Question:
Dear Greg,
There
is a show on television called “Crossing Over”.
A fellow named John Edward hosts it.
He seems to have a link with loved ones that have crossed over by telling
people here things that he couldn’t even know of unless he had a “gift”.
I was raised to believe that people had these abilities but were not to
use them. What is your belief?
What scriptures can be quoted to support such?
Have
you ever watched the show? I appreciate your thoughts.
May God bless.
Tina
Answer: Dear Tina,
No,
I have never watched the show, though from its title I have a good idea of its
contents. The claims of the host
are not new—there have always been those who claim to be a link, a medium, a
channel, through which we can communicate with God—and most especially the
dead.
Main
problem, biblically? Nowhere in the Bible are we given evidence that leads us to
believe that humans can communicate with the souls of those who are now dead.
We don’t even know, precisely, what the “intermediate state” (the
time between death and the resurrection) is all about.
There is a debate about what souls are “doing” in heaven—whether
they are conscious or unconscious (sleeping is the term that some use).
But very few orthodox Christians, if any, believe that we can communicate
with those who are dead—or the dead with us—not with you or me, and not with
some “gifted” person.
Since
any claims to such communication cannot be verified, substantiated, documented,
studied—since it is not objective--there is room for much subjectivity.
If someone tells you that he/she communicates with the dead, they may, in
fact, fabricate anything that a dead person is supposedly saying without any
fear of being proven wrong.
I
do not believe that anyone has such a gift.
There are several places where the gifts that God gives are mentioned in
the New Testament, and not one of these lists includes “communicating with the
dead”.
In
Christ,
Greg
Albrecht