I HAD NO PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE with demons or spiritual forces the day my future wife and I went to visit Harry in a small rural hospital near the church where I pastored part time during college. He had suffered a serious heart attack and been in a coma ever since. We arrived near lunchtime, and encouraged his wife to take a much-needed break while we stayed with her husband.
After talking to Harry, Julie and I decided to pray for him. Shortly after we began, he moved his lips and said, “Jesus Christ did not come in the flesh.”
Stunned, Julie and I immediately thought of 1 John 4:2: “Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist.” Julie began to cry. I wanted to.
Perhaps by divine design, we had studied about the Gadarene demoniac in a “Life and Teachings of Christ” course just that morning at Baylor University. The professor said, “Jesus always found out the demon’s name before casting it out.”
I said to Julie, “Let’s pray, and ask for a name.” We bowed our heads and demanded in the name of Christ that if we were dealing with a demonic spirit, it must reveal its name.
Much to our surprise, Harry spoke: “My name is Clarissus.”
We were speechless and terrified. After calming down, Julie asked, “What do we do now?”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “The dismissal bell rang this morning and that’s as far as we got” (which was the truth).
“Then why don’t we do what Jesus did?” Julie suggested. “Let’s pray for Clarissus to come out.”
So we bowed our heads and prayed for Clarissus to come forth. Nothing happened.
Shortly afterward, Harry’s wife returned. “How did things go?” she asked.
Julie looked at me, and I looked at her. We weren’t about to tell her what happened. The truth is, we were not certain ourselves.
“Just fine,” we said.
We were in the parking lot when Harry’s wife came running out the hospital door yelling, “Wait! Wait! What happened in there? Something’s happened to Harry! I want to know what happened.”
Frightened, we said not a word.
About 10:30 that evening. Harry regained consciousness and said to his wife, “I just had the strangest dream. I was climbing the steps to heaven and St. Peter said, ‘You can’t come in now.’ So I climbed back down the ladder. I guess God has more things for me to do before I die.”
Ten minutes later he had a massive heart attack. Three days later I conducted his funeral.
Then I had a hundred questions about what happened that day, and Harry wasn’t around to answer them. But in the twenty-five years since that intriguing Thursday afternoon in central Texas, I have invested considerable energy in thinking about how spiritual forces oppress pastors in two areas: in our personal lives, and in how we care for people who have opened their lives to the Evil One and suffered spiritual attack. Overcoming the devil is a must-learn skill in the process of spiritual growth (1 John 2:12-14).
Spiritual warfare in our personal life
If I were the devil, I’d wage warfare against pastors. I’d attack relentlessly with spirits of depression and despair, anger and bitterness, jealousy and lust, deceit and pride. I’d motivate all sorts of people and hosts of demonic forces to make pastoral life miserable. In addition, I would make sure all pastors memorized early in their careers the passage, “Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world” (1 John 4:4, kjv). Then, I would wreak havoc while pastors assumed divine immunity from my attacks. I would hide while they sought help everywhere but the one place where they might find relief.
One of the most vicious satanic attacks I’ve withstood began one Sunday during the closing moments of the evening service. An impression of impending death overwhelmed me. I felt I had just preached my last sermon. I would die before next Sunday. I sat in dread in the blue rocking chair in our living room late into the next two nights, waiting to die. Strange tinglings moved down my arms. Tuesday morning I called a cardiologist friend at University Hospital, and within hours I was on a treadmill undergoing all sorts of heart tests. When all checked out well, the cardiologist called the chief of neurology, and thirty minutes later I was in his office undergoing a neurological exam.
“Your symptoms don’t fit any of the usual neurological problems or diseases,” he said. “Perhaps you have some exotic problem I have never encountered. Other than that, I don’t know what to tell you. I advise you to go on home, resume your normal activity, and see if any other symptoms develop.”
But the oppression did not abate. Late Thursday afternoon I was exercising on my NordicTrack when a counselor from one of our deliverance teams called. “I really hate to bother you,” he began, “but we had something happen that may interest you. A woman struggling to get out of witchcraft just revealed in a deliverance session that she and some other friends had placed a curse on you. They actually prayed for a spirit of death to destroy you. I know this is probably nothing, and I almost didn’t call, but perhaps you’ll find the information useful.”
I got back on the exercise machine and shouted out praise and thanksgiving to God. Then I rebuked the spirits attacking me, and immediately the oppression lifted. The symptoms dissipated.
Most spiritual attacks are not nearly so dramatic. I would be hard pressed to tell another story like that one. However, over extended periods, less intensive attacks can be just as devastating. Subtle attacks often go undiagnosed for years. Many pastors rarely consider that their depression, despair, envy, anger, bitterness, jealousy, lust, deceit, or pride may have a spiritual-warfare component.
Worry was one of my besetting sins. I can spiritualize it and call it “unbelief” or a “lack of faith,” because those words sound better, but they fail to disguise the ugliness of my problem. Living in the future and brooding about the past siphoned off needed energy from my wife, children, and church family.
My day off was the worst. My wife often told me how much she hated Fridays. Without pressing church problems to distract me, I was free to brood about all sorts of problems.
“You’re acting like a preoccupied, intimidated child,” Julie said to me on many occasions. “Now stop it. You’re no fun to be around.”
Like most worriers, I had observed that at least 99 percent of what I worried about never happened, but I could not stop. I was miserable. One day, while navigating through a worrisome fog of “what ifs,” I wondered if I had persisted in uncontrolled worry for so long that Satan had gained a foothold in my life (Ephesians 4:27). Perhaps I was not only fighting the flesh; I was fighting the devil as well.
The process I used to find relief from my worry I now use often when I suspect a spiritual attack. James 4:7 gives a simple formula: “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” For me, submitting to God involves three things: (1) confessing that the area is out of control and needs help; (2) consciously yielding the area to God; and (3) considering myself dead, according to Romans 6, to the sin in that area. If these three activities provide freedom, then I thank God the problem was only a sin of the flesh. However, if the struggle persists, I consider that I may be experiencing a spiritual attack. The second half of James 4:7—”Resist the devil”—then comes into play.
Resisting the devil addresses the spiritual forces attacking my life. Finding freedom involves four things: (1) declaring that I have forsaken and confessed my sin to God so the forces of evil no longer have a foothold; (2) renouncing the attacking forces (“In the name of Jesus Christ, depart and leave me alone. I rebuke you and your attacks against me. I want nothing to do with you.” ); (3) asking for the filling of the Holy Spirit; and (4) imploring the Holy Spirit to build a hedge of protection around me from future attacks. (If God can build a hedge around Job—Job 1:10—then he can build one around me. Also, I often ask God not to lower my hedge like he lowered Job’s. I figure it can’t hurt to ask!)
I believe it is easier to avoid a spiritual attack than to struggle through one later. Just as I never leave the house in the morning without my clothes, I never leave without my spiritual armor. Every day I specifically pray for the spiritual armor of Ephesians 6:10-17. I also pray daily for God to erect that spiritual hedge around my family, my church, and me.
Spiritual warfare is always a prayer project. Prayer provides protection prior to attack. Prayer provides offensive weapons to neutralize attacking spiritual forces. Prayer provides healing balm for recovery from inflicted spiritual wounds.
Spiritual warfare in our work
The man from the utility company finished his work and said, “You’re Roger Barrier, aren’t you? I listen to your radio program every day. My wife and I are both Christians. She’s having some problems; in fact, there are times when I wonder what’s going on inside of her. Do you believe in demons?”
“Yes,” I replied. “Why don’t we sit down in the kitchen and talk?”
“Several months ago,” he began, “we went to a spiritualist church where we were encouraged to pray to receive spirit guides to help direct our lives. I didn’t pray for any, but my wife did. She hasn’t been the same since. Sometimes, it’s as if there’s a different person inside. Her voice changes; her face contorts; she has an aversion to the things of God. Our marriage is falling apart. She won’t go back to our Christian church. It all came to a head last night. While we were arguing, she walked into the hallway, turned slowly, and said with a sneer, ‘Don’t you know who we are?’ Her voice rose to a scream as she repeated, ‘Don’t you know who we are? Don’t you know who we are?’ “
He was shaking now.
“I think,” he said, “she is demon-possessed, like they talk about in the Bible. Can you help us?”
My affirmative answer was easy to say. But reaching the point where I felt confident to say it was not.
Today Casas Adobes sponsors a deliverance ministry, which developed because of people who sought help for problems that could only be described as demonic. As we began caring for these folks, some in our congregation were upset. Some were convinced that demons existed only in the first-century world. Others were indignant; most were ignorant of spiritual-warfare issues.
A key turning point was when our counseling pastor grew frustrated working with people who should have found emotional healing for their personal problems, reconciliation for their marriages, and harmony in their relationships—but never did. Well-trained by every secular standard in both counseling and psychology, our counseling pastor lamented that the success rate in the psychiatric field hovered around 10 percent.
When he added the spiritual-warfare component to his tools for helping people, he discovered that people who were not helped in any other way began finding victory. When a problem does not yield to medical attention, standard psychological counseling, biblical insight, or the usual prayer requests, it is not unwise to consider the possibility of a spiritual attack.
Deliverance checklist
Alan came to my office late one afternoon after everyone had left for the day. Over the years his childhood devotion to Christ had waned. Unfortunately, he responded to his spiritual longings by attending a spiritualist church. When the leaders asked if he wanted a spirit guide to help him through life, he responded enthusiastically.
Now he was no longer enthusiastic.
He told me, “I received something that night, and I don’t like what I got.” I looked on with amazement as he went into a trance. His eyes had a glazed, faraway look. After a while he came back to himself and said simply, “They’re back, aren’t they.”
I was not quite certain who “they” were, but I agreed—they seemed to be back.
I excused myself and called another of our pastors, who was at home, to return to the office. I did not want to be alone with Alan. When the other pastor arrived, Alan detailed the symptoms of his problem, which ranged from astral projection to demonic visions. I never cease to be amazed at unsuspecting Christians who use a demonic tool to open the door to the occult. Our deliverance ministry has a checklist of past activities for people to examine:
- Contact with occult activity (Deuteronomy 18:9-13)
- Personal invitation for demonic guidance and help (2 Corinthians 11:4)
- Drug and alcohol abuse involvement (Ephesians 4:20-22)
- Perpetual sin (Ephesians 4:27)
- Transference (Exodus 20:5-6)
- An undisciplined or “out of control” mind (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)
- Sexual sin or abuse (Many deliverance sessions reveal that struggles in this area allow Satan to gain a foothold in a person’s life.)
The above list is not exhaustive, but it is a good place to begin. Neil Andersen’s Seven Steps to Freedom1 is now our basic tool for helping people identify areas where they might have opened the door to occult activity. We encourage Christians to remove every occult influence by confession, repentance, and renunciation. Many people I shepherd have innocently entered into occultic activity—from palm readings at the fair to role-playing games at parties to fortune-tellers with crystal balls—with unfortunate long-term results.
Before he died, Dr. Walter Martin—a specialist on cults and occultic activity—and I were discussing satanic attacks against Christians. He said, “It is not paranoid for Christians to think that Satan is out to get them. I teach people that the areas of their lives that are not under the control of the Holy Spirit are open to control by demonic spirits.”
Shortly after our that, I used a concordance to underline every verse in the Bible that described Satan and his devices. My Bible oozed yellow highlighter. This exercise convinced me to prepare my congregation to protect themselves.
Let me summarize some areas in which we instruct our congregation in spiritual warfare:
- First-century Christians had trouble recognizing satanic attacks, and Christians still have trouble today. (2 Corinthians 2:11)
- Evangelism improves when we realize that many refuse Christ not because they love their sin, but because Satan blinds their eyes so that they cannot see the Gospel. (2 Corinthians 4:3-4)
- Satan’s major tool is deception. Job was deceived (Job 3:25-26). Since perfect Eve was deceived (2 Corinthians 11:3), we who are imperfect must be doubly vulnerable to misdiagnosing Satan’s intentions. (The word occult means “hidden.” )
- The Bible constantly warns Christians to beware of satanic harm (Acts 13:10; 2 Corinthians 11:13-15; 2 Thessalonians 2:9-12; 1 Timothy 4:1; and 2 Timothy 3:13). His tools include lying (John 8:32, 44), anger (Ephesians 4:26-27), an unforgiving spirit (2 Corinthians 2:10-11), sin (Ephesians 2:12; 1 John 3:8-10), accusations and insinuations (Revelation 12:10), temptation (1 Corinthians 7:5; 1 Thessalonians 3:5), contact with the occult (Deuteronomy 18:10-13), and drug and alcohol abuse (Galatians 5:21).
While we provide instruction about spiritual warfare, we also point the way toward freedom in Christ. I read The Adversary,2 a primer on spiritual warfare by Mark Bubeck, shortly before I counseled Alan about his spirit guides and astral projection. “I believe the biblical tools you need for victory,” I said to Alan, “are outlined in this book. Read it, do what it says, and you will find freedom. If not, let me know and we’ll take the next step.”
I was running an experiment with Alan. Most of my deliverance experiences to that point involved direct encounters with the spirit world. I wanted to see if Alan could gain victory on his own with a more discipleship-oriented approach. He took the book, followed the biblical guidelines, prayed the suggested prayers, and found freedom. He has served faithfully in our church ever since. My experience is that people who struggle with demonic problems seldom need direct intervention. A Bible and some discipleship instruction provide all the help they need.
Deliverance perspective
The only organized opposition I ever had against me in the past twenty-five years of pastoring came from individuals who were dead set against our ministry to those harassed by the occult. The pain of that experience still lingers. I have learned to be patient in developing a spiritual-warfare ministry within an established church. It needs to be done—but carefully and wisely.
Since the work of a deliverance ministry involves the occult, those who minister in such a work need to be maturing Christians—not spiritual children. Spiritual young men—not children—are the ones who have overcome the Evil One (1 John 2:12-14).
A word of caution: I watched a pastor lose his church because he became so involved in deliverance work, he had little time or energy left for his other pastoral duties. As I made myself available for deliverance work, I discovered that Satan was delighted to bring me into contact with demonically attacked people from all over town. Not only was the experience oppressive, it was time intensive. While I helped pioneer the spiritual-warfare ministry, I soon after turned it over to others. It gets no more time from me than other church ministries.
Few events demonstrate the power of God more than watching the Spirit of God overcome the forces of evil. I worked for several hours with a woman who was spiritually overwhelmed. She hardly moved or changed facial expression as I demanded in the name of Christ that the numerous spirits who kept talking through her be silenced. I wanted to speak directly with her. No one in the room that day will forget her face—frozen, locked in stone, a tear trickling out of the corner of her left eye—the moment I asked her if she wanted to receive Christ. Her lips moved, and an almost imperceptible “yes” came out of her mouth. Soon she was free.
I remember the night a woman raced toward me screaming, “I am going to gouge your eyes out.” A raised hand and a command in Jesus’ name brought her to her knees. For the first time, I felt I understood what the seventy-two disciples meant in Luke 10:17 when they returned from their mission, awed with Jesus’ power over demons, and said excitedly, “Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name.” Christ immediately put deliverance work in perspective: “Do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven” (Luke 10:20).
Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.
Neil Anderson, Seven Steps to Freedom (Ventura, Calif.: Regal Books, n.d.).
Mark Bubeck, The Adversary (Chicago, Ill.: Moody Press, 1996).
Copyright © 1998 Roger Barrier
