A video titled “Iran’s Role in Biblical Prophecy” dropped recently and already has millions of views. It casts Iran—under its biblical name, Persia—as a major prophetic player from Genesis to Revelation. It’s dramatic. Emotional. Seamlessly woven with scripture. And that’s exactly what makes it dangerous.

Because when a story comes wrapped in divine authority and drops during geopolitical upheaval, it’s not just information—it’s indoctrination (a framework taught so completely, it rarely gets questioned). It becomes a filter. It tells you who the “enemy” is, who God is using, and what side you’d better be on. It doesn’t invite reflection. It demands alignment.

I know this story because I lived inside it.

I was raised in the evangelical world. For a long time, I followed its rhythm, internalized its values, and measured myself against its version of truth. But here’s the part that saved me: I had other windows.

My father, for all his quirks and complexities, loved dream interpretation. He talked openly about astrology. He introduced ideas that showed me meaning could exist in places the church never dared to look. My Little Grandma Rose—God, she was pure love in human form—did her best to help me wrestle with questions most grown-ups brushed aside. Questions like: Why doesn’t the Bible mention dinosaurs? Did the world really only start 2,000 years ago? She didn’t have every answer, but she had the kind of heart that made space for the asking.

Looking back, I realize she didn’t have the access I do now. She lived her faith in the world she was handed—a world where obedience mattered more than exploration. She didn’t go to college. She focused on her family, her church, her flower garden, and her belief in a good God. And I honor that.

But I also understand now why some of my family still live within the walls of that same story. They’re trying to be good people in a framework that teaches them questioning is dangerous. It’s not that they’re blind—it’s that they’ve been shaped not to look past what they were told.

And yet, some of us were made to stretch.

As I grew older, I studied. I mean really studied. Religion. Psychology. History. I made it to graduate school for clinical psychology. I’ve spent years exploring the frameworks that shape the human mind. I’ve read across traditions. And I’ve seen something many people are too afraid to name:

Most belief systems aren’t chosen. They’re inherited. And fear is often the glue that holds them together.

I’ve heard it so many times: “I just wouldn’t want to be wrong.”

To anyone still saying that, I say this with love:
If your faith is based on a fear of hell, I invite you to consider something that set me free—
The version of hell you were taught? Eternal torment? That wasn’t original. It was invented. A tool to control behavior and maintain order.
And once you realize that, so much of the fear starts to lose its grip.

You don’t have to live inside a glass house built by fear. The roof won’t cave in if you step outside. In fact, outside is where the real knowing begins.

The world is bigger than any one religion can contain. Your mind is more expansive than any doctrine can limit. Your soul was made to stretch.

And now, more than ever, we need people who are willing to stretch.

Stretching the Mind Beyond the Map

There comes a point when you realize the map you were given doesn’t cover the whole terrain.

For me, that realization didn’t happen all at once—it unfolded over years. In quiet thoughts. In contradictions I couldn’t ignore. In the longing I felt for something more than “because the Bible says so.” I was told the map was complete, unquestionable. But cracks started forming when I looked around at the actual landscape of the world: science, history, ancient texts, spiritual traditions that predated Christianity itself. Suddenly, it didn’t feel rebellious to ask questions—it felt necessary.

I think some of us were born with an instinct to press beyond the lines.

Even back when I was supposed to believe without doubt, I couldn’t ignore the pull to understand the why behind the what. My curiosity wasn’t defiance—it was devotion of a different kind. And what I’ve learned since is this:

Stretching your understanding isn’t a betrayal of your faith. It’s the beginning of your freedom.

As I studied more—everything from world religions to psychology to astrology to ancient cosmology—I realized that Christianity was never the whole story. And maybe it was never meant to be.

I studied the Essenes, who were deeply mystical and steeped in a kind of dualism that mirrored Zoroastrian thought. I explored the idea that Jesus himself might’ve grown up in an environment filled with apocalyptic expectation and celestial interpretation. The Magi weren’t a side note in the nativity story—they were astrologers from the East, likely Persian, and their understanding of the stars led them to the feet of a newborn prophet. That alone should challenge how we frame what’s sacred and what’s heretical.

And while there’s no hard evidence that Jesus formally studied astrology or Eastern traditions during his “missing years,” I find it telling how little the Gospels say about the decades that shaped him. That silence is space. Space for curiosity. Space for mystery. Space to wonder what shaped his depth.

This isn’t about rewriting history—it’s about reclaiming the right to seek.

I’ve met people who act like there’s only one door to truth and anything else is a trap. But doors exist for a reason—and I believe many of them were meant to be opened. Some gently. Some with a crowbar. But all of them with honesty.

The map you were handed might have been sacred to someone else. But if you’re sensing that it no longer fits, that doesn’t mean you’re lost.

It means you’re starting to find your own way.

A Prophecy Is Not a Policy

We’re at war with Iran. And now, right in the middle of escalating tensions, a polished, emotionally-charged video is circulating—casting Iran’s role in biblical prophecy as inevitable, even righteous.

It pulls from ancient scriptures to paint a modern enemy. It draws a straight, unquestioned line from Persia in the Book of Daniel to Iran on the evening news. It gives spiritual weight to political decisions, and in doing so, it quietly reassures viewers that conflict is not just inevitable—it’s divine.

This is what happens when people confuse prophecy with policy.

It’s not that the Bible should be discarded. It’s that the Bible—like every sacred text—needs to be held with context, wisdom, and a healthy understanding of history, psychology, and power. Otherwise, it becomes a tool of projection, not reflection.

We’re not meant to use scripture to dehumanize. But that’s exactly what happens when we spiritualize military action or claim to know God’s geopolitical preferences. The war of Gog and Magog wasn’t meant to become a defense budget talking point.

This is where indoctrination shows its teeth. It doesn’t look like hatred—it looks like certainty. Certainty that your country is always right. That your religion holds all the answers. That your enemy is already damned. And in that certainty, empathy disappears.

We’re taught to love our neighbor… unless they’re from a nation we’ve demonized in the name of prophecy. Then it becomes permissible—even righteous—to look away.

But that’s not discernment. That’s just another form of fear.

“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.”
—Carl Jung

You’re Allowed to Evolve

You are not wrong for asking questions.
You are not broken because you’re growing.
You are not lost just because the story no longer fits.

You are evolving. And evolution, especially spiritual evolution, is a sacred thing.

The hardest part isn’t realizing the story was incomplete—it’s realizing that the people you love may still be clinging to it for safety. I see it in my own family. Some hold on because they’re afraid of being wrong. Others because the world has changed too fast and they want something familiar to anchor them.

But if your foundation is built on fear—fear of hell, fear of questioning, fear of getting it wrong—I want you to hear this from someone who has walked that path and stepped off of it:

You are allowed to change. You are allowed to grow. You are allowed to leave behind what no longer holds truth for you.

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”
—Socrates

Maybe you were taught to stay inside a doctrine that felt safe. But what if safety was never the goal? What if it’s not about being certain—but being honest?

“The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.”
—Bertrand Russell

Doubt is not the enemy. Doubt is the compass. It’s what moves us from inherited frameworks to lived wisdom. It’s what pulls us away from certainty and toward curiosity, toward connection, toward a deeper, freer relationship with whatever you choose to call the divine.

You don’t need permission from a pastor or a prophet.
You don’t need a theologian’s blessing to listen to your intuition.
The universe has always been big enough to hold your questions.

So stretch. Expand. Wander. Relearn. Reclaim.
If the glass house shatters, let it.

What remains will be the real foundation.

The one you chose for yourself.

? Watch the video referenced above:

While I encourage you to view it with discernment, I’ve included it here so readers can see firsthand how these narratives are being framed and shared. Consider this an invitation to watch with both eyes open.