Discipleship: The Battle for the Mind.

1 Matthew 12: 29—if we have the Holy Spirit in us then devil cannot occupy us.

2. Matthew 12:43-45—if we do not then it is possible for demons to invade.

3. John 8:49—honoring God and hosting demons are mutually exclusive categories.

4. John 14:23 and Romans 8:9-17—if you are follower of Christ, the King himself indwells in you.

5. 1 John 4:4—greater is He who is in us, than he who is in the world.

6. An objection: Luke 13:10-17 is case of a believer demonized.

a.       It was as described as a healing but even if it were an exorcism…

1.      Christ encountered all kinds of people in the synagogue who were not believers. Matthew 23:13-15

2.      Being physically descended from Abraham doesn’t mean you are automatically saved. (Matthew 3:9, Romans 9:7-8, Luke 19:9)

7. We are defeated in spiritual warfare because we follow the ways of the world. Ephesians 2:1-3

8. In Matthew 6:13 Jesus underscored temptation not demonization.

9. Matthew 15:19-19 and Luke 6:45. Out of our heart springs sin.

10. A proper perspective on spiritual warfare is focused on the power of God not the ploys of Satan. Ephesians 6:10-11.

11. 1 Peter 5:8—the devil is looking to devour. He can’t force us to do anything.

12. The devil can speak to our minds. Judas (Luke 6:16; 22:3), Ananias (Acts 5:3), David (1 Chronicles 21:1) It is through biblical instruction we aware of his schemes and are not helpless to his intellect…” in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes.” 2 Corinthians 2:11. We overcome the devil’s schemes by basically ‘coming to our senses.’ 2 Timothy 2:24-26

13. They are intimate aware of the truth they twist.[1]

Prep for the Next Week

Deliverance: The Cleansing Stream

The devil is in the details: An Examination of the Teachings of Bob Larson

http://www.equip.org/free/DD806.htm

Cleansing Stream Ministries (Deliverance motif.) http://www.cleansingstream.org/

Is Jesus Cleansing His Church with Cleansing Stream?

http://www.letusreason.org/curren21.htm --

Excerpts…

The Stream promotes the teaching that Man is a tri-partite being and that we are cleansed by salvation in our Spirit, but not in our soul or body. The old deliverance rap is that the soul is separate and still in bondage, but not our spirit.  Therefore a demon can be present somewhere inside a Christian (i.e. his soul), but not in his spirit.[2]

What they do is have people look at what kind of sin they are entrapped by and then shift the blame from the individual to demonic activity which, of course, requires spiritual warfare and deliverance. The program emphasizes that most sins are either caused by demonic influences or implied to be from generational curses. This is similar to the teachings of Neil Anderson who bases his deliverance methodology on finding root causes in the past and convincing people that they are victims of demonic strongholds passed on from their ancestors. (Neil Anderson, The Bondage Breaker, 1990, p. 207)[3]

The Bondage Maker: Examining the Message and Method of Neil T. Anderson.

Part One: Sanctification and the Believer’s Identity in Christ
http://www.equip.org/free/DA081.htm

Part Two: Spiritual Warfare and the “Truth Encounter”
http://www.equip.org/free/DA082.htm

Part Three: Spiritual Warfare And The Seven “Steps To Freedom”
http://www.equip.org/free/DA083.htm

Part Four: Spiritual Warfare and the Myth of Satanic Conspiracies and Ritual Abuse
http://www.equip.org/free/DA084.htm

This teaching is right out of the “Words session” is word faith theology. What they are teaching is that words have an inherent power, they bless or curse, that we can break the curses over us by speaking the right words. Stream puts the emphasis on the words themselves as if they have some inherent power within to do good or bad. We have a choice to accept or reject someone’s words. But it’s not the words themselves that contain power but what they convey that brings us understanding and concepts of what to do or not do.[4]

An article on cleansing stream from a Calvinistic perspective…
http://www.geocities.com/Bob_Hunter/csch4.htm

Excerpts…

In the beginning of the Words section, the workbook states that God had only to speak and everything came into being.⁽²⁶⁾ But the analogy between God speaking and man speaking breaks down since man is not God and cannot speak things into existence. Also, it was not the power of God's words that brought forth creation, nor faith, but the very fact that it was God who did the speaking![5]

The workbook states, "We repent and our sin is gone. But what about the foothold or sin gave to the enemy? That hook remains."⁽⁵⁴⁾ For Cleansing Stream, repentance must also be coupled with renouncement of the hook and spiritual warfare with the devil. With face upward one speaks to God in repentance and with face downward one speaks to Satan.[6]

1 John 1:9