Could Aliens Be a Part of God's Plan?

Tom: Thanks Gary. You’re listening to Search the Scriptures Daily, a program in which we encourage everyone who desires to know God’s truth to look to God’s Word for all that is essential for salvation and living one’s life in a way that is pleasing to Him.

We’re currently going through Dave Hunt’s book A Cup of Trembling: Jerusalem and Bible Prophecy, and last week we discussed what very likely will be a key event in rallying all religions to the worship of the Antichrist, which is the disappearance of millions of people from every nation and people group, and that event is called the Rapture, although the term is not found in the Bible is it Dave?

Dave: Well it is in the Latin Bible.

Tom: In the Vulgate.

Dave: I Thessalonians 4: We’ll be “caught up,” raptured, “ecstatic catching away.”

Tom: Snatching.

Dave: Right.

Tom: Dave, in presenting this scenario in your book, you mention a connection that some people would find—well, not everybody, but many people would find—far-fetched. You introduce the idea that perhaps—and I say perhaps—the Antichrist, one of the things that will draw people to him is that this disappearance that takes place (and we know that’s a biblical fact; that’s going to take place. It hasn’t happened yet, but it will happen. I call that a fact), he will have a reason that this took place, and the reason that he may supply is that aliens may have abducted these people from this planet. Now people might find that and say, “Okay, I was following you, I was going along with this up to a point, but now you’re introducing aliens? Come on Dave!”

Dave: Well, Tom, it’s not a biblical idea, and it certainly isn’t possible because there are no aliens out there, all right? But as far as the world is concerned, it’s a very probable scenario. I mean, we have, as you know, a search for extraterrestrial intelligence, as we have spent millions of dollars building huge radio telescopes placed in strategic areas around the world, and we are beaming messages out there by radio and hoping to hear an answer. It’s a little bit absurd because of the vast distances involved. At the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to cross our galaxy and another million and a half to reach the next galaxy. There are billions of galaxies! And now we’re going to look for some message? Suppose it takes a thousand years for the message to get to some alien group out there. This is radio, and it takes them another thousand years to get back to us. If there were aliens within a thousand light years of earth, that would be pretty close. That would be in 1 percent—or 2 percent if you want to make it a diameter—2 percent of our galaxy. It would take a thousand years for a message to come back, for a message to get there and to come back.

Tom: Dave, although this is improbable from a—I mean our law of physics, chemistry, doesn’t seem to work, nevertheless, President Carter sent along a message to the space aliens on board of the Voyager spacecraft. Let me quote the message that he sent: “This Voyager spacecraft was constructed by the United States of America. We are a community of 240 million human beings among the more than 4 billion who inhabit the planet Earth...

Dave: It’s interesting, there are over 6 billion now.

Tom: Right. “…still divided into nation/states but rapidly becoming a single global civilization. We cast this message into the cosmos. Of the 200 million stars in the Milky Way galaxy, some, perhaps many may have inhabited planets and spacefaring civilizations. If one such civilization intercepts Voyager, here is our message.

“This is a present from a small distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts, and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours. We hope someday, having solved the problems we face, to join a community of galactic civilizations. This record represents our hope and our determination and our good will in a vast and awesome universe. Jimmy Carter, President of the United States, the White House, June 16, 1977.”

So there’s credibility for you. Even though we find it rather incredible. But my point here is, this isn’t far-fetched, although some people may think that it is. Here we have the President of the United States kind of laying the groundwork for the possibility, the distinct possibility, that there are aliens out there.

Dave: Yeah, it wasn’t just Jimmy Carter’s harebrained idea. This was pressed upon him by the scientists—by Carl Sagan, as well as others. This is what they really believe, because they believe in evolution. And they believe that life happened by chance on this planet. If it could happen by chance on this planet, then maybe there are other planets throughout this universe where life also would have happened by chance. Okay?

Tom: Even though probability—statistically?

Dave: No, even though it’s impossible. There is no way life could by chance, so we won’t go into that. But that can be proved mathematically. It is simply impossible. You have to get so many molecules lined up in the right order even to get life started. And it is an absurdity, and any mathematician will acknowledge that.

But anyway, this is what they believe, because they don’t want to believe in God. Now, Carter claimed to be a Christian. But notice, he ends his message, he says, “We hope some day, having solved the problems we face, to join a community of galactic civilizations. This record represents our hope and our determination and our goodwill in a vast and awesome universe.” And that caused me to title one of my books, Whatever Happened to Heaven? I thought we were looking forward to going to heaven, and here Carter says, “No, no, our dream is to join an intergalactic community.”

So, Tom, as you were saying, this is a believable scenario for many people. In fact, what other explanation could there be? A great delusion comes upon the world after the Rapture. They will not believe this was the Rapture. That is the last thing they would believe. Well, what else would you believe, then? We are being set up for this by science, by science fiction, by movies, and so forth.

Tom: Right, entertainment, certainly.

Dave: And if you don’t believe in God, and you don’t believe in the Rapture—and they won’t—what other explanation will there be? And this will literally terrify the world: Who took them? Where did they go? Why didn’t they take me? Are they coming back for me next?

I don’t think anything else—and we’ve mentioned it a number of times—I don’t think anything else could unite the world.

Now you mentioned that maybe a billion. Well, there’s not that many Christians on this earth. But if we believe—I….

Tom: But you have to say “biblical Christians,” Dave, because there’s over a billion Roman Catholics, and now that the Catholic Church has made overtures to Islam, there’s a billion and a quarter Muslims that supposedly believe, according to Catholicism, in the God of the Bible.

Dave: Yeah, so true Christians—real followers of Jesus Christ—there are not that many. However, I believe that aborted babies go to heaven. I believe that babies that die in infancy go to heaven. They’re not going to go to hell and suffer for sins they did not commit. I believe the blood of Christ covers them.

Now why would I believe that? Do I have a good verse? Well, David, you remember, when the baby died, and he stopped weeping and praying and asked for some food—he was no longer going to fast—he said, “He will not come back to me. I will go to him.”

Tom: And he wasn’t just talking about a physical grave.

Dave: I don’t think so. So, that would mean, then, that there could be millions of babies, of Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims—unbelievers all over this world that Christ is not going to leave to the tender mercies of the Antichrist. He’s not going to leave them to grow up under the Antichrist, just as he would take them if they died. It could be. I’m not dogmatic about that, but if so, there could be a billion, and the world would be terrified.

So, what does all this have to do with Israel? Well, Hafez Assad, who was the Syrian president a few years ago, in an interview with Time magazine, he expressed the belief that only an extraterrestrial power could bring real peace to this world. That’s rather interesting, and they have set up stations in Israel and so forth. They’re watching for some sign from the heavens of an extraterrestrial power taking interest in us. I attended—actually, I was invited as one of the speakers to a rather interesting conference in Washington, D.C., in May 1995. It was called “When Cosmic Cultures Meet,” and, Tom, there were people there—I mean this was sponsored to some extent by Rockefeller money; government funding as well. There were people there from the U. S. government; there were professors from universities, people there who claimed to have been abducted aboard UFOs.

They were all very serious about this, Tom. And I was the only one that gave them something to be afraid of. “Why should we trust these aliens?”

Hafez Assad said, “Well, they wouldn’t be prejudiced about the Middle East. They wouldn’t be for Israel; they wouldn’t be for us either.”

Well, but maybe they’re for themselves—if they existed, of course. Who says that just because you are a highly evolved being, you now have no selfish interests? Of course they would have selfish interests. But as a matter of fact, biblically, there are no such beings out there.

But it’s rather interesting that Robert Jastrow, and I think we’ve quoted him in the past, he was the founder and director for many years of the Goddard Space Institute in New York that sent Voyager and Pioneer out there. Rather absurd—I mean, how far have they gotten in all these year? They haven’t even touched the fringe of space yet. Yet serious scientists put this message on there. But anyway, he said, “Evolution on some planets could have been going on for ten billion years longer than it has on planet Earth. And they would be as far beyond man as man is beyond a worm on the evolutionary scale. When we see them, they will seem like gods to us.”

So we talked about that, I think, last week or the week before. We have serious scientists, now—Jastrow said they could have even evolved beyond the need of bodies—now we have serious scientists trying to make contact with nonphysical entities. They don’t know how to handle this. And there are none out there, except demons. Well, the demons are perfectly willing to pose as extraterrestrial intelligences. And I don’t know, Tom, where that could fit in.

Tom: Dave, some Christians say, “Well wait a minute. We don’t believe in evolution. But we do believe that God could have created beings, humans, like or human-like—

Dave: Humanoids, yeah.

Tom: Or yeah, on a planet somewhere. What do you think?

Dave: Well we don’t believe that.

Tom: Well, we don’t, but there are some who would say why not?

Dave: Yeah, there are many reasons for it, Tom. First of all, the Bible doesn’t tell us about any other beings out there. It gives us the impression that man was created on this earth. This is the world to which Christ came. We have a history. We have archaeological, historical evidence for the Bible—for the fact that Christ is who He claimed to be: the Redeemer of the world, the Savior of sinners.

Now, if there are any other beings out there, humanoids, they had the power of choice. Being less than God they would make less than godly choices. In other words, they would sin. Now, they would need redemption also. Are we going to have another Christ go off to each of those planets and die on a cross and redeem them? It’s the only way.

Furthermore, the Bible says that by Christ’s blood He cleansed the universe. He cleansed the very throne of God, where sin had actually originated. That’s an incredible statement, but this is what the Bible says. It originated in the heart of Satan, the most powerful, beautiful, wisest being that God ever made. Right there in the presence of God, in the heart of Satan, he said in his heart, “I will be like the most High,” and so forth.

So, sin had to be cleansed from the entire universe. It contaminates the entire universe, and the blood of Jesus Christ on the cross did that. It is to this world that Christ will return, and he will rule and reign. And this is called the kingdom of God. There are no other kingdoms of God out there. So every indication from the Bible is that the only intelligent beings, moral beings, that exist apart from Satan, demons, and angels and God himself, is mankind.

Tom: And, Dave, if there were, and again, we don’t believe this, but if there were a race of people or humanoids, as you’ve said, that were not tainted by sin, certainly any relationship with us, any connection with us would—that wouldn’t be good for them, right? I mean, we’re fallen, so that’s a problem.

The second thing is you mentioned the Bible. The Bible would be meaningless to another civilization.

Dave: Well, they certainly couldn’t be saved by the redemption of Christ; by the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Tom: Well, they wouldn’t understand Bethlehem, the prophecy—we talk about the Bible with regard to prophecy. That would be meaningless.

Dave: Yeah, no it doesn’t work, Tom. But there are—you may be certain—there are Jewish scientists as well as Muslim scientists. I don’t know exactly how it will work, Tom, but it certainly could play a role in the false peace that is coming to this earth, without a doubt. And therefore, it does have some bearing upon Jerusalem and Bible prophecy. Certainly, the Bible foretells the Rapture, a sudden mass disappearance from this earth. Certainly the Bible foretells a false peace, and certainly the Bible foretells that Israel will be deceived, Ezekiel 38: They’re living in peace; they’re living securely, no walls, no fence, the fence that is being built in Israel now will come down. We know that from the Bible. Because they will be deceived—now why the whole world would follow this man, the Antichrist, I don’t see any other reason than that he arises in the midst of this terror that is created by millions, hundreds of millions, perhaps, dozens of millions at least, disappearing from this earth. He must have an answer for this. People are going to look to him, and of course, he has the power—all the power—of Satan. This is Satan’s man. You remember Satan offered the world, the kingdoms of this world, to Christ. He took him up on a high mountain, and in a moment of time—that’s all they will last; like a vapor, it will be gone—in a moment of time, he showed Christ the kingdoms of this world. He didn’t need television, he didn’t need some kind of electronic thing—I don’t know how, but it was all laid out in front of Christ, and he said, “All of this is mine; [well, he’s called the god of this world] To you will I give this if you will bow down and worship me.” Christ of course, refused.

The Antichrist will accept it. And so Revelation 13 says that it is the dragon, Satan, who gives him his seat, his power, his authority. This is a work of Satan. He has maneuvered this man into position, and he has put him into this place of power. Well, then, there are lies involved, and I don’t know a better lie than this whole delusion of extraterrestrial intelligences.

Tom: Well, as you said Dave, 2 Thessalonians, scripture says, “Those who have not a love for the truth, God is going to send strong delusion that they believe the lie.” Last week, or it may have been last week or the week before, we had a news alert about a Hindu temple being built in Omaha, Nebraska, and then I mentioned being at a Hindu temple just outside of Chicago, and you have Hanuman the monkey god being worshiped by these people who came. These are certainly many Hindus who’ve come from India, but these were not people from these villages back in the jungles. We’re talking about doctors, lawyers, computer technicians, people driving Lexuses and Mercedes and so on, worshiping the monkey god, or Ganesha, the elephant god, and so on. Now, here, today, in our society—there’s strong delusion.

Dave: You remember, Tom, when we used to have the time back in those days—well, we were investigating it for various books—we would go to New Age conferences, conventions, and wow! What went on there! And they’re still going on. But we’ve lost touch with that sort of thing. But I remember talking with UFO cult members, and they had been told by the space brothers (this is what they call them), that when they took over this world, all those who were rebels in their hearts and would not submit to this new order (and I’m not say that there would be a new order—this is the explanation), but at least they believed that the space brothers said they would instantly remove these people to a slave planet where their minds would be reprogrammed before they were allowed back on planet Earth. Then you remember talking to New Agers who said, “Well, we know that when the time for this transformation takes place to a higher state of consciousness to homo noeticus, all those who haven’t been spiritually prepared, doing yoga and so forth, they will be instantly removed to a nonphysical dimension where their karma will have to catch up with them before they’re allowed back. So we have various explanations, and I could mention some others, but we’re out of time.

Tom: Yeah. Well, Dave, one of the points here is that people are saying, “Oh, well, that’s not credible, that’s not believable.”

If you have not a love for the truth, you’re going to believe the lie in whatever form it’s going to be, no matter how bizarre, no matter how wild, and so on. And we’re seeing that more and more today. Those who have not a love of the truth, they are buying into anything and everything, whatever’s out there.

Dave: Well, I don’t think it will be bizarre and farfetched as far as science is concerned, as far as unbelievers; university professors are concerned. It will be very believable for them, but it will be a delusion.