Do Ghosts Exist?

I just recommended Ghost Master a few days ago and I had this crazy idea, why not write a related post from a theological angle? This is, afterall, what I had originally intended to do with the blog.

So here's the question, do ghosts exist?

I am of the conviction that they do not exist, at least not in the way we usually think of them.


When people talk about ghosts I'm assuming that they refer to the spirits of the deceased. A wandering child who runs out in front of cars on rainy nights and then suddenly vanishes right where he was run over some 30 years back. An ill tempered store manager who still haunts his old establishment, knocking things off the wall and moving furniture late at night. Even a well meaning parent or grandparent who chooses to stay after death and watch over their loved ones, speaking and appearing every so often. I don't believe in these 'ghosts', but I am sometimes inclined to believe the stories of people who say they've encountered what they think are ghosts.

The reason for my disbelief is the way that God has ordered the world. In the book of Hebrews 9:27 it says "man has been appointed to die once and after that to face judgement." That judgment being either with Christ in heaven or apart from Christ in hell. How to choose one destination and avoid the other is fully explained but the logistics of precisely how and when this takes place aren't. Even so there is no 'in between' phase or cracks for lost souls to slip through. Every time someone dies their soul is taken out of the world and will not return until the end of time when Jesus returns and everyone who ever died gets resurrected back to life, the righteous to a new heaven and a new earth and the unrighteous to damnation. This is foundational to Christian belief and has always been a part of our earliest creeds and confessions.

So if the souls of the deceased are being held for judgement and are no longer a part of our world then how does one explain 'paranormal' phenomena like what is described above? I would argue that most 'ghostly' experiences are our minds playing tricks on us. We hear scary stories or invent our own and in the right situation, when we are tense and naturally hovering on the fight or flight reaction our minds are racing to make sense of the sounds and sights and all it takes is our sub-conscience to say "ghost" and suddenly we're hearing footsteps where there are none and seeing faces in every corner where you can't quite make out what's there. There are also a lot of conditions, medications, and drugs which put the user in an altered state of mind where seeing and hearing things that don't exist is normal.

A small amount of stories can also be explained by other people playing tricks on us, setting up the illusion of a haunting like a practical joke. This is how 'paranormal investigators' make there living, by convincing people with illusions and acting the part.

To a materialist (one who only believes in physical things) these are the only explanations that one can have for ghosts. The Bible, however, also testifies to the existence of other spiritual beings aside from human souls and God himself, namely angels and demons. The angels were created to be God's servants, they act as his agents in the world and very rarely draw attention to themselves. The demons are fallen angels who chose to rebel and now roam the earth trying to undo God's work and destroy as many people as possible be leading them into spiritual snares and trying to keep them away from Christ.

From a Biblical perspective it is natural to attribute otherwise unexplainable 'ghosts' to demons who are masquerading as the souls of deceased. Why would a demon pretend to be a ghost? Because they want to be worshiped and feared, because it is their nature to deceive, because they revel in death and corruption, because once they have permission they will try to distract, torment, and destroy anyone they can. (Deut 32:17; 1 Cor 10:20; John 8:44; 2 Cor 4:4; 11:14; Rev 12:9; 2; Thess 2:9-10; Jude 1:6; 2 Peter 2:4; ) The boot fits the foot rather well.

In my personal experience I've encountered enough evidence to convince me that The Bible isn't speaking metaphorically about demons but that they are an actual reality, albeit one that we needn't focus on too much.


Q - Why couldn't God send a spirit back into the world to make amends for its sins?
A - Because the method God has chosen to make amends for sins is to put faith in his one and only Son, Jesus, who took all the sins of the world upon himself and paid their price in full. Even in life there is nothing we can do to make amends before God except to accept the grace and forgiveness offered in Jesus Christ. (John 3:16; Acts 4:12; Rom 3:23-24; 6:23)

Q - Could angels be confused for ghosts?
A - No. Every time an angel appears in Scripture it makes its presence and intentions known immediately. There is no mistaking an angel for a ghost. (Ex 3:2-4; Judges 2:1-2; Luke 1:11-19; 1:26-38; Gen 16:7-13; Acts 12:7; Num 22:22-24; Mat 1:20, 2:13)

Q - What about mediums, Ouija boards, seances, necromancy, etc?
A - Attempts to communicate with the dead are forbidden in Scripture because all such attempts are first of all futile (the dead do not talk back) and secondly open one's self up to the demonic.