As I look upon my life with Christ I see so much error in past beliefs. Sometimes, you just don’t know what you don’t know.

 

While still reading through Acts I come to chapter 5. Ananias and Sapphira have some interesting points I think I’ll address later because today I’m staring at this gem of a passage:

 

 

Act 5:14 – And believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women.

Act 5:15 – so that they brought the sick out into the streets and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might fall on some of them.

Act 5:16 – Also a multitude gathered from the surrounding cities to Jerusalem, bringing sick people and those who were tormented by unclean spirits, and they were all healed.

 

Never are we told that those being healed and delivered are unbelievers. We just know that they were brought for help.

 

Isn’t it amazing the conclusions we come to all by ourselves? I think we start to believe whatever makes us feel better.

 

By now I have heard, and used to believe, that only unbelievers could be tormented by demons and in need of deliverance.

 

Again I say, this is indeed not true.

 

I shudder at those who toss out experiential ministry because honestly you’re going to need some experience to understand the scriptures otherwise you’ll read and interpret based on your own bents or the bents of those who taught you.

 

Today, everyone who comes for help to us, so far, has been a born-again believer.

 

So, what if it is true? Who cares? Well, we all should care. It’s a command from Christ to set people free. A New Testament directive.

 

If it, indeed, is true then we sit in our meetings week after week with bound people coming and going never being changed and never being freed.

 

Sometimes it’s not because they don’t want to change but sometimes they just can’t. In essence they are bound.

 

If someone walks into my room with anxiety I’m going to make sure that the anxiety isn’t a spirit wreaking havoc in that life. She’ll have a hard time growing in grace when bound in despair.

 

Truth be told, many in leadership are still bound. Lack of knowledge really does cause us to perish.

 

Jealous spirits are real and they love when we dismiss them. They’ll just keep on keeping on and there will be a certain death come into a life and ministry. Things will die from the inside out. You’ll go after everything someone else has, never being satisfied with what is yours…you can’t even help yourself. You’re being led by a very real and dangerous jealous spirit.

 

Sometimes I’m just talking to someone and teaching in our meetings and suddenly someone comes into a pain that wasn’t there before.

 

I’ve learned that this is God exposing something He wants to deal with right then. Everyone God has exposed a “thing” in He has also been faithful to deliver them from. I’ve learned to get excited when this happens. It is the power of God causing something to happen.

 

We don’t ignore those moments around here, we’ve come to understand that it is His assigned moment. He gets to call the shots. We do our best to follow Him.

 

Not everything, of course, is a demon, or spirit. But my job is to make sure it isn’t.

 

By now I’ve watched many spirits of fear, spirits of anxiety and depression, spirits of death, spirits of heaviness, spirits of infirmity, and more go in the name of Jesus.

 

I don’t need to know their names, I just need to know His.

 

JESUS.

That name makes every demon tremble.

 

I’ve seen many released from the spirits of abuse. I’ve watched headaches leave as I’ve cast out spirits in the mind and voices speaking to people things that are anti-Christ.

 

I’ve seen paralysis come and then go, hopelessness leave, witchcraft effects fall.

 

I’ve seen burdens lift from shoulders, eyes change from dim to clear, voices freed to speak, and spirits of confusion cave.

 

Really… read the scriptures again, friends. Put aside what you’ve thought to be true and ask the Holy Spirit to teach you.

 

Because, listen, it’s going to get much worse and we had best know how to handle an unleashing of demonic assignments and know that who we carry has given us the authority to mess up the plans of darkness.

 

If you have a tormenting thing in your life, get someone who can pray over you and make sure that it has not been sent by wickedness in high places.

 

Jesus is a deliverer and so should we be.

 

Matthew 10:8

Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give.