The spirit of fear...In Jesus Name - Be GONE!
I am not sure what I have to say about the spirit of fear, but I am going to start typing and see what happens. This last year much has gone on in my life. I have faced trials that I thought or hoped I would never have to face. But I have made it through to a place that is better than before the trials. God really does use fire to refine us and make us stronger. God was an ever present help in trouble for sure. I had his reassurance that if I would just keep my eyes on Him and press onward to the goal that there would be a blessing on the other side.
In the last month it became apparent that the battle was truly spiritual. Lots of spiritual battles were going on, the two spirits I had been tormented by were fear and control, but the one I am going to talk about today is fear. I have a sweet and gifted friend and her husband (who is also sweet and gifted), who has prayed with Rob and I over the last couple of weeks. It became apparent to her immediately that the spiritual battle was clear and until we dealt with our struggles on a spiritual level we would be wearing ourselves out trying to keeping the spirits under control. I loved her words, "Jesus talks about these spirits, tormenting spirits, and He says in scripture that they must leave, there is no controlling them, no persuading them, they will not behave with therapy, they just need to be told to leave, in Jesus name." I listened to her words and they clicked with me. I however, didn't know how pervasive the spirits I was dealing with were in my life, until they were gone, in Jesus name. Kicked out, adiosed, don't let the door hit you on the way out. I did know however, that I wanted to be free of them. I could see how over the many years I would fall into the same pattern of fear, and then trying to control the situation to make it manageable. I can remember being a small child and fear taking hold, for 40 years, I thought it was normal to have sweaty palms, a need to gasp for breath, tormenting words swirling around in my head, "You're not good enough," "They don't like you," "You caused all this trouble," "It's all your fault."
We have all heard that when you have been born again into Christ, saved by His blood, and baptized to follow His example we receive the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit and an evil spirit can not live in the same soul. However, we can be tormented by spirits, and the more we feed them, the more control we give them and the more we can be affected by them in our mind and even in our physical body. Our soul is safe, we just live a broken beaten down life because of the constant torment. We can look at examples in scripture for getting rid of a tormenting spirit is to say, out loud, In the name of Jesus, I renounce you spirit of _______, you must leave. You are not welcome, I belong to Jesus and He is who I worship. He is my King. You must get out in His name. This is my paraphrase.
Then we also know that you must fill the empty space with God, a clean house will fill up with even more evil if you don't fill it with God and His goodness. The evil spirits will hang around even though they have been ousted waiting for an opportune time to strike again. And each time we can use those same words to protect our self through the power of Christ.
I have been searching for God's peace in my life for several years. Programs, classes, books, prayer, quiet time, study of the Word,...all valuable, and all precious in many ways to me. But I still would get a wave of fear over me through out my day, I would pray for God's peace, I would try and fix the situation, my heart would race, I would be jittery, I was fearful. God had given me His peace for the taking, but it was being thwarted by an entity of fear that did it's best to freak me out. I can remember saying specifically when Jack was sick, the words of Christ, "In the name of Jesus 'I say get behind me Satan'," and I know it helped. My nightmares stopped. But I never addressed the spirits directly. I guess I didn't know what spirits I was dealing with. In the book "Walking With God," by John Eldridge he says you have to name the spirit, they are tricky and stubborn, they will not all skidaddle unless named, a general calling out wont work. Belief is an important component of this. If we have no conviction that our words are truth, and we don't even believe, then the spirits wont either.
Rob and I were set to go and pray with our friends the next day, but this first day of prayer with her when I was by myself she had discerned the spirits I was dealing with and told me that I needed to pray and ask God where they were showing up, where they were doing their work, and then I needed to pray for them to be gone. I had to be somewhere shortly after I left her office and I started to get sick to my stomach while in the car, I remember my first thought being that I hoped I wasn't sick because then Rob and I couldn't go back to pray with them the next day. These thoughts went on for about 10 minutes. Then, I believe the Holy Spirit convicted me that the illness was not a stomach virus but an attack by these evil spirits because they didn't want us to meet to pray the next day. They knew what was at stake. So while driving in my car I renounced these spirits, commanded them out in Jesus name and within a minute or two I wasn't sick any more. This was the gurgly stomach, headachey, I'm afraid I am getting the flu kind of sickness. And it was gone after my prayer.
As Paul says in Ephesians 6:10, our battle is not with the flesh, it is in the spiritual realms. I believe this, I believed this before, and now God has increased my faith to believe it even more. Faith and belief is truly a process.
As I hit send on this, I will need to pray that prayer again, because fear would like to mess with me for speaking out about my experiences. But fear is no longer welcome in me, I will speak boldly about the gifts of walking with Christ, there is so much victory in Christ to be had, if only I will take hold. Satan isn't an idiot, he knows where we are weak and that is where he will try and attack over and over again. I am ready to proclaim freedom and God's power to keep them from tormenting me, I might have to do it a hundred times a day, but I will - if that is what it takes. I am free indeed, thanks be to God.
- As a side note, I had prayed all week that my church would address the spiritual realm of evil spirits, darkness and the power of Christ, Light. I was desperate to hear words from my church's pulpit to know that we would be a church that wouldn't be afraid to speak of this battle. I couldn't believe it when this exact topic was preached on this Sunday. I told my preacher this story and he said that it had obviously been my prayers that caused Him to rewrite his sermon 5 times that week. God's timing is amazing.
In the last month it became apparent that the battle was truly spiritual. Lots of spiritual battles were going on, the two spirits I had been tormented by were fear and control, but the one I am going to talk about today is fear. I have a sweet and gifted friend and her husband (who is also sweet and gifted), who has prayed with Rob and I over the last couple of weeks. It became apparent to her immediately that the spiritual battle was clear and until we dealt with our struggles on a spiritual level we would be wearing ourselves out trying to keeping the spirits under control. I loved her words, "Jesus talks about these spirits, tormenting spirits, and He says in scripture that they must leave, there is no controlling them, no persuading them, they will not behave with therapy, they just need to be told to leave, in Jesus name." I listened to her words and they clicked with me. I however, didn't know how pervasive the spirits I was dealing with were in my life, until they were gone, in Jesus name. Kicked out, adiosed, don't let the door hit you on the way out. I did know however, that I wanted to be free of them. I could see how over the many years I would fall into the same pattern of fear, and then trying to control the situation to make it manageable. I can remember being a small child and fear taking hold, for 40 years, I thought it was normal to have sweaty palms, a need to gasp for breath, tormenting words swirling around in my head, "You're not good enough," "They don't like you," "You caused all this trouble," "It's all your fault."
We have all heard that when you have been born again into Christ, saved by His blood, and baptized to follow His example we receive the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit and an evil spirit can not live in the same soul. However, we can be tormented by spirits, and the more we feed them, the more control we give them and the more we can be affected by them in our mind and even in our physical body. Our soul is safe, we just live a broken beaten down life because of the constant torment. We can look at examples in scripture for getting rid of a tormenting spirit is to say, out loud, In the name of Jesus, I renounce you spirit of _______, you must leave. You are not welcome, I belong to Jesus and He is who I worship. He is my King. You must get out in His name. This is my paraphrase.
Then we also know that you must fill the empty space with God, a clean house will fill up with even more evil if you don't fill it with God and His goodness. The evil spirits will hang around even though they have been ousted waiting for an opportune time to strike again. And each time we can use those same words to protect our self through the power of Christ.
I have been searching for God's peace in my life for several years. Programs, classes, books, prayer, quiet time, study of the Word,...all valuable, and all precious in many ways to me. But I still would get a wave of fear over me through out my day, I would pray for God's peace, I would try and fix the situation, my heart would race, I would be jittery, I was fearful. God had given me His peace for the taking, but it was being thwarted by an entity of fear that did it's best to freak me out. I can remember saying specifically when Jack was sick, the words of Christ, "In the name of Jesus 'I say get behind me Satan'," and I know it helped. My nightmares stopped. But I never addressed the spirits directly. I guess I didn't know what spirits I was dealing with. In the book "Walking With God," by John Eldridge he says you have to name the spirit, they are tricky and stubborn, they will not all skidaddle unless named, a general calling out wont work. Belief is an important component of this. If we have no conviction that our words are truth, and we don't even believe, then the spirits wont either.
Rob and I were set to go and pray with our friends the next day, but this first day of prayer with her when I was by myself she had discerned the spirits I was dealing with and told me that I needed to pray and ask God where they were showing up, where they were doing their work, and then I needed to pray for them to be gone. I had to be somewhere shortly after I left her office and I started to get sick to my stomach while in the car, I remember my first thought being that I hoped I wasn't sick because then Rob and I couldn't go back to pray with them the next day. These thoughts went on for about 10 minutes. Then, I believe the Holy Spirit convicted me that the illness was not a stomach virus but an attack by these evil spirits because they didn't want us to meet to pray the next day. They knew what was at stake. So while driving in my car I renounced these spirits, commanded them out in Jesus name and within a minute or two I wasn't sick any more. This was the gurgly stomach, headachey, I'm afraid I am getting the flu kind of sickness. And it was gone after my prayer.
As Paul says in Ephesians 6:10, our battle is not with the flesh, it is in the spiritual realms. I believe this, I believed this before, and now God has increased my faith to believe it even more. Faith and belief is truly a process.
As I hit send on this, I will need to pray that prayer again, because fear would like to mess with me for speaking out about my experiences. But fear is no longer welcome in me, I will speak boldly about the gifts of walking with Christ, there is so much victory in Christ to be had, if only I will take hold. Satan isn't an idiot, he knows where we are weak and that is where he will try and attack over and over again. I am ready to proclaim freedom and God's power to keep them from tormenting me, I might have to do it a hundred times a day, but I will - if that is what it takes. I am free indeed, thanks be to God.
- As a side note, I had prayed all week that my church would address the spiritual realm of evil spirits, darkness and the power of Christ, Light. I was desperate to hear words from my church's pulpit to know that we would be a church that wouldn't be afraid to speak of this battle. I couldn't believe it when this exact topic was preached on this Sunday. I told my preacher this story and he said that it had obviously been my prayers that caused Him to rewrite his sermon 5 times that week. God's timing is amazing.
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JanaB