, and then doesn’t think about what he does.
And there is no activity on earth that demands a higher concentration and a higher level of thinking than approaching Jehovah in his temple. Worship of God should not be like the gentile Canaanite gods. The priests of the Canaanite gods always conducted their service and got their oracles from their gods in a state of intoxication. You have seen a priest of a god who will drink before doing the worship and say something inspired. So the Lord is saying you should not worship mindlessly; worship me according to my word, just as I have commanded.
Notice verses 10-11. He tells them that only when you worship me with a clear mind and use your mind and think critically, will you not allow demonic influences. You will develop two wonderful qualities: discernment and a full and accurate knowledge of truth. Mindless worship hinders discernment and coming to a full knowledge of truth.
Notice in verse 10 you will have discernment to do two things: “that you may distinguish between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean.”
This is so important in the worship of a holy God; you need to have discernment between what is holy and unholy, clean and unclean. Though in this context it is about ceremonial clean and unclean discernment, the principle is that you should know what is acceptable to me and what I have commanded and not commanded. Do you see how it is emphasized? This applies to us today in the sense that we should be mentally alert when we pray, study the Bible, or participate in worship. We need to be free from distractions that could cloud our judgment or hinder our connection with God. You cannot offer true worship without discernment. Oh, this is all an Old Testament passage; in the New Testament, we can forget we have a mind and keep blabbering whatever comes to our mouth in worship. Is that what the New Testament says about true worship? Our Lord said we should worship God in truth and spirit. How can you worship in truth without a mind? What do apostles teach us about true worship? Is it to be passive, allow demons to come into the mind, and mindlessly blabber? No. Romans 12:1-2: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” True acceptable worship is to be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Do you see God should be worshipped with all our mind? Some of you sin here. Your mind does not prepare, pray, or just come. Your mind keeps wandering. Though there is no ritual of clean and unclean or holy and unholy, the principle applies today that mental alertness is commanded as part of God’s worship.
Discernment is nothing more than the ability to decide between truth and error, right and wrong. Discernment is the process of making careful distinctions in our thinking about truth. In other words, the ability to think with discernment is synonymous with an ability to think biblically. Oh, how people lack that.
The second thing is that mental alertness will not only help discernment, but you will also arrive at a full, accurate knowledge of truth so that you will be able to accurately communicate the truth. Verse 11: “and that you may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord has spoken to them by the hand of Moses.”
See, this is part of worship. You should teach the Israelites what? Not whatever comes to your loose, sinful mind or demonic ideas, but what the Lord has spoken to them by Moses. Teach God’s word; do expository preaching. The Bible repeatedly says to “gird up the loins of your mind,” don’t allow your mind to wander, but be accurate and meticulously teach my word. Timothy said, “Preach the word.” To preach the word is to be a herald; preach the king’s message.
You should clearly and accurately teach what I have commanded; not say anything that comes to your mindless mouth. They were to be prophetic mouthpieces of God. Use all your mind; worship with me all your heart.
What about the people? Can they come drinking, with distracted minds, or with mindless worship? No, repeatedly, all the books, the whole book of Deuteronomy, are written to tell them to “be careful to remember all I command you; keep meditating day and night. Remember. Don’t forget; be careful to observe.” There is no place for mindless worship.
So mental alertness is commanded for discernment between right and wrong and for the exact, meticulous preaching of God’s word and understanding God’s word.
Application: This is a lesson to us. Do we worship God with all our mind? Do we spend a late night and wake up and come in a hurry for the sake of worship, with less sleep and a mind that is not active? Or do we sleep well, wake up a little early, pray and read, and prepare a mind to be active without any distractions, without the influence of sleep, or eating too much? Even fasting is a way to listen to God’s word. All this is required. If you don’t worship God with all your mind, you also open a door for the devil and don’t allow the seed of the word to go deeply into your heart. It remains superficial, so he takes the seed away from your heart. You can go on like that and never grow spiritually. God will punish you for that. Beware of mindless worship!
If you ask for one secret of the Pentecostal movement’s growth, it is that it is a mindless religion. That is how it thrives and grows. The whole system runs on making people mindless. I am not speaking to accuse anyone; there was a time where I decided that whatever you say, they will not change. It is no use wasting my breath. Get lost. I stopped. But of late, I am burdened by hearing stories of many people who have come out of Pentecostal churches. When some of them come to a knowledge of the truth and they beat their heads and breasts in regret with tears, they painfully say, “Oh, how I wasted 30, 40, 50 years in that mindless delusion.” This is a burdened appeal to at least whoever can hear this message to see what God’s word says. I also believe God is moving and bringing people out of this deception. Just like God brought men to the truth from the Roman Catholic blindness in the Reformation after printing was invented, people started reading, and they cut the Roman Catholic religion down to size. In the same way today, God is bringing many from that group because of the internet. They hear sermons from R.C. Sproul, MacArthur, and Paul Washer and are coming out. I believe it is those men coming out from that group who will become reformers and cut this deceptive movement down to size. For my part, tomorrow in the day of judgment, people should not say, “As a preacher, you didn’t say anything.” Some of my friends say, “You didn’t warn us.” I want to be free of blood guiltiness, so I am trying to expose the deception in that group and warn people.
Do you see from this passage God says that mindless worship, which hinders discernment, doesn’t know the difference between right and wrong and so never comes to a full knowledge of truth? If there is one problem that today’s Christians lack, which if they cultivate what the Lord tells Aaron, is to stop mindless worship and cultivate discernment between error and truth, holy and unholy. God’s word commands in 1 John 4:1, “Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.” In Romans 12:2, spiritual discernment is the ability to know the perfect, good, and acceptable will of God.
Mark my words. Pentecostalism will disappear from the map of India. It is discernment to know what is clean and unclean, what is truth and false, what is God’s word and what is the devil’s lies. Discernment is like the immunization of the soul; you know what to allow into your mind and what not to allow. The greatest problem in the church is a lack of discernment. If you don’t have this, you have a spiritual disease like AIDS. A victim of AIDS doesn’t actually die of that disease; AIDS completely weakens the immune system so that the person is susceptible to dying of a thousand other diseases. A lack of discernment in the church is like a case of spiritual AIDS—it leaves Christians vulnerable to dying of a thousand heresies.
That discernment comes from using your mind; stop mindless activities; keeping your brain critical and active; read scripture; understand truth. That discernment will make you like the noble Bereans who went to Scripture to authenticate, corroborate, and validate what they heard preached. But today, people never give time to learn the scriptures, the foundational truths taught in confessions like the 1689 confession, and they lack discernment. All kinds of soul-destroying teaching, demonic doctrines from 1 Timothy, and worship are allowed. My heart breaks to see that.
The joke is that these Pentecostal guys do everything against the scriptures. You know how they keep people from coming to the truth? They dress up reformed teaching in a hideous way and say, “Oh, Reformed teaching is a big heresy. This Calvinism is a horrible teaching about election and total depravity.” They neither know the Bible nor church history. If they would study church history, they would know there was no Pentecostalism before the 19th century; no great reformer spoke in tongues, did a miracle, or any of this mindless Christianity was there before the 19th century. Martin Luther, Calvin, Spurgeon, William Carey, and even Wesley, those men who did great work for God’s kingdom, didn’t play any of these tricks. Their forefathers are the heretical teachings of Montanism in the 2nd century.
Let me show how the whole system is mindless manipulation, and this mindless manipulation invites demons into their worship.
Take their worship: praying in tongues. You cannot do that without switching off your mind. When they trained me to speak in tongues, the first thing I remember they told me was, “Don’t think of anything. Try to empty your mind of any conscientious thought.” They purposefully switch off their mind to enable the gift to function. “Speak what comes to your mouth; don’t think.”
One great Pentecostal preacher, Frances Hunter, continually reminds his audience that they’re not supposed to be thinking. Quote—he says, “The reason some of you don’t speak fluently is that you try to think; switch off your mind; disconnect yourself from what is rational and reasonable and logical. Go beyond intellect; bypass your mind and feel; feel. It transcends human understanding. It is a heavenly language. It’s like the sweetness that you can’t know until you taste it yourself. It is the heart of man speaking to the heart of God.” Okay, a question: what is the man speaking? Neither his heart understands, nor will God understand, nor will anyone understand, because no one is using their mind. Yet there is supposed to be a deep, intimate communion with God.
Is this screaming, blabbering, and jumping a communion with God or with demons? See the danger of surrendering one’s mind and abandoning control of oneself; it is an open door for demons. It is not only spiritually dangerous but also psychologically very damaging to the individual. Ecstatic experience, like drug addiction, requires larger and larger doses to satisfy. They start doing more terrible things; you notice the noise keeps increasing, the activities more, the clapping more, rolling, and jumping.
Okay, this radical Pentecostalism used to regularly happen 20 years ago at Paul Thangiah’s church and M.A. Varghese’s Bethel AG church when he had a church in RT Nagar, not in Hebbal. I went there for a few days with my friend. This religion takes different forms, like a witch who destroys lives and then takes another form to hide itself. This Pentecostalism has morphed itself for 2,000 years in different forms; it keeps morphing itself like all false teaching. Now we don’t see them that extreme throughout the world because they have seen many lives destroyed by these practices; they are exposed everywhere. Now it is more morphed, reformed, and refined Pentecostalism.
It is morphed into musical hypnotism techniques; a sensual musical concert in the name of worship. It is a group of people singing loud rock music with drums, like a concert. This was not there; this is contemporary strange fire. Oh, the power of music! Music has the power to numb critical thinking, to create a state of heightened emotionality that may bypass rational thought, so there is no logical reason to believe what people say. It creates an emotional state; after that, you believe whatever happens. When emotions are very strong, they can dominate cognitive processes, making it harder to engage in objective analysis. We see this in movies. They are all stupid, illogical, and impractical, but the background music makes us emotional, so we don’t think.
Repetitive rhythms and melodies can induce a trance-like state, reducing mental alertness and critical analysis. This phenomenon can lower the resistance to suggestions and influence people’s beliefs.
Do you understand why these churches have 30 to 1 hour of “praise and worship” with an electric guitar and drums? And notice the songs; they are repetitive chanting. You will not find songs; they are not hymns with deep theological concepts that make them think. Oh, no, it is always repetitive melodies, repeated excessively, like a mantra, to create a trance-like state, reduce mental alertness, and create a state of diminished critical thinking. They use the power of music to manipulate people’s minds.
Repeating simple phrases or choruses creates a hypnotic effect of autosuggestion and overshadows thoughtful engagement. Then they have dim lighting and sensory stimuli to create an emotionally charged atmosphere that can bypass critical thinking.
This state of mind is conducive to the planting of seeds of ideas, without much resistance from a person’s own personal reasoning. This state opens them to the influence of demonic doctrines the preacher will preach after the music concert. They are vulnerable to false teachings and unbiblical ideas. The music concert induces very strong emotions so during a sermon, people might be less likely to question what they are being told. Music can completely hinder critical thinking.
I don’t say we shouldn’t use music, but it should always be background music, with limited use. We have one song that is five minutes long, not a one-hour music song to numb the mind, and it is always background music. What is the most important instrument at the Sunday meeting? The answer is, “The voices of the congregation.” A question: who are the worshippers there? When all the bright spotlights are on the band, while the other worshippers are in the dark, it is only a performance, a concert. By the way, I like good concerts, but we shouldn’t do that in worship.
Okay, then comes preaching. “Oh, today the pastor preached from the Bible.” 1 Timothy 4:1: “Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons.” Doctrines of demons. Demons are masters of deception. They can use scripture. Do you know demons can preach from the Bible and make you believe what you are hearing is from the Bible?
Do you know the devil actually preached to Jesus Christ from the Bible? He used Psalm 91:11-12: “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.” So “fall; God will protect.” What is wrong? It is in the Bible, so believe it.
But do you know how Jesus showed it is a demonic doctrine? He used the literary style of the passage. Every Bible verse has a literary style; this is a poetic style Psalm, you should not take it literally. Secondly, the analogy of scripture: you should check whether other portions of scripture teach the same truth. Jesus took another passage from Deuteronomy and said, “Thou shall not test the Lord.” So, it is against the analogy of their context. You should never take the Bible verses out of context.
You see all these places; they will never start with the Bible. They will have points to say; they will use the Bible as support, but they are not following the literary style. No. They take everything out of context.
Notice the content of their preaching; it is all psychological motivation, self-help, and marketing book principles. It will sound like the preacher is saying something profound, and people will say, “Wow,” and clap. You just think, “Does the verse really say that in context?” It will say completely the opposite. Preachers using very strong emotional stories with little to no Bible context, just stories, stories, and incidents.
Thousands of people, after musical hypnotism, hear this. They don’t have a thinking mind and believe, “Oh, that pastor teaches such a wonderful message,” while all he is speaking are doctrines of demons. Nobody will question what he preaches; a culture of blind acceptance, with clapping, where questioning is seen as a lack of faith. They don’t question whether God really said that in the passage because the mind is numbed. Sermons that lack depth or biblical substance, focusing instead on emotional anecdotes or motivational platitudes: “Just do it.” “Believe in yourself.” “Never give up.” “Every day is a new opportunity.” “The best is yet to come.” with voice modulation techniques and asked people to repeatedly clap and say “Hallelujah.”
So they neither have discernment nor grow in the knowledge of truth but are taught doctrines of demons and have offered strange fire worship. Claims of divine revelation or spiritual encounters are accepted without scrutiny. Individuals become vulnerable to manipulation. The secret of Pentecostalism: mindless worship without discernment.
But you see in our passage the principle is clearly taught: it is a command negatively to avoid any kind of influence that will numb your mind from being active, thoughtful, and thinking. It’s calling for a deep, thoughtful, active pursuit of understanding and knowing God. Intellectual Engagement: It involves actively using your intellect to learn about God through Scripture, study, and reflection. Avoiding Error: Worship God as he said; you see what happened when careless strange fire was given.
It’s mindless emotional hysteria. It’s not about worship. Worship only goes high when understanding goes deep. The deeper your understanding of the truth of God, the higher your worship goes. Worship is directly correlated to understanding. The richer your theology, the more elevated your worship becomes. Today we climbed so high in the sermon; every word made me worship. We didn’t play any rock music. In fact, if you had played any sudden rock music, it would have hindered my thinking, and my worship would have been disturbed. A low, superficial, shallow understanding of God leads to shallow, content-less, superficial hysteria. That’s not worship. We sing great hymns because there is rich theology in hymns. We don’t have to go hysterical. We want your mind fully engaged.
See, like Romans 12 says, it is only when the mind is renewed that our life changes. Life Transformation starts with a change of thought patterns, aligning them with God’s truth. The Holy Spirit touches our conscience to bring about inward transformation. The route to conscience is not through emotions but through the mind. The appeal of truth is to the mind. When the mind understands and grasps, it talks to the conscience, and life changes. Mindless worship brings no change; no Holy Spirit transformation happens.
Mindless worship, you see, is an invitation for demons and doctrines of demons to be sown in our hearts. 1 Peter 4:7: “be alert and sober-minded; clear-minded/sound thinking for the sake of your prayers.” This means you can pray and worship God when you have a clear mind. I stated that mindless worship is an open invitation to demons. There is a real danger. 1 Peter 5:8: “Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” So how does Peter tell us to be careful about him? “Be sober-minded; clear-minded; be watchful.” That is how you can resist the devil’s influence in your mind and soul.
Oh, may God save people from this delusion! MacArthur said if God saves someone from that group, they will somehow come out and find a true church. So we should pray that God saves many in that group.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 