The Strongman
Too many things try to latch on to us—sickness, disease, things that start out small but work their way in over time, a little pain until we can’t shake it and it becomes debilitating as time goes by. When we do not rise up to combat the problem, pretty soon we are chained so tightly we can’t break loose. Sometimes we become addicted to pain pills to the point of not being able to live without them. We become frustrated because we can’t get free no matter what we do.
There is a scripture that tells the parable of what happens to us. It says that no one can enter a strongman’s house without first tying him up first. Then he can plunder the strong man’s house. Jesus refers to Satan as the strong man in the parable and to Himself as the One who enters the house and plunders the place. I John 5:19. Jesus is the One who is stronger than the strong man, and he can bind the strong man, Satan and get control of him.
We must bind the strongman who is Satan and don’t let him enter our bodies with sickness and disease. He will bring debilitating pain on us to the point that it incapacitates u. He makes us believe that there is nothing we can do about it. He locks us in chains so tight we cannot get loose, but Jesus said, “Greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world” (I John 4:4). Do we believe that His greater power is within us or do we believe that it is just inevitable that Satan huffs and puffs with all his might to blow our house down or to steal, kill, and destroy anything we will let him take. A well-known verse says, “”we wrestle no against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high place” (Ephesians 6:12). Another verse tells us more about this adversary. It says, “Your adversary, the devil, prowls around seeking someone to devour” (I Peter 5:8).
Paul said we used to walk “according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience,” (Ephesians 2:2). This is why the strong man must first be bound before people can be set free. This is not only true of sin but of sickness. We can be bound with the shackles of sickness to the point where we are paralyzed.
(See; Mark 3:227 and Colossians 1:13).
Satan attempt to set up strongholds against God’s people but these strongholds must be brought down with spiritual weapons of the Word of God and the authority that Jesus has delegated to us. The Bible warns us not to let the strongman get an advantage of us for we are not ignorant of his devices. This could be his clever schemes that he uses to trick us into believing his lies.
How do we know we are up to doing anything about Satan. Jesus said, that “he gave us authority to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy” (Luke 10:19). Another scripture says, “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven and whatsoever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven” (Matthew 18:18).
What does this mean to us? We must learn to take action and exercise the authority Jesus has made available. Most of us don’t. We need to do more than bind—we must loose something to replace what we have bound. For example, we bound pain and the root cause of that pain. What do we replace it with? We replace pain with healing and wellness. Do not leave any empty space there for the devil to move back with seven more bad things. Scripture gives us an example of what happens. There are two references, one in Luke 11:225 and one in Matthew 112:44 NIV that says “when it [the spirit] arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and in order. Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself and they go in and live.’ He is referring to an impure spirit coming out of a person and it goes through places looking for rest and does not find it. Then it says I will return to the house I left and when it arrives it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order. Then the spirit takes seven more wicked spirits and moves in. The final stage is worse than what it was at first. Get the devil out and keep him out by filling up the empty space with healing if that is what you need. Get the resurrection power of Jesus into your body and keep the sickness nd disease out. Don’t give the devil a foothold. Once the spirit is bound, don’t let it stick around. Send it to the pit and tell it not to come back. Once the spirit of infirmity is bound, don’t let it linger around and try to regain a foothold. Ephesians 4:27 says, “Leave no room or foothold for the devil.” Paul says, “Do not give the devil a foothold—don’t make it any easier on him. Send the devil and his demons on their way as soon as you bind them. Send them to the pit and tell them not to come back. Say, “Be gone and mean it.” One woman always prayed, “and don’t come back for 24 hours.” It is better to say, “Don’t come back at all. Don’t come back period!”
