ESP & The Church
Is there a category for "neutral" spiritual gifts?
My recent episode on Remnant Radio discussing the scientific research behind ESP and the implications for Christians (especially Charismatics) generated a number of questions, not all of which I managed to successfully answer in the one-hour timeframe. One of the primary points of difficulty concerned whether there could be such a thing as a “supernatural” ability to receive preternatural knowledge as an innate faculty of the human person.
Charismatic Christians have no qualms with such things as telepathy, remote viewing, or precognition within Christian contexts, where we use terms like the “word of knowledge” or “prophecy.” These are understood to be the charismata described by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 12–14. The hitch is when such preternatural abilities seem to occur among non-Christians. What do we make of it when non-believers who have not been “sealed” with the Spirit (Eph. 1:13) have precognitive visions or dreams which later come to pass? How do we make sense of it when those who have not yet “seen the light” (2 Cor. 4:4) experience telepathic insights?
Neutral or Demonic?
One of the instinctual answers I’ve heard from both Charismatic and Cessationist Christians is that these episodes must necessarily be demonic in origin. Those who have no category for the “supernatural” outside God/angels on the one hand and Satan/demons on the other hand feel they have little choice in the matter. This is something I wrote about in my “demon of the gaps” article, and it is reflected in the anecdote I brought up about Chris Rosebrough’s precognitive dream about the election of Pope Francis.
The idea that I suggested in the recent interview (and in my book) was that these preternatural abilities might represent a “built-in” aspect of the human soul, one that is able to transcend the normal sensory channels in receiving information. While acknowledging that this conduit may sometimes be harnessed or energized by both angelic and demonic sources, I nonetheless proposed that these mysterious abilities may be neutral by nature. In the parapsychological literature, this is the standard hypothesis regarding such “psi” abilities (though researchers in that field are disinclined to posit demonic interventions and would not typically speak in terms of the “soul”).
As I expressed it in A Magical World:
According to this view, extrasensory abilities are just one faculty among many in the composition of the human being. Once one moves beyond the idea that human beings are more than just flesh and blood—that we have a part of us called the soul—it should be no surprise that certain abilities belong to the immaterial soul while others belong to the material body. And just as some are born with natural aptitudes in physical abilities (e.g., athletic prowess), others may be born with natural aptitudes in spiritual abilities (e.g., spiritual sensitivity). That these abilities may be developed and employed in the service of evil spirits is a given, but it does not negate the reality that they seem to constitute an innate power of the human soul. We should not be so quick to resort to the “demon of the gaps” and write off this universal human experience as evil. Instead, this connection with the nature of the human soul is the key to understanding extrasensory experiences, as well as placing them within the larger context of a supernatural world.1
The Biblical record certainly records a number of “ESP-adjacent” episodes. To use modern terminology, we might speak of “clairvoyance” in 1 Sam. 9:20, “remote viewing” or “out-of-body travel” in 2 Kings 5:1–19 and Luke 4:1–13, and “telepathy” in John 4:16–18. Instances of “precognition,” moreover, are so ubiquitous that one need not even cite them.
I suspect, however, that none of these will satisfy those looking for an unequivocal biblical teaching on the neutrality of spiritual sensitivity or ESP-type giftings. For in each of these instances, the subject of the ability is either Jesus himself or an ordained prophet. We could easily attribute these to the power of the Holy Spirit rather than an innate human ability. It is for this reason that I admit that my case is not airtight from the biblical text alone, and I am happy to consider counterarguments to my position.
ESP & The Church
With that said, I want to make it clear that my suggestion is by no means novel or out of step with orthodoxy. In fact, not only do I argue in my book for its consistency with the biblical worldview, but I also point to figures in the Church who have interacted with the idea. In this article, I want to point to a few of these figures and their respective reflections on ESP abilities. By doing so, I hope to bring greater understanding to this important topic.
Since the term “ESP” was not coined until the twentieth century, and since even terms like “telepathy” only go as far back as the late nineteenth century, this can be a difficult subject to research in terms of Christian history. The various words used to describe these universal abilities (intuitions, divination, prognostications, etc.) make it difficult to conduct a full survey even with modern technology. In the intervening time since the publication of A Magical World, in fact, I have come across a number of additional Church figures who have commented on the subject. Let’s take a look at this non-exhaustive list in chronological order, beginning with the prolific saint from Hippo.
Augustine (Open but Skeptical)
Some people indeed would have it that the human soul has a certain power of divination in itself; but if that is the case, why can it not always make use of it, since it would always like to? Or is it that it does not always get help to enable it to do so? So when it does get help, this can scarcely come from nobody, can it, or from this body? Thus it remains that it gets help from a spirit.
Next the question is, what kind of help? Is it that something is done in the body to loosen the soul from it, so to say, and thus to let its attention scout around until it comes to where it can see in itself significant likenesses? . . .
Or finally, does it sometimes see these things in itself, sometimes through the interaction of another spirit? Whichever of these it is, there should be no hasty assertion of it (The Literal Meaning of Genesis 12:13[27]).2
Augustine is here fielding questions on the notion of precognition as an ability of the human soul. He questions why this ability cannot be used at will if it is indeed an innate ability, and wonders if the ability must be “activated” by an external spirit (whether good or evil). In the end, however, he is clear that “there should be no hasty assertion of it,” and so we can at least say that Augustine was hypothetically open to the idea that the human soul could have an in-built faculty of precognition (which is his meaning for the word “divination” in context).
Gregory the Great (Affirming)
Peter: Now I would like to know how it happens that people so often make predictions when they are at the point of death.
Gregory: Sometimes it is through a subtle power of their own that souls can foresee the future.
At other times the future is made known to them through revelation shortly before death. . . .
There is evidence to show that sometimes the soul by its own subtle powers has knowledge of the future (Dialogues 4:26–27).
Gregory, whom Calvin once called “the last Bishop of Rome” (Institutes 4.17.49), was even more open than Augustine to a natural human ability of precognition. His usage of the terms “sometimes” and “subtle” are perhaps a recognition of this ability’s reputation for being sporadic and not typically available at will—a feature that is borne out in the case studies collected by Louisa Rhine and (later) Sally Rhine Feather.
Thomas Aquinas (Affirming)
This natural prophecy differs in three ways from that about which we are now speaking.
It differs, first, in this, that the prophecy of which we speak gets its foreknowledge of future things immediately from God, although an angel can be an intermediary inasmuch as he acts in virtue of the divine light. But natural prophecy is due to the proper activity of second causes.
Second, it differs in this that natural prophecy extends only to those future things which have determinate causes in nature, but the [supernatural] prophecy of which we speak relates indifferently to all things.
Third, they differ in this, that natural prophecy does not foresee infallibly, but predicts those things which are true for the most part, whereas the prophecy which is a gift of the Holy Spirit foresees the future infallibly. Hence, it is called a sign of the divine foreknowledge, since it foresees with that infallibility with which future things are foreseen by God (Disputed Questions on Truth 12:3).
Although some of my Protestant friends are less keen to take insights from a medieval theologian, no one can accuse Aquinas of being an intellectual slouch. His systematic method for collecting and analyzing information is nearly without rival. And I, for one, am happy to take his opinions into consideration.
Thomas is more forthright about this ability of “natural prophecy” than either Augustine or Gregory. He clearly distinguishes it from divinely-inspired prophecy. The former is fallible and is a faculty of the “soul” or “human imagination” (see Summa Theologica II-II q.172 a.1 resp.), while the latter is infallible and comes from the Holy Spirit. These are precisely the categories that I have suggested.
John Flavel (Affirming)
This eminent Puritan writer had favorable comments for the phenomenon that we now call telepathy. Citing passages from his Pneumatologia, I summarized his view in A Magical World:
Citing a fellow theologian, [Flavel] recognizes those incidences where “the spirit of one at a distance has found itself affected with the motion and state of another,” pointing to “a desire in us to communion of spirits.” He speaks of our communication through “the eye, and the ear” as “painful and short” in comparison with the “better way” of soul-to-soul communication. For spoken language and physical expressions “cannot give an exact copy of our apprehensions, desires, designs, delights, and other affections.” He speaks to these anomalous instances of spirit-to-spirit communication as a foretaste of the heavenly state, when there will be “an ability in those blessed spirits silently, and without sound, to instil and insinuate their minds, and thoughts to each other, by a meer act of their wills,” just as we now can communicate our thoughts to God without the use of our physical senses. He considers the clarity and speed of this future state of telepathic communication “much more noble, perfect and excellent, than that which is in use among us, by words and signs.”3
Flavel, then, understood telepathic impressions and communications as a natural faculty of the human spirit, one that is partially inhibited by the (post-Fall?) body.
F.B. Meyer (Affirming)
Meyer was a close friend and colleague of D.L. Moody, and in many ways was his evangelistic counterpart in England. Although he lived in an era of rampant Spiritualism (which he rejected), he was nonetheless frank about ESP abilities as innate to human nature, writing:
Neither telepathy nor clairvoyance appears deserving of our censure. They are natural properties of the mind, and only reveal the wondrous faculties with which the Almighty has endowed us.4
Watchman Nee (Recognition with a Prohibition)
The intrepid Chinese church leader Watchman Nee recognized ESP as a natural human ability: “Before his fall Adam could quite naturally exercise this ability with ease.”5
At the same time, however, he strictly cautions his followers not to develop these abilities. Due to the Fall, there is too much risk of these abilities being usurped for evil purposes. He goes so far as to say that “all who develop their soul power cannot avoid being contacted and used by [an] evil spirit.”6 Nee, it seems, believed that these abilities will be re-established in the eschaton, but that they are to be eschewed by Christians in the meantime. Still, we may say that he does not believe that these abilities are intrinsically demonic.
John Warwick Montgomery (Affirming)
If prediction of the future is indeed possible, what interpretation should be placed upon it? Is it divine, demonic, or neither? The answer is that it can be any one of the three, depending upon the pattern (Gestalt) of the particular prophetic situation. The simple precognitive faculty, as represented in ESP experiments, is no more “demonic” (or “angelic”!) than a faculty of lightning calculation or the ability to play the piano by ear. Here we are evidently encountering a mental faculty . . . which permits some people to look through the temporal haze separating the future from the present.7
Prominent in the second half of the twentieth century, Montgomery was a renowned Lutheran apologist and international lawyer, among other roles. He had a renegade streak at times and was always characterized by curiosity and imagination in his writings. His passing last month marks the end of an era.
His view, like mine, recognized that precognitive abilities may come from God or demons, but that, in some cases, they may simply reflect a natural “mental faculty” of human beings. He goes on to caution against those who fancy themselves fortunetellers or who presume to “pronounce on the nature of life and the meaning of the universe,” citing the negative examples of Papus, Rasputin, and Edgar Cayce.8 Yet at the same time he maintains that the ability itself is innate and not intrinsically divine or demonic.
Furthermore, in his section on the ability known as “second sight” among the Scottish, he writes:
Without prior warning, those having this faculty “see” a future event, often an accident or death, and can relate the circumstances that will accompany it. Andrew Lang found this strange phenomenon in the folk literature of peoples as widely separated as the Australians and the Incas, but it is particularly associated with the Scottish Highlands. Indeed, so many attested cases have been recorded in that geographical area that the phenomenon is often termed “Highland second sight.”9
The fact that this ability is cross culturally recognized among the Christianized Scottish as well as among pagans lends support to the idea that premonitions may be a natural human ability. Montgomery notes again in this section that the “gift” in question is typically spontaneous and uncontrollable, often associated with tragic events (something that is again corroborated by the case studies collected by Louisa Rhine and Sally Rhine Feather). Montgomery speaks, at least in this case, not of professional psychics and fortunetellers, but of ordinary citizens who are sometimes bombarded by preternatural revelations.
John White (Affirming)
John White was a companion of John Wimber and a large influence on Jack Deere. His role as a theologian and practitioner within the “Third Wave” of the Charismatic renewal can hardly be overstated. He shares stories of premonitions and telepathy from within his own family:
I have seen the same thing happening in my family. I remember my mother suddenly turning round sharply at home and with a startled expression on her face, saying, “Your Auntie Jenny’s having an operation! They’re anesthetizing her. I can smell the chloroform!” And it was so. At that hour. My mother was not a psychic. So far as I know it was the only time something like that ever happened to her. And she did what a Christian does under those circumstances. She prayed for the person whose chloroforming she could smell.
In a similar way my grandmother was aroused from sleep one night during the Battle of the Somme in World War 1 to see my Uncle John, her son, marching wearily in his muddied uniform, beside her bed. Suddenly he clutched his belly and pitched head-first through the floor. She waited months for the cable from the war office, knowing what it would say, “. . . missing in action and presumed dead.” His sergeant later visited her and described to her exactly what she had seen.
Both of these experiences are textbook cases of ESP. And yet White is careful not to dismiss them as demonic:
Many Christians have these experiences. Some fear to talk about them because they go under the rubric of second sight and are thought to be occult. And so they can be. They are in fact brief flashes of prophetic insight. And as I continue to insist, people can have such experiences in alliance with the powers of darkness even though in their origins they are God-given.
We must of course recognize that White does not expressly call these incidents natural human abilities. Rather, he sees them as “God-given.” And in at least one of the above cases, the subject was indeed a Christian. That being said, his last statement that this “second sight” is God-given at its most basic level but that it can sometimes be usurped by “the powers of darkness” agrees with my basic framework for understanding ESP abilities.
Sam Storms (Open?)
After the Remnant interview, a listener reached out to inform me that Sam Storms himself—the contemporary godfather of the “reasonable Charismatics”—has written on the idea of spiritual gifts afforded to non-believers. In an appendix to Understanding Spiritual Gifts, he writes:
Could it be, then, that by means of his bountiful display of common grace toward an unbelieving world, the Spirit at times mercifully bestows on the non-Christian at least some capacity to operate in supernatural power that may bear some degree of resemblance to the charismata that are given to those who are born-again? If true, this would certainly account for what we see in the life of Judas as well as in the experience of those we read about in Matthew 7:21–23. But the charismata themselves are reserved for God’s children, those who have also been made the merciful recipients of God’s saving, special grace.
It is important to note that Storms nowhere speaks of ESP. Instead, he refers to non-believers who might be loosely affiliated with the Church having the supernatural ability to exorcize demons or prophesy.
That said, what is important for our purposes is to note Storms’ openness to the idea that non-Christians may hold supernatural “gifts” by virtue of common grace, which gifts are expressly not to be identified as the charismata reserved for Spirit-filled Christians. This category allows for the idea that non-believers may indeed operate in such abilities without necessarily attributing them to demons.
Douglas Wilson (Open)
I have previously expressed admiration for Doug Wilson’s brand of Cessationism—one in which God still works mysterious and miraculous things on a regular basis.
Wilson has a category for natural ESP abilities which may be neither divine nor demonic. In fact, he even makes use of this category to warn Charismatics from too readily attributing preternatural knowledge to the Holy Spirit. In the wake of the Strange Fire conference of 2013, he wrote:
In short, the fact that I know something by other-than-normal-means doesn’t make this knowledge infallible or divinely inspired, any more than my knowledge by normal means. I can know something because I read it in a book, but can still get that knowledge wrong in some respect. The fact that I got the knowledge in a dream means that it is not materialistic—which is not the same thing as being infallible. I might have second sight—but there is no reason why that second sight of mine might not be near-sighted. It might be true, human knowledge, but not inspired, and it might be true, human knowledge acquired by some human capacity that we have not figured out yet. But, as human knowledge, it remains fallible. This is why charismatics who have such experiences (which they may genuinely have) ought not to be too quick to attribute it to the Holy Spirit. Maybe they are just fey.
Curiously, Wilson is here adopting Aquinas’ distinction between the fallible “natural prophecy” of the human soul and the infallible prophecy which originates with the Holy Spirit.
After Brandon Biggs’ infamous prediction of Donald Trump being shot in the ear came to pass, Wilson commented:
I think that video is remarkable, and I don’t think it is coincidence. But in order for it to be a prophetic vision from God every detail has to be fulfilled, and not just one. Was Trump’s ear drum broken, for example? And was he radically born again when he fell? Now if it was not a vision from God, what was it? I do believe there is such a thing as second sight, that even nonbelievers can have, but which is not guaranteed accurate. We do not live in a materialist cosmos.
Again, Wilson distinguishes between natural abilities of precognition and Spirit-inspired prophecy. Michael Miller, himself a Charismatic, spoke of the possibility that the Biggs prophecy “could be supernatural, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that’s God using him as a prophet.”
Concluding Thoughts
A number of questions still remain partially or wholly unanswered for Christians:
What is the precise relationship between the “natural” abilities of ESP and the charismata described by St. Paul? Are they to be identified with each other, with the only differentiation being their Christian context (Simon Tugwell)?10 Are they completely separate phenomena (Wayne Grudem)?11 Or is there a middle position where “the spirit both heightens natural sensibilities and imparts new energies” (Donald Bloesch)?12
How do we clearly distinguish between ESP and the gift of prophecy when making judgments (1 Cor. 14:29)? Should these categories be added to an arsenal of interpretative options when considering “prophets” with significant moral or theological failings (e.g., Paul Cain, William Branham)? Jack Deere has offered four categories of “prophets” in his discernment advice:
Spiritual Prophets who use their charisma to glory God
Carnal Prophets who use their charisma to magnify themselves
False Prophets who employ the devil’s power
False Prophets who “have learned how to traffic in the Lord’s power”
Perhaps the information that we have regarding ESP abilities could help refine this diagnostic list. As I have said, I hope to see more Charismatic scholars dive into this subject matter.
How should we understand Remote Viewers who contract with the government to spy on enemy territory, locate hostages, or foil smugglers? Are these men and women guilty of violating the prohibitions against divination expressed in Deut. 18:10? Watchman Nee would probably say yes. Michael Heiser might disagree. I mentioned in the Remnant interview Paul Smith’s report of the controversy that broke out among the Remote Viewers when a woman who consulted “spirit guides” was inducted into the program. A large proportion of the Remote Viewers objected at this “occult turn,” arguing that they were practicing innate human abilities and that they did not want the involvement of discarnate spirits (whether or not the existence of those spirits could even be proved).
How should people with these apparent natural abilities be discipled in the Church? Should they view their past experiences as intrinsically occult or demonic? Or should they understand a continuity between their pre-conversion sensibilities and the charismata? One mentor of mine listened to the Remnant episode and instinctively thought of Bavinck’s notion of “grace restoring nature,” writing to me: “maybe we had this before the Fall and in Christ, we get it back in the Charismatic gifts. Meanwhile, there are those who remind us what we lost.”
Despite these lingering questions, I hope that the above citations and reflections have made it clear that there is a plausible Christian framework for understanding that God has endowed human beings with some sort of innate ability of preternatural knowledge—perhaps via the conduit of the soul or spirit, as some theologians have suggested. Maybe, as Sam Storms has speculated, we can classify such non-charismata gifts as part of God’s common grace.
Matthew McGuire, A Magical World: How the Bible Makes Sense of the Supernatural (Independent, 2024), 104–105.
I am indebted to Jimmy Akin and his course, “Religious Perspectives on Psi,” for bringing to my attention these quotations from Augustine, Gregory the Great, and Aquinas.
McGuire, A Magical World, 109.
F.B. Meyer, The Modern Craze of Spiritualism, as quoted in Cris Putnam, The Supernatural Worldview: Examining Paranormal, Psi, and the Apocalyptic (Crane: Defender, 2014), 220.
Watchman Nee, The Latent Power of the Soul (New York: Christian Fellowship, 1972), 20.
Nee, The Latent Power of the Soul, 29.
John Warwick Montgomery, Principalities and Powers: A Fascinating Look at the Paranormal, the Supernatural, and the Hidden Things, Revised ed., (Irvine: NRP, 2017), 125.
Montgomery, Principalities and Powers, 126.
Montgomery, Principalities and Powers, 132. See also Sheldrake’s discussion of the Scandinavian phenomenon known as vardøger (The Sense of Being Stared At: And Other Unexplained Powers of Human Minds, (Rochester; Toronto: Park Street, 2013), 214–215.
Simon Tugwell, Did You Receive the Spirit? (New York; Paramus; Toronto: Paulist, 1972), 104.
Wayne Grudem, The Gift of Prophecy in the New Testament and Today, Revised ed. (Eastbourne: Kingsway, 2001), 99.
Donald Bloesch, The Holy Spirit: Works & Gifts (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2000), 292 (emphasis added).