Chapter 28

Psychics, Mediums, Aliens, and the Dark Fringes of the NDE World

I need to be honest with you about something that troubled me. When I first started digging into near-death experience research, I expected to find doctors, nurses, and ordinary people telling extraordinary stories about what they saw on the other side. And I did find that — mountains of it. But I also found something else. Something I wasn't expecting at all. Mixed in with the serious medical research and the deeply moving personal accounts, I discovered an entire subculture of psychics, mediums, past-life regression therapists, and — of all things — alien abduction enthusiasts. And they weren't on the margins. They were right there in the middle of the NDE world, at the conferences, in the bookstores, on the Netflix documentaries, and all over social media.

This chapter is about that darker fringe. It's about the ways that genuine near-death experience research — research that I believe points powerfully toward the reality of God, the soul, and the afterlife — has been infiltrated by practices and beliefs that the Bible explicitly warns us to avoid. And I want to be careful here. I'm not saying that everyone involved in these fringe areas is evil or acting in bad faith. Many are grieving people desperately searching for connection with loved ones they've lost. Many are genuinely curious truth-seekers who have simply wandered into dangerous spiritual territory without knowing it. But the Bible is remarkably clear about these dangers, and I believe we ignore those warnings at our peril.

My thesis in this chapter is straightforward: the infiltration of psychics, mediums, past-life regression, and alien encounter narratives into the mainstream NDE community represents a deliberate strategy by the enemy to corrupt a genuine divine phenomenon and lead vulnerable seekers into spiritual darkness. As we explored in Chapter 25, Satan's consistent playbook throughout Scripture is to take what God intends for good and twist it for his own purposes. If God is using NDEs to reveal Himself — and I believe the evidence strongly suggests He is — then we should fully expect the enemy to attempt to corrupt that channel. And that is exactly what we see happening.

Let me be clear at the outset about what I am not saying. I am not saying that everyone involved in the NDE world outside of orthodox Christianity is consciously serving the devil. I am not saying that every paranormal claim is demonic. And I am not saying that Christians should retreat from NDE research entirely because of the dark fringes. What I am saying is that the NDE world has become a spiritual battlefield — just like every other area of human life and culture — and that Christians need to navigate it with their eyes wide open, their Bibles in hand, and their discernment fully engaged. The stakes are too high for anything less.

The NDE World's Unexpected Guests

Shaun Tabatt had been researching and writing about near-death experiences for years before he attended his first IANDS (International Association for Near-Death Studies) national conference in the summer of 2024. What he found there surprised him. As he recounts in The NDE Conspiracy, psychics and mediums seemed to be everywhere at the event. Attendees could consult a pet psychic in the exhibit area — someone ready to help you finally understand what your dog or cat had been desperately trying to tell you. Other psychics offered readings and spiritual guidance. Tabatt even sat in on a packed session led by a medium who claimed to help grieving parents "reconnect" with their deceased children — for a fee, of course.¹

He shouldn't have been surprised, he admits. Earlier that summer, he had been watching Netflix series related to near-death experiences. Popular shows like Life After Death with Tyler Henry featured celebrity mediums offering readings to grieving families. Another series, Surviving Death, started strong with excellent medical research on NDEs but then pivoted in its later episodes to heavy focus on psychics, mediums, and reincarnation.² The pattern was unmistakable. Serious NDE research was being crowded out — or at least overshadowed — by content that veered into spiritual territory the Bible explicitly warns us to avoid.

J. Steve Miller noticed the same troubling pattern. In Is Christianity Compatible with Deathbed and Near-Death Experiences?, Miller describes reading The Afterlife Frequency by popular medium Mark Anthony, who styles himself "The Psychic Lawyer." Anthony argues that since NDEs provide evidence for the deceased living on the other side, why not initiate contact with them? For $250, he will provide a one-hour psychic reading by phone — and there's a six-month waiting list. Anthony even offers a technique called RAFT for ordinary people to contact spirits: Recognize the spirits around you, Accept their reality, "Feel first; think later!" and Trust in the truth and guidance given.³

Miller's critique is pointed and important. Why should we trust spirits we don't know? Anthony simply assures us they're benign and loving, without offering any evidence for the non-existence of evil spirits. As Miller observes, Anthony asks us to be open-minded enough to trust spirits and mediums — but perhaps he should be open-minded enough to consider that most of the world's major religions, representing thousands of years of accumulated experience, warn us about the existence and danger of evil spirits.⁴

We should also note that this phenomenon is not limited to the conference circuit. Sabom, writing from the perspective of a careful medical researcher and committed Christian, observed as early as 1998 that the NDE world was beginning to attract psychic phenomena and that prominent NDE researchers were occasionally linking NDEs to psychic abilities, mystical experiences, and other paranormal claims without adequate critical scrutiny. Sabom's concern was that blurring the boundary between carefully documented medical evidence and uncritical acceptance of psychic claims would undermine the credibility of legitimate NDE research.³⁸ His concern has proven prophetic.

So what exactly is going on? How did a field of serious medical research become intertwined with psychics, mediums, and the paranormal fringe? And what should Christians make of it? To answer those questions, we need to look carefully at each of these "dark fringes" — and then step back to see the bigger picture of what I believe is a deliberate spiritual strategy.

Door One: Psychics and Mediums

Let's start with the most prevalent — and perhaps the most dangerous — fringe element in the NDE world: psychics and mediums. Before we go further, it helps to understand the difference between the two. While most people use the terms interchangeably, there is a meaningful distinction. Psychics claim to use intuitive abilities — such as clairvoyance (the claimed ability to "see" hidden things), clairaudience (the claimed ability to "hear" spiritual messages), and clairsentience (the claimed ability to "sense" things beyond normal perception) — to gather information about a person's past, present, or future. Mediums, by contrast, specifically claim to communicate with the spirits of deceased people. They position themselves as go-betweens — intermediaries between the physical world and the spiritual realm, delivering messages from the dead to the living.⁵

Why are psychics and mediums so prevalent in the NDE community? The answer is heartbreakingly simple. The NDE community attracts enormous numbers of grieving people — people who have lost children, spouses, parents, and close friends and who are desperate for some assurance that their loved ones still exist. Near-death experience research provides powerful evidence that consciousness survives death (as we examined in Chapters 6 through 10). But for many grieving people, evidence isn't enough. They want contact. They want to hear from their loved one. They want to know that Mom is okay, that their child is safe, that their husband is still out there somewhere.

And that is exactly the vulnerability that psychics and mediums exploit. As Tabatt observes, the NDE community is filled with people desperate to reconnect with their deceased loved ones, which makes the offerings of necromancy — communication with the dead — enormously appealing.⁶

What Does the Bible Say About Mediums and Necromancy?

The Bible's position on consulting mediums, necromancers (those who claim to communicate with the dead), and spiritists is not ambiguous. It is not a gray area. It is not a matter of interpretation where reasonable Christians might disagree. The biblical prohibition is sweeping, emphatic, and repeated throughout both the Old and New Testaments. Let me share several of the key passages.

In Deuteronomy 18:10-12, Moses delivers God's instructions to the Israelites as they prepare to enter the Promised Land:

"There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering, anyone who practices divination or tells fortunes or interprets omens, or a sorcerer or a charmer or a medium or a necromancer or one who inquires of the dead, for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD. And because of these abominations the LORD your God is driving them out before you." (ESV)

Notice the strength of the language here. The Hebrew word translated "abomination" is to'evah (תּוֹעֵבָה), one of the strongest terms of moral condemnation in the entire Old Testament. This is the same word used for the most grievous offenses against God's holiness. Consulting a medium or necromancer is not merely discouraged or frowned upon — it is described as something that disgusts God at the deepest level.

Leviticus contains three separate prohibitions. In Leviticus 19:31, God commands: "Do not turn to mediums or necromancers; do not seek them out, and so make yourselves unclean by them: I am the LORD your God" (ESV). The word "unclean" here is significant. The Hebrew tame' (טָמֵא) refers to ritual and spiritual defilement — the kind of contamination that separates a person from God's holy presence. Consulting a medium doesn't just break a rule. It defiles you. It contaminates your spiritual life.

In Leviticus 20:6, the consequences escalate: "If a person turns to mediums and necromancers, whoring after them, I will set my face against that person and will cut him off from among his people" (ESV). The metaphor of "whoring" (Hebrew zanah, זָנָה) is startling but intentional. Just as adultery violates the marriage covenant, consulting mediums violates our covenant relationship with God. We are seeking intimate spiritual connection from a source other than our Creator. And God's response is severe: He will "set his face against" that person — a terrifying image of divine opposition.

Leviticus 20:27 goes even further with the penalty for practitioners: "A man or a woman who is a medium or a necromancer shall surely be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones; their blood shall be upon them" (ESV). Under the old covenant, the practice itself was a capital offense — indicating just how seriously God takes this form of spiritual rebellion.

We should also note the broader context of the Deuteronomy 18 passage. God is about to bring Israel into the Promised Land, where the Canaanite nations practiced every form of divination, sorcery, and necromancy imaginable. God's command is emphatic: do not learn to imitate these practices. Instead, God will raise up a prophet — ultimately fulfilled in Christ — through whom His people are to receive divine guidance (Deuteronomy 18:15-18). The contrast is stark and intentional. God is not leaving His people without guidance. He is providing a legitimate channel — His prophets, His Word, and ultimately His Son — through which they can receive wisdom and direction. The prohibition against mediums is not arbitrary. It exists precisely because God has provided something infinitely better.

The prophet Isaiah offers perhaps the most pastorally pointed rebuke: "And when they say to you, 'Inquire of the mediums and the necromancers who chirp and mutter,' should not a people inquire of their God? Should they consult the dead on behalf of the living?" (Isaiah 8:19, ESV). Isaiah's logic is devastatingly simple. If you need wisdom, guidance, or comfort — why would you go to a medium when you have access to the living God? Why consult the dead when you can consult the Creator of all life? The Hebrew phrase "chirp and mutter" (hametsamtsepiym vehamahegiym) may refer to the whispered, mumbled incantations of mediums — a far cry from the clear, authoritative word of God delivered through His prophets.

The New Testament continues these warnings with equal force. Paul identifies sorcery (pharmakeia, φαρμακεία) as a "work of the flesh" in Galatians 5:20, grouping it with idolatry and warning that "those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God" (Galatians 5:21, ESV). The Greek word pharmakeia originally referred to the use of drugs and potions in magical rituals and came to encompass all forms of magical arts and sorcery. It is the root of our English word "pharmacy" — a reminder that ancient sorcery often involved the use of mind-altering substances to facilitate contact with the spirit world.

In Acts 19:18-19, we see a dramatic illustration of what genuine repentance from occult practices looks like. When the gospel reached Ephesus — a city famous for its magical arts — new converts demonstrated the seriousness of their faith by gathering their books of magic and sorcery and burning them publicly. Luke records that these books were worth fifty thousand pieces of silver — an enormous sum, equivalent to perhaps fifty thousand days' wages. These weren't casual practitioners giving up a hobby. They were people deeply embedded in the occult who recognized that following Christ required a complete and costly break from forbidden spiritual practices. The new believers in Ephesus understood something that many in the modern NDE world have forgotten: you cannot serve both God and the powers of darkness. There is no middle ground.

Paul's warning to Timothy about the last days is especially relevant to our discussion: "Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons" (1 Timothy 4:1, ESV). Notice that Paul doesn't say these people will knowingly follow demons. He says they will "devote themselves to deceitful spirits." The deception is the point. The spirits present themselves as benign — as spirit guides, as departed loved ones, as sources of wisdom and comfort. But behind the mask, they are what Paul calls them: demons (daimoniōn, δαιμονίων). And their teachings — no matter how appealing or comforting they may sound — are "teachings of demons." This is precisely the dynamic we see playing out in the NDE community today.

John's first epistle drives the point home with practical instruction: "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world" (1 John 4:1, ESV). The command to "test the spirits" (dokimazete ta pneumata, δοκιμάζετε τὰ πνεύματα) uses a word from metallurgy — the testing of metals to determine whether they are genuine. Just as a goldsmith tests whether a metal is real gold or a cheap imitation, Christians are commanded to test whether a spiritual phenomenon is genuinely from God or a counterfeit from the enemy. This is not optional. It is a direct apostolic command. And it applies fully to the spiritual phenomena we encounter in the NDE world.

The Case of King Saul: A Warning from Israel's History

The most dramatic biblical story involving a medium is the account of King Saul at Endor, recorded in 1 Samuel 28. As we discussed in Chapter 14 (where we examined this passage in its proper exegetical context), Saul found himself in a desperate situation. The Philistine army was advancing, the prophet Samuel had died, and God was not answering Saul's prayers — not through dreams, not through the Urim (a priestly device for divine guidance), and not through prophets. In his desperation, Saul did the very thing he knew was forbidden. He disguised himself and went to consult a medium at Endor.⁷

The irony is almost unbearable. Saul himself had earlier expelled the mediums and necromancers from the land, obeying the Mosaic prohibition. He knew the law. He knew the danger. Yet in his fear and impatience, he chose a path that God had explicitly condemned. And the result was catastrophic. The spirit that appeared — whether it was genuinely Samuel or a demonic impersonation (a question scholars debate) — delivered a message of doom. Saul would die in battle the next day, along with his sons.⁸

Saul's story is a warning for our own time. When God seems silent, when we're grieving, when we're desperate for answers — the temptation to seek guidance through forbidden channels is real and powerful. But the biblical record is clear: rather than providing comfort and resolution, consulting a medium led Saul deeper into despair and accelerated his destruction. The chronicler later identified this decision as one of the primary reasons for Saul's downfall: "So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith with the LORD in that he did not keep the command of the LORD, and also consulted a medium, seeking guidance. He did not seek guidance from the LORD. Therefore the LORD put him to death" (1 Chronicles 10:13-14, ESV).

Former Psychics and Mediums Testify: "Our Spirit Guides Were Demons"

Some of the most compelling testimony about the true nature of psychic and mediumistic activity comes from people who used to practice it — and who have since become Christians. Tabatt presents several of these accounts in The NDE Conspiracy, and they are chilling.

Jenn Nizza was a practicing psychic medium who believed she was genuinely communicating with the deceased. After her conversion to Christianity, however, she came to recognize that the entities she had been interacting with were not the spirits of dead people at all — they were demonic beings masquerading as departed loved ones. Nizza describes how these demonic forces provided specific, accurate information to psychics, perfectly mimicking the personality and knowledge of the deceased person in order to make the deception convincing. After turning to Christ, she reports that the demonic activity in her life diminished significantly.⁹

Marcia Montenegro, a former professional astrologer and psychic, tells a similar story. After years immersed in the occult, she came to faith in Christ and now warns others about the spiritual dangers she experienced firsthand. She emphasizes that engaging with spirit entities — no matter how benign they appear — opens the door to demonic influence that can be extremely difficult to escape.¹⁰

These testimonies align perfectly with what the Bible teaches. Paul encountered a slave girl in Philippi who had a "spirit of divination" (pneuma pythōna, πνεῦμα πύθωνα) — literally, a "Python spirit," a reference to the oracle at Delphi. This girl followed Paul and his companions around, crying out, "These men are servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to you the way of salvation" (Acts 16:17, ESV). What she said was technically true! But Paul recognized the demonic source and cast the spirit out (Acts 16:18). As Miller astutely observes, this is precisely the appeal of apparently authentic mediums — they channel someone telling you truths that the medium couldn't have known, demonstrating that their powers seem real. They might even claim to follow Jesus. But in the end, this pulls vulnerable people into a life of seeking direction from mediums rather than from God through legitimate means such as prayer, Scripture, fellowship with believers, and wise counsel.¹¹

Tabatt summarizes the danger bluntly: by willfully welcoming input from a "departed soul" or "spirit guide," you are essentially giving a demon permission to enter your life. This puts you on what Tabatt calls "the first rung of the ladder of progressive demonic activity" — the ladder that begins with infestation (a demonic presence making itself known) and can progress through oppression, obsession, and ultimately full possession. Many exorcists and deliverance ministers confirm that consulting psychics and mediums is one of the most common entry points for demonic harassment in a person's life.¹²

The Difference Between Mediumship and NDE/DBE Encounters with the Deceased

Now, someone might ask an important question at this point: "Wait — if it's wrong to communicate with the dead, what about NDEs and deathbed experiences where people encounter deceased loved ones? Isn't that the same thing?" This is a fair and important question, and it deserves a careful answer. As we explored in detail in Chapter 14, there is a critical distinction between necromancy and the passive encounters with the deceased that occur in NDEs and deathbed visions.

The biblical prohibition targets the active, deliberate, human-initiated practice of seeking contact with the dead through techniques, rituals, mediums, and spiritists. The Hebrew word 'ob (אוֹב) refers to a medium or spiritist who claims to summon or channel the dead. The condemnation is directed at the practice — the deliberate act of consulting forbidden spiritual sources.

NDE and deathbed encounters with deceased loved ones are fundamentally different. They are passive — the experiencer does not seek them out. They happen spontaneously during cardiac arrest, near-drowning, or the dying process. The person is not performing a ritual, consulting a medium, or trying to summon anyone. The encounter comes to them unsought and unsummoned. The direction of communication matters enormously: necromancy is humans trying to reach the dead through forbidden techniques; NDE and deathbed encounters involve God or the spiritual realm reaching out to the living. As I noted in Chapter 14, the Bible itself records several instances of the living encountering the dead — Moses and Elijah at the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-8), Samuel's appearance at Endor, and the rich man's conversation with Abraham in Hades (Luke 16:19-31) — without those encounters being condemned as necromancy.¹³

So the answer is no — NDE and deathbed encounters with deceased loved ones are not the same as consulting a medium. But the line can become dangerously blurred when the NDE community itself is saturated with mediums and psychics who use NDE research as a launching pad for necromantic practices. This is precisely why discernment is so critical, and precisely why I believe the enemy has flooded the NDE world with these forbidden elements — to blur the line between what God is doing and what the enemy wants to exploit.

Door Two: Past-Life and Pre-Life Memories

The second "dark doorway" in the NDE world is the phenomenon of past-life memories — and its newer cousin, pre-life memories. We examined the question of reincarnation in depth in Chapter 24, where we showed that the biblical worldview firmly and repeatedly rejects the concept of past lives. Here, I want to focus specifically on how past-life claims have infiltrated the NDE community and their connection to demonic deception.

Tabatt describes past-life memories as "one of the strange offshoots of the NDE space." These are cases — typically involving young children between the ages of two and five — where a child begins to recall detailed memories of another person's life. The University of Virginia's Division of Perceptual Studies has documented over 2,500 such cases, and some of them include verifiable details that are genuinely difficult to explain through normal means. The child describes people, places, and events from a deceased person's life with startling accuracy.¹⁴

Many researchers in this field lean heavily toward reincarnation as the explanation. But as we demonstrated in Chapter 24, reincarnation flatly contradicts the biblical teaching that "it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment" (Hebrews 9:27, ESV). Jesus told the thief on the cross, "Today you will be with me in paradise" (Luke 23:43) — not "Today you will begin your next incarnation." And if reincarnation were truly a standard afterlife destination, we would expect these past-life memories to be far more widespread than they actually are. As Tabatt notes, if reincarnation is real, these cases should be nearly as common as NDEs — which affect somewhere between five and ten percent of the general population. They are not even close to that prevalence.¹⁵

Tabatt proposes an alternative explanation that I find far more compelling — and more consistent with the biblical data. He suggests that demonic activity may be the root cause of these past-life memories. Drawing on his extensive research into demonology and exorcism, Tabatt points to a well-documented pattern in possession cases: a demon takes control of an individual and masquerades as the trapped soul of a deceased person, providing specific and accurate information about that dead person's life in order to manipulate the living. The demon is not the soul of a dead person. It is an evil spirit impersonating a dead person — using real information about that person's life to make the deception convincing.¹⁶

How might this apply to children? Tabatt connects past-life memories to the third stage of demonic activity — obsession. Father Vincent Lampert, the exorcist for the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, defines demonic obsession as "mental attacks that the devil uses to influence a person's external and internal senses. By impacting our imaginations, he can cause a person to see visions that are intended to cause fear, to entice one to commit sin, and to distract from the practice of virtue."¹⁷ Through impacting a child's imagination and senses, a demonic entity could implant vivid, detailed memories of a deceased person's life — memories that the child experiences as genuinely their own.

Tabatt also briefly addresses the newer phenomenon of "pre-life memories" — memories that allegedly come from before a person was born. His one data point is telling: a presenter at the IANDS conference disclosed that his pre-life memories began in his early thirties after he started practicing transcendental meditation, which many exorcists and deliverance ministers identify as a potential gateway for demonic influence.¹⁸

What matters most for our purposes in this chapter is not the precise mechanism — whether past-life memories are caused by demonic obsession, demonic impersonation, or some other spiritual phenomenon — but rather the fact that they have become a major attraction in the NDE world, drawing vulnerable seekers toward beliefs (reincarnation) and practices (past-life regression therapy) that are incompatible with the Christian faith. This is precisely the kind of confusion that the enemy excels at creating (for the full treatment of why reincarnation contradicts Scripture, see Chapter 24).

Door Three: Alien Encounters — The Strangest Doorway of All

If psychics and past-life memories seem like odd companions for near-death experience research, the third "dark doorway" Tabatt identifies will truly surprise you: alien abduction encounters. I'll admit — when I first encountered this connection in my research, I wasn't sure what to do with it either. Tabatt describes his own reaction in The NDE Conspiracy: "Of all the things I had encountered at that conference, this is the one that I wasn't quite sure what to do with." Yet at the IANDS conference, there were entire sessions devoted to discussing alien encounters alongside NDEs.¹⁹

How on earth — pun intended — did aliens end up at an NDE conference? To understand the connection, we need to look at the actual structure of alien abduction narratives and compare them to NDEs. When we do, the parallels are striking and unsettling.

Famous Alien Abduction Cases

Consider some of the best-known alien abduction accounts. In 1961, Betty and Barney Hill were driving through New Hampshire when they observed a bright light following their car. They later experienced a time lapse and, under hypnosis, described being taken aboard a spacecraft and examined by humanoid beings. In 1975, logger Travis Walton was reportedly struck by a beam of light from a UFO while working in an Arizona forest. He vanished for five days and reappeared claiming to have been aboard an alien spacecraft. In 1985, author Whitley Strieber described being taken from his cabin by non-human entities and subjected to various procedures — an account he published in his 1987 bestseller Communion. And in 1989, Linda Napolitano claimed she was levitated from her Manhattan apartment through a closed window into a waiting spacecraft.²⁰

These stories sound utterly different from near-death experiences on the surface. But Tabatt makes a fascinating observation: when you analyze them structurally, alien abduction narratives share a remarkable number of features with NDEs. Both are told as travel narratives — the experiencer leaves their normal environment and journeys to another realm. Both involve encounters with non-human beings. Both frequently involve receiving messages or special knowledge. Both transform the experiencer. And both produce lasting, often traumatic, aftereffects.²¹

Tabatt tested these alien encounters against his nine-point NDE framework — the set of features typically found in near-death experiences — and found that the five famous abduction cases collectively matched six of the nine categories. They included out-of-body-like experiences (floating or being transported toward light), encounters with other beings, visiting otherworldly realms, returning to their earthbound body, and lingering post-experience effects. The correlation is strong enough to suggest that whatever is causing these experiences may be operating in the same spiritual domain as certain NDEs.²²

Evaluating the Evidence: Normal, Paranormal, or Demonic?

How should we evaluate these alien encounters? Tabatt suggests we begin the same way we'd evaluate any extraordinary claim — by first considering normal explanations.²³ Could these be cases of fraud? Fantasy? Faulty memory? Certainly some of them could be. But these normal explanations don't account for all the cases, particularly those involving multiple witnesses or physical evidence of missing time.

Moving to paranormal explanations, there are three options. First, maybe aliens are real and these encounters are genuine extraterrestrial contact. Second, maybe these are actually spiritual transformative experiences (STEs) — experiences similar to NDEs but not triggered by a near-death medical crisis. Third, maybe they are demonic encounters disguised as alien abductions.

The evidence for the demonic nature of alien encounters is strengthened considerably by what happens when abductees invoke the name of Jesus. A 2024 article in the Christian Post reports on the research of Gary Bates, who has investigated this phenomenon for over twenty-five years. Bates states: "There are over 400 cases that I am aware of where these abductions have been halted by people calling on the name of Jesus Christ... the instant His name was called, it stopped."³⁹

While individual accounts of this phenomenon can be difficult to track down in published research, they do surface in various forms. Consider this account from one experiencer, who describes seeing a bright blue orb near his rural home, followed days later by an episode of sleep paralysis involving classic "gray alien" beings:

"Four beings were above me. Looked exactly like grey aliens... the black in their eyes fills your soul with a fear that is unlike anything you could dream of. I tried to move and I couldn't; it suddenly came to me to say Jesus. I called out to him, but I couldn't get the words out. Finally I said it — JESUS. I woke up in my bed drenched in sweat with a pounding headache."

The experiencer concluded: "There is power in the name of Jesus."⁴⁰ Whatever one makes of the precise nature of this experience — whether it was a fully physical event, a demonic vision, or something else — the fact that it stopped when the name of Jesus was invoked is deeply significant. This aligns perfectly with the New Testament pattern of demonic entities being subject to the authority of Christ's name. Jesus Himself told His disciples: "In my name they will cast out demons" (Mark 16:17, ESV). The apostles consistently exercised authority over demonic spirits by invoking the name of Jesus (Acts 16:18; Acts 19:13-16). If alien encounters respond to this same authority, the implication is clear: we are dealing with entities in the spiritual realm, not visitors from another galaxy.

Tabatt acknowledges that the evidence of encounters stopping at Jesus' name, while compelling, may not be fully sufficient on its own to prove the demonic nature of all alien encounters. So he offers three additional correlations that strengthen the case.²⁴

First, the experiences fit the pattern of demonic obsession — the third stage of demonic activity, where a demon impacts a person's imagination and senses, creating vivid visions, hallucinations, and experiences that feel completely real to the victim. Father Lampert's description of obsession — where a demon influences a person's "external and internal senses" to "cause a person to see visions" — maps remarkably well onto what alien abductees describe.²⁵

Second, the sexual elements in some abduction accounts — such as Antônio Vilas-Boas's 1957 claim that he was forced to have intimate relations with a female alien — correspond to well-documented demonic phenomena known historically as incubus (male) and succubus (female) attacks, where demons assault people sexually. These cases have been documented throughout centuries of Christian demonology.²⁶

Third — and this is the most speculative of Tabatt's correlations — some of his prophetically gifted friends have described encountering beings in visions that looked like the classic "gray aliens" of popular culture, but whom they identified as demonic entities. Tabatt leaves this thread open for further study, acknowledging its speculative nature, but it is consistent with the broader pattern.²⁷

Taken together, the evidence points toward a demonic explanation for alien encounters. The structural similarity to NDEs and STEs, the immediate cessation when Jesus' name is invoked, the correlation with known patterns of demonic obsession, and the sexual assault elements that match centuries-old accounts of incubus and succubus activity — all of these converge to suggest that we are dealing with spiritual entities, not extraterrestrial ones.

Ghosts: A Brief but Important Note

Before we move to the bigger picture, a brief word about ghosts is warranted, since ghost encounters are another element that has migrated into the NDE world. Tabatt addresses this in his chapter on psychics and mediums, drawing on the expertise of exorcists and deliverance ministers.

The basic principle is straightforward: in the vast majority of cases, what people identify as "ghosts" — unexplained noises, moving objects, shadowy figures, doors opening and closing — are actually manifestations of demonic infestation, the first stage of demonic activity. As Father Lampert explains, demonic infestation involves "the presence of evil in a location, object, or animal" and can include "unexplained noises, such as footsteps, voices, laughter, and doors and windows opening and closing... objects disappearing from one location and reappearing in another, pictures falling off the walls, furniture moving, seeing dark shadowy figures."²⁸

Monsignor Stephen Rossetti, an exorcist for the Archdiocese of Washington, offers a wise caution: "When encountering spirits in a place, it is safest to first assume that it is an evil spirit and to have it exorcized. Demons often try to disguise themselves as good spirits in order to develop an unholy relationship with its victims." He warns that "more than a few have believed that they were dealing with benign human souls when, in fact, they were engaged with demons."²⁹

While it may be possible — as Thomas Aquinas and some Catholic theologians have suggested — for God to permit, in rare and exceptional circumstances, a departed soul to appear to the living, the overwhelming pastoral advice from those with the most experience in spiritual warfare is clear: do not assume that any spirit you encounter is benign. Do not attempt to communicate with it. Do not develop a fascination with it. The widespread cultural fascination with ghost hunting, haunted houses, and paranormal investigation — much of it fueled by popular entertainment — is, from a biblical perspective, playing with spiritual fire.³⁰

The Common Thread: Satan's Strategy of Corruption

Now let's step back and see the bigger picture. We've examined four phenomena that have infiltrated the mainstream NDE community: psychics and mediums, past-life memories, alien encounters, and ghost phenomena. What connects them all?

Tabatt puts his finger on it with characteristic directness: "The one thing you've no doubt noticed is I see potential demonic connections in all the topics I discussed in the latter half of the book."³¹ And he's right. Every one of these phenomena — psychics, mediums, past lives, aliens, ghosts — shares a potential demonic connection. But the question is: why? Why would the enemy invest so heavily in corrupting the NDE world?

The answer, I believe, lies in the framework we developed in Chapter 25 — Satan's hijacking strategy. As we explored there, the enemy's consistent approach throughout Scripture is not to create from scratch but to corrupt what God has already created. God created sexuality; the enemy twists it into exploitation. God created worship; the enemy redirects it toward idols. God created the desire for knowledge; the enemy offers it through forbidden sources (see Genesis 3:1-6). It is always a corruption of the good — a counterfeit that looks similar enough to deceive but leads in the opposite direction.

If God is using near-death experiences and deathbed visions to reveal Himself — His reality, His love, the reality of the afterlife, the truth of the soul's survival, the centrality of Jesus — then we should expect the enemy to attempt to corrupt that channel. And the strategy is devastatingly effective because it operates on multiple levels simultaneously.

This is exactly the strategy Paul warns about in Ephesians 6:12: "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" (ESV). The NDE world, like every area of human experience, is a battleground. And the forces of darkness are actively working to corrupt what God is doing in that space.

Miller's Warning: Subtle Deception Through Forbidden Sources

Miller provides an important additional layer of analysis in Is Christianity Compatible with Deathbed and Near-Death Experiences? He notes that the danger is not just that mediums are frauds — some of them may actually access genuine information. The slave girl in Acts 16 really did have a spirit of divination. She really did provide accurate information. That was what made her so dangerous. If mediums were always wrong, no one would consult them. The fact that some mediums occasionally produce astonishingly accurate information — information they could not have obtained through normal means — does not prove they are channeling the benign spirits of the deceased. It may prove the exact opposite: that demonic entities, who have observed human lives for millennia, are feeding information through human mediums in order to build trust and draw people deeper into spiritual bondage.³²

Miller also makes a crucial observation about the practical effect of mediumship on the spiritual life. Mark Anthony's RAFT technique — Recognize spirits, Accept their reality, Feel first/think later, Trust in their guidance — is essentially a formula for developing a daily walk of trusting spirits rather than God to direct your life. If you need wisdom, commune with the spirits. Subtly, this practice shifts the focus of your wisdom-seeking away from God. But Scripture says the exact opposite: "If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him" (James 1:5, ESV). God invites us to commune with Him — not with spirits. If He chooses not to immediately give us answers to certain questions, we can trust that it's best for us not to know those things right now.³³

I want to press this point a bit further because it gets to the heart of why mediumship is so spiritually corrosive — even when it "works." The fundamental issue is not whether a medium can access accurate information (some apparently can). The fundamental issue is about the direction of our spiritual dependence. God designed us to depend on Him — to bring our questions, our grief, our confusion, and our longing to Him in prayer. This is not because God is controlling or insecure. It's because He knows that our deepest needs can only be met in relationship with Him. When we turn to mediums instead, we are not merely breaking a rule. We are redirecting the deepest longings of our soul away from the only Source that can truly satisfy them. We're drinking from a poisoned well when the Fountain of Living Water is freely available.

Miller is particularly concerned about the growing cultural normalization of mediumship. He notes that paganism, Wicca, magic, and consulting mediums are rapidly gaining popularity, reinforced by popular television shows, documentaries, and movies. The NDE world has become one of the primary pipelines through which mainstream culture encounters and normalizes these practices. A person who begins by watching a fascinating documentary about near-death experiences may end up, within a few clicks or conference sessions, consulting a medium or attending a séance — and may not even realize they've crossed a spiritual line that God drew for their protection.³⁴

The Sabom Contrast: What Genuine NDE Aftereffects Look Like

It is helpful at this point to contrast the spiritual fruit of the dark fringes with the spiritual fruit of legitimate NDE experiences. As we examined in Chapters 12 and 13, Dr. Michael Sabom's Atlanta Study — one of the most carefully controlled studies of NDE aftereffects ever conducted — found that cardiac arrest patients who had NDEs consistently moved toward deeper Christian faith, increased prayer, more conservative theology, enhanced love and compassion, and decreased fear of death. These are the fruits of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23) — love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. This is good fruit by Jesus' own test: "You will recognize them by their fruits" (Matthew 7:16, ESV).³⁵

Now compare that with the typical fruit of involvement with psychics, mediums, and the paranormal fringe. Tabatt and numerous exorcists document a consistent pattern: increased spiritual confusion, dependency on mediums for guidance (rather than on God), vulnerability to demonic influence, progressive spiritual bondage, anxiety, and — in the most extreme cases — oppression or even possession. These are not the fruits of the Spirit. They are the marks of demonic influence.³⁶

Dr. Richard Gallagher, a board-certified psychiatrist who trained at Yale and Columbia and who has served as a scientific consultant to exorcists for over twenty-five years, provides important corroborating testimony on this point. In Demonic Foes, Gallagher documents that the most frequent reason people end up oppressed or even possessed by demons is that they have turned to "sinful or occult practices." He notes that "the primary motive of the typical individual who may become possessed has been to turn to evil because they want something in return" — whether power, knowledge, or contact with the spiritual realm through forbidden means. Gallagher's clinical experience, spanning hundreds of cases, confirms what the Bible has always taught: involvement with the occult opens doors to demonic influence that can be extraordinarily difficult to close.⁴²

This contrast is itself a powerful form of discernment. When we ask, "Where does this lead?" the answer tells us a great deal about the source. Genuine encounters with the living God produce love, faith, holiness, and peace. Engagement with forbidden spiritual forces produces confusion, bondage, fear, and spiritual darkness. The fruit reveals the root. Jesus Himself gave us this principle as our primary tool for spiritual evaluation: "Every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit" (Matthew 7:17-18, ESV). When we apply this test to the dark fringes of the NDE world — psychics, mediums, past-life regression, alien contact — the bad fruit is unmistakable.

Addressing Potential Objections

Before we conclude, I want to address several objections that readers might raise.

"Aren't You Being Too Harsh? What About People Who Are Just Grieving?"

This is a fair and important concern. I want to be absolutely clear: my criticism is directed at the practices and the spiritual forces behind them — not at the grieving people who are drawn to them. I have deep compassion for anyone who has lost a loved one and is desperate for comfort and connection. That grief is one of the most powerful human experiences, and it makes people incredibly vulnerable. This is precisely why psychics and mediums targeting grieving families is so insidious — they are exploiting the most tender and vulnerable moment in a person's life. My heart goes out to anyone caught in this trap. The answer is not condemnation but compassion — and then clear, gentle, truthful guidance toward the genuine source of comfort: God Himself, His Word, His Spirit, and His people.

"But Some Mediums Give Accurate Information — Doesn't That Prove They're Genuine?"

This is perhaps the most common objection, and we've already addressed it, but it bears repeating. Accuracy does not prove benevolence. The slave girl in Acts 16 gave accurate information — through a demonic spirit. If anything, accurate information from a medium should increase our concern, not decrease it, because it demonstrates the involvement of supernatural entities who have access to knowledge beyond normal human ability. The question is never whether the information is accurate. The question is: what is the source? And the Bible is clear that the source is not benign.

Miller also offers a helpful observation drawn from the research literature on mediumship. Even the most impressive mediums — such as Leonora Piper, one of the most studied mediums in history — produced a mix of accurate and inaccurate information. They sometimes displayed knowledge they couldn't have obtained naturally, but they also frequently got things wrong or couldn't answer questions that the purported deceased person should have known. This mixed record is exactly what we'd expect if the information source were demonic entities with extensive but imperfect knowledge of human affairs — not the actual spirits of the deceased.³⁷

"Isn't the Alien Explanation a Stretch? Maybe These Are Just Hallucinations."

Some alien abduction cases may indeed involve hallucination, sleep paralysis, or other psychological phenomena. I'm not arguing that every single alien encounter is demonic. But the hallucination hypothesis doesn't explain everything — particularly the cases involving multiple witnesses, the remarkable structural parallels with NDEs and STEs, and above all the consistent finding that calling on the name of Jesus stops the experience. Hallucinations don't respond to spiritual authority. Demonic entities do.

"Aren't You Just Seeing Demons Everywhere?"

This is a legitimate concern, and it's important to maintain balance. Not every unusual experience is demonic. Not every strange phenomenon has a supernatural explanation. I am not arguing that Christians should live in fear of demons around every corner. The Bible makes clear that "he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:4, ESV). Christians who are walking with Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, and living in obedience to God's Word have nothing to fear from the enemy. We are on the winning side. Christ has already defeated the powers of darkness through His death and resurrection (Colossians 2:15).

What I am arguing is that the Bible clearly teaches the reality of demonic beings, clearly forbids certain practices that open the door to their influence, and clearly warns us to "test the spirits to see whether they are from God" (1 John 4:1, ESV). When we see phenomena that match the biblical description of demonic activity, that are associated with practices the Bible explicitly condemns, and that respond to the authority of Jesus' name — it is not paranoid to identify them as demonic. It is biblical discernment. The posture I'm advocating is not fear but awareness. Not paranoia but vigilance. Not obsession with the demonic but sober-minded recognition that we live in a world where spiritual warfare is real and our adversary is actively at work.

As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 2:11, we are not to be "outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs" (ESV). The enemy has designs. He has strategies. He is intelligent and purposeful. And one of his most effective strategies is to cause Christians either to see demons everywhere (which produces fear and paralysis) or to see them nowhere (which produces naivety and vulnerability). The biblical posture is neither paranoia nor naivety — it is sober, informed, Spirit-empowered discernment. As Peter instructs us: "Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith" (1 Peter 5:8-9, ESV). Sober-minded. Watchful. Resistant. Firm. That is the Christian posture toward the dark fringes of the NDE world.

Practical Guidance for Christians Navigating the NDE World

So what should Christians do with all of this? Let me offer several practical principles.

First, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. The fact that the NDE world has been infiltrated by psychics, mediums, and other forbidden elements does not mean that all NDE research is corrupt. As we've seen throughout this book, there is extraordinarily powerful evidence from carefully controlled medical studies — evidence that points unmistakably toward the reality of God, the soul, and the afterlife. The presence of weeds in a garden does not mean there are no flowers. It means you need discernment to tell the difference.

Second, stay far away from psychics, mediums, and spiritists. The biblical prohibition is absolute and allows no exceptions — not for grief, not for curiosity, not for "research purposes," and not for entertainment. Don't consult them. Don't watch their shows for fun. Don't attend their sessions at NDE conferences. Don't read their books uncritically. The risks are real and the biblical warnings are severe.

Third, be alert to the enemy's corruption strategy. When you encounter NDE-related content — books, documentaries, podcasts, conferences — be aware that legitimate research is often mixed with illegitimate spiritual practices. The enemy's strategy is to blur the line between the two, making it difficult to distinguish genuine divine activity from demonic counterfeits. Use the discernment framework we'll develop fully in Chapter 29 to evaluate everything you encounter.

Fourth, test everything by Scripture. "All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness" (2 Timothy 3:16, ESV). Scripture is our ultimate standard. Any NDE element, teaching, or practice that contradicts Scripture — no matter how compelling or emotionally appealing it may be — must be rejected. This applies to reincarnation, mediumship, spirit guides, and every other element of the dark fringe.

Fifth, seek comfort in God, not in forbidden sources. If you are grieving, turn to God. Immerse yourself in His Word. Lean on His promises. "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted" (Matthew 5:4, ESV). Seek the support of your church family, your pastor, and trusted Christian friends. Let the Holy Spirit — the true paraklētos, the true Comforter — do His work in your heart. The comfort He gives is real, lasting, and safe. The "comfort" offered by mediums is counterfeit, temporary, and spiritually dangerous.

Sixth, distinguish legitimate NDE research from the paranormal fringe. The strongest NDE evidence comes from prospective hospital studies by qualified medical researchers — cardiologists like Sabom, oncologists like Long, and controlled research teams in hospital settings. Their work stands on its own merits, entirely independent of the psychic and mediumistic elements that have attached themselves to the NDE community. When evaluating NDE claims, always ask: does this come from legitimate medical or academic research, or from the paranormal fringe? As we'll develop in Chapter 29, the source quality of an NDE report is one of the most important factors in evaluating it.

Seventh, pray for those caught in spiritual deception. Rather than condemning people who have been drawn into psychic practices, the occult, or other forbidden territory, pray for them. Many of them are victims — grieving people who were exploited in their most vulnerable moments. Pray that God would open their eyes, break the bonds of spiritual deception, and lead them into the freedom and truth of Christ. Remember the testimony of former psychics like Jenn Nizza and Marcia Montenegro — God's grace is powerful enough to deliver anyone from spiritual bondage, no matter how deeply entangled they have become.

Eighth, if you have been involved in any of these practices, repent and seek help. If you have consulted psychics or mediums, practiced divination, engaged in past-life regression, or pursued any other form of forbidden spiritual practice, the path forward is repentance and faith. Confess your involvement to God. Renounce the practices. Break any ongoing connections. Ask for the cleansing and protection of Christ. If you are experiencing ongoing spiritual harassment or oppression as a result of past involvement, seek the counsel of a mature pastor or trusted Christian leader experienced in spiritual warfare. As Tabatt notes, prayer is powerful — but sometimes we need the help of the body of Christ to break free from spiritual bondage that we opened the door to through forbidden practices.⁴¹ There is no shame in asking for help. The shame would be in remaining in bondage when freedom is available.

Conclusion

The dark fringes of the NDE world — psychics, mediums, past-life regression, alien encounters, ghost phenomena — are not random additions to an otherwise wholesome field of study. They are, I believe, part of a deliberate spiritual strategy to corrupt what God is doing through near-death experiences and deathbed visions. The enemy cannot stop God from revealing Himself. But he can muddy the waters. He can surround the genuine with the counterfeit. He can exploit the vulnerability of grieving people. He can blur the line between legitimate spiritual experience and forbidden spiritual practices. And that is exactly what he has done.

But here is the good news. The enemy's strategy, though real and dangerous, is ultimately futile. "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" (John 1:5, ESV). God's truth cannot be permanently suppressed, corrupted, or counterfeited out of existence. The evidence from near-death experiences — the veridical perceptions, the consistent reports of encountering Jesus, the transformed lives, the good fruit that endures — shines through the darkness of the fringe elements. Christians who approach this evidence with biblical discernment can separate the wheat from the chaff, the genuine from the counterfeit, and the divine from the demonic.

And let us never forget: the very fact that the enemy has invested so heavily in corrupting the NDE world is itself a backhanded compliment to the power of the genuine evidence. If NDEs were meaningless hallucinations — if they posed no threat to the kingdom of darkness — the enemy would have no reason to bother with them. You don't counterfeit something that has no value. The intensity of the enemy's corruption effort is itself evidence that there is something real and powerful happening in near-death experiences — something that threatens the dominion of darkness. The enemy's counterfeiting campaign, paradoxically, confirms the value of the genuine article.

In our next chapter, we will bring together all of the discernment principles we've developed throughout Part V into a single, practical, biblical framework for evaluating any NDE or deathbed experience. That framework will equip you to navigate the NDE world with confidence — neither gullible nor dismissive, but discerning, wise, and anchored in the unchanging Word of God.