Sunday 12 February 2017

The Healing of the Mind

Scripture:  2 Timothy 1 v 7: "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind."
Mark 5 v 2 - 8: "And when he was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit, Who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains:  Because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces: neither could any man tame him.

And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones.  But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him,  And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not.  For He said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit."

Mark 5 v 15: "And they come to Jesus, and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid."

In this day and age, those who are possessed by demons are mostly in institutions, locked in padded cells, placed in ice baths, given strong tranquilizers and other anti-psychotic medication.  People have to specially trained to handle violent, dangerous, unpredictable humans who are potential psychopaths.

Of course we now have psychopaths disguised as militant extremists roaming the world exacting their terror on unsuspecting soft targets.  On the other hand there are millions of people living with dementia, misunderstood, shunned, lonely and afraid.
Dementia, properly translated, means controlled by demons.  The terrorists are controlled by demons too.

They are a burden on health services because there is no cure for dementia, Alzheimer's, and other such mentally degenerative disorders.  The numbers are growing and care homes are filled to capacity.  

The Bible is The Manufacturer's Handbook.  It has answers for every problem if you know where to look.  God created people to have a sound mind.  All people.  No exceptions.  So where did the phobias, nightmares, dementia, epilepsy, differently abled people come from and how can they get their normal life back?  They got that way when Satan held us hostage and fearfully tormented our souls, before the world was formed.

Jesus came to this Earth to show by example how to fix the medically incurable.  Among many other things like dying for our sins.  He healed the lepers, the outcasts of society, and made those who were thankful, whole again.  He restored fingers, toes noses and faces.  He restored them to their families.

The Gadarene demoniac of Mark 5 gets a whole chapter as this remarkable deliverance is full of lessons for us in how to deal with impossibly insane people, and in a short time restoring soundness of mind.

Firstly, the possessed man recognised Jesus afar off and ran to worship Him.  When you are filled with the Holy anointing of Jesus, demons go into shock.  They see Jesus in you and they react and retreat.  The moment they retreat, the Holy Spirit touches the man and he comes towards someone who can help set him free.

The demons also reacted speaking out of the man, using his vocal chords, What have WE to do with YOU, JESUS, SON OF THE MOST HIGH GOD!  The name of this demon is Legion.  There are between 6000 and 10000 men in a Roman legion.  Thousands of demons had invaded this man's soul and flesh and spirit.  The demons recognized Jesus, not the man.

The demons begged Jesus not to send them back to Hell before the time.  It was only after the death and resurrection of Jesus when He took possession of the Keys of Hell and Death that they could be sent back to Hell by us, the disciples of Jesus.

However, this is a part of Jesus' ministry that is not encouraged much these days.  So the demons flourish undisturbed and the institutions struggle to cope, and families are robbed of a precious family member because we do not have the courage or learning to deal with their bondage.  You don't need a priest with holy water and a Cross.  All you need is pure faith in Jesus, and to know your enemy.

In some places Jesus says, This kind of demon can only be removed by prayer and fasting.  A fast is when you shut the world out - no TV, work, books, newspapers, entertainment, computer games, internet, telephone or food.  Nothing that will stimulate your soul or flesh.  Gospel music, The Bible and prayer for 3 or more days, as the Lord wills, will prepare you to face any spiritual enemy and defeat him.

Higher knowledge arrived for me when I was thrown in the deep end infested with crocodiles as a very young Christian.  A lady came to stay with me after she attempted suicide.  She was demon possessed from being married to a Satanist who was now looking for her to sacrifice her.  I took her to church and demons started manifesting in her immediately!

I had never seen anything like that before.  Screaming, drooling, spitting, foaming at the mouth, writhing on the floor, shouting obscenities.  Another lady and I took her to the kitchen and suddenly the gift of discerning spirits (which was unknown to me) arrived downloaded into my mind.  We were able to pray and bind those demons and cast them out.

It took several sessions with a team of spiritual warriors to finally see her set free.  It was a powerful ministry, and not pretty at times, but Jesus was so involved with us, it was amazing.  We all learnt important lessons and grew spiritually as she was truly a text book case and the change in her was beautiful.  We give all the glory to Jesus for her remarkable deliverance.

There have been many more over the years, and we do not just beat the air.  We know Satan and his demons were defeated by Jesus and have no weapons, armour or anything but lies, bluff, trickery to deceive us.  Often their victims say, I feel so free, there is nothing left to do, and we realise that there is still something trying to escape detection.  It is usually the strong man, the main one, and he is hoping to fool us so he can let all the other ones back in.  Jesus always alerts us for the final victory.

When you see the peace of Jesus upon the person now set free, the effort is worthwhile.  When you see people with dementia now in their right minds, no longer fearful, recognising their family, happy and without fear, you worship Jesus for His great love and the power He has given us to set the captives free.

I have seen two and three-year old children casting out demons successfully.  One child rebuked his granny for smoking.  The demon of nicotine left her immediately.  People have to truly want to be free for God to release them.  Some just enjoy their demons as a harmless vice not realising that they are making an alliance with Satan for him to destroy them.  We need to close every door and lock it so he is completely vanquished.

Seventy percent of the ministry of Jesus was on healing and deliverance.  We need to get back to that level of ministry today so we can turn this world upside down and Jesus can find true faith on Earth when He returns.

Prayer: Heavenly Father, it is time to raise up the long-awaited sons of God who will surely be those who set many captives free.  Please teach us and use us in this much needed ministry to truly help the oppressed go free of their terrible burdens.  Let them be in their right minds and testify of Your greatness. In Jesus' name. Amen.