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This is a conversational podcast that brings powerful moments from the Inspirational Media sermon library into fresh, engaging dialogue. Hosted by voices who care deeply about sharing timeless biblical truth, each episode unpacks key ideas from sermons, devotionals, and real-life stories — helping listeners reflect, relate, and rediscover hope in today’s world.
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00:00:00 Speaker: I begin. Before I begin today's message, I want to show you many of the figures that are used to play the game Dungeons and Dragons, because I'll be making reference to the figures. And these figures, believe it or not, these are only about ninety five cents a piece. They're they're small. They come in box fulls of figures, but when you get into the larger figures, you can pay up to ninety five dollars for a figure and you can get them all hand-painted, you can get them in various materials, and you can even paint them yourself. But this is a little, well, a little demon like character. As we go through these, let's go through all twelve of them. And I'll just say that there are many names for the different figures. This looks like a little spider here, but we have Skeleton Commander, skeleton flag bearer, we have the Mind Flayer. Uh, we have the necromancer, the cockatrice, the shrieker. We have the ghoul. The vampire. Medusa. Gargoyle. Goblin with axe. Goblin with sword. We have type three demon. Werewolf. We're rat. We have Yeti Windex. Extra mental. And we have all kinds of different characters. Let's go quickly now to the last grouping. Now this is a grouping. Shows what comes in a box full of figures. This is all the figures that come into a box. And during the course of the game, you will be given your figure and what you are in the game. And tonight we're going to be talking about Dungeons and Dragons, and you will if you ever play the game, God forbid you will become one of these characters. And that's what we have to address tonight. Now let's go to the first slide, and I'm going to take you right now into Dungeons and Dragons. This is a dragon labyrinth that we're in right now. It's like a tunnel underneath the dark, cavernous areas of the earth, and our company has entered into the dark, cavernous, labyrinthine corridor. Weapons drawn, frightened at facing the imminent danger they know will be awaiting them. With each approaching step towards the fiery monster's lair. Should I go first? Questions are five foot companion, his elfish features contorting with anticipation and agitation. No, whispers the Druid. Perhaps I can charm this giant reptilian creature with a potion that will not allow him to achieve consciousness. And this that I've been reading just now is not a fairy tale, but it's a bizarre role playing game called Dungeons and Dragons. This is a fantasy role playing game. Now we are going to have to get into letters like FRP. That means a fantasy role playing game. F PG. It involves a group of players who are given fantasy roles such as monsters, gods, dwarves, magicians, and so forth. In other words, all those players you just saw at the beginning represent a different creature that you're going to identify with, and you're going to take on that role and become that part. Each player assumes a created personality and enters the game to do combat, to win treasures, and to kill his opponents as brutally as he can. Each game needs a Dungeon Master to oversee all the players, and we're going to get into the Dungeon Masters in a moment because they direct the game, he has to be the overseer of the game. The Dungeon Master actually plays the role of the Supreme God in the world he creates for the players. His tools are maps, dice, miniature figures, and his rule books from which he rules the game. A game can last a couple of days, a couple of months, or for several years. Some games go on and on, and usually the players will play for hours at a time. They've noticed in the young people, especially the children, and even college students are getting caught up in this. It's a a craze on the school campuses. It's even taught in some of the schools right now by professors who stay after school to be the Dungeon Masters and to lead the children through the game. But it's becoming so popular with kids and such an obsession with them that they found that many of the young people that play the game actually forsake television. They forsake their their friends and the playing out in the the yard. They don't want to do anything but play their fantasy role game, Dungeons and Masters, or maybe some of the other games that are like it. Now let's go to slide number one. The game actually engulfs the person. You become part of it, and the Dungeon Master takes you through. And because the game can go on for months or even years, there is immediately. Now here's the danger you're going to see all through the game. There's the danger of the players identifying so closely with their characters that they are finally playing out a fantasy role where they actually believe that they are the character they identify so closely with that character. They believe that in this fantasy role, a piece of them is that character. Each player can stay in the game as long as his character is not killed. So you you can play the game for years until your player is killed. If the game continues for a long time, most players identify themselves with the character they are playing with, and the game has now become a real event in which the player begins to have a hard time separating reality from fantasy. And this is the danger. I want to state the danger right from the beginning, that many of the players have a hard time separating reality from fantasy, and this game becomes the reality in their life and the world around us. The real world becomes the fantasy to them. Now, I read a tract put out by Christian Life Ministries from Sacramento, and they said often the players become addicted and identified so closely to the role they play that when a player's character is killed, the emotional strain is so great that the player goes into a rage of uncontrolled anger. He is in reality experiencing a part of himself dying. When a person gets addicted to the game, lethargy occurs in real life. Reality is sacrificed for imagination. Personal hygiene suffers. In other words, people that play this game play it for so many hours that they they forget to take care of themselves. They don't want to eat, they don't wash their bodies anymore. And it says that personal hygiene suffers and people just don't care. Let me give you an example. In a family where they were heavily into playing D and D, which is the hep term for Dungeons and Dragons. The house smelled of cat urine. It was a chaos of cardboard boxes, strewn clothes, and unmade beds. A small child slept completely clothed on the bare carpet, while several D&D fans, with their now familiar slumped posture and soft pear shape of the physically unfit, worked on plans from their fat briefcases. Their lives become engulfed in this game, and they have briefcases and suitcases full of game plans and graphs and charts. There are no playing boards in Dungeons and Dragons. They actually play in their minds, and they play it out on graph paper, figuring out what their next move will be, how much power they have. Let me give you another example of a person becoming obsessed with the game. John, a sixteen year old student at a private school in Southern California, became obsessed with dad. In an interview, he stated, I am Dungeon Master ninety eight percent of the time. I am the God of my world, the creator who manipulates the gods and the humans. But my bossiness has extended itself into real life. I've exploited people and abused people, and people have hated me for it. He continues and says this it's hazardous. Your vocabulary and mental quickness increases, but school seems increasingly boring and droll. Your grades drop. The more time you spend on your fantasy world, the more you want to walk away from the burdensome decisions in life. And really, what he's saying here is you drop out of life, your work, your school, your relationships, they all become boring. All you want to do is get back to your fantasy world of Dungeons and Dragons. Doctor John Eric Holmes, who is the editor of the basic D&D rules. He actually edited the rulebook for Dungeons and Dragons, he said in an interview in Psychology Today, November nineteen eighty. For a few hours, the world of magic and mystery explored by a group of friends is a reality, a sort of giant shared insanity. You and the other players enter into an insanity where fantasy becomes reality. Now let's take an imaginary trip with the players. I want to actually take you into a game, and I want you to imagine yourself playing the game. And we're going to go in a moment down into a dungeon labyrinth. And here's what a game in progress actually sounds like. Let's go to slide number two here. Player one let's say is The Hobbit. And I'm just going to put a blank slide with a little flame up here on the board so that the rest of you can just imagine this game going on, and you'll see how real it becomes as I take you into the game. Player one A little hobbit says, let's split Player for the druid says no way. There's treasure in there for sure. Player one says, what good's treasure if we're dead? The Dungeon Master says the creature is awakening. He senses your presence in the corridor. Player three the cleric says, I contact my familiar eye contact my familiar. Stationed at the outside entrance is the flying dragon in sight. Dungeon master says as he rolls one of the many odd shaped dice in front of him to check out the odds of the dragon being there. He sees nothing. Player one I'm turning invisible. I'm going to make myself invisible. Player four you chicken! Dungeon master says he the monster. He's nearing the entrance in the hall. Player two the elf I draw my magic bow with the black arrow. Player one says I'm running down the hall about fifty yards now. Player three rummaging frantically through a pile of books on the table, I found it, I found it! I threw a sleeping spell towards the creature. Dungeon master chimes in. No good. He wasn't into the hall yet. Your spell went harmlessly by, but the reptile sensed the magic passing and stepping back is roaring in rage. All players. Oh! Groan! Player three and it was my last spell. For this day I can't throw any more spells, dungeon master. He rushes into the halls, fumes and fire spewing from his nostrils the reptilian monsters about to strike. Player three or player two? I unleash my arrow. Dungeon master rolling a dice again. You see, he rolls the dice. The Dungeon Master rolls the dice to see how potent the spell or the arrow or whatever the power that is unleashed is. If it's only a two on the dice, you don't have much power and it may not push the the monster back. But anyway, he throws the dice. Uh, checking the odds of contact on a sliding scale in front of him, and the Dungeon Master says you hit him. Rolling again. He says it went in through the left eye. He's in a blinding fury. Now you have four seconds before he's upon you. Player three says if I grab the other's hands and teleport, will they go with me? Dungeon master, dungeon master says you'll have to try to know. Player three. Quick, give me your hands. I teleport outside the caverns. Dungeon master rolling dice. It worked. You're all outside except the Hobbit, who you couldn't possibly have touched fifty yards away. Player one I'm running. I'm running as fast as I can. Guys. Help me. In other words, the Hobbit is still inside and he's calling to the others and he's saying, listen, guys, I'm in here with this monster. I'm running as fast as I can. Guys. Help me. Player four. Serves you right. You weren't going to help us, dungeon master. The creature checks himself in mid-flight in confusion as he passes the spot where you stood, but he smells and hears the Hobbit farther ahead and charges on player one. Help me guys! Player for Fat Chance player three. I teleport back to the Hobbit Dungeon Master rolling dice. You're there. Player three I grab him and teleport back to the entrance. Dungeon master rolling dice again. No good. There's enough power left for only one of you. Leave him or you both stay. You have four seconds. Player one the Hobbit. Don't leave me. I have no powers left. Player three hesitantly. What's the use of us both dying? I'm going, dungeon master, you're gone. You have two seconds left. Player one helplessly, I turn and throw my dagger. Dungeon master rolling dice. Totally useless. It's like throwing a pin at an elephant. He doesn't even bother to eat you because you're a burnt little crisp from the fire. As he rushes on towards you and towards the entrance. Player one oh I'm dead! I can't believe it! And that was the end of The Hobbit. Let's go to picture three. Now I'm going to take you into a dungeon module here. And as you can see, and from the little rhetoric I've just taken you through D&D, Dungeons and Dragons games are fought in the minds of the players as the Dungeon Master or the God sets the stage in a fantasy world. He takes all the players through a fantasy world. He knows what they're going to encounter. He knows by the throw of the dice how much power they're going to have, and he knows where the game is leading to. The players are totally in a fantasy world, not knowing what's going to come next. Second Corinthians ten five tells us, though, that we should not live in a fantasy world. I just want to tell you what God says right from the beginning. It tells us to be casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Jesus Christ. God says, bring every thought, every imagination into obedience to Jesus Christ. And when you're cutting heads off and you're shooting fire and throwing darts and some of the things we're going to say in a few moments, I do not think your thoughts are in captivity to Jesus. Let's see if Dungeons and Dragons and other role playing games are actually anti-Christ or ungodly. In an article in New West Magazine, volume five, August twenty fifth, nineteen eighty, Maria Johnson writes the group young and bright, the wit is sharp, excitement high. The mood is one of eager, Pepsi swilling innocence. Here. The dark side doesn't show, but it is there, stalking the new games like a specter, casting a shadow of sinister implications over our apparently harmless fun. Implications are there of sadism and the occult, of the satanic, of schizophrenic withdrawal from reality. The game is full of schizophrenic, schizophrenic withdrawal from reality. Now, I'd like to make a note here that Maria moria Johnson not only plays the game herself, but also allows her teenage son to play it quite frequently. And even though she's telling some of the more bizarre and negative aspects of the game, actually admitting that it's got implications of sadism and the occult and of the Satanic and a withdrawal from reality, she actually plays the game herself. She thinks it's harmless to play with the devil's tools. Tom Payne, on the other hand, in a book called Fantasy Role Fantasy Death, says this it is the withdrawal from reality which will blind the eyes of humanity left on the tribulation earth. It is the constant bloodshed and debauchery while in this altered state that will harden the hearts of man against repentance to God. What he's saying here is that these games are desensitizing people to violence and evil. The more they play the games and the more bizarre, debauched things they do in the game as they play the role, the less likely they're going to be to have their conscience pricked by the Holy Spirit to know good from evil. And they're certainly not going to be upset when heinous things begin to come upon the earth. Paine says, I have been scoffed at more than once for implying that a game could have a role of deciding the future of mankind. However, the subtitle of a New West article called Our Brightest Kids love this game. What does it say about our future holds greater significance than the writer of the article may realize? The kids today, even the astute, bright kids, the intellectuals, are getting so caught up in this game that the leaders of tomorrow are totally into a fantasy world. They're checking out of the real world now. First, the players acquire their imaginary characters. Now, as they get these characters, they then acquire strengths and weaknesses by rolling three six sided dice. Now isn't that interesting that there are three six sided dice? Six, six, six? Now, I think it's interesting that revelations thirteen eighteen, which is the number of Antichrist, says, here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is six hundred threescore and six or six, six six. In other words, the Antichrist power of the end times of this earth is going to come in six, six, six numerals. Now when the characters are created, the dice then will govern what they will be. In the D&D manuals, each character will have six basic abilities. Every character has these abilities strength, intelligence, wisdom, constitution, dexterity, and charisma. The manual guidelines will determine if the characters will be good or evil. Now from these they choose a role. They actually will become a druid or a cleric, a fighter, a magic user, a thief, for example. Now you see, the role of the dice will depend on how strong their abilities are and if they're heavy in strength, for instance, but low in intellect, they'd probably choose to be a fighter or a thief who has to have a lot of dexterity. He would be a thief if he had strong dexterity and low mentality or something like that. Or a magic user would be one that has great smarts. So you see your particular abilities strength, intelligence, wisdom, constitution, dexterity and charisma. Whatever you have, the strength of that will determine what your character will be. And in order to survive, survive the events in the game. Each character is also equipped with special weapons such as magical weapons, potions, spells, and magical trinkets for instance like holy water, garlic, wolfsbane, etc. now, the object of the game is to maneuver each character through an ongoing maze of dungeons or tunnels filled with monsters, magic, ambushes, and the adventures in search of treasures. Daggers, hand axes, mace, swords, and battle axes are some of the conventional weapons given to the characters. In other words, you're fully armed going in to do warfare. To combat the powers of evil or good. To come against the gods. To rescue the maidens, to go down and capture treasures. Now let's look at the rulebook and the manuals and the materials involved in the game. I'm really setting the stage here before I tell you what the game really represents. Let's go to the next slide number four. Now the basic this is the basic D&D set. And it runs for ten dollars. But believe it or not, it's just two little thin manuals. And for ten dollars you don't even get the dice to play the game with. You have to buy that separately. Then if you go to number five. I just this is the second manual you get. You can see Dungeons and Dragons by TSR fantasy adventure game. And there you see the dragon's head and the woman holding out a fire against it, and the man with a sword and the, uh, the shield trying to keep the dragon back. And here a druid high priest or a merlin, the sorcerer type of figure is casting spells. And so the whole game here is basic D&D. And the thing is, the kids consider this kids play after they've played it a few times, and they're then hungry to go into the deeper stuff. And that's where the danger comes. And let me ask you, do these look godly to you? Well, we get into some of the heavier stuff now. Dungeons and Dragons is one of the hottest items in the world of games today. TSR hobbies, the company started by Gary Gygax, started with a two thousand dollars investment. Then by nineteen eighty, it had reached eight point nine million dollars worth of sales. That was in nineteen eighty, just a year ago, and is expected to reach over twenty million dollars in nineteen eighty one. The game has taken off, and they even estimate by nineteen eighty two it will sell three times that amount, or sixty million dollars worth of these games. So it's not such a small thing when you sell sixty million dollars worth of these games to our kids, you had better know what it's going to do to them. Now, John Langone Langone in Discovery Magazine or Discover Magazine, January nineteen eighty one, said MND is being translated right now into French and German, and Mattel Toys will bring out an electronic version very soon. A movie script. A movie script is being prepared right now, and the number of official MND Conventions held each year has risen to four. They actually have four big conventions. They call them GenCon or something like that, where they have all the game, people come together and they see all the newest games and the crazies. I'm amazed there's a movie out right now called Heavy Metal. Have any of you heard of that movie? I read the reviews on it in Newsweek and I couldn't believe it is full. It's it's geared towards the young people, and it's full of mutilations, of decapitations, of heads, the dismemberment of arms and legs, sexual perversion, sadism and all kinds of homosexuality. And I mean, you name it, it's in that movie and this is what we're feeding our kids today. But as bad as that movie is, wait till I show you what Dungeons and Dragons represents. Let's go on to number six. Most players want to escalate to the advanced D&D handbooks, and now we get into a very thick volume, these things. Oh, I don't know. They have one hundred and twenty seven, sometimes one hundred and fifty some pages in them, their thick handbooks. And let me say here that God says in Deuteronomy seven twenty six, neither shalt thou bring an abomination into thine house, lest thou be accursed thing like it is, but thou shalt utterly detest it, and thou shalt utterly abhor it, for it is a cursed thing. God says, do not bring a gory. You see what this thing is? It's like a demonic creature with long unicorn horns coming out of its head. These blood thirsty teeth, long fangs, great big bat like wings and furry legs like some kind of a werewolf with these talons on the bottom and. Oh, gross. I'm only saying this for the people listening to this on the radio, they're probably saying, what in the world is a picture of, you know. And here's a guy with a a shield with a skeleton's face and another hoary monster in the back. God says, do not bring the detestable thing, the abomination, into thine house, lest you be cursed as it is. That's what God says. Now let's go on to another advanced handbook, number seven. And these handbooks, this is another Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. These are some of the skeleton crew. You see these skeletons with the swords and shields. These manuals cost anywhere from twelve dollars to fifteen dollars apiece. And they are selling them by the millions. Now, monster manuals, let me tell you what some of the manuals represent. If you get a monster manual, which I'm going to show you in a moment, it'll list types and powers of demons. Then if you get a Dungeon Master's Guide, it's a book which gives deeper insight into the occult and gives leadership high priest status to the Individuals and players Handbook. How to become a more powerful person in the occult. If you get the Player's Handbook, it'll teach you how to become more powerful in the occult. Now, you know, the people that sell these games will say there is no Occultic involvement whatsoever. It's totally in fun. That's what they tell you. Let me show you what the games really represent, though. Let's let's go on to number eight. Then there's the Player's Handbook we just mentioned. Now remember, there's no occultic involvement, but this great big, this great big demon like God here with the jewels for eyes and the great big open mouth with these heinous big teeth and holding this fiery thing in his in his lap. It's sort of like Dagon. Or let's see, that would be like Baal god in the Old Testament. Pardon me. Moloch. Yes. Okay. This looks like Moloch, where they would burn live children in his burning hands. They would put the babies as sacrifices into the hands of Moloch. And all of these druids and people down here. You can see there's two dragons stretched over each other, all blood coming out of their chest and, uh, their parts dismembered and all this bleeding. And two guys up here trying to pull the jewels out of Moloch's eyes. Uh. Very interesting, very interesting connotations. And any idiot I believe could see this giant figure represents a huge, hideous demon god, Moloch. Deuteronomy thirty two, verses sixteen and seventeen says they provoked him God to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they him to anger. They sacrificed unto demons, not to God, to gods that came newly up whom your fathers feared not. I want to tell you tonight some of the kids today are resurrecting New Gods, and we are sacrificing our lives to these gods, not knowing that Satan is behind it and that he's out to destroy our children. Now in Media Spotlight by L dagger, July nineteen eighty a Christian mother contacted the dean of the Christian university her Christian son was attending, and after having become enamored by Dungeons and Dragons, she told the dean her son wrote to her asking for prayer. She related to the dean a portion of her son's letter, and in it he told of an oppression of evil that had begun to feel. He sensed a malignant presence in his room, and was frightened by the hold on his mind that Satan had achieved. This young boy actually admitted that the devil had gotten some kind of malignant hold on his mind after he had gotten involved with Dungeons and Dragons. And a little while, I want to show you how playing the game actually invites demons and evil powers to oppress the players. Let's go on to the next slide though. Number nine. Here we see the Dungeon Master's guide again a sweet, innocent monster. I don't I don't know, This would probably look more like Baal with a great big drawn sword, great big red body with, uh, barely any covering on his body as far as, uh, his dress. And here's some wizards or warlocks trying to throw spells on him and holding up a jewel, trying to cast a spell on him. And he's got a half nude woman in his left hand and a big sword in his right. All kinds of fiery type of lightning coming out of his body. I don't believe that's too godly myself. This is a Dungeon Master's guide. Now, remember, the Dungeon Master is the god of the game. He's the one that directs the players and leads them through the game and through the labyrinth and the dungeons and so forth. And oh, what fun we're having right now. This grotesque red demon monster may seem vicious and depraved at looking at him, but there are sinister creatures in their other role playing games that are more sadistic, more cruel, and barbarous than this could ever be. Let me tell you for a moment about the other degenerate role playing games that are out right now. Did you know Dungeons and Masters has opened the door for some of the most cruel, violent, vicious games that have ever come down the pike? Games like RuneQuest, Chivalry and Sorcery, Arduin, Grimoire, Tunnels and Trolls, and Dragon Quest. Do you know there's give you an example of the savage brutality and violence in one of these games. For instance, let me take the Arduin Grimoire. Arduin grimoire. Now, I took this out of New West Magazine, August twenty fifth, nineteen eighty. In the rule book to the Arduin Grimoire Game, volume one, page sixty is listed. The critical hit table options listed are dice roll thirty seven to thirty eight hit location, crotch or chest. The results being the genitals or breasts are torn off. The player has gone into shock. Another dice roll now is ninety five. The hit locations are now the guts ripped out. Results twenty percent chance of the feet getting tangled up and the person falling. Person will die in one to ten minutes. Another dice roll gets a hit of one hundred points. The hit location is the head, resulting in the head being pulped and splattered over a wide area. On page ten, we read the Dread Vamp, a macho beast man with writhing, writhing snakes for hair and a skull face bristles with Neanderthal sexual imagery, his left hand holding a long, sharp lance sticking straight out from his genitals, dripping blood, his I can't say this word, his sex organ hanging limp just above it. Now you tell me this is anywhere close to godly or sweet and innocent. Your kids are growing up with this game. Arduino creator. Let's let's talk about the man who created this game. His name is Dave Hargrave, and he defends the grisly specifics of the game here and states it's deliberately gruesome. You have to blow a hole through that video shell the TV the kids are encased in. In other words, he says, I gotta get the kids away from television. I gotta blow a hole in their their like, their engulfment in television. And he goes on, there are little zombies. They don't know what pain is. They have never seen a friend taken out in a body bag. They've got to understand that what they do has consequences. The world is sex. The world is violence. It's going to destroy most of those kids someday, so they might as well leave TV land and find out what it's like now. That's the creator of our doing Ephesians five verse eleven says, and have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. In other words, expose them and reject them completely. If you dabble with the unfruitful works of darkness, you are inviting the consequences. You're opening your your protective hedge and letting demon powers have their play with you. Now, I believe Christians are going to have to wake up to the fact that these fantastic fantasy games adapt and desensitize our young people to sexual perversion, violent acts, and ruthless crimes. Doctor Holmes, the editor of the D&D rulebook, said the level of violence in this make believe world runs very high. There is hardly a game where the players do not indulge in murder, arson, torture, rape or highway robbery. End of quote. The psychological problems brought on as a result of the playing of FRP or fantasy role playing games are tantamount to an epidemic. It's spreading like an epidemic right now. A standard question that's actually asked by of criminal suspects by the city police department in central Washington is are you a participant of fantasy role games? The police, when they arrest a person for a violent crime, actually first ask him if he's involved in a fantasy role playing game. In one instance, two adolescents who were convicted for shooting nearly forty rounds of fire into passing motor vehicles said they constantly fantasized killing someone. After playing the game, all they could fantasize would be the joy, the ghoulish joy in killing someone. And so they shot forty rounds into passing cars. You tell me. The game has no effect on children. Did you know that children today are totally into imitating what they see? They imitate what they see on television, they imitate what their parents do, and they imitate the role they play in their fantasy games. There's other games. Let me take you to the next slide. This is some of the t shirts that are out. Oh actually we skipped one of the slides. Let's go on to the next one. This is some of the t shirts that are out that show you some of the other games like Warlocks and Warriors, the Awful Green Things from Outer Space. Here's the awful green things from outer space. You can actually have a t shirt and go around and show your kids. There's one called the Snits Revenge. Another one called dungeon. Uh, let me speak about dungeon for a moment. There's a young man at the Eagle's Nest that brought me some magazines. There were three issues of a popular magazine. It was a God oriented magazine for young boys and men. And these men are actually involved in the Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts. And this is a magazine that they receive. I don't want to mention the name of the magazine, But in the magazine he found these advertisements for Dungeons and Dragons in almost every magazine. And these are for the little boys that are in Cub Scouts and so forth. And the one of them shows the family. I can't put it up on the screen. We don't have a slide, but here's a whole family of father, mother and a little boy and girl around playing the game dungeon, and all of them are smiling and have a good time as they're all playing dungeon together. And then in another one we have here, it shows. I'll read one of the captions. It's a bunch of cartoons on one page here. And the cartoons. One of them says the hungry lycanthrope monster lunges for kelek with sharp fangs and claws. And it shows this half man, half monster with claws and hair all over his body, lunging for a Jack the Ripper type of guy and about to tear his head off. And at the bottom, and this is in a boys magazine now, a young boys magazine. It's got an advertisement for a catalog and for Were actually getting Dungeons and Dragons The adventure game through writing to this address. And finally, there's another add in this third magazine where it says who needs to hang around? It shows a guy absolutely bored, looking very mean, holding Dungeons and Dragons in his hand, and all of his friends are playing out in a kitchen or something, and he wants to go and play Dungeons and Dragons. And so this is an advertisement for you to drop out of life and get involved with Dungeons and Dragons. Now, one lady wrote to Tom Paine on June twenty eight, nineteen eighty one, and she said, Dear Mr. Paine, I read your article in Christian Life and I thank you for putting it in this magazine. A few days later I received, and I won't mention that boys magazine that I mentioned earlier, but I received blank, blank in the mail and that game Dungeons and Dragons was advertised in it. She saw the same thing that I just saw here. Also, there was an ad on a game called attack of the mutants in the same magazine. I was shocked at this being in blank, blank. My son. My son is in the Cub Scouts, and I don't want him seeing those kinds of things advertised in a magazine for little boys. So many kids buy these kind of games, and knowing that it will lead what what it'll lead to. I would like to know if something can be done about this. I plan to write to the editors and express my opinion on these games. God says in second Corinthians six seventeen, wherefore come out from amongst them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing. And I will receive you. These magazines God says, you should not touch the unclean thing. This is a magazine that on some of the pages actually talks about God and your relationship to God. And here in the middle of the magazine, it's glorifying Dungeons and Dragons. Many people defend the game saying it's harmless. It certainly won't hurt the little kids like Maria Pearce, author of The Gift of Play. Do you know what she said? Now, here's one of the ladies that defends the game. Look at her mentality. Any four year old listen to this. She says any four year old who slays his baby brother in fantasy has my blessing. But if he pinches baby brother, that is where the line has to be drawn. In other words, as long as you're killing him in your mind, no big deal. But if you go and actually pinch him now, you got to draw a line there. She goes on. The danger, she says, comes when someone, perhaps influenced by drugs, believes that he is a given character and destined to purge the world. She says that brings to mind Charles Manson or Jim Jones. Can't you imagine the Charles Manson and the Jim Jones that were raising right now in our own bedrooms? Christians alert May day. Let's go to the next slide number twelve. Now I'm going to get into all through the games. You'll see these half clad females with most of their bodies showing because sex plays a great part in the role playing games. You'll find most of the heroines are half dressed and they're sexually assaulted in the games. Homosexuality, sodomy, rape and other perverse acts of sexuality are played out by the people participating. Participating in the games in D and D, a player will put himself into the character he has been given. By becoming identified with his make believe character, he can actually act out his own emotions, his desires, and his fears without risking being punished. In other words, this is such a fantasy release that you can actually seduce women and rape girls and do all that you want in this game and never be punished. Sexual innuendos are present in many of the Dungeons and Dragons worlds. Holmes tells us of a setting where a dwarf tries to slip his hand down a fair lady's dress. In another one of the games with teenage players, a certain magic user was trying to seduce a female character. A roll of the dice was made and used to determine her endangered virginity. In other words, if it had been a high score, her virginity would have been out the window. Luckily, the odds were in her favor, and for the time being, she was safe. Now let me get into the greatest dangers of the game. Number one, what I believe is the greatest danger in the game is not the violence, not the sex. It's the addiction and obsession of the game. Let's get into number thirteen. The next slide here you're going to see fighting. Them fighting monsters here. But when they get to fighting they're monsters. And they're unicorns and they're half man half horse. And the dragon with wings and things like this. And see all these monsters down here under the earth. Uh, gosh. When they get into that, they actually sometimes drop out of life and become so obsessed and addicted to the game that they forget that there's a real world. New West Magazine, August twenty fifth, nineteen eighty. Said, consider the story of John, a sixteen year old sophomore in a Southern California college. He sits in his small dorm room, nine hundred dollars worth of hand-painted miniatures covering the bed. Ever since I was ten, he says, I've wanted to drop out of this world. There are so many flaws. A lot of things are unfair. When I'm in my world, I control my own world order. I can picture it all. The groves, the trees, the beauty. I can hear the wind. The world isn't like that. My beliefs, morals, sense of right and wrong are much stronger since playing D&D, he says. But in comparison, the real world becomes less tenable. It's hazardous. John worries your vocabulary. Your mental quickness increases, but school seems increasingly boring and droll. Your grades drop. The more time you spend in your fantasy world, the more you want to walk away from the burdensome decisions in life. And he says very quietly, the more I play D&D, the more I want to get away from this world. The whole thing is getting very bad. You know what creator Gary Gygax says about the game? He says, and I quote, you have to pursue D&D with your entire soul if you're going to do well at it. He said that in rolling Stone magazine, October nineteen eighty. You have to give your whole soul. Have you ever heard of selling your soul to the devil? Devil and Daniel Webster? The tragic case is stated of a brilliant Michigan State University student, James Dallas Egbert, the third, who helped feed parental fears about the game because Egbert, at the age of sixteen, disappeared in Appeared in nineteen seventy nine amid suspicion that he had so identified with the game that he was now playing it, a realistic form of it, in the tunnels beneath beneath his university. They felt he had gone down into the labyrinthine tunnels below his university and was actually playing the game out for real, because he had identified so heavily with it. He did turn up later, but his disappearance was never fully explained. Last summer, though, Egbert committed suicide, and though it was revealed that he had suffered from adjustment problems, many, many people still believed that his death was related to the reality bending quality of the game. Many, many testimonies I could give you tonight of young people who have killed themselves after or while playing Dungeons and Dragons, are one of these other games. It'd be hard to hard to prove that in a court of law. But I'm telling you tonight, just playing with it opens up the realm of the supernatural you should not be dabbling with. Let me go on and say Doctor Holmes makes the statement that the game player sometimes suffers psychic shock and may actually go into depression. Now, this is said by one of the men that's an editor of the game. He actually realizes that the game can even put a young person into psychic shock or deep depression. He goes on and says, Dungeons and Dragons players sometimes begin to think of their characters as real persons with a separate existence of their own. But let me get into the greatest danger in closing tonight a cultic involvement with Satan and demons. This is the greatest danger of these games. Let's go on to the next picture. Number fourteen the ability to become a god. You see, that's what they want. They want to become a god. The players, they want to achieve godhood. And they want to fight spiritual powers with supernatural abilities and spiritual powers given to them. In each of the four major handbooks of D&D, ND there's a progressive listing of the gods from every imaginative culture Celtic, Norse, Egyptian, Oriental, etc. from hang the thunder spirit of the American Indians legend to Zeus of Greek mythology. You can call on these deities or to come to your aid. The miracles of Jesus, on the other hand, are depicted as spells alongside definite occultic rites. In other words, they actually depict Jesus as not just another one of the many gods gods who throw spells and does miracles. Do you see how that could water down their faith in our Lord Jesus Christ? Isaiah fifty seven verse nine God warns in the Living Bible, you have traveled far, even to hell itself, to find new gods to love. Heavy stuff. God says you've traveled far, even to hell itself, to find new gods to love. And these children have found their gods. Here you see deities and demigods. You see the great big Zeus type character. Or, uh, what was the guy with the wings on his head? Well, Mercury. Yes, he's got the wings on his head with the helmet and so forth. He's holding a dragon here by the neck, and you see all the different gods and the green flames and things, the suns and all that is part of this god ship that that you are led to go after other gods, strange gods to get your power from Deuteronomy eleven verse twenty eight, God says, and a curse, if you will not obey the commandments of the Lord your God, but turn aside out of the way which I command you this day to go after other gods which you have not known. God says a curse on you if you follow other gods than the true and living God Jehovah. According to Paul Lunt, I heard a testimony by this man Paul Lunt, who wrote the book witch of the East, and Paul Lunt was an ex satanic Lord High Priest of Satan. He had risen through the ranks to where he had many, many covens under him. Coven of witches. And now he was a a high Lord, High Priest of Satan. And when he got converted to Jesus Christ, he began to he tell what the occult really stood for. He told in this particular interview that occult is a Latin word meaning hidden. It can mean hidden science, hidden revelations from the gods. In other words, the gods reveal things to you. In essence, the occult is an elixir of demonic power from the gods, and the followers don't realize that they are being used by the devil. The occult promises power and wisdom. That's that's two of the things that you're promised when you enter into these fantasy games. Power and Wisdom Christian Life Ministries. The track says power is probably the game's most potent appeal, its area of greatest controversy. A Dungeon Master has powers never attainable on earth and he has become a God in his own fiction world. He has the power to let a character die of his wounds or to be resurrected by the clerics. Now, according to the D&D instruction manual, I want to quote, wisdom is the prime requisite for clerics. Now wisdom again, you see what how the occult and this go together. Because immediately you're seeking after wisdom. As you play these games, wisdom is required. It's the foremost thing. The cleric is like a religious priest who plays with power, supernatural, spiritual powers. As he goes into the game, the manual continues. Clerics can perform miraculous spells, and second level clerics or experienced clerics can actually heal wounds. Now let me note here clerics are humans who have dedicated themselves to one or more gods, not the living God of the Bible. Let's go on to the next slide. Here's a magazine called Dragon Magazine that's put out by TSR Hobbies and Dragon magazines looks like a big fantasy magazine with these elves, with these great big ears and so forth. But Dragon Magazine gives us some good insight into the involvement of Satan, demons, and the occult with these games. Remember, this is put out by the same people that put out the games in Dragon magazine, for instance, published monthly by TSR Hobbies Incorporated, relegating specifically a fantasy role playing participants. In other words, this is for the participants. This is their magazine in volume four, October nineteen eighty. Under the article The Possessors, it says this and I want to quote it, hell raged around the crag faced mountain top, bringing down monstrous strokes of white lightning from the cloudy black sky. The throne was hellishly ornated, with red rubies and blue diamonds all set into the bleached bone of the royal seat. Upon it sat the ruler of this domain, Satan, the Lord of hell in the same issue under the article Patron Demons, it said, and I quote, to be useful in making a pact with demons. Sacrifices must be performed with brazier and fire. A stone altar. In other words, a portable altar weighing about five hundred and fifty GPS bejeweled silver or gold bowls for the victim's blood and five minutes of time per creature, sacrificed and non-human types. All but humans count only a successful sacrifice. In other words, when you make sacrifices, all the sacrifices five minutes a piece of them and all of them being non-human will be acceptable on these altars to the Lord, high Satan. Now I, I, I have to say that I believe that Satan has cleverly tricked our young people into experimenting into occult practices. Said. Last Wednesday, I talked with some Christians in a restaurant who played with what they thought was a harmless occultic game. Well, it wasn't a game. It was actually some kind of an exercise that people used to go through. And they did this when they were younger and they played this game called The Spirit of Mary Worth. I don't know if any of you have ever played this, but they said that they would all hold hands in a circle and they'd concentrate as they called out in unison for the spirit of Mary Worth. And they come, Spirit of Mary Worth. I guess they'd say that over and over. And this particular girl shared with me that doors would slam, she said. Suddenly objects all over the room would begin to move around, and finally grotesque faces would rush towards them from all over the room, rushing towards them out of nowhere and then disappearing. And she said it was very frightening. And she didn't play the Spirit of Mary worth very long. Now let's go to the next slide. Right now I want to say this. There is no such thing as dabbling in the occult for fun. You may think this is fun to have these demonic creatures like this with bat wings and open jaws and these super characters like Batman here. I mean, do you know what we're being programmed with on the cartoons on the Saturday morning with your kids watching Batman and Aquaman and Spider-Man? Look at all the different creatures, the ghouls, the goblins, the great, the created pieces of fantasy that the kids are being programmed with when those kids grow up. Past cartoons, they immediately go into their fantasy role playing games, and we're watching it happen before our eyes and we say, oh, it's just harmless fun. Jan Ailment wrote me this letter this week. She said, Dear Pastor Gary Greenwald, one day in March nineteen seventy eight, I started playing with the Ouija board. Within minutes, I had encountered evil spirits, and in a few days the evil spirits took control of my hand, my hand, and started writing messages on a piece of paper. She played with the Ouija board, and within a few days the spirits had taken control of her hand and were writing through her automatic handwriting. Then the evil spirit started to afflict my entire body. I started hearing voices. I had an abnormal bleeding which caused me to undergo a major surgery. The evil spirits just tormented me to the point where I couldn't get a peaceful sleep because the evil spirits wouldn't let me sleep, and I was filled with fear. I was afraid to even shut my eyes to go to sleep. What I thought was only a fun game. In the beginning, Ouija boards was not a fun game at the end. I just wanted to read that because when we dabble with these things, we may think they're fun. Let's go to the next picture. You see this? This like a medium or sorcerer here, pouring a potion and so forth with all of his vials and whatever. I'm going to say this and I hope this makes the point tonight. Dungeons and Dragons is plainly an initiation rite of the occult, in which the participants unknowingly are taught to practice the black arts. Many of the spells in the books and the handbooks are thick with pages on how to cast spells, how to throw potions, how to conjure up demons. The end result of this game is the ultimate demon possession and death of the player. Newsweek magazine, volume ninety four, September nineteen seventy nine, said, and I quote, the players have to fend off attacks from rapacious bands of gnomes, screeching harpies and vicious wererats. I've seen people become so involved that they try to become their characters, observes Scott Jacobs, a political science student at the University of Georgia. End of quote. People get so involved in this fantasy game that they actually become their characters. Maybe you still don't believe that demons are involved. I want to say I do. I believe in the devil as much as I believe in God. And I believe that I'm a Son of God, and I have no place letting myself or my children or anyone involved with me if I had children play this game. Let me read you another testimony and I'm going to close with this. Let's let me show you another slide while I'm reading this to just set the mood. Let's look at this, uh, Moloch type of type of god. Again, I'd like to read the testimony of Michael Murphy, who wrote to me about Dungeons and Dragons. He said about six months ago, while living in Washington, a friend of my wife and I came to visit with her three boys whose ages ranged ten, twelve and fourteen. Our friend who was visiting us is a born again, spirit filled Jew who was fighting a great spiritual battle in her own home. Her husband was unsaved and yielding to the evil spirit of transvestism, and the boys brought a game with them called Dungeons and Dragons, and they went into my bedroom to play the game. My friend alerted me to this game, saying she thought it was right from the pit and my spirit instantly, instantly witnessed to it. She said her husband was the dungeon master and encouraged the boys to play it. In other words, her unsaved husband at home was the Dungeon Master and actually played the game with the boys. After the family left, Michael goes on. My wife and I went to bed in the middle of the night. I was awakened to see an evil demon staring at me from the corner where the boys had been playing the game. I instantly started to feel fear, but the Holy Spirit quieted me and told me that the demon could not come out of the corner because I served the God who always was and always is and always will be. Amen. Michael says each time the Holy Spirit said this, I was filled more and more with the confidence of Jesus Christ. The Lord then led me to rebuke the demon and he fled. Praise God, he says. In the morning he says, I told my wife what had happened, and I. I told her to call our friend and tell her. She told her sons who had since that time received Jesus. In other words, I guess they went home and the very next morning they had received Jesus and they asked me about it, and I told them what happened. Praise Jesus! The Holy Spirit told our friend to throw the game in the trash. Outside. My friend and her sons got all the pieces of the game together and threw them into the trash can, and were astounded to hear screams coming out of the game. Also, when she threw a match into the trash can. She struck it and threw it in. It flew back on her and tried to burn her. The family, the woman and sons then prayed and rebuked the evil spirits. And immediately the Lord showed this friend in the spirit that there were more pieces of the of the game in the house, including a book about it in her husband's briefcase. She proceeded to round up the rest of them, as the Lord ferreted them out and listened again as all the pieces screamed when she threw them in the trash. You tell me there's no demons involved in the pieces of this game. Let me show you one more slide and tell you what Deuteronomy eighteen, verses nine through twelve says. Deuteronomy eighteen, verses nine through twelve. When you come into the land which the Lord your God gives you, you shall not learn to follow the abominable practices of these nations. There shall not be found among you anyone who burns his son or his daughter as an offering. Anyone who practices divination, a soothsayer or an augur, or a medium, he's naming all the things that this game represents. Or a medium. Or a wizard. Or a necromancer. For whosoever does, these things are an abomination unto the Lord. And because of these abominations, the Lord your God does drive them out from before you. In other words, a word to the wise. In closing, if you want to avoid God's curses and you want to avoid Satan's oppressions and his demon powers, get the games out of your house. Warn your friends and live for Jesus. Amen. Don't be fooled by what the D&D promoters tell you. They'll tell you the games are harmless. But I want to tell you that out of these fantasy role playing games comes suicide's drug addiction, mental sickness, sexual perversion, and savage demonic obsessions. The.