God’s Warning Against Inner Listening and Channeling Spirits

Inner Listening and Channeling: A Deceptive Door to Demonic Influence

In today’s age of spiritual experimentation and New Age teachings, many are drawn to practices like “inner listening” or channeling for personal guidance, emotional healing, or deeper enlightenment. These practices involve quieting the mind to receive supposed messages from spirit guides, ancestors, or other unseen entities. While these methods may appear harmless—or even beneficial—at first, they often open the door to dangerous spiritual influences that can lead to mental torment, confusion, and even death. As Christians, it is crucial to discern the spiritual roots of such practices and to understand why God strictly forbids them.

What Is Inner Listening?

Inner listening refers to the practice of stilling the mind to receive internal guidance, usually attributed to higher beings or universal consciousness. It's often promoted through meditation, channeling, automatic writing, or spiritual coaching. Many practitioners claim to hear messages from ascended masters, spirit guides, deceased loved ones, or extraterrestrial beings. These messages usually come in the form of thoughts, voices, visions, or inner impressions.

The intent behind this practice is often spiritual growth, emotional healing, or personal empowerment. However, it also reflects a deeper desire for secret knowledge and divine insight—outside of God.

Who Uses It and Why?

Those who engage in inner listening come from diverse backgrounds—psychics, mediums, spiritual healers, energy workers, and New Age seekers. Many are genuinely looking for answers, healing from trauma, or purpose in life. Some seek to awaken hidden abilities or establish a direct link to the spiritual world. However, the source of this “guidance” is not the Holy Spirit but unclean spirits that disguise themselves as beings of light.

2 Corinthians 11:14 warns, “Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.”

Historical and Cultural Roots

Inner listening and channeling have deep roots in ancient pagan cultures. These practices are found in shamanism, Hinduism, spiritualism, Theosophy, and Eastern mysticism. One key figure in popularizing channeling was Alice Bailey, a Theosophist and medium who claimed to receive messages from a spirit named “Djwhal Khul.” Her writings laid the foundation for much of today’s New Age teachings.

Bailey’s spirituality was steeped in occultism, esoteric knowledge, and Luciferian principles. She saw Lucifer as a bringer of light and knowledge—a blatant contradiction to the truth of Scripture. Her god was not the God of the Bible, but the so-called "universal consciousness" or cosmic force—impersonal and morally neutral.

The Spiritual Danger: Demonic Influence

What many do not realize is that opening oneself to unknown spiritual voices is equivalent to giving demons legal access to torment the soul. These unseen beings do not come in peace. Once invited, they begin to influence the mind and emotions, often leading to mental health issues, hearing disturbing voices, seeing flashing lights or shadowy figures, sleep paralysis, depression, or suicidal thoughts.

While these manifestations are often dismissed as psychological, they are spiritual in origin. People inch closer to madness without realizing the enemy is using their desire for divine connection as a trap.

King Saul: A Biblical Warning

Scripture gives us sobering examples. In 1 Samuel 28, King Saul, after losing favor with God, turned to a medium to call up the spirit of the prophet Samuel. Though he once banished such practices, Saul's disobedience led him into direct contact with the occult. The result? He was told of his impending death. His descent into madness and death was the cost of consulting the dead.

This is not just an Old Testament story—it is a severe warning. When people reject God’s voice and instead turn to lesser spirits for answers, they are stepping into enemy territory.

What Does the Bible Say?

Deuteronomy 18:9–12 clearly forbids inner listening, channeling, and any form of occultism:

“When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not learn to imitate the detestable ways of the nations there. Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. Anyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord.”

Why does God forbid these things? Because they are not innocent. They involve communion with demons who offer counterfeit guidance that leads to bondage, deception, and spiritual death.

God desires His children to hear His voice—through His Word and the Holy Spirit—not from dark spirits masquerading as guides.

The Occult’s Empty Promises

The occult promises enlightenment, hidden knowledge, and healing. It tempts seekers with control, power, and deeper understanding of life’s mysteries. But in reality, these “gifts” are a baited hook. The knowledge they offer is counterfeit. The power they deliver is slavery. The enlightenment they claim is darkness disguised as light.

Many who enter into inner listening end up spiritually oppressed, emotionally unstable, and physically ill. Deliverance ministries around the world are full of testimonies from people who dabbled in these practices and paid a heavy price—until they turned to Jesus for freedom.

Jesus: The Only True Source of Light

The good news is that Jesus Christ is the only door to true peace, wisdom, and spiritual connection. He doesn’t speak in riddles or manipulate. He says, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27).

Jesus demonstrates throughout the Gospels that His power and authority are far greater than the demonic realm. In Mark 1:23-27, Jesus casts out an unclean spirit simply with His word—no rituals, no incantations, no “inner listening.”

Unlike the spirits that demand submission through fear, Jesus brings love, truth, and deliverance.

God’s Invitation to Freedom

If you’ve been involved in inner listening or channeling, know this: You can be free. Repent, renounce the spirits you’ve listened to, and turn to the living God. He will not shame you—He will forgive and deliver you. He longs to speak with you through His Spirit and His Word. You don’t need a spirit guide. You need the Holy Spirit.

Jesus says in John 8:32, “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

Let His truth be your anchor. Reject the counterfeit. Receive the true and living God.

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CONCLUSION

Inner listening and channeling may sound spiritual, but they are dangerous deceptions. Rooted in occultism and guided by demonic spirits, these practices open the door to torment and death. God's Word warns against them not to restrict us, but to protect us. Only in Jesus can we find truth, freedom, and true connection to the One who created us.

Choose the voice of God—not the voices of darkness.

Methods of discernment to not fall into these false demonic practices:

• Who was the founder of this modality?

• What was his/her spirituality?

• What culture did it come out of?

• What were their beliefs?

• Who is their God or gods?

Many occult practices within Christianity require discernment.  Another method of discernment is the Word of God. The word of God is our measuring stick. The more we read the word, know the word, and have a relationship with the Lord, the more we discern right and wrong. We perish from a lack of knowledge.

Hosea 4:6 declares, “My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as my priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children.”

By Teresa Morin, President of Touch of God Int'l Ministries of Healing and Deliverance. 

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If you've been involved in a new age, occult, or cult, it can invite demonic spirits to torment you. If you feel tormented, you may need deliverance.

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