Cartoon Characters Are Demons?

[Junia]

What you should be worrying about more is the condition of your heart. You should be righteous in your thoughts and heart. This is what Jesus said about a defiled heart:-
But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these things defile a man.
For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. Matthe

Reality is seldom so black and white. Genesis 3 tells us the serpent was the most subtle of all the animals in the Garden. And subtlety is still a primary tactic of the devil. Like anything else, cartoon characters can be used for good or for evil. They can be used to teach good moral and spiritual principles, or bad moral and spiritual principles. It depends on how they are used and how we receive them.

The same is true of just about anything. I saw you had a thread on pharmaceuticals. They can be used; they can be abused. You had a thread on pop idols - again, used or abused. Some diversion is good, especially when it is wholesome. But when it is not wholesome - as is very often the case these days - or when we take our "idol" worship too far for our own good, it has become a bad thing.



Agree with all this.

Paul talks about this in 1Cor:

All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful. All things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the authority of any. -1Cor 6:12​

It's good to try to understand what's going on, but the best answer to many questions about where to draw the line is simply to err on the side of seeking Jesus. Then the questions usually work themselves out automatically. Follow hard after Jesus and you won't go wrong.

 

[Junia]

Become born again, then you will go to Heaven. bless you

 

[ViaCrucis]

I'm convinced some Christians can't be bothered to acknowledge and address the real problems that exist in the world--hunger, poverty, the lack of medicine, war, greed, injustice against the weak and vulnerable--and so in order to distract them from having to engage with the real world, loving their neighbor, they simply invent their fantasy evil.

After all, it's a whole lot easier to attack imaginary evil then to face real evil by doing actual good.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Junia]

I'm convinced some Christians can't be bothered to acknowledge and address the real problems that exist in the world--hunger, poverty, the lack of medicine, war, greed, injustice against the weak and vulnerable--and so in order to distract them from having to engage with the real world, loving their neighbor, they simply invent their fantasy evil.

After all, it's a whole lot easier to attack imaginary evil then to face real evil by doing actual good.

-CryptoLutheran

I agree. i am not saying demons do not exist, and there may be soem cartoons which are demonic. But not all and I do feel that some of these testimonies come from countries where the gap between rich and poor is so extreme and i cannot help but wonder why is their focus on cartoons or jewellery or perfume being evil. (not saying this to judge because i live in the UK where the rich-poor gap is worse than it has been for many decades)...i even heard one testimony claiming poeple were in hell for wearing deodorant.....we have to test the spirits.....

 

[Junia]

I'm convinced some Christians can't be bothered to acknowledge and address the real problems that exist in the world--hunger, poverty, the lack of medicine, war, greed, injustice against the weak and vulnerable--and so in order to distract them from having to engage with the real world, loving their neighbor, they simply invent their fantasy evil.

After all, it's a whole lot easier to attack imaginary evil then to face real evil by doing actual good.

-CryptoLutheran

oh and i love your avatar! I need to take it to heart as sometimes i worry am not good enough for being saved. remembering my baptism would be a good start for me maybe?

 

[ViaCrucis]

I agree. i am not saying demons do not exist, and there may be soem cartoons which are demonic. But not all and I do feel that some of these testimonies come from countries where the gap between rich and poor is so extreme and i cannot help but wonder why is their focus on cartoons or jewellery or perfume being evil. (not saying this to judge because i live in the UK where the rich-poor gap is worse than it has been for many decades)...i even heard one testimony claiming poeple were in hell for wearing deodorant.....we have to test the spirits.....

The evil one comes with the appearance of an angel of light. I would be far more worried about devilish schemes which have the appearance of Christian piety, but are in fact meaningless rubbish, hypocrisy, and serves no point other than to shipwreck our faith. These are those who say, "Don't taste!" and "Don't touch!"

Legalism is the devil's tool to try and shipwreck the faith of those who would be taken in by the false promises of holiness and purity. As though what could go into a man could make him impure, as the Lord Himself says, it is not what goes into a man, but what comes out, that makes him impure. It is our callousness, our pride, our selfishness, our apathy, our greed, our malice, our anger; it is as St. James says, that out of the same mouth comes blessing and cursing, and this should not be.

It is not so much the outside of the cup that we should be concerned about, but the inside. We seek the Lord, who conforms us to Himself, renewing our minds and hearts, and giving us hearts full of contrition, and invites and calls us out in His name to love others even as He has loved us.

Give the devil a panic attack by loving someone.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[ViaCrucis]

oh and i love your avatar! I need to take it to heart as sometimes i worry am not good enough for being saved. remembering my baptism would be a good start for me maybe?

Martin Luther recommended that we should take every opportunity we can to remember our baptism, that we can stand with boldness in our faith saying baptizmatus sum!, "I am baptized!" That even when we take a shower or bath it is an opportunity to remember our baptism.

One of the chief meanings for why Lutherans encourage making the Sign of the Cross is that it is a reminder of our baptism.

To look not to ourselves, to our own feelings, our own ideas, our own works--but to look to the external, objective work and word of God which declares us His own. We belong to Jesus, and no power in all of creation can change that.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Junia]

Martin Luther recommended that we should take every opportunity we can to remember our baptism, that we can stand with boldness in our faith saying baptizmatus sum!, "I am baptized!" That even when we take a shower or bath it is an opportunity to remember our baptism.

One of the chief meanings for why Lutherans encourage making the Sign of the Cross is that it is a reminder of our baptism.

To look not to ourselves, to our own feelings, our own ideas, our own works--but to look to the external, objective work and word of God which declares us His own. We belong to Jesus, and no power in all of creation can change that.

-CryptoLutheran

This is one of the reasons I love Luther. He was like me, He struggled with OCD/Scrupulosity, doubt and fear over his faith journey. i do not agree with his views on the Jewish people (read somewhere he was anti-semitic) but I completely relate to him so much. He is very comforting.

 

[※※♡Rose○Gold○Macaron♡※※]

I agree. i am not saying demons do not exist, and there may be soem cartoons which are demonic. But not all and I do feel that some of these testimonies come from countries where the gap between rich and poor is so extreme and i cannot help but wonder why is their focus on cartoons or jewellery or perfume being evil. (not saying this to judge because i live in the UK where the rich-poor gap is worse than it has been for many decades)...i even heard one testimony claiming poeple were in hell for wearing deodorant.....we have to test the spirits.....

Do you have any idea why they think silly things are evil?

 

[ViaCrucis]

This is one of the reasons I love Luther. He was like me, He struggled with OCD/Scrupulosity, doubt and fear over his faith journey. i do not agree with his views on the Jewish people (read somewhere he was anti-semitic) but I completely relate to him so much. He is very comforting.

No one should agree with Luther's views about the Jewish people, they were abhorrent. Earlier in his life he had been more philo-semitic, writing to the German princes to treat Jewish subjects justly and with kindness; but in his later years he became increasingly bitter and resentful--just in general really--and it is in this part of his life that he wrote his anti-semitic screed. And that should be, without condition, condemned utterly.

Lutherans don't regard Luther as a prophet or a pope, but as an ordinary fallible sinner, we cherish Luther's bold theology of the Cross, but Luther isn't treated uncritically. Indeed, the only reason we are called "Lutheran" is because that is what others called us, in order to try and charge us with the "heresy" of "Lutheranism". The preferred term was Evangelical. Which is why even today, in German, Lutherans are known as "Evangelicals" (Evangelische in German).

For Lutherans our identity is two fold: Evangelical and Catholic. We are Catholic, because we don't see ourselves as ever having departed from or left the Holy Catholic Church; and thus the 1500 years of history before the Reformation is our history. And Evangelical because the whole point of the Evangelical Reformation was the Evangel--the Gospel itself. That the good news of Jesus Christ is that we have been freely justified by the grace of God alone, through faith, on Christ's account alone; and thus our sins are forgiven, we have peace with God, and life everlasting. God's promises to us are true and irrevocable, the word He speaks to us is Gospel, the very word of our salvation.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Junia]

No one should agree with Luther's views about the Jewish people, they were abhorrent. Earlier in his life he had been more philo-semitic, writing to the German princes to treat Jewish subjects justly and with kindness; but in his later years he became increasingly bitter and resentful--just in general really--and it is in this part of his life that he wrote his anti-semitic screed. And that should be, without condition, condemned utterly.

Lutherans don't regard Luther as a prophet or a pope, but as an ordinary fallible sinner, we cherish Luther's bold theology of the Cross, but Luther isn't treated uncritically. Indeed, the only reason we are called "Lutheran" is because that is what others called us, in order to try and charge us with the "heresy" of "Lutheranism". The preferred term was Evangelical. Which is why even today, in German, Lutherans are known as "Evangelicals" (Evangelische in German).

For Lutherans our identity is two fold: Evangelical and Catholic. We are Catholic, because we don't see ourselves as ever having departed from or left the Holy Catholic Church; and thus the 1500 years of history before the Reformation is our history. And Evangelical because the whole point of the Evangelical Reformation was the Evangel--the Gospel itself. That the good news of Jesus Christ is that we have been freely justified by the grace of God alone, through faith, on Christ's account alone; and thus our sins are forgiven, we have peace with God, and life everlasting. God's promises to us are true and irrevocable, the word He speaks to us is Gospel, the very word of our salvation.

-CryptoLutheran

thank you- this is very interesting. we do not have many Lutheran churches in the UK. not sure we have any, so it is really interesting.

 

[Sketcher]

I was talking to this guy about cartoons and he told me that cartoon characters are inspired by real demons, he saw that from African Christian testimonies, they had visions of stuff like that. Peniel Ngonde is an example. Should I listen to people like Peniel Ngonde in terms of cartoons, makeup, and Coca Cola being "evil?" Are cartoon characters actually real demons?

I've drawn my share of cartoon characters, none were demons.

This isn't to say that no cartoon character will ever be inspired by a demon - that depends on the artist, and what the artist intends. Some will be, many will not be.

Interesting thing about cartooning - the church embraced a form of it in the early centuries. Roman art was very realistic, but as Christian art came about, it was deliberately not realistic, because it wasn't supposed to remind you of the world. It was supposed to take your mind to the spiritual realities that are "above" it. They weren't the first cartoonists, but they used cartooning as part of their message.

 

[Junia]

well, if all cartoons are evil, how do you do explain Superbook, Veggietales etc?

 

[Junia]

Do you have any idea why they think silly things are evil?

I do not know but what tehy say is not supported by scripture. of course cartoons were not invented when Jesus was around, so it i spossible SOME cartoons are evil. but not all, as some of them are Christian or hamless like VeggieTales, Superbook etc

don;t know how that Paneil ngonde would explain those christian cartoons!

The problem i have with these preachers is not that they are forbidding things, althought that is frustrating but that they believe they are salvation issues and that a born again Christian who is in Jesus and sincerely follows Him could go to hell because they we dressed wrong that day or event hat they fell asleep in church etc...(ye si have seen these testimonies that say things like that!) .i could never worship a God so harsh that He would throw me into hell fr not being perfect enough.

Christ imputed to us His righteousness, we cannot earn our way into Heaven.

 

[WDSobieski]

Don't get so addicted to Youtube "preachers", it's a place where stuff similar to 4chan or even the deep web would pop up when you're spending too long on YT with the autoplay on. Often these "preachers" are conspiracy theorists, extremists or weird folks with very little formal theological training, and they preach for earning extra income. Why not finding people at your church or talk to people who have real theological training, such as ministers and genuine pastors (not those self-proclaimed priests or pastors online)? These videos and posts are simply sensational clickbaits, or even worse, they're either false teachers preaching wrong messages (and fear) or extremists. Sometimes the explicitly extremist people abuse religious language or symbolism as to appear less bad, many far-right people and even some neonazis often use Christian imagery despite not being Christians at all, as to lure people into their hateful agenda. One example is Björn Höcke of the radical wing of the already hard right AfD, from his interview he stated he isn't really religious at all.

Just please don't believe everything on YouTube, it's where many normal, or even intelligent people get radicalised or brainwashed with crazy stuff. Find some reputable Bible reading tools and talk to a legit church authority instead,

 

[Junia]

Don't get so addicted to Youtube "preachers", it's a place where stuff similar to 4chan or even the deep web would pop up when you're spending too long on YT with the autoplay on. Often these "preachers" are conspiracy theorists, extremists or weird folks with very little formal theological training, and they preach for earning extra income. Why not finding people at your church or talk to people who have real theological training, such as ministers and genuine pastors (not those self-proclaimed priests or pastors online)? These videos and posts are simply sensational clickbaits, or even worse, they're either false teachers preaching wrong messages (and fear) or extremists. Sometimes the explicitly extremist people abuse religious language or symbolism as to appear less bad, manyf ar-right people and even some neonazis often use Christian imagery despite not being Christian at all, as to lure people into their hateful agenda.

Just please don't believe everything on YouTube, it's where many normal, or even intelligent people get radicalised or brainwashed with crazy stuff. Find some reputable Bible reading tools and talk to a legit church authority instead,

yes! i have noticed that many of these extreme hellfire and damnation Holiness preachers are into some weird ideas. not all of them but some. some of them are into ideas that are wacko, others are into ideas that may have some grains of truth eg the nephilim, fallen angels etc but are not important doctrines to be concerned with. some of them are into downright heresies- one of them was into the Black Hebrew Israelite movement and the idea that we need to go back under the Torah to be saved. some of them pull statistics out of the air- saying only 2% of people will be saved. sorry but Bible gives no such number

 

[Junia]

don;t get me wrong, am not sying all the Pentecostal Holiness movement is bad. there are some sincere ones out there. but they do tend towards the legalistic and many of them reject the doctrine of salvation through grace.

 

[Junia]

I'm convinced some Christians can't be bothered to acknowledge and address the real problems that exist in the world--hunger, poverty, the lack of medicine, war, greed, injustice against the weak and vulnerable--and so in order to distract them from having to engage with the real world, loving their neighbor, they simply invent their fantasy evil.

After all, it's a whole lot easier to attack imaginary evil then to face real evil by doing actual good.

-CryptoLutheran

yes!

it makes you wonder what all their time is spent doing?

i remmebr a certain preacher whose name escapes me who preached agaisnt cartoons for children. he said even Adventures in Odyssey was a sinful cartoon for children because it promoted sin. what heinious sin, you ask? the terrible, terrible sin of a 10 year old girl character wearing TROUSERS!!! the preacher was saying this was damning girls and women into hellfire! this same preacher says even a little girl wearing pyjamas is a violation of God's command for women to not wear men's clothing.

i dont want to sound glib or sacreligious but sometimes i think Jesus is facepalming up in heaven at the stupidity of some of his human creation!

 

[Joined2krist]

Some not all. There are some with demonic characters especially the ones where there's are super heroes and villains involved. The Villains might be inspired by demonic characters.

I remember I included some comic books in my Book store and when I brought them in, I noticed a weird drop in sales. After a while I decided to hide them in a Carton and sales picked up again

I was convinced that I didn't need them or need any body buying them so I decided to set them on fire and they refused to burn as easily as paper should. It was weird

 

[Radagast]

I was talking to this guy about cartoons and he told me that cartoon characters are inspired by real demons, he saw that from African Christian testimonies, they had visions of stuff like that. Peniel Ngonde is an example. Should I listen to people like Peniel Ngonde in terms of cartoons, makeup, and Coca Cola being "evil?" Are cartoon characters actually real demons?

No, and no.