This week’s message entitled “Enemies of Freedom” focuses on the need to address the activities of the powers which hinder freedom. The moment a person surrenders his or her life to the Lord Jesus, he creates serious problem to all the diabolical spirits residing inside him or her. This is because the presence of Jesus Christ will cause them to become weak, therefore making it very easy to chase them out. This is why thorough deliverance ministration is necessary because the devil makes sure that those evil spirits hold on tenaciously to something, and would resist any form of attempt to get them out from the place. They know they would be penalized by the devil their master if they lose out, hence they strive to consolidate themselves by all means. A lot of people go for deliverance ministration several times and yet, they still complain that there is no freedom. This is why we must address the issue of the enemy seriously. We must note that true and complete freedom depends on a number of factors.
1. THE CONDITION OF THE HEART: The state of one’s heart determines whether he or she can be truly delivered or not. The Bible tells us in Philippians 4:8 the state which hearts ought to be all the time. It says, “Finally brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.”
If the heart is not in accordance with the above passage, no matter the efforts made, the person will not be delivered. The heart can be likened to a garden where a lot of evil seeds have been planted and until all these are rooted out, one cannot expect God to plant His own good seeds there. The Bible says in Jeremiah 17:9 that, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked who can know it?"
This means that the most powerful anointed prophet can minister to a person, lay his hands on the person and yet, the person remains undelivered.
2. THE STRATEGIC VALUE OF A PERSON TO THE KINGDOM: One secret we must know is that the devil knows those who are not serious with him among his servants. He knows those who are one leg in and another leg out, those who are tending towards that righteous man Jesus, and who may never come back to him anymore. Even though such people have not left his kingdom, he can still recognize them. Just like God recognized lukewarm believers in the church. So, the devil knows those that are likely to run away from him. Also, the devil knows those who would constitute a danger to his kingdom right from their birth and tries his best to hinder their deliverance. He would make them unable to do what God wants them to do. For example, if he noticed that the behaviour of a lady would eventually lead her out of the kingdom of darkness, he might cause her to marry a husband that would make her spiritual life cold and at the end of the day she would backslide. He might also organize all kinds of spirits to be pestering her about. Despite the fact that she is still in his kingdom, the devil would still map out strategies that would prevent her from getting out of his kingdom. That is why such people need to do serious warfare prayer.
3. THE EXTENT TO WHICH THE SPIRIT IS DEEPLY ENTRENCHED: You cannot expect a demon that has been residing in a person right from the day the person was named, and the one that just entered a person yesterday at the market place to be cast out the same way. The one that has been there for 65 years is firmly entrenched and will be more difficult to cast out than the one that has just got in. Sometimes, when you pray fire prayers for some people, they vomit blood because the demon has its root in the intestine. It is just a sign that such candidates are being delivered. Some deliverance cases are tougher and take longer time than others. This is due to the fact that some people’s cases started immediately they were born and in such situations, it takes more than a snappy prayer to deliver such cases.
4. FAMILY STRONGHOLD: If the stronghold in a family is tough, then deliverance too will be tough. A stronghold is a citadel of defence which is difficult to attack. A stronghold in the Biblical sense means a city surrounded by tall and thick walls, which is difficult to attack by the enemies. This means that if a person’s enemy is said to be hiding in a stronghold, it is bad news. A concerned mother came to a man of God to say that her five daughters could not marry. When the minister asked her why, she said that they all just refused to get married. And as the man of God wanted to pray, the Holy Spirit restrained him from doing so. Instead, he was told by the Holy Spirit to ask the woman where she had taken these daughters of hers to in the past. She explained to the man of God that they had been given to the family snake as wives i.e they were all married to the family snake. The man of God asked the woman how she expected them to marry again since they were all married to a snake. He said further that even though they were no longer serving the snake in the family, the covenant still held. So until that covenant is broken nothing will happen.
5. ANOINTING AND KNOWLEDGE OF THE MINISTER: Except the minister knows what he is doing, it would not be easy to succeed as a deliverance minister.
6. WILLINGNESS TO BE FREE: Do you know that some people do not want to be free because they enjoy the situation? Sometime ago, three men of God were praying for a sister sweating profusely, because they all had compassion on her after she explained her problems to them for almost one hour. When they prayed to a certain level, one demon spoke through the sister saying, “Sirs, mind your business, did she tell you that she wants us to go?" They then asked the sister if she wanted those spirits living in her to go, she said no, that she only wanted the problems to be solved. People generally ask in the school of deliverance, why God has not disgraced the devil all this long? The answer is, He will not do that now.
The first reason why He will not do that now is to prove mankind. There is no doubt that if you remove the devil from the street today, churches will virtually be empty on Sundays. The presence of the devil in the world is like an examination body to human beings, otherwise everybody would be matching up and down, bragging, “I am a child of God.” . But the presence of the devil makes God to be able to know the true colour of everyone. It is also a test of your loyalty to God, and the true test of loyalty comes when you have an alternative. For example, you cannot claim that you are not a thief when you have never had the opportunity to steal. Why not wait until you are put in charge of a big amount of money before you can draw a conclusion about your integrity in this respect. Or, you say, “I cannot commit fornication,” wait until you are faced with the challenge before you know your worth. Or you may brag that you don’t get angry, wait until you are provoked before we can take you for your word. After all, if you say that you do not normally get angry unless you are provoked, it is only a mad person that will get angry without being provoked.
The second reason is to demonstrate God’s power over Satan and ultimate triumph of good over evil. The Bible says that the wages of sin is death. Death is the price of sin and this represents the curse put on Adam. Satan said, "... ye shall not die,” but God said, “…ye shall surely die…” and of a truth, he died. So, the demand of the court of heaven has to be met by somebody who is ready to die; and this explains why Jesus had to die and by so doing, He defeated Satan and his cohorts. It is now our responsibility to enforce that victory won for us at Calvary. God has not finished with the devil yet, He uses human beings to display His power over the forces of darkness.
At a crusade organized somewhere, some demonic people were sent to go and scatter the programme. The first batch who got there met with fire prayers and as such were the first people to answer altar call. Their leader who brought them was stunned. The devil sent another sixty agents to the crusade and all of them gave their lives to Christ. To this end, the man went back for reinforcement, he also contacted the queen of the coast who contributed additional number of agents. But to their amazement, those ones were easier to capture than the first batch. Therefore, God proved to the devil that he does not have the absolute power.
The third reason is that it is the determination of our future reward. Whenever we overcome any temptation the devil brings our ways, we are rewarded. God did not create the devil, but He created Lucifer who decided to convert himself to the devil. I recall a remark made by an old brother who had gone to be with the Lord in my former church. He said that you do not get victory when you do not wish to fight. So, our conflict with the devil is the basis of our reward.
The fourth reason is to teach us spiritual lessons, develop our faith and heavenly character. As clever as the devil is, God is exploiting him for His purpose. Man tends to learn from hardship and suffering inflicted by satan, and sometimes people end up becoming better people. When you come to the house of God and see the blind receiving their sight, and the lame walking, your faith increases. Even if it is the devil that caused them to suffer these things, when the power of God reverses them, your faith develops, your character improves and you will become more experienced, wiser, happier, bolder and better equipped to counsel others. So, we can now conclude that the availability of the devil in the world is an opportunity to reflect God’s wisdom for the good of man. As God did not remove the tree from the Garden of Eden, so will He not remove the witches and wizards from the earth. The important thing is to pitch your camp with the Psalmist who says, “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies, my cup runneth over…” This will be your lot if you immunize yourself with the blood of Jesus and no evil would be able to touch you even when you are in win their midst. The Bible says that “With God all things are possible.” However, it is pertinent to state that God Himself has decided that there are certain things He would not do, no matter how hard one prays. So, this also may account for why some deliverance cases remain impossible. God can decide that He is not going to do it. We should know that God cannot tolerate iniquity. It is also impossible to please God in the absence of faith. God does not lie and cannot support lying. If you as a knowledgeable and mature Christian decides to backslide on your own volition, God will not force restoration on you, since you just decided to run away from Him. God also cannot admit any sinner into His heaven. He cannot take the second position in your life, that is, He cannot share you with any other thing. It is an unacceptable practice to God for someone to pull His hands and say, “God, follow me.” God is interested in helping us, but in His attempt to assist, if there is an enemy in the person’s life constituting a hindrance, it is his responsibility to aggressively fight the enemy.
SOME OF THE ENEMIES TO CONFRONT ARE AS FOLLOWS:
i. Failure to repent completely from all your sins.
ii. Failure to confess your sins specifically. Note that when you were sinning, you did not commit them simultaneously, therefore you must confess them one by one.
iii. Failure to forgive others is a way of putting a stumbling block to your prayers from being answered. Unforgiving spirit is an enemy of freedom.
iv. When you lack desperation to challenge your mountain, the stubborn situation will definitely remain unmoved. That is why those who are not desperate enough in prayer cannot be aggressive and violent enough to bulldoze their mountains of problems.
v. When you have wrong motives there will be no freedom in sight. You should be able to ask yourself some questions in the light of the plan of God for your life. Why do I want deliverance? Is it because I want to be more useful to God? Or do I want deliverance so that I can have more strength or opportunity to commit sin? God knows our motives. It is not just to get off the hook, but for us to serve Him.
vi. Failure to break with occult and false religions would still keep you in bondage. As far as you fail to disconnect yourself completely from all forms of occult and false religion, trouble will continue. Keeping occult materials at home in the name of decoration is an invitation to perpetual bondage. Check your belongings and destroy everything that is not supposed to be there including your secret society certificates if truly you want to be free. All believers need to be very careful, seeing they are at the warfront.
vii. Failure to cut away from evil relationship may also lead to partial deliverance. Except you cut away completely from such relationships, the journey to your freedom would still be far.
viii. Refusal to tell all the secret is an indication that you are hiding away important information that can assist those who are helping you. They would not able to do much if you conceal the location of your enemy’s stronghold. Not until you come out without being ashamed to say, "This is what I am. This is what I have done before," nothing will happen. Sometime ago, we were praying for a particular sister for about two months without any result. Until she eventually told us that her own father was the first man to sleep with her we could not make a head way. She had been ashamed to reveal it, so the devil capitalized on that to hold her bound. There is no doubt that your long standing bondage can go if you are ready to heed this message today. Therefore enter into your own freedom by following all these enumerated principles in the word of God. Let us pray.
PRAYER POINT
1. O God, forgive me if I have brought any problem into my life with my own hands, in the name of Jesus.
2. Lord Jesus, send your axe of fire into the root of the problems in my life, in the name of Jesus. (Place one hand on the head and another close to your navel).
3. Every association against me in the second heaven, scatter, in the of Jesus (Point one finger to heaven)
4. Oh Lord, ignite my mouth with your fire to destroy all contrary powers, in the name of Jesus.
5. I paralyze every strongman coming from my home, in the name of Jesus.
6. Every strategy of household wickedness be paralyzed, in the name of Jesus.
