 What do Satanists believe? Do they worship a god? Do they have their own set of standards and morals? The answers may surprise you. Today we're going to be reacting and responding to a video by Anthony Padilla, where he spends a day with Satanists. Let's respond to this video from a biblical perspective. As always, this is going to be fun. How long have you been Satanist? Four years. 17 years. 20 years. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, real it back, real it back, real it back. Let me see. Wait a minute. This guy. We've seen this guy before on this channel. Do you guys remember that video I did a while back? I think it was a Jubilee reaction video. This guy had a starring role on that where he was all dressed up in his suit and his, you know, mustache as he's doing right now. This guy is very interesting. I'm interested to see hear more from him. So let's just keep going. Years. 20 years. Can you define what Satanism is to you? The value of Satanism that I identify with centers on rethinking and rebellion. I mean, even in a biblical sense, Satan presented himself as a snake to even offered kind of the fruit of knowledge or the ability to be human instead of strictly enslaved to God in this kind of bliss. It's interesting because look, she paints humans that are kind of in perfect relationship with God as somehow slaves like that was a negative thing. Oh man, they really couldn't do what they wanted to do and they couldn't, they didn't have the knowledge that Satan was going to allow them to have if they simply ate the fruit. The sad fact is, is that she's got this story completely backwards. It's that actually now because of our sin, we are enslaved to our sinful nature. We can't go against that kind of sin that we are all born into through Adam. And so we are less human than then we had been in the garden. We were made very good like perfect, right? That was our optimal and initial design created in the image of God. So we weren't unlocking this human like this more to become more human. We are actually becoming less of what God designed us to be and in turn are enslaved to sin. So it's actually the opposite of what she's saying here. Putting the framework of being a negative, but I think it's actually been something that has been quite, we have put in the frame or the ability to be human instead of strictly enslaved to God in this kind of bliss. It's interesting we have put in the framework of being a negative, but I think it's actually been something that has been quite liberating. It's very natural to desire things that bring us pleasure, you know, the idea that... Interesting there, she's equating what is natural with what is good in her worldview, right? That's not a presupposition that the Bible puts forward. Actually, it says that often what our desires are and where our flesh will lead us is not towards what is good, it actually is what to what is evil because of our sinful flesh. And that's why we need Jesus, His transformation that we can encounter to actually change our nature, to change our desires. That we should refrain from that certainly should be up to us to decide. It is an atheistic religion where we don't believe in God or gods or demons or angels. For the most part there are some who do, but for the most part we do not. We do, however, view ourselves as a God in our own world. We are the creator of our own by nature of things been given the ability to create and to think for ourselves. And then therefore we become our own deity, our own God. So instead of kind of worshiping Satan, these folks just worship themselves, which they really take on as a badge of honor. But it's actually a breaking of one of the fundamental commandments in the Bible. You shall have no other gods before me, God speaking of himself. You shall have no other gods before him. And so these people obviously are, you know, putting themselves forward as God. And I guess they think that's a good thing. Well, let's let's hear more. If everyone views themselves as their own God, then yes, it's selfish to an extent. But then I like how he acknowledges that there. He's like, yes, it is selfish a little bit, you know, to see yourself as God Almighty is a little bit selfish. But you know, here, just here, keep hearing from me. Everyone takes care of everybody else because we are all our own God. So they treat themselves with the respect of a God while also treating everyone around them with the respect of a God as well. When they deserve it. Okay, I love that. He's like, you know, Anthony Padilla here, the interviewer. He's like, okay, so, you know, how do we stop from just becoming these like savages where we can do whatever we want because we are God. And how do we stop from just kind of people creating mayhem? Because that would be a bad thing if a lot of people had that perspective that I am God and you are my subjects. Like, you know, so he's like, okay, well, you know, hey, you know, we all should treat each other as God. It's because we are all gods in effect. And he's like, only if we deserve it here. Like, okay, well, you know, how do you know? And I think that's what he's going to ask him here actually next. That's the caveat. Well, how do they decide who deserves it? Well, there are sets of ideals. So basically it is, if you've ever read the Tenants of Satanism, it's very humanistic. Basically, if I could boil them down, don't be an asshole. Interesting the language he uses here. Often people that are kind of anti-Christianity or anti, you know, even anti-religion, they'll try to not use the word morals or morality because that, you know, attributes something to be objective in a way like there is some, but there are ideals that we can all look towards. So there's ideals in Satanism that is, don't be a substitute for that word because I'm going to bleep it out. Don't be a douche. Maybe that's a little bit less offensive. Don't be a douche. Okay, it's like, that's fine. I'm glad that you have that morality, but where do you get that from? He never, you know, he never actually expounds on that. It's just kind of there. It's just kind of like a group of people got together and they're like, you know what, we're sick and tired of all the rules. We just want to be free and enjoy, you know, what feels natural to us, but we can't start killing each other and we can't start doing, you know, what is socially understood as bad, you know, at least in, you know, large part. So let's put forward just like a couple of general principles and we're going to see some, their version of the Ten Commandments. But you know, you can't get away with the need of a belief system to have some sort of morality because otherwise you just kind of devolve into meaninglessness. And ultimately that's what atheism presents us with. It presents us with no objective morality, simply opinions of stardust and other stardust. You know, it's like there's no fundamental morality or ought. It's just, hey, you know, whatever you want to do after all, the world is meaningless. You're just primordial oozed, evolved over millions of years. So what does it really matter? I feel like I've been living by that idea my whole life. Have I always, have I been a Satanist? Don't be an ass. That's kind of the thing. And even religious people, when you ask them, well, do you agree with this? Do you agree with this? And they'll go, yeah, actually, that makes perfect sense. Yeah, that makes a great sense. Yeah, I agree with that. Congratulations. You agree with the Tenants of Satan. Well, the funny thing is here is he's actually stealing from the Christian worldview. We're not stealing from Satanism. We're saying, yeah, yeah, that sounds okay. That sounds good in kind of a broad sense, just because all of a sudden Satanists are like, hey, well, we need to have some sort of standard of morality. Ultimately, it all comes back to God and God's word and the conscience that he has put within us. It's not atheism. It's not this atheistic sense of, well, we should help preserve other people and do what is best for general humanity. It's like, you made that up. That's not a fundamental tenet of atheism. Atheism says that we are primordial ooze that has evolved over millions of years, that we are stardust bumping into stardust, that we are chemical reactions with no intrinsic meaning, dignity or worth. You can find no morality in that belief system. Throw them up on the screen right now. Just do a little quiz and let us know how many of these you agree with. Okay, let's go through these here just real quick. So one should strive to act with compassion and empathy toward all creatures in accordance with reason. Okay, so it looks like here their foundation is reason. Well, how do you know that your reasoning is valid? How do you know that your logic usage is valid in an atheistic worldview? Logic and reason, they don't exist because they're immaterial, right? Similar to truth. Truth, something that is true or false. That can't, you can't actually quantify that in an atheistic worldview because look, who's to say what is quote unquote true or wrong or an inconsistency. All these things are metaphysical and the atheistic worldview can't account for these things. The struggle for injustice is an ongoing and necessary pursuit that should prevail over laws and institutions. It's a nice idea. I mean, somebody just made this up, so that's fine. Okay, I don't want to go through all these. They're just not that interesting. But this one here, beliefs should conform to one's best scientific understanding of the world. One should take care to never distort scientific facts to fit one's own beliefs. So there's a certain sense of integrity that is called upon for Satanists to follow. It's interesting how science has been touted as the God of our age. It really is. At the same time though, scientists of old, so many of the most famous scientists used the tool of science and exploration and the scientific method in order to explore God's creation, to explore what he has done. It's just interesting how this method of exploring God's creation has been twisted into an idol on its own. People are fallible. If one makes a mistake, one should do one's best to rectify it and resolve any harm that might have been caused. Why? I'm my own God. I could do what I want. Like, what? These principles are like, okay, nice. But it's like, ultimately, if your main understanding of what Satanism is is that you are your own God, why should you care about other people? Really, like I'm just saying, there's some inconsistencies here. Is Satanism a religion or an anti-religion? It has all the defining features of a religion. So it has like a set of shared ritual practices, a community, an aesthetic, certainly a very long history. It's all of those things minus the God element, minus the supernatural element. Satan means opponent, opponent of. Even up into the New Testament, if someone was called Satan, it meant you're my opponent. So is Satanism an anti-religion? At its core, absolutely it is an anti-religion religion. Okay, so, you know, at least they're acknowledging it here. But believe me, it's not a good thing to be in opposition to the Almighty God. That's not a place that we want to stay for very long. Like, when we recognize our sin before God, that is a scary thing to understand God's wrath and His judgment. And we're going to talk about that a little bit later. But it's not something that we want to toy around with this idea of being in opposition to God. That's a scary and frightening thing. I'm hoping that these people come to repentance and faith, that they get themselves out of this literally demonic religion and actually find a renewed and restored relationship with God through Jesus. And instead, like, this rebellion and this outright denial of God's authority in our world and in their lives, it's not good. So it's not good. I keep saying that, but it's not. Do you believe in a literal Satan guy with the horns, with the wings that's buff and red, or more so, what Satan represents? I worship the idea of what Satan represents. I don't believe that there's, you know, a big guy with, like, red skin and wings and all of that. No, Satanism really just says, hey, do whatever you want as long as you, you know, you're not harming anyone. I do not believe in a... Notice again that little caveat. It's like, do whatever you want. But maybe not some things. Why not? Well, we don't really know. Just probably don't. Like, you know, there's no foundation for that little asterisk of what they can do and what you can't do. Can you murder someone? No, no, no, no. Can you lie? Well, maybe sometimes. Can you cheat? Well, only if it's in good fun. It's like they're just making this stuff up as they go, which they are. And the reason I say that is to point us back to God's law, his unchanging law, and also our conscience. God has laid his law on our hearts so that we can know right from wrong. The Bible talks about the law being a mirror to show us our own sin. If we refuse to acknowledge that that mirror is there, that that mirror is actually kind of blurry, that they, you know, it's not really conclusive what that mirror is actually showing, then we can continue on in our sin. But we need to recognize that mirror is clear, that we all do have a knowledge of our own sin, and we need to turn from it and turn to Christ. Literal Satanists. Now, there are people who claim to be Satanists that worship a literal devil. I believe that if you worship a literal devil, that you are literally a devil worship or not a Satanist, because you don't follow the tenets of Satan. I don't believe that I worship anything. I mean, I worship myself. Who's defined? Yeah, okay. Well, at least there's a little bit of an honesty there. Like, I think it's beneficial that people come to this conclusion more quickly than not, because it really grounds us down to the concept of, hey, look, you either worship yourself or you worship God. You can't have two masters here and you need to give up the one to serve the other. And when you're a slave to God, there is so much freedom, because we're actually stepping into who we were made to be in right relationship with God, and he changes our desires, and he actually points us on the path of righteousness, on this path of sanctification, where we are indwelt with the Holy Spirit, now walking with Jesus, growing more and more like him every day. I was a member of a Wesleyan church, and I grew up within a Lutheran church. It was sinful to have, you know, lust, thoughts of lust or envy. And like, I just remember feeling like, oh, like so awful about myself and being like, why do I have no self-control? And the reason why those kinds of guidelines are there is so that you do feel ashamed and that you do act in accordance to those who you must seek forgiveness from. Interesting. There needs to be a distinction here. It's not like the church, quote unquote, is pushing, unless they're kind of a legalistic church that are pushing extra things on to you that are not scriptural. Okay, taking that out of the question. But if they're just preaching the Bible, right, and you feel bad about yourself, well, that is kind of a natural progression of what the law shows us. It shows us that we don't measure up. When we look at how amazing and glorious Jesus is, it shows us that we're not good people. When we look at the Israelites in the Old Testament and they keep on failing and doing pretty much the opposite of what God commands them to do, we're supposed to say, hey, look, that's pretty much me, right? That's my rebellion. And yet Jesus, the ultimate Messiah, has come to bring me back into right relationship with God. I started to not sit with me very well. I'd been reading the Bible and it held onto it. And I was like, but it doesn't make sense. And I don't believe like this. And I went, you know what? I don't believe in the Bible. And I'm more than just, I'm not atheist. I am an extreme anti-theist. I'm a Satanist. I don't really talk to my family anymore. My father, I could never forgive him. He was a very cruel person and he got angry one day and he drowned my brother in the bathtub. Oh my God. When my mother came in, he grabbed her and drowned her. He even grabbed my dog and drowned that in the bathtub too. He was angry because we had not gone to church that day and he was so angry that he decided that he would drown my family. And I'm actually lying about that because I'm talking about... If that were a true story, you could not. You would not be expected to forgive such a monster. You would not be expected to forgive. I'd say, did that man go to prison? Is that man serving life? Is that man being... That man is God in the Old Testament as to God not being able to find not one righteous person accepting for Noah and his family. And so he decided to open up the windows of heaven and pour out and drown the entire earth because he didn't like what they were doing. Okay, okay. So let's think back to what he just said there. He explained a certain story where a father drowned his whole family. And Anthony Padilla, the interviewer's response is like, wow, something bad should happen to that guy. That was absolutely messed up. And so he is actually demonstrating a certain level of justice and judgment on that person's actions. So when we look at the Old Testament, what was going on there? What was going on was child sacrifice, right? There was so much of that going on. Evil worship of pagan gods. There was just debauchery to the greatest extent that this world had ever seen. And so God, looking down in judgment, injustice is going to carry out this act of flooding the world. And so it's like it's not like justice and judgment are foreign to us. It's just we always see God is, or hear about God is this loving, nice, fluffy guy. It's like, no, God has standards. God has morality and he commands of us to follow him and what he has ordained. Ultimately, God is the standard of what is good and what right and wrong. So who are we to say that something is unjust? At the same time, though, he did provide a way out for Noah and his family. He actually helped Noah miraculously in a weird way build this Ark and preserve this family and so that they would be safe. And he told Noah to put pitch on the Ark to act as a seal and a covering so that no water would get in. That word pitch in Hebrew is also the word that we use for atonement. So it's this atonement that God sealed the Ark with that we also understand Jesus' atonement for our sins. He was the seal. He was the covering for us, for our own sin so that we wouldn't experience the wrath and judgment of God. So even in God's justice and his judgment, he was merciful. Like they weren't worshiping him. God is love. I hear that all the time. But to me, love is not telling your children to commit genocide. Love is not telling your children to sacrifice their own children. The concept of hell did not exist prior to the creation of Jesus. I do not like being threatened with eternal damnation. I don't consider that love. Okay, so this guy was presented an idol, basically a false Jesus, a Jesus that is simply, and a God that is simply warm and fluffy and nice and squishy, but he has no real foundation to him, no holiness, no truth, no justice. But God does possess those things. He does. And that is the reason that hell does exist is because when we compare ourselves to other people, our sin doesn't look that bad. But when we compare ourselves to God, we understand that we have fallen infinitely short of God's goodness. And because God is just, he has to punish sin. And hell is that place where people will be punished for all eternity. And Satan and his demons will be punished. But God gave us a way out through Jesus. And that's the good news of the Gospel, that when we trust in Jesus, put our faith in him, repent for our sin, and trust in that sacrifice, Jesus will forgive us and he'll make us new. He'll give us a restored relationship with himself. And in that, we find this newness of life and joy and not a burden of trying to measure up and be a good person. But now there's so much freedom in following Christ. He didn't stay dead. He rose again. You know, he defeated death. Satan, it was never a match with him. And Satan, they weren't two guys battling it out and God just kind of won at the last second. It was like, no, this was God's plan from all along. And what we need to do is swallow our pride and stop rebelling against God and stop treating ourselves like we are God and humble ourselves. James says that God gives his law to the proud but grace to the humble. And we need to ask God for that humility so that we may receive that grace. Thank you so much for watching, guys. If you enjoyed this video, please subscribe because I'm putting out new videos every single day. A huge shout out to everyone on Patreon that makes this content possible. If you want to help me get to my goal of 300 patrons by the end of the year, head to the link in my bio and sign up today. God bless you, God bless you, God bless you.