January 16, 2025 • 10 mins
This episode was released on January 6, 2025.
Tony Merkel went hunting for for portals in the woods but ends up discovering something more disturbing than he ever imagined. A shocking truth revealed!
@TheConfessionalsPodcast
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
That set me off. I was like, what the heck? I got to go visit this property.
(00:04):
We went out there and we visited the property hunting for portals.
Not a good idea.
Tell me about some of the things that have affected you,
because I know as you talk about this, in a way,
you're opening yourself up to spiritual warfare.
Not in a way you are opening up your yourself to spiritual warfare.
(00:24):
Not that you're necessarily opening the door like somebody would be playing
with a Ouija board or other occult type things.
But because you're exposing it, you're under attack yourself.
Can we talk about that for a little bit?
Yeah. So doing this stuff definitely gets a target on your back.
And I use the example at times where, you know, I'm a big basketball fan.
(00:50):
I know you guys are in Orlando, the Orlando Magic.
I look at it as a game almost,
where if you say you're a Christian and you're just riding the bench,
nobody's going to guard you.
And even worse, if you say you're a Christian, you get put in a game
and you're just standing at half court and the game's going on,
(01:11):
you're not participating, nobody's going to guard you.
As soon as you start becoming a problem,
that's when the opponent pays attention to you.
And that is something that I've experienced
throughout the years doing this.
It's something that, you know,
I don't really I don't really have a great understanding
(01:34):
as to how it all works.
But I know that in the spiritual realm
where these wars are happening and between God's angels
and these demonic principalities,
somebody like me doing what I'm doing,
it's like I'm almost like a glowing green, you know?
(01:55):
It's just like I stand out in a dark room.
And I feel like at times I do things and it's like all eyes get put on me.
And it's something that I've had people over the years tell me,
you got to be careful.
And I agree, you got to be careful.
But when God calls you to do something,
(02:17):
I firmly believe he's going to protect you.
And guide you through it.
And it's not to say I've done it perfectly.
I've done things that I've regretted over the years.
I've done things that I've misstepped on.
And I'm like, oh, that was a really bad decision.
And I walked in ignorance, thinking God will protect me.
(02:39):
And it's not always the most pleasurable experience
going through the stuff.
You can get carried away with some of the stuff.
Like when I first started really understanding this idea of portals,
I was fascinated by it because I just...
(03:02):
It wasn't until probably about two years ago, three years ago,
that it really started becoming a thing on the show where people...
I had a frame reference to understand that this is actually something legit.
And I got really interested in it.
And I remember there's a woman, her name is Dr. Laura Sanger,
(03:24):
and I had her on the show.
And the first time I had her on the show,
it was right around the time that I started learning about this stuff,
then how portals and the astral realm and all this stuff.
And I forget what her and I were talking about,
but last month I was at a conference in Utah.
(03:45):
And right before I left, I sat down with her husband and her for dinner.
And we were fellowshiping and talking.
And she told me, the first time we talked,
she said she walked away from the interview
thinking I had an unhealthy interest in the topic of portals.
And I confirmed to her, you're absolutely right, I did.
(04:08):
I absolutely did.
I was infatuated with it.
And I put myself in positions with that infatuation,
where I feel like I overstepped the line on certain things.
And I regretted it on a spiritual level where I feel like I...
(04:30):
Disrespected the Lord, but also I felt like God gave me a lot to be trusted with.
And I felt like I abused that at certain points.
And for instance, there's a guy that came to my studio,
and he's in Kentucky, and he has some really wild stuff happening.
(04:54):
And he talks about this magic, and he's like,
this magical cave, I don't know how else to call it, but it's huge.
30 foot ceilings, it goes back for miles.
He's been exploring it his entire life.
He hasn't explored the whole thing yet.
And in the same conversation, he shares with me
(05:14):
that he saw a portal in the woods around the cave.
And he was able to take a picture of it.
And he showed me the picture.
And it was like, I've seen a lot of pictures,
and people say, oh, it's Bigfoot in the trees.
I'm like, that's a shadow, or it's a tree.
This was a glowing sphere in the woods.
(05:38):
And when you zoom in and look at it,
you can see how it's actually going behind one of the other trees in the foreground.
It was definitely something that was actually there.
And he said he took his camera.
He's not tech savvy.
He has an actual camera, digital camera.
And he takes his camera, he takes a picture of it,
looks down, and then looks back up, and it's gone.
(06:00):
It happened that fast.
So he actually got the picture of it.
That set me off.
That set me off.
I was like, what the heck?
Like, I gotta go visit this property.
And we went out there, and we visited the property.
And hunting for portals, not a good idea.
(06:20):
It's just a door.
I don't want to say just.
It's a doorway.
It's a doorway to another realm.
And things go in and out of that.
And you're hunting down, trying to hunt down the doorway
where things are coming in and out of.
Not a good idea.
I don't even like talking about it anymore.
(06:45):
It's something I regretted.
I felt convicted of it.
And the people I was with have since also felt like
we overstepped that line.
And traditionally, I try to be a person that I know
where my boundary is, and I stay 20 feet away
from the boundary.
I don't want to walk the fence.
I don't want to walk that line of, oh, I can explain
(07:06):
it this way, and it's still okay.
I just want to stay away from it.
Like, I know where God's called me to do.
We do go out into these areas and, you know, like things
like we had an area, another area in Kentucky
where somebody had experience with an upright walking
(07:26):
canine creature in the woods one night.
Terrifying story.
An upright walking canine creature.
That sounds like what we would say is a werewolf.
Yes.
Okay.
I didn't know if I should say werewolf.
So, I don't know.
I don't know.
I didn't know if I should say werewolf.
So, the newer culture, people are calling it dog man.
(07:48):
Okay.
I've heard that too.
I think what we're dealing with is something
that has different origins.
So, when you talk about werewolf, I think it's more ritual.
I think that people, there are rituals that people will wear.
I don't know if it's exactly the, you know,
the generic term Satanist, but there will be people
(08:10):
who go through these magical practices
where they'll wear the skin of a wolf
and they'll do rituals trying to transform themselves
into a wolf, skinwalker type stuff.
And on that premise, me and the guys wonder
if what people are doing and seeing,
are they actually transforming their bodies
(08:32):
or are they doing dark black magic
that when other people come across them
in the middle of that ritual, they are seeing
what is being projected out to them.
So, there's that aspect.
There's also the more ancient thing
where people think that these are creatures
roaming the woods.
There's also the aspect of people believing
that these things are created by governments.
(08:56):
We have several different stories
that fit all those categories with this specific idea.
But anyways, we went out there into Kentucky
and we put ourselves in the environment.
And this is where we feel like is our wheelhouse.
So, we believe that God has called us
in our own rights to show the world
(09:16):
that the supernatural realm is real and it exists.
I do that through my podcast in these conversations.
And my guys that I go out with, we're all Christians
coming from different denominations.
I'm the most charismatic of the group.
But we all have the same motives.
(09:38):
And what we believe is if this stuff
is happening to people in these areas,
we don't need to go asking for it.
We don't need to conjure things.
We don't need to pull out Ouija boards and stuff like that.
We just go out into the woods
and exist in these environments
to see what happens around us.
Sometimes weird things happen around us.
And we go out there, we pray before, during, and after.
(10:03):
But yeah, so when it comes to the spiritual warfare,
I think that it's gonna happen,
but you have to be on guard
and know the boundaries and limitations.
And there's been a couple of times
where I've had to learn the lesson the hard way for sure.
That set me off. I was like, what the heck? I got to go visit this property.
(00:04):
We went out there and we visited the property hunting for portals.
Not a good idea.
Tell me about some of the things that have affected you,
because I know as you talk about this, in a way,
you're opening yourself up to spiritual warfare.
Not in a way you are opening up your yourself to spiritual warfare.
(00:24):
Not that you're necessarily opening the door like somebody would be playing
with a Ouija board or other occult type things.
But because you're exposing it, you're under attack yourself.
Can we talk about that for a little bit?
Yeah. So doing this stuff definitely gets a target on your back.
And I use the example at times where, you know, I'm a big basketball fan.
(00:50):
I know you guys are in Orlando, the Orlando Magic.
I look at it as a game almost,
where if you say you're a Christian and you're just riding the bench,
nobody's going to guard you.
And even worse, if you say you're a Christian, you get put in a game
and you're just standing at half court and the game's going on,
(01:11):
you're not participating, nobody's going to guard you.
As soon as you start becoming a problem,
that's when the opponent pays attention to you.
And that is something that I've experienced
throughout the years doing this.
It's something that, you know,
I don't really I don't really have a great understanding
(01:34):
as to how it all works.
But I know that in the spiritual realm
where these wars are happening and between God's angels
and these demonic principalities,
somebody like me doing what I'm doing,
it's like I'm almost like a glowing green, you know?
(01:55):
It's just like I stand out in a dark room.
And I feel like at times I do things and it's like all eyes get put on me.
And it's something that I've had people over the years tell me,
you got to be careful.
And I agree, you got to be careful.
But when God calls you to do something,
(02:17):
I firmly believe he's going to protect you.
And guide you through it.
And it's not to say I've done it perfectly.
I've done things that I've regretted over the years.
I've done things that I've misstepped on.
And I'm like, oh, that was a really bad decision.
And I walked in ignorance, thinking God will protect me.
(02:39):
And it's not always the most pleasurable experience
going through the stuff.
You can get carried away with some of the stuff.
Like when I first started really understanding this idea of portals,
I was fascinated by it because I just...
(03:02):
It wasn't until probably about two years ago, three years ago,
that it really started becoming a thing on the show where people...
I had a frame reference to understand that this is actually something legit.
And I got really interested in it.
And I remember there's a woman, her name is Dr. Laura Sanger,
(03:24):
and I had her on the show.
And the first time I had her on the show,
it was right around the time that I started learning about this stuff,
then how portals and the astral realm and all this stuff.
And I forget what her and I were talking about,
but last month I was at a conference in Utah.
(03:45):
And right before I left, I sat down with her husband and her for dinner.
And we were fellowshiping and talking.
And she told me, the first time we talked,
she said she walked away from the interview
thinking I had an unhealthy interest in the topic of portals.
And I confirmed to her, you're absolutely right, I did.
(04:08):
I absolutely did.
I was infatuated with it.
And I put myself in positions with that infatuation,
where I feel like I overstepped the line on certain things.
And I regretted it on a spiritual level where I feel like I...
(04:30):
Disrespected the Lord, but also I felt like God gave me a lot to be trusted with.
And I felt like I abused that at certain points.
And for instance, there's a guy that came to my studio,
and he's in Kentucky, and he has some really wild stuff happening.
(04:54):
And he talks about this magic, and he's like,
this magical cave, I don't know how else to call it, but it's huge.
30 foot ceilings, it goes back for miles.
He's been exploring it his entire life.
He hasn't explored the whole thing yet.
And in the same conversation, he shares with me
(05:14):
that he saw a portal in the woods around the cave.
And he was able to take a picture of it.
And he showed me the picture.
And it was like, I've seen a lot of pictures,
and people say, oh, it's Bigfoot in the trees.
I'm like, that's a shadow, or it's a tree.
This was a glowing sphere in the woods.
(05:38):
And when you zoom in and look at it,
you can see how it's actually going behind one of the other trees in the foreground.
It was definitely something that was actually there.
And he said he took his camera.
He's not tech savvy.
He has an actual camera, digital camera.
And he takes his camera, he takes a picture of it,
looks down, and then looks back up, and it's gone.
(06:00):
It happened that fast.
So he actually got the picture of it.
That set me off.
That set me off.
I was like, what the heck?
Like, I gotta go visit this property.
And we went out there, and we visited the property.
And hunting for portals, not a good idea.
(06:20):
It's just a door.
I don't want to say just.
It's a doorway.
It's a doorway to another realm.
And things go in and out of that.
And you're hunting down, trying to hunt down the doorway
where things are coming in and out of.
Not a good idea.
I don't even like talking about it anymore.
(06:45):
It's something I regretted.
I felt convicted of it.
And the people I was with have since also felt like
we overstepped that line.
And traditionally, I try to be a person that I know
where my boundary is, and I stay 20 feet away
from the boundary.
I don't want to walk the fence.
I don't want to walk that line of, oh, I can explain
(07:06):
it this way, and it's still okay.
I just want to stay away from it.
Like, I know where God's called me to do.
We do go out into these areas and, you know, like things
like we had an area, another area in Kentucky
where somebody had experience with an upright walking
(07:26):
canine creature in the woods one night.
Terrifying story.
An upright walking canine creature.
That sounds like what we would say is a werewolf.
Yes.
Okay.
I didn't know if I should say werewolf.
So, I don't know.
I don't know.
I didn't know if I should say werewolf.
So, the newer culture, people are calling it dog man.
(07:48):
Okay.
I've heard that too.
I think what we're dealing with is something
that has different origins.
So, when you talk about werewolf, I think it's more ritual.
I think that people, there are rituals that people will wear.
I don't know if it's exactly the, you know,
the generic term Satanist, but there will be people
(08:10):
who go through these magical practices
where they'll wear the skin of a wolf
and they'll do rituals trying to transform themselves
into a wolf, skinwalker type stuff.
And on that premise, me and the guys wonder
if what people are doing and seeing,
are they actually transforming their bodies
(08:32):
or are they doing dark black magic
that when other people come across them
in the middle of that ritual, they are seeing
what is being projected out to them.
So, there's that aspect.
There's also the more ancient thing
where people think that these are creatures
roaming the woods.
There's also the aspect of people believing
that these things are created by governments.
(08:56):
We have several different stories
that fit all those categories with this specific idea.
But anyways, we went out there into Kentucky
and we put ourselves in the environment.
And this is where we feel like is our wheelhouse.
So, we believe that God has called us
in our own rights to show the world
(09:16):
that the supernatural realm is real and it exists.
I do that through my podcast in these conversations.
And my guys that I go out with, we're all Christians
coming from different denominations.
I'm the most charismatic of the group.
But we all have the same motives.
(09:38):
And what we believe is if this stuff
is happening to people in these areas,
we don't need to go asking for it.
We don't need to conjure things.
We don't need to pull out Ouija boards and stuff like that.
We just go out into the woods
and exist in these environments
to see what happens around us.
Sometimes weird things happen around us.
And we go out there, we pray before, during, and after.
(10:03):
But yeah, so when it comes to the spiritual warfare,
I think that it's gonna happen,
but you have to be on guard
and know the boundaries and limitations.
And there's been a couple of times
where I've had to learn the lesson the hard way for sure.
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