I won’t be able to do this subject justice on this little blog – greater books by great Christian men have been written on it. But at least I might be able to begin the process of shifting you out of darkness and into a place far brighter and less difficult. Attachment will have to be dealt with, we love our ‘stuff’, but sometimes those seemingly inane, peaceful looking objects sitting on desks, hanging on walls or slid into bookshelves can bring a continual, negative spiritual energy into our lives that if we knew how it was affecting us, we’d burn it all.
A note: this topic is nothing to broach casually. Not to glorify Satan and the demonic, but he is a formidable foe in our walk with God. If you feel particularly annoyed by these writings, or angered, then you might be dealing with more demonic influence than you might have thought. So beware of yourself and how you are feeling as you read. There is no power greater than God so the Holy Spirit can deliver you entirely and in an instant of all demonic possession and/or influence. Just yield and ask Him to deliver you.
Our Inner Workings, Thoughts, Assumptions, Presuppositions, Stubbornness
First I’d say we have to look at ourselves because often we say one thing and live out another. When it comes to spiritual matters, being congruent and remaining steadfast is of utmost importance. Before we became Christians the devil ransacked us and ignored us for the most part. If you aren’t gaining spiritual territory from him (changing people’s lives for the good, reconciling them to God, saving souls, instilling biblical principles, interceding and pulling down the devil’s strongholds) then he certainly doesn’t know or care what your name is. You’re an unknown ‘son of Sceva’ and he’ll devour you as a lion would.
Without the Holy Spirit, we are simply dark on the inside. There may be goodness there, but often times it’s a reflected light that isn’t congruent or whole. ‘If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!’ Matthew 6:22-23
It matters what goes into our eyes and into our ears. They are portals. So then, what is inside our minds can be complete darkness but we can fake the outside and no one would know differently…for awhile anyway. But God does not mimic, mimicry is the devil’s game. It’s false, superficial and not the Holy Spirit. The photo below represents how we as humans can mimic goodness, but goodness not really be within us. This is a person/Christian who isn’t reading the Word of God, so there’s no real transformation from inside to outside.
Surface, outer dimension: imitate, model, (possibly mimic, denotes artificial or contrived) Changing the outer behavior but not the inner motivations. Can be faked, self-deceiving aspects?
The Devil’s Game
As much evil as we want the devil will provide – of course never for free. The wages of sin is death. And there is more than one way to die. But once we give our lives to God, some extremely complex shifts happened which aren’t immediately apparent. The best way to see it is we shifted from darkness, ignorance, unknowing, to the light which was shed abroad in our hearts – now all the dusty, dark corners are illuminated by Christ’s light and we begin the process of healing our souls/minds. But there’s a lot of residual dark elements that sometimes get overlooked.
The devil is happy to share you with many other spirits and things, especially things that pamper our flesh/carnal nature, which is enmity with God, even after you are saved. That’s why we have to crucify, put to death, the deeds of the body (Romans 8.13). As far as the devil is concerned, the more distractions entering into your being the better. He’ll possess you in a thousand small ways and he doesn’t care what else possesses you, as long as it isn’t the Holy Spirit of God. Demons want darkness and chaos – the more the merrier!
Below is an example of how demonic possession might be represented. Chaotic, uninvited (sometimes willfully invited) habitation (sin lay crouched at your door ready to pounce and you welcome it), multiple gods and sources of motivation, possessed, ambivalent, disunity; overtaken, involuntary animation.
God’s Order, The Holy Spirit Indwelling is Pure and Brings Clarity
On the contrary, the Holy Spirit of God will share you with nothing else because He is pure and holy and no other gods can stand before Him. And He resists the proud, so that even we can exalt ourselves in pride and God will vacate our life by removing His presence. (And of course He will return if/when we repent, stop being prideful.) God does not share habitation, dear people. This is where Paul stated that if one sleeps with a prostitute then that action joins her mind/body with the Body of Christ, and may God forbid it Paul stated.
Same as infidelity, fornication, adultery. And when two people have sexual relations, they open themselves to every channel the other person is also open to. This is why fornication/promiscuity is so destructive. We become one with whatever that is, and it isn’t godly.
So below is another photo that might represent how the indwelling of the Holy Spirit looks. Please understand, it is not possession – possession denotes uninvited or overtaking of the will of a human. Sure, we may invite evil in, but then the demonic takes over. God never takes over and animates us: Satan pushes and shoves, God leads and guides. Possession is the wrong term for the Holy Spirit indwelling.
To indwell, embody, personify – ordered invite, unified integration (Jesus/Logos) Changing the inner motivations leads over time to genuine outer behavior with an integrated purpose and foundation. We become one with God in Christ (John 17.23). Holy and perfect habitation and not shared. The vessel, you and me, must remain as pure, clean and holy as we can manage. The more we manage, the brighter His light will shine through our lives. And no condemnation as we grow into Him, praise God:) Romans chapter 8.
The Holy Spirt Will Not Share Habitation
So God is ready to be reconciled with us, take us to Himself and become one with us, this was Jesus’ prayer for all of us to the Father, ‘I in You and they in Me’. We are all one and it denotes the same sacred bond as the marriage of two, not to be defiled by adultery.
So any other habitation of our vessel (know you not, you are the temple of God?) by demonic energies/entities is defiling that bond, that oneness with God and He will not permit it. Since Satan pushes and the Holy Spirit leads, it will be the Holy Spirit Who is grieved and will ‘remove His presence’ from over our lives – same thing happened to Job. Satan passed through the hedge as God allowed Job to be tested due to his belief that he was righteous in and of himself. But what pathetic righteousness we can muster (Pharisaical) is as filthy rags to God (Isaiah 64.6). God revealed Himself to Job so that he stated, ‘I had heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now I see You, therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes’.
When God reveals Himself to us there is no escaping our own inadequacies. If we come to know this and humble ourselves before Him we are restored exponentially. Our growth in Him can be thwarted by the entrance of unholy things through our eyes, ears…any of our senses. Purity is important when we reach a certain level in our walk with God.
After Salvation, Residual Demonic Energy Needs to be Dealt With
Negative, demonic energy can move through people, but not only people. There are many portals from the spiritual realm into our lives. One might say ‘I felt something strange’ for instance when walking into a room or touching an object. It’s the same idea as the serpent lifted up in the desert, those that touched it were healed. This kind of energy can flow through objects and also be demonic, otherworldly and dark.
Do you think Mediums, witch doctors and psychics work out of God’s spiritual kingdom? No, they work out of the soulish, demonic realm. Where do you think Satan fell ‘to’? He isn’t in heaven and we know there are levels even of Heaven because Paul stated he was taken up to the Third Heaven…so many, many levels of hierarchy are built into the realm of spirits, both good realms and evil realms. Humans can tap into all of them due to the way we are made – probably something to do with the conscience. Satan fell into the lower realms of the hierarchy since he fell from heaven like lightening (ha, see ya ‘ole dragon), but so did the third of angels he swiped down with his tail. That’s innumerable evil angelic and demonic power structures functioning over us in the spiritual realm.
There Are Multiple Hierarchical Levels In Both Heaven and the Spiritual Realms
This spiritual realm is where Satan works, where his power is and where he has all the influence over mankind. It is not the same spiritual realm God inhabits – remember, the Spirit of God will not share habitation with evil. We don’t see the devil visiting God’s throne in the New Testament – the Son’s blood was sprinkled on God’s alter, Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of God, the devil is defeated; death, hell and the grave are no longer our fate. Satan is no longer permitted to enter heaven. Well, he might be part of that footstool Christ props His beautiful feet up on:) And since we are in Christ, our feet also are propped up on that footstool where our enemies reside, hallelujah.
Our New Spiritual Habitation Once Saved
We now have to understand that we are ‘seated in heavenly places in Christ’ (Ephesians 2.6), so we are inhabiting the upper spiritual realms, far above all principalities and powers in heavenly places – this is not metaphorical only, this is who we are, restored in God through Christ’s blood sacrifice – we are above all demonic spiritual realms but we still must fight them, ‘the kingdom of God suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.’ This is the spiritual battle laid before us all. The devil knows it. Unfortunately we don’t, so we perish in a thousand different ways hour by hour.
Our mind must be renewed to this new creation reality. That’s what the word does, it renews our minds to better grasp that we are indeed now in Christ above all other hierarchies in the heavens and in earth AND we have received all the power to conquer all these levels – I mean my God! – no wonder He insists on humility and humbleness!! Come on people, understand we are the children of the Judge of ALL creation and we are already pardoned of our sins! This is why the scriptures are so adamant to remain lowly, humble and meek.
Don’t you see? We are above it all.
Okay, that’s spiritually speaking. And it flows into our earthly habitation but we’re still subject to the laws of the earth as humans – until Jesus is flowing through us in such a manner we are able to walk on water and break the laws of physics. And so being here in the earth, we are still subject to all the wiles of the devil, but we can conquer all his fiery darts. We just need to keep ourselves as free and clear of evil as possible.
In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one. (Ephesians 6.16) And also,
No weapon formed against you shall prosper, And every tongue which rises against you in judgment You shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, And their righteousness is from Me,” Says the LORD. (Isaiah 54.17)
How Do We Triumph Over Evil?
How are we going to fight against demonic powers and principalities if we are also captured by them? Please, think about this.
‘Well it’s just one book, one hobby, one habit, one painting, just one this, one that…..’
It only takes one. Then you die. Slowly I might add, subtly the demonic infiltrates your life like a frog being brought to boil in water.
Satan is a controlled maniac. Absolute chaos, but he’s crafty and can actually plan it. He has a third of the angels to help unleash his attacks – they reign in hierarchies. Come on, keep up with me. Principalities in the air influence whole nations in our realm. Sound crazy to you? Then you’re not thinking broadly or near deeply enough.
The Demonic Can Move Through Objects
Objects are portals. Maybe not every object but whatever we attach to can become a portal to all kinds of evil and chaos. Maybe it’s something like this: we feel an attachment, the door opens, we have a choice, we let what’s on the other side of the open door into our lives, then it moves into us, we become possessed, we act, we die (in a thousand tiny ways).
You have hundreds of portals in your house right now. Some for good energy, light; and some for bad energy, darkness. Do you think you could find these and discern between what is in your house that is evil and bringing demonic energy into your habitation? It could be things you most cherish. If your mind is only partially renewed to the word of God, then you won’t even be able to see what is affecting other aspects of your life.
There is a gift that helps the children of God with this, it’s called the discernment of spirits. Pray God bestows this gift to you.
I’m telling you, people blame misfortune on so many things – and it could be a correct analysis – but they miss ways in which darkness is entering on a daily basis through common objects like books, negative sentimental attachments/gifts/trinkets/tokens, (the demonic loves these types of objects), if someone who is into the occult gives you something….my friend, please understand the enemy is within your walls actively affecting your state of being.
Prove Me
Please think on this and if you are having a hard time accepting it, then here’s something you can do. If there’s anything that you think may be demonic or have demonic energy flowing through it, but you also are attached to it, cherish it even or have an affinity for it, then test out what I’m telling you. Take those things, wrap them up and store them away from you, in a shed or a room where you do not access. See if the atmosphere in your life changes. I’m telling you it will, even your health can be affected by the demonic. It’s negative energy working independent of anything else save for your voluntary invitation into your abode. Test and see if what I’m telling you isn’t truth.
Also, if we want more of God, then less of everything else must be our goal. And I’ll be the first to say, I struggle! We all do, our own wants and needs are prevalent. But at least, try to do away with the blatantly demonic influences. Ask the Lord to help you root these items/objects out, remove them from your place of habitation and watch God move in to fill you even more.
This is a lot of information and I’m not altogether concise in my delivery. It’s a huge topic that whole books have been written on, so maybe I’ll post more but this is all I can do for now. I pray that God takes my crazy writing and conveys it to you in a way that is understandable.
Featured Image by Carolina Pimenta