Halloween is a time when we might think about things that are a little creepy. I don’t know about you, but I’ve always thought of UFOs as being in that category. As I write this article, the world is affected by the barbaric attacks on Israel and Israel’s retaliation. We do not know how far-reaching the effects will be on the entire world. We have enough horrific things in our real world without adding mysterious things of uncertain existence.

Estimated Reading Time – 12 minutes (not including links)

What Do You Think?

Do you think there might be outer space travelers in those alleged outer space vehicles, like the “little green men” in the 1957 movie called Invasion of the Saucer Men? Or might there be bluish, wide-eyed, clay-like aliens, as in the dynamic 1977 Steven Spielberg movie called Close Encounters of the Third Kind? Or how about some like the more lovable short-legged, brown creature with a turtle-like head and eyes, who was nick-named “E.T.” (for extra terrestrial), in the movie by the same name released in 1982?

I must say that one version of space aliens I found really disgusting was the one wherein some reptilian-looking creatures growing in the bodies of a human space crew burst out of the humans’ chests. This was the subject of the sci-fi horror movie Alien, released in 1979. I’m not certain if I saw a snatch of that one or just some other movies inspired by it. I saw pieces of several movies that seemed similar, when reruns came on TV. They were too predictable, not to mention gross, for my liking. According to a website called collider.com, there are currently ten movies that borrowed ideas from the Alien movie.

A Hot Topic

The question of whether UFOs are real has become a hot topic of late. Though we have long used the term “UFOs” (meaning “Unidentified Flying Objects”), the official government term is now “UAPs.” One article defined them as “Unidentified Aerial Phenomena.” Another article stated that the term is evolving into “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena” because it can also cover unidentified objects that disappear into the water. For purposes of this article I will sometime use the long-established term UFOs, as well as the new term UAPs.

Interest in the subject of UAPs recently prompted Congress, on July 26^th of this year, to hold a hearing on the subject. Three military veterans testified. A former Navy pilot, Ryan Grave, testified that both military and commercial pilots have spotted UAPs and that there needs to be a better reporting system. A former Navy commander, David Fravor, testified that he and three other pilots saw a white object shaped like a Tic-Tac in 2004. He said it began to approach his fighter jet, then disappeared and reappeared 60 miles away a few seconds later. The biggest “eye-brow raiser” at the Congressional hearing was when a former U.S, intelligence official named David Grusch claimed that he had spoken to individuals who had recovered “non-human biologics” from crashed UAPs. However, his testimony amounted to hearsay. There was no documentation.

If you wish to see the hearing for yourself, you may click on the video below:

I decided to read a scientist’s views on this congressional hearing, despite the fact that his article appeared on a website claiming that religion is just a figment of our imaginations. I wonder how many of the writers of the articles on religion had read the Bible, a book written by 40 authors over hundreds of year that all fits together to give the one true and living God’s plan to redeem mankind.

The scientist writes that we need to use better science on this subject of UAPs. He is very skeptical of the testimonies in the hearing—not their sincerity but their validity. He states that 94% of the UAP cases had “earthly causes.” I found it amusing that he said that we are expected to believe that these super-advanced space vehicles managed to come all the way to earth, but crashed when they reached New Mexico. He said it’s as if “the aliens are sending us the equivalent of a 1987 Dodge Omni” (noted to be classified among the “Worst Cars of the 1980s”). You may wish to read his entire article.  

On September 12^th of this year, the Mexican Congress held their own hearing on UFOs. During the hearing the political leaders were shown two small “bodies” in cases, by a journalist by the name of Jaime Maussan. He claimed they were the bodies of extraterrestrials. Each hand had three fingers, and the heads were elongated. Past discoveries similar to those have been discovered to be mummified children. This information about the Mexican hearing was reported in a Reuters article. An article on thehill.com website called “Mexican Congress shown ‘non-human’ corpses in UFO hearing” states that “bodies” displayed in the Mexican hearing looked similar to the alien in the E.T. movie. Hmmm.

Many Contributions to the Debate

I read a 2005 article called “Abducted: the Myth of Alien Kidnapping” on the npr.org website.

It recounted an interview with a Harvard psychologist named Susan Clancy, who has written a book entitled Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped by Aliens. 

In the interview Clancy stated that her research indicated that all who had dreams where they remembered being abducted by aliens did not have those dreams until they had watched a movie about an alien abduction. Even someone who was elderly and said it happened when they were very young did not “remember” it until hypnotized after the abduction movies came out. Wikipedia currently lists 66 movies wherein a portion of the story involves an alien abduction.

On the other hand, I read an article called “Kidnapped by UFO?” on the pbs.org website.  It related an interview with another Harvard psychologist named John Mack. In 1994 he wrote a bestseller called Abduction: Human Encounters with Aliens. Mack came to believe that the many interviews he conducted indicated that these abduction experiences seem to have both a literal and spiritual basis. He stated that a number of “abductees” say they experience the removal of their sperm or eggs in a spacecraft, for a sort of hybrid offspring they were brought back to see later. The “abductees” were sometimes told that this hybrid species “will populate the earth or will be there to carry evolution forward” once the human race has destroyed the earth by abusing their environment. The interviewees sometimes displayed scars as evidence. A subsequent pbs.org article called “Kidnapped by UFOS/ Where’s the Physical Evidence” states that attempts to get interviewees to get medical verification was unsuccessful.

Yet another article in the pbs.org series is entitled “Kidnapped by UFOs/ Budd Hopkins’ Cases.”

The article speaks of  Budd Hopkins’ interviewees– people claiming to have floated through windows, to have seen little figures from a spacecraft digging soil samples, to have experienced aliens entering their house, etc. I wondered if Budd Hopkins had written any books on this subject. Sure enough, I discovered four books about aliens written by this man. It does make one wonder whether lucrative sales of books has any effect on whether the writer claims these events are real. It’s difficult to know.

Focusing on Possible Spiritual Significance

A video called “Aliens and Demons: Evidence of an Unseen Realm” by Michael Heiser delves into the subject of alien abduction stories. Some of the conjectures in the video, though interesting, don’t have evidence clearly accepted by all. However, he mentions an MIT Conference he attended in 1992, where participants observed that many of the “abductees” are given messaging that attacks the truths of Christianity—but no other religions. This indicates that there is Satanic deception going on here. For instance, sometimes encounters involve “extraterrestrials” telling people that Jesus is “one of them.” Heiser informs listeners that many who have these abduction experiences and are led to Christ, or ask the “abducters” to leave them alone in the name of Jesus Christ, no longer have the experiences.

So are these encounters with so called “alien space craft” and “alien beings” actually a means of spiritual deception being used by Satanic evil forces? This is not really a new theory. In a 31-page book first published in 1972, called The Riddle of the Flying Saucers, Bible scholar and evangelist Gordon Lindsay addresses this subject. After carefully considering many accounts of UFOs and their passengers’ interactions with humans, he concluded that their purpose seems to be spiritual deception. Some of the reported messages from “aliens” were supposedly to warn the human race of atomic destruction. He believed that the verse in Luke 21:11 referring to the “fearful sights and great signs” predicted by Jesus applies to these appearances.

Early on, the “abducters” reportedly warned of people destroying the earth by atomic weapons. More recently they have been warning of the earth being destroyed by abuse of the environment. They seem to be using fear and the false idea that man will determine when the earth, as we know it, will be destroyed. The Bible indicates that man will not bring about the destruction of the earth. God will destroy the earth and create a new Heaven and Earth at the end of the Tribulation and the Millenium (the thousand years’ reign of Christ). II Peter 3:10 says, “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed with fire, and the earth and everything it it will be laid bare.” Revelation 21:1 says,  “Then I saw ‘a new heaven and a new earth,’ for the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.”

Assurance of the Future

But how do I know that what the Bible predicts about the Tribulation and the end of the world, as we know it, is true? That’s an easy answer. There were many, many prophecies in the Bible about the life of Jesus that Jesus did fulfill.  According to an article called “The Mathematical Probability that Jesus is the Christ” on the empower.global website, a Westmont College professor used 600students to conservatively estimate the mathematical probability that just eight of the prophecies about Jesus could all be fulfilled. Here is what the professor came up with to illustrate the probability at which the students arrived: Suppose the state of Texas is filled with silver dollars two feet deep. One of the silver dollars is specially marked and stirred in with all the rest over the whole state. A man is blindfolded and told he can go anywhere in Texas, but he must pick up that one silver dollar that has been specially marked.

After Jesus’ resurrection, He walked along the road to Emmaus with two disciples (not of the twelve disciples), who didn’t recognize Him. Luke 24:27 says, “And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets [the books in the Bible written by Moses and the prophets], he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.” Seeing the amazing number of Bible references fulfilled in the person of Jesus, it isn’t difficult to believe that the world will end exactly the way God planned and prophesied that it would. I Timothy 4:1 tells us, “The Spirit clearly says that in later time some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons.” We should not fear predictions make by deceiving spirits in “UFOs.”

The times leading up to the end of the world will be difficult, even for those who believe in Christ and have entrusted their lives to Him, II Timothy 3:1-4 warns us: “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God–”   Yet, for believers there is assurance of great things just around the corner. We read these words in I Thessalonians 4:16-18: “For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”

Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.TM Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.

Below is a song by sung by Stephen McWhirter that Christians looking forward with great anticipation to the trumpet call of God can identify with:

Youtube – Come Jesus Come – We’ve Been Waiting So Long –

Uploaded by Stephen McWhirter  [3:48]