Deliverance Ministries: Their tragedies and their Triumphs 1

Chapter Sixteen:
Deliverance Ministries:
Their Tragedies and Their Triumphs

This is a short review of some types of Christian Deliverance

ministries. It is based on those I have come across and read of
over a number of years. I draw my own conclusions. Before we
continue into our subject it would be a good idea to consider
language, terms and concepts.

Deliverance ministry or minister

There may be different terms to describe this but Deliverance
Ministry concerns exorcism of evil spirits from persons or places by
Christian ministers and lay people.

Demon possession
The control by evil spirits of the whole of a person. This includes
control of the body, mind and soul.

Demonic oppression
As distinct from possession, oppression is an evil influence or attack

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upon body or soul by spirits.

Casting out demons

Implies the casting out from inside a person the evil spirits that have
possessed them.

In the Name of Jesus

Implies faith in the full authority of Jesus Christ, Son of God over all
forces of evil. Christian ministers use the name of Jesus to cast out evil
spirits.

Legal ground
The concept that God's Spiritual Law by which He governs the
universe is binding upon all creatures. Demons gain control over
believers and others by legal ground. That is by use of deception or
intimidation or temptation, causing a person to 'open a door' to the
evil spirits, either knowingly or more likely unknowingly. In this
sense evil spirits have used God's Spiritual Law to gain access, as God
regards those who give legal ground as giving permission to evil
spirits to work.

The Power of the Cross and the Blood of Jesus

It was through the Cross that Jesus personally defeated Satan and by
shedding His blood that He provided the means of deliverance. This is
all related to God's Law but it means in practise that deliverance can
come specifically by faith in the Cross or the Blood of Jesus. The
Blood of Jesus cleanses us from sin (legal ground) and the Power of
the Cross is applied by the Holy Spirit against the Powers of Darkness.

The Powers of Darkness

Primarily Satan and his fallen angels, as well as demons but it can also
include those who use dark arts or evil spirits; such as Satanists,
occultists and so on. I will explain any other terms I use. This is only a
brief introduction to the subject.

Types of deliverance ministries

Today evangelical Christians in various denominations would have

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gained ideas of Deliverance Ministry mainly from Charismatic or

Pentecostal sources, including literature. Before considering these let's
consider more traditional deliverance ministers. Many more
traditional types of Christians know of Deliverance Ministry under
different names.

Catholic Exorcists
The Catholic Church does have some ministers trained in performing
exorcisms. In the Catholic Church there are set prayers and rituals that
are gone through in cases of demon possession or other types of
demonic activity where exorcism is required. Today there is also
training in the areas of counselling and psychiatry and priests are
trained to forward people with mental problems, who believe they are
possessed, to qualified professionals. In practice it is very difficult to
cast out evil spirits. Success is measured by the change that comes over
the person being delivered or exorcised. The Catholic Church is
failing to identify and free captives. Where there are earnest exorcisms
the success rate varies according to God's free grace offered to all who
pray and believe. In fact before going on I should say, contrary to
conventional wisdom, that God often frees captives from pure
kindness. As God indeed gives many blessings to people in the hope
they will repent. Because of this principal of God's undeserved help
and kindness, exorcists in other religions are sometimes successful and
generally exorcists who invoke the Name of Christ have some
measure of blessing from God.

Anglican exorcists
The Church of England also has minsters that are trained in
deliverance. These few priests within Anglicanism that practice
deliverance ministry are usually evangelicals. They too read prayers
and sing hymns as well as using set rituals and language. Some of
these ministers have been very successful. This is due to a lot of sound
teaching in the area of shepherding congregations and following the
basics of faith in Christ and His power over evil. They tend to reject
as bizarre and purely frictional the kind of phenomena often depicted
in Charismatic 'personal testimony' books. This caution is legitimate
but they are also unaware, as almost all deliverance ministers are, of
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many of Satan's works.

Pentecostal and Charismatic deliverance ministers

How they conduct deliverance is based upon their religious culture;
according to its assumptions and prejudices. They tend to be more
hyper-active and have many rules and beliefs that in no way reflect
reality, spiritual or otherwise. For example many have a cultural belief
that Christians who have a demon will 'manifest' it, often by writhing
as a snake upon the floor. People who believe they have a demon tend
to do this. The minsters then shout; shouting is seen as being
authoritative, something like, “We cast you out in Jesus Name!” This
may be, and usually is, said over and over again. After a while the
person delivered gets up off the floor to the praise of all. Often
speaking in tongues, supposedly a spiritual language from God is used
in deliverance as well as prophecy and other gifts.

The tragedy of all this is that the whole spectacle is itself a delusion
from beginning to end. Much of it is psychological. Much is
psychogenic in terms of manifesting symptoms of possession and
deliverance by the power of the mind. The apparent remedy is
normally psychogenic- as they believe they feel, and they feel as they
believe.

There have been cases in history where demons caused people to

writhe as a snake but generally this is not a symptom of most demon
possession. Another tragedy is that there are many signs of demon
possession and oppression that are seen as real manifestations of God's
Spirit by practising Pentecostals. Among these are confusion,
passivity, paranoia, censoriousness, super-spirituality or religious
pride, sexual immorality, petty blasphemies, strange illnesses,
madness, hatred of holiness and the holy...

These are disguised, excused and justified variously as righteous

indignation, grace (i.e. “God knows we're only human”), freedom of
the Spirit, anointing, natural etcetera. To go further into the subject
I'd need to write a book on deliverance alone but for now I will give
you one or two real examples of Christian exorcism.

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A spiritualist's demon cast out

A young friend of mine complained that a spiritualist neighbour had
been causing trouble for Christians and that they felt oppressed and
believed an evil spirit was at work connected to the spiritualist. I
prayed against the antichristian spiritualist and her demon. Into the
room where I was praying an old woman entered. I could see her
clearly but I could also see through her. She walked toward me with
an evil sneer upon her face. I realised that she did not know I could
see her. Behind her a great pit opened up in the floor. As I turned my
head toward her she realised I could see her and as I commanded her
to depart into the pit in Jesus' Name, she screamed in terror, fell back
into the pit and it closed.

I am not going to defend, justify or explain this exorcism. It was after

all engineered by God. It was not what I had read or been taught. It
was just reality. Few know it as fact. The demonic oppression of my
Christian friends ceased.

The demons' ultimate terror

I have often not followed the rules in Christian books about casting
out demons. Once I came up against an evil spirit and I said, “I
command you in Jesus' Name to appear before the Father in Heaven
and He will tell you what to do!”
I learnt from this that they fear going before God more than they do
going down to the Pit. The evil spirit rose up to God in great terror.

“Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out
demons. Freely you have received, freely give.”
[Matthew 10:8]

Self Deliverance
Generally Christians that are troubled by evil spirits that have to some
extent entered them, such as in the form of frightening and sickening
images that appear in their minds apart from their own volition; or
strange body jerking and or shaking – may practice a form of self

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deliverance – by which is meant of course deliverance by the Holy

Spirit using the believer to be their own minister.

Mental illness or demonic oppression?

Firstly the believer needs to question whether they have a form of
mental illness as most people that believe they are oppressed by
demons are suffering from mental illness. However occult power and
mental delusion are differing things as are spiritual entities and mental
neuroses. For those suffering from mental and emotional problems a
counsellor or Christian psychiatrist is recommended. For the totally
sane and self aware believer who recognises intelligently the activity
of evil spirits however there is self deliverance.

Psychiatry had a vested interest in dismissing all spiritual

phenomena as delusion as it is a fundamentally materialist and also
sin justifying philosophy specifically designed to counter the influence
of Christianity. The harm done by psychiatry is incalculable and its
effects truly evil – spreading unbelief in the words of Jesus and failing
to free the oppressed from the devil – failing to acknowledge real
evidence for the supernatural and by necessity rewriting history and
reality to fit into a neat, self justifying antidote to faith. You must
realise that according to psychiatry the biblical Jesus and all the
prophets and apostles were totally insane and also corrupt individuals
who variously suffered from delusions of grandeur, schizophrenia,
paranoia... and they also manipulated and exploited others. Jesus, if
you can find a psychiatrist honest enough to admit it, would be seen
as a cult leader who had delusions about being the son of God as he
heard voices – voices that also warned him of persecution. In other
words he would be seen as a paranoid schizophrenic...

The fact is however that around the world each year millions of
people will see spirits and many millions will be oppressed by
them – mostly unawares. All these will be patronisingly dismissed
upon the basis of a scientific knowledge called Psychiatry that is
neither scientific nor knowledge. The reader should therefore realise
that in this chapter I am not mistakenly giving advise to the mentally

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ill because I have failed to understand narcissism, paranoia, anxiety,

schizophrenia, obsessiveness compulsive disorder, or any number of
disorders and syndromes – I have a good layman's understanding. I
am giving advice to the self aware – those self aware of being tranquil
in mind and sensible and logical in thinking – clear headed and sound
– as a rule- except for a specific problem often traceable to a specific
cause in the spiritual realm.

Here are some examples:

The pentecostal or charismatic who had noticed that their own
prophecies often fail: Failed prophecies are unacceptable to God and
not part of His will and should not be tolerated. Do this: Think of the
power of the Cross and apply it to the prophecy while praying that if
this thing is not of God it will cease. As you are prophesying -
especially as you have a prophecy telling you the prophecy is of God-
continue to pray in this vein. As a rule you will gradually become
enlightened and free of false prophecy – a gift inspired by the devil.

For tongues, slain in the spirit, dancing in the spirit, laughing in

the spirit, groaning and shouting in the spirit, making animal
noises in the spirit - do the same. A steady application of the Cross
of Christ by faith will eventually whittle away everything that is not
of God. It is however a battle and only the true disciples of Christ will
win this battle. Many pentecostals and charismatics who try this out
will only become more convinced their obviously failed gifts are of
God! This is due to lack of holiness and discipleship. GOD IS HAPPY
FOR HIS GIFTS TO BE TESTED but the powers of darkness will
make excuses to the mind for not doing so or not being thorough....

Mental images that are horrific

Often evil spirits inject into the mind images or visions that are part of
their imagination and therefore utterly horrible and evil. The graphic
nature of these images can be and usually are indicative of an
imagination and knowledge of evil that is beyond that of the believer
– that is the believer is very aware that another mind that is familiar
with evil the believer on their own could not imagine is having a
direct influence upon them. The antidote is to repent of any known
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sin and ask God to cast the oppressing spirit into Hell – Yes, right into
Hell. Apply the Cross of Christ to your thoughts and wilfully reject all
thoughts not of God. Exercise your mind and train it to reject
offensive images, thoughts and blasphemies. Blasphemies may enter
the mind if you go near a church or want to pick up a bible. This does
not mean you have blasphemed but that you are oppressed by a spirit
of blasphemy. The twofold exercise of attacking the evil spirits in prayer
and disciplining your own mind to gain control of it will give you
both a discerning and clear mind. You may achieve in hours, days or
months what psychiatry will take years, if at all, to achieve. However
for those with a psychiatric problem a good counsellor is needed – but
such counsellors are useless in dealing with the evil of the
supernatural- which is why I said earlier when it comes to great
suffering and overwhelming and real problems the counselling
industry is a fraud as it pretends to be able to supply needs it cannot
supply to foster profitable business and reputation. Like a petrol pump
that falters after just a few drops enter the car...

Here is an interesting observation: The Christians I have known

who have been the most intelligent, clear headed and insightful over a
number of issues also had a greater faith: Their minds were stronger,
purer and far more advanced than most. These also would agree with
all I have said above as it was very familiar to them. This is in stark
contradistinction to the view of psychiatry that the impaired mind is
the mind that believes fully in demonic battles.

Shaking of the body, loss of control of facial muscles, and

sometimes beatings upon the body by unseen beings.
The cause for this is always passivity of mind usually in relation to
some false spiritual gift. By false teaching the undiscerning and often
young believer will give themselves up to a kind of zombie minded
state in which they wait for the 'Spirit to move' in dance or prophecy
or rapture of some kind. The spirits behind this false teaching begin to
control what the believer has given up control of. They begin to take
over some of the muscles and gestures of the believer, sometimes
unknown to the believer. If you look on Youtube at some of the

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charismatics and observe closely you will see, that even while trying
to discuss something normally, they will often have jerking
movements or strange facial expressions... A deliverance from this
attempt at the possession of the believer can result in the evil spirits
attacking from without, quite literally so that the believer feels unseen
fists hit them. Command them to depart to Hell IN JESUS NAME-
and train your mind to always be active and never passive and free
yourself of all zombie, trance like states – which are actually occultic
and not Christian – It takes effort but follow all the guidelines above.

Take control of your mind and body by steady faith, prayer and
discipline and may God be with you. Don't give in or give up. This is
just the fearful demons trying to whittle away your will power and
consecration to God. Persevere in holiness and Christ will save you.

Deliverance from evil objects

Evil spirits like to regard what is inspired by them as belonging to
them and those who own such things that are inspired by them as
under their authority. Therefore you must rid your home of all
occultic objects – even of Christmas and Easter cards from false friends
who may hate you in their hearts can generate an evil, oppressive
dynamic– Get free of satanic movies and books – of pornography...

Pornography
The internet has made access to porn easy and commonplace. Most
Christian men and probably a larger proportion of Christian women
than would be guessed at look at pornography. Men may find that
they indulge what seems like a natural desire and find themselves
drawn to look at what is unnatural and find to their horror that when
they try to break off or repent they do not but go further into sin.

The reason for this is that pornography is of course sinful and

satanically inspired. The evil spirits hold sway over the viewers of
pornography and their power is felt by undiscerning men and women
– and kids too sometimes.

By recognising the occultic element behind pornography you may be

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helped to reject it. You should also remember that if you pay for
pornography you are paying for the people that make it to go to Hell
and you may even be paying for the rape and murder of victims as a
certain percentage of funds of mainstream pornography also finds its
way into the hands of the most sexually depraved people on the
planet. Understanding these things may help you break off of it.
Another helpful thing is to realise that in your ‘flesh life’ you do not
possess the power to break with sin but the Holy Spirit has the power
to make you holy by faith in Christ.

Some advise you in the vein of the usual rubbish you read in Christian
counselling books that avoid the issues and don't know how to solve
the problems – as they often skirt around the issues. However many of
you reading this will indulge in looking at pornography – I know it –
God knows it and so does the devil. If a clean break is too much for
you – like a drug addict using methadone to lessen the withdrawal
symptoms from heroin – break gradually until you achieve purity of
heart and action. It is possible and generally the earnest disciples will
come out of this trough if they apply themselves. For some knowing
of the connection between the powers of darkness and pornography
will be enough but for others there will be a slow climb out of the
mire. In this area I will in fact advise counselling – but Christian
counselling. It is not enough to command demons when you yourself
are the one committing the sin.

May you all find peace – the very peace waiting for you in Christ.

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