Something is happening.
You can see it almost everywhere.
Turn on the television and there is another documentary about UFOs. Open social media and you’ll find videos about ghosts, shadow figures, spirit guides and unexplained encounters. Entire communities have formed around the search for answers that exist beyond the physical world.
People are looking for something.
They know there is more to reality than what can be measured in a laboratory or explained away in a textbook.
The question is where that search is leading them.
That question surfaced again and again during a recent episode of Stewards of the Mysteries, where filmmaker Joey Loomis sat down with Katie Souza to discuss months spent traveling across America documenting reports of UAPs, paranormal encounters and supernatural phenomena.
At first glance, it sounded like a collection of strange stories.
Lights appearing over remote mountains.
Ghost sightings.
Shadow figures.
Reports of supernatural manifestations during worship services.
But underneath every story was a much bigger conversation: Discernment.
Loomis said his journey into documenting the paranormal began with a dream.
After seeking the Lord for an interpretation, he said God gave him an unexpected assignment.
“He said, ‘You’re doing documentaries. I want you to cover the scary things.'”
Those “scary things” would eventually take Loomis and his wife across the country investigating everything from reported UFO hotspots to stories of ghosts and unexplained spiritual encounters.
Yet the goal was never entertainment.
“The whole point is to be from the God perspective,” Loomis said.
That statement reveals something many Christians have missed.
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For decades, the culture has been flooded with supernatural content. Hollywood has spent years telling people where to look for answers.
Sometimes the explanation is aliens. Sometimes it’s ancient civilizations. Sometimes it’s interdimensional beings.
Almost never is it the Bible.
“We have the greatest ancient text called the Bible,” Loomis said.
That observation cuts to the heart of the issue.
People are fascinated by the supernatural because they were created for a supernatural God.
The hunger is real.
The danger comes when that hunger is fed by the wrong source.
Souza pointed to the explosion of occult content online and warned that many people are learning about spiritual realities from influencers, paranormal investigators and New Age teachers instead of Scripture.
Meanwhile, Christians often avoid the conversation altogether.
That creates a vacuum.
And vacuums rarely stay empty for long.
One of the more striking moments of the interview came when Loomis discussed the sheer number of people who report paranormal experiences.
“Sixteen to 20 million people just in the United States have said, ‘I have seen a ghost,'” he said.
“There’s no scientist in the world that would disregard 20 million data points. There’s no judge in the world that would disregard 20 million witnesses.”
Whether every account is genuine is not the point.
What matters is that millions of people believe they have encountered something beyond the physical world.
And they are searching for an explanation.
“If you come to the end of that thread, you will always end up spiritual,” Loomis said.
That may be the most important takeaway from the entire discussion.
The battle is not over whether the supernatural exists.
The battle is over who gets to define it.
Scripture has never shied away from the unseen realm.
The Bible speaks openly about angels, demons, visions, miracles and spiritual warfare. Yet many believers have become uncomfortable discussing the very subjects that dominate modern culture.
The result is that countless people are seeking spiritual answers everywhere except the place where those answers can actually be found.
As the conversation shifted toward reports of shadow figures, orbs and unexplained encounters, Souza repeatedly brought the discussion back to a central truth.
Not everything spiritual is from God.
In fact, some of the most dangerous deceptions look remarkably close to the truth.
“Satan masquerades as an angel of light,” Souza said.
That is why discernment matters.
Not because every supernatural claim deserves belief.
Discernment matters because deception rarely arrives looking like deception.
It usually arrives dressed as something else.
Something intriguing. Something fascinating. Something that appears harmless.
Loomis pointed to Jesus’ teaching that a tree is known by its fruit.
“You tell a tree by its fruit,” he said.
That principle cuts through confusion faster than any paranormal investigation ever could.
- Does it produce peace or fear?
- Does it point people toward Jesus or away from Him?
- Does it lead to freedom or bondage?
- Does it produce truth or confusion?
The fruit tells the story.
Near the end of the interview, Souza offered a simple but powerful reminder.
“Peace acts as an umpire,” she said.
An umpire makes a call.
Safe.
Out.
The same principle applies to spiritual discernment.
In a world filled with competing voices, believers must learn to recognize the peace of God and the voice of the Holy Spirit.
Perhaps that is the real story hiding beneath the headlines about UFOs, ghosts and paranormal encounters.
People are searching because they know there is more.
They know the material world is not the whole story.
The danger is not that they are asking questions.
The danger is that someone else answers them first.
And in an age overflowing with spiritual counterfeits, discernment may be one of the most important forms of spiritual warfare we have.
James Lasher, a seasoned writer and editor at Charisma Media, combines faith and storytelling with a journalism background from Otterbein University and ministry experience in Guatemala and at the LA Dream Center. A Marine Corps and Air Force veteran, he is the author of The Revelation of Jesus: A Common Man’s Commentary and a contributor to Charisma magazine. For interviews and media inquiries, please contact [email protected].
