46

46. Deliverance - VII

Some of our difficulties

 Satan is real; if he wasn’t real, then one could almost argue the sacrifice Jesus gave of Himself upon the cross was a waste of time. After all, the story of the cross is, that He shed His blood for us, freely, and out of pure love. He won a great victory over Satan. Ever since then Satan has been the defeated enemy. Satan is real, but don’t let us spare a thought for him.

 Many times we dwell on the things we see Satan has put upon us, such as freak accidents where he has tried to destroy us, and failed, because God has had His hand upon our lives and protected us; yet time and again we fail to give God our due thanks that He has saved us from destruction, and dwell on what could have been. Many of us are “problem centred”. We need to get our eyes off the problem, and on Jesus. Are our problems to big for God to solve? Matt.19: 26 - …..With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.

 We have negative thoughts - the moment we need to work out a problem, we think of the worst that can happen. We need to, at this time, turn our negative thoughts to Jesus, and thank Him for the very opposite - for the victory!

 We worry at times over small things; there’s a saying: “Worry gets you nowhere at all”. God has our lives in His hands, He is our Provider, Healer and Deliverer, in Whom we can trust.

 We even worry about the future. We are always questioning ourselves. Negative doubts sets in. We need to cast all our cares on Him, for He cares for us (1Pet. 5: 7). He is always with us. He has promised, that, when we are His, He will never leave us nor forsake us (Heb.13: 5).

 He is always there to guide us, if we will let Him do so. Many times we hear these words: “Don’t worry so much”. Easy to say these words, but, when the large bills come in, etc., the thoughts are: “How am I going to manage to pay them?” Again we need to be practical and also put our trust in the One Who said, that He will supply all our needs (Phil. 4:19). He has promised also, that, if we seek first the Kingdom of God, all things will be added unto us (Matt. 6: 33).

 Satan attacks through filtering negative thoughts into our minds. His favourite weapon surely is fear. Many of us put on a front of bravery, when deep inside is that dreaded spirit of fear. We would perhaps say, that the opposite of love is hatred, but what about fear? When people are drawn into Satanic works, e.g. witchcraft, they also become full of fear because of things, that are spoken over them if they break any of the rules or reveal any of the secrets. Once they are into these things, they become, as it were, addicted, and yet full of fear. Even hatred can and does build up in such cases, yet: …..perfect love casts out fear…..(1Jhn. 4:18). Also in 2Tim.1: 7 (KJV): …..God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.

 Worry is the opposite to peace. God wants us to have a peace of mind. We need to get rid of the tension and fear, and to take hold of the Word of God; we need to accept the love and peace of Him in our hearts and lives. Who do we put our trust and hope in? Satan or God? We need to do battle against Satan.

 When we are suffering from tension and stress, we are laying ourselves open to all manner of sicknesses. Doctors state, that a high proportion of illnesses are triggered off by distress and fear of what “it might be”. Stress can lead to headaches, migraine, digestive problems, heart troubles, arthritis, and even rheumatism. Certainly spiritual problems can be involved and, indeed, mental ones too. We allow Satan to feed us with fear; he is free to afflict us in many ways.

 We see the relationship between fear and cancer. Before modern treatments were discovered, doctors preferred not to tell the patients, that they had cancer, because that might have led them to become afraid of the cancer getting worse, and leading to death. It is known, that, if the person gives way to fear, the cancer actually grows more rapidly. New drugs, however, are found now, and that gives people new hope, yet the Bible says: Our hope is in the Lord.

 The Lord wants to fill us with a childlike trust in Him, with His peace and with His love; then it is not possible, that we become a prey for fear, nor for any of the other problems that can follow. Then indeed we shall begin to receive the peace of God which passes our understanding.

 Jesus knew how we needed to get rid of our worries. Matt.11: 28 - Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. The apostle Peter says: …..casting all your anxiety upon Him, because He cares for you (1Pet. 5: 7).

 However, Satan will try to infiltrate thoughts of fear in our minds. We need to train ourselves so, that, the moment we are aware of any feeling of fear, we turn to Jesus and pray: “Thank You, Jesus, that I am safe with You. Thank You, that I know You will always look after me. Thank You, Jesus, that I can trust You in this situation too.” Trusting Jesus is not a matter of feelings, but of decision.

 Something about guilt. Many people walk around with a spirit of guilt, which again produces strain and stress. All sorts of things can arise from this. If we could get it across to people, that our God is a loving and forgiving God, there would be happier people going around. It probably seems hard to accept, that Jesus does in fact forgive us our sins and washes us clean.

 Jesus said to His disciples: …..whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven (Matt.18:18). If someone comes to us, who is burdened with his sins, and indeed with a guilt complex, we need to invite him to pray, confessing his sins (remembered and forgotten), asking Him to forgive them.

 If the repentance and confession are genuine, they will know on the authority of God’s Word, that they have been released and, most of all, completely forgiven.

1Jhn.1: 9 - If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Is. 43:25 - I, even I, am the One Who wipes out your transgressions….. and I will not remember your sins.

Our past and our sins are completely wiped out. The slate, as it were, is wiped clean.

 Satan will always try and remind us of our past. He will try to put the guilt feeling back onto us. We just reject and rebuke it in the Name of Jesus.

 We need to continually thank Jesus for our past, that has been forgiven.

 Satan will try putting a poor self-image onto us. We need to remind him, that we are special, made in the image of God. What we are, we are by the grace of God. Specially chosen. He loves us. Jesus said, that, after loving God, the next most important thing is to love our neighbours as ourselves (Mc.12: 31), also to love even our enemies. We can only do this, if we truly know and have experienced the real love of God in our hearts. We thank God for His unfailing love. It is the repeated prayer of thanks which releases the Lord’s power to set us free and heal us.

 Many people doubt the power of our Lord Jesus Christ. Reinhard Bonnke once said: We need to doubt our doubts and believe on the Word of God, take our doubts and hit the devil with them.

 We can control our own thoughts, if we choose to.

 The way to deal with doubts is, as Paul wrote to the Corinthians: …..we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ (2Cor.10:5).

 Suppose we have allowed ourselves to have thoughts as to whether Jesus the Man really was the Son of God. In that case we need firmly to praise Him: Thank You, Jesus, that, in truth, You are the Son of God, and You always have been the son of God. If we doubt whether He really loves us, then we can keep saying: Thank You, Jesus, that You do love me. If we doubt what really happened on the cross, we can then pray: Thank You, Jesus, that you set me free when You died on the cross for me.

 The way to deal with doubts is to affirm the truth as revealed in the Bible, and to express affirmation in Jesus as a prayer of grateful thanks.