Man’s fascination with UFOs and aliens seems to know no bounds. Apart from science fiction movies, more and more reports are being published of people claiming to have seen UFOs or of having had “close encounters of the third kind,” including having allegedly been the victims of alien abductions.

In a recent article by Politico, dated November 17, it was stated:

“Early in Ronald Reagan’s second term, he asked his Soviet counterpart a seemingly off-the-wall question… Reagan turned to his Cold War enemy and said: ‘What would you do if the United States were suddenly attacked by someone from outer space? Would you help us?,’ Gorbachev later recounted. ‘I said, “No doubt about it.” He said, “We too.”’…

“Reagan… had an encounter with a UFO while riding in a plane in the 1970s. Reagan, it turns out, wasn’t the only president who has had a more than passing interest in the possibility of extraterrestrial life. For the past half-century, almost every president has come to office pledging — publicly or privately — to get to the bottom of UFOs…

“Jimmy Carter spotted his UFO while waiting for a Lion’s Club event to start on Jan. 6, 1969… [According to Politico, this UFO was later explained as a man-made natural phenomenon, “a high-altitude rocket-released barium cloud.”]

“Most recently, in 2021, former President Barack Obama spoke about the mystery [saying] ‘that there’s footage and records of objects in the skies that we don’t know exactly what they are. We can’t explain how they moved, their trajectory. They did not have an easily explainable pattern.’”

And so, conspiracies abound to the effect that the government is hiding the truth about aliens and that the remains of an alien body or bodies are kept secret in Roswell.

It must be pointed out that many reported UFO “sightings” and “encounters” can be explained naturally. After all, UFO means “unidentified flying object”—and many, if not most of those “sightings” have a natural origin. When it comes to “strange” occurrences such as alleged encounters or even abductions etc., they can often be explained with hallucinations, wishful thinking and wild human imagination. But some of the reports might be very real, and if so, how can they be explained?

Most associate UFOs with the existence of aliens, even though the Bible nowhere suggests that aliens exist—or have existed—on other planets. While the argument is that the mere biblical silence does not deny their existence, it would be strange if God, the Creator of EVERYTHING, visible and invisible, never even gives a hint of the possibility of such extraterrestrial human-like existence on other planets. From beginning to end, the Bible deals with the human existence on earth… including when man in the future will have been made immortal on a new earth and a new universe.

And so, some associate UFOs, if they believe in them, not with aliens, but with demons or angels.

We state the following in our free booklet, “Angels, Demons and the Spirit World”: 

“Satan and his demons can show great signs and wonders…  Haunted houses, poltergeists, séances, communication with the dead, and contacts with ‘aliens’ are all clearly of demonic origin…

“Satan and demons have the power to transport a human being from one place to another (Matthew 4:5, 8; Luke 4:5, 9). This explains strange encounters with UFOs, where ‘abducted’ people are sometimes found hundreds of miles away from their residence, without knowing how they got there…

“It appears from Scripture that demons cannot materialize themselves the way that angels can. Demons cannot appear as men. They can, however, create an illusion, or an apparition that might look very real to people…”

When we research the topic on the Internet, we find that more often than not, it is claimed that UFOs are holy angels manifesting themselves in some way. It is sometimes claimed that UFOs give us a glimpse of the fights between angels and demons (which do exist, as passages in the book of Daniel clearly prove; compare Daniel 10:13, 20)… even though UFO sightings do not even remotely picture such fights; or that angels have manifested themselves in many different ways, and that they can appear in whatever form and shape they want. This, too, is manifestly wrong. Angels are created spirit beings, but when they manifest themselves, they do so by showing their true appearance in the physical realm, but of course not as glorified spirit beings, except in visions. On the other hand, remember that demons cannot manifest themselves as physical beings (but they can create illusions and apparitions and “lying wonders”).

Furthermore, some say that the Bible proves the existence of UFOs by claiming that fallen angels had sexual intercourse with women. This false teaching is based on a wrong understanding of the passage in Genesis 6. As we explain in our free booklet,  “Heavens and Earth… Before and After the First Man,” in chapter 5, that passage describes forbidden sexual relationships between human beings— the unrighteous descendants of Cain and the righteous descendants of Seth.

Is it conceivable, then, that some UFOs could be the manifestations and the activities of holy angels?

Those who propose this concept give certain biblical examples of human encounters with God’s angels (while others use those same examples to “prove” the existence of aliens).

Ezekiel repeatedly saw in a vision four cherubim (Ezekiel, chapters 1 and 10). Some have used this description to say that they depict aliens with spaceships—an idea which had been made popular by Swiss author Erich von Däniken in the late 1960s and more recently by the 2009 movie “Knowing” with Nicolas Cage.

What Ezekiel saw was a clear manifestation, in a vision, of angelic beings carrying the throne of Christ, who in turn delivered a powerful message to Ezekiel to pass on to the people. By contrast, no godly messages are contained in or communicated by UFOs or “alien abductions.”

David saw an angel with a drawn sword to punish Israel. David immediately understood the message and asked God for forgiveness and for the angel to stop slaughtering the Israelites (2 Samuel 24:16-17). In Luke 1, Gabriel appears to Zacharias and to Mary with a clear message. Daniel saw an angel in a vision in Daniel 9 and 10, who passed on a detailed message from God. On the other hand, no clear or even hidden UFO or alien message is communicated to anyone (except in science fiction movies), but all it does is confuse people—and God is not the author of confusion (compare 1 Corinthians 14:33).

We also read that angels appear unrecognized (compare Hebrews 13:2; the example given has to do with testing Christians to see how hospitable they are). Practical examples could perhaps be the appearance of two angels to Lot and to the people of Sodom. Their appearance and their message had clear purpose—to see how many righteous were in Sodom, and to lead Lot out of Sodom before its destruction.

We point out the following in our free booklet, “Angels, Demons and the Spirit World”:

“Hebrews 1:14 says about angels: ‘Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?’ Psalm 34:7 adds: ‘The angel of the LORD encamps all around those who fear Him [that is, ‘who will inherit salvation’], And delivers them’…

“God sends forth His angels to ‘minister,’ that is, to serve and help man achieve his potential to inherit salvation—eternal life in the Family of God. With this understanding, let’s take note of the particular services that angels are called upon to perform.”

We then explain in our booklet seven purposes, namely:

• God’s angels protect us from harm;
• God’s angels are sent to direct, guide and lead us on our path to spiritual salvation;
• God’s angels guide us in physical ways;
• God’s angels give us encouragement and strength;
• God’s angels serve us by punishing the unrighteous;
• God’s angels serve us when they punish us for our sin;
• God’s angels serve us by fighting Satan and his demons.

On the other hand, we should realize that what God’s angels don’t and won’t do is:

• To confuse us;
• To give us uncertain “messages”;
• To appear just for show, without any purpose or message;
• To manifest themselves in ways which clearly do not depict their real appearance, even in the physical realm. Our booklet, “Angels, Demons and the Spirit World,” describes the appearance of angels, and they in no way resemble descriptions of those who claim that they had encounters with UFOs and were the victims of alien abductions. Those abductions might have appeared very real to the persons, and it is interesting that many times, they do not “remember” exactly or at all what has happened to them… as somebody under hypnosis has normally no recollection of what happened during the hypnosis when he is “awakened.” (That is why we should NEVER allow someone to hypnotize us.) It is also interesting that many times, those who claimed that they had encounters with aliens had a certain proclivity for the acceptance of such encounters. Finally, the description of those aliens are very similar, so as to create the illusion of their real existence; whereas it seems to be a complete hoax, inspired by demons, to confuse mankind. Again, demons cannot materialize themselves, but they can create illusions which may look very real. Appearances of the “Virgin Mary” might be classic examples.

As pointed out above, when angels do manifest themselves to us, they do it for a clear purpose… to help us, to test us, or to encourage us. Nothing like that can be said about the sightings of UFOs which seem to have no godly purpose at all. What possible godly purpose could there be in UFO sightings? But they give room for speculations regarding the existence of aliens and extraterrestrial spaceships—many times combined with the idea that they are out there to destroy us. If we consider the appearance of UFOs as a godly warning, then we should remember that God condemns those who practice astrology and who observe the clouds or planets for guidance. Deuteronomy 18:14 says, literally, that we are not to observe the clouds—as the study and motion of the clouds was a common way of foretelling good or bad fortune. 2 Chronicles 33:6 draws a clear connection between observing times (or clouds), using enchantments and witchcraft, and dealing with a familiar spirit (a demon) and with wizards.

Could it be that Satan is “preparing” mankind for Christ’s return in the sense that Satan is convincing mankind that the coming Christ will be in fact a hostile alien who will have to be destroyed? We read that armies will fight Christ and His holy angels when they appear (Revelation 17:14; 19:11-14, 19). They may perhaps think He is the Antichrist… or the leader of hostile aliens, riding on “white horses,” which they may interpret as strangely construed “spaceships.”

To summarize, there is little room to assume that UFOs and “close encounters of the third kind” are alien or angelic manifestations. Rather, the evidence points to the divisive activities of demonic forces with the declared goal to confuse and deceive a gullible and God-defying mankind.

Lead Writer: Norbert Link