Spiritual Authority
By Andrew Wommack Please take a minute to read this letter I recently received from a 19-year-old girl.
Dear Mr. Wommack, I realize that you must receive frequent letters
regarding your ministry. But even with that knowledge, I feel compelled
to write. I’ve just finished listening to your audio series entitled “Spiritual Authority,”
and it has changed my life.
When I was in junior high, I became involved in Wicca, or
Paganism. For two- and-a-half years I toyed with the powers of Satan,
calling on numerous demons to do my bidding. Not only was I demon
possessed, but I was heavily into drugs and alcohol. A few months before
I became a Christian, I began to realize that I was no longer in
control. In fact, I was the one being controlled. My free will was so
entangled with Satan’s deception that I lost the ability to think for
myself.
On August 29, 1996, I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior. At
the moment I confessed my sin and gave my life to God, He delivered me
from the demons, drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, and sexual relationships I
was involved in. I thought I was rid of Satan’s power for good.
It wasn’t long before fear started to overcome me. The demons I
once fellowshipped with tormented me day and night. I could see them in
the corner of my room while I was trying to sleep. When I was outside at
night, I could feel their presence. After a while, I began to cope with
it, and it became an everyday part of my life. I knew they couldn’t
touch me, but I was terrified nonetheless.
Almost four years after my conversion, I was still dealing with
these demonic forces. It was only when I listened to your series that I
understood the power and authority I have over them. Instead of
literally hiding under my blankets at night for fear of the demon in the
corner of my room, I smile, say a quick prayer of praise to God, and
fall asleep.
Your illustration of how we sometimes picture demons was of
particular interest to me. You say that we picture them as towering
beasts with claws and such, when in reality they are sniveling, little
things. That is so true! The only power they have is the power we give
them. What a blessing to finally realize that! My outlook on life has
totally changed, thanks to your willingness to be used of God. If it
were not for the godly truths of your ministry, I would still be
enslaved by my fear.
I am now actively pursuing the calling God placed on my life, a
calling to ministry. I am excited and anxious for the future and the
things that God will be able to accomplish through my obedience. My
Christian walk is stronger than ever before, and my friends constantly
ask what’s different about me. They don’t seem to grasp that a
nineteen-year-old can be so in love with God that it’s physically
evident.
Again I thank you for your willingness to step out
in faith and be used of God. God, through you, has touched my life and,
I’m sure, the lives of countless others. I’m looking forward to
listening to your other teachings. Tori from PA
Isn’t that awesome! Praise the Lord for the power of the truth and
how it sets us free (John 8:32). The only power that Satan has is the
power of deception, and the worst thing about deception is that you
don’t know you’re being deceived. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be deception.
Once the truth is received, deception loses all its power. Therefore,
Satan loses all his power when we know the truth.
Many people don’t know the truth about Satan’s defeat.
In fact, many Christians are the very instrument the devil is using to foster the deception that he is still a powerful foe. “Spiritual
warfare” is one of the hottest topics in the church today. People are
expending great amounts of energy constantly battling the devil in ways
contrary to Scripture, but in reality, Satan has already been defeated.
We don’t need to defeat him again.
We need to believe that Satan has already been completely destroyed
(Heb. 2:14) and simply enforce his defeat. The only power he has is the
power to deceive. Our battle should be against the wiles (trickery) of
the devil (Eph. 6:11), not the devil himself. Any other approach is
actually giving the devil authority and power which he doesn’t have, and
he uses that to intimidate us.
The only weapon Satan has is the power we give him when we believe his lies.
Warfare only takes place between two undefeated foes. Once an
enemy has been conquered, the war is over. Satan is a defeated foe.
Colossians 2:15 says, “And having spoiled principalities and powers,
he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it.” The archaic
meaning of the word “spoiled” here is “to plunder; despoil” (American
Heritage Dictionary). This means that after Jesus defeated Satan, He
stripped him of everything he had, specifically the keys of death and
hell (Rev. 1:18). Satan has no power to imprison anyone.
The Greek word that was translated “shew” in this verse (Col 2:15) is
“deigmatizo” which means “to exhibit” (Strong). This comes from the
root word “deigma” which means “a specimen (as shown)” (
ibid.).
Satan is like one of those bugs we had to capture for biology class. We
caught it and then impaled it on a board with a little pin to exhibit
it.
You need to picture the devil nailed to the cross of Jesus like a bug on display. Hallelujah! Take that, Mr. Devil!
The Greek word that was translated “triumphing over” in Colossians
2:15 is especially significant. It means “to make an acclamatory
procession” (
ibid.). This is specifically referring to the way the Romans had a “triumphant procession” after they had defeated their enemies.
Upon conquering an enemy, the Romans would hold a parade. They would
take the conquered king, strip him naked, and drag him through the crowd
behind the conquering king or commander for all their subjects to see.
He would be humiliated and insulted, but that’s not all. They would also
cut off the thumbs of his hands and the big toes of both feet. This was
to assure the subjects this enemy would never be a threat to any of
them again. He could not hold a sword and he would never be able to run
again. There was no need to fear him any more. Any rumor about him ever
challenging Rome again would be scoffed at because the citizens had seen
him in the parade.
The same thing happened to the devil. That’s what this verse is
referring to. Jesus not only beat the devil, but He had a triumphant
procession to display the devil to the universe as a totally conquered
foe.
Satan should never terrify us again. Unfortunately, many Christians have missed the parade. They
haven’t seen God’s triumphant procession that was pictured in God’s
Word where Satan was displayed as a totally defeated foe. They are circulating rumors that Satan is a powerful foe to be reckoned with. That’s not so.
Satan is still alive, and we do have to reckon with him but only
because he has so many lies circulating about his power against us.
These are all lies, and therein lies Satan’s power. If we believe his
lies, he then uses our own authority, which our fear grants him, to work
his destruction in our lives. He has no power of his own. He’s using
the power and authority that our misdirected faith gives him.
When I was just beginning my walk with the Lord, I came into the
knowledge that demons do exist, and they are not all in Africa. We
encounter demons often, and they are the workers of much of the evil we
see every day. At first, this caused a fear in me that actually gave
these demons in-roads into my life. On one hand, I was resisting them,
but through fear I was also empowering them.
An example of this happened to me in Arlington, Texas, where I grew
up. I was in love with the Lord and wanting to minister to people. I
decided to open up what I called “Arlington Christian Center.” It was
going to be a home where people who were being controlled by things like
alcohol, drugs, sex, etc. could come and stay while we broke the power
of the devil over them and helped set them free. I rented a two-story
house, right on the edge of the University of Texas at Arlington campus,
and started fixing it up.
This house had been a fraternity house, and there had been a lot of
demonic activity in the house prior to our occupancy. The people were
gone, but not all the demons were. There were some strange things about
that place. One night I was working up there at 1 a.m., and some demons
attacked me. There was no one in that house except me, but I was being
hit and choked, and I was fighting for my life.
I ran out of that house and got in my car and backed out of the
driveway. I was ready to “burn rubber” and get as far away from there as
possible. Just before I got the car into drive, I heard the Lord say to
me, “What are you doing?” I told Him I was getting away from that place
as fast as I could. He then reminded me of the Christian’s armor that
was described in Ephesians 6:10-18, and He said, “There isn’t any armor
to cover your back.”
I knew what He meant. He was saying that the armor He had given me
only worked when I faced the devil, not if I turned and ran. I thought,
Lord, You couldn’t want me to go back into that place and face those devils.
He never said anything else to me. I pulled back into the driveway and
thought about that for what seemed to be an eternity. Finally, I got out
of the car and walked back into that house. I spent the rest of the
night fighting off fear and those physical attacks of the devil. When I
left in the morning, the demons were gone, and there was a supernatural
peace in that place.
During that time, I had a lot of demonic attacks against me. I had
dreams where demons would attack me, and I would wake up bleeding from
those encounters. They weren’t just in my mind. I was being physically
attacked. That also happened one night in Louisiana at a Bible
conference. It felt like I was being choked to death. I won, but these
demonic encounters were not fun.
Then one day as I was praying and binding every demon on every
continent, it dawned on my lightning-fast mind that I was actually
spending more time in my prayers talking to the devil and rebuking him
than I was talking to the Lord. I knew that wasn’t right. The Lord began
to reveal to me that all my attention on the devil was actually giving
him these in-roads into my life, which caused all these attacks.
I repented and changed my thinking and focus and guess what? It’s now
been at least thirty years, and I have never had another demonic
manifestation in my life. I have seen demons manifest around me in other
people, and I’ve cast them out, but those personal attacks stopped
nearly instantly. There has never been another one because the only
reason Satan’s imps were able to manifest like that to me in the first
place was because of the fear I released toward them. The fear is gone,
and therefore, so is their power.
This is an awesome revelation and one that is not the dominant
theological position on Satan and demons today. This truth desperately
needs to be communicated throughout the body of Christ.
The teaching MP3 includes:
http://www.awmi.net/extra/audio/1017
| Who’s The Enemy? |
| What Authority Does Satan Have? |
| How Does Satan Fight Us? |
| Authority Comes From The Law |
| The Battle Is In Your Mind |
| Aggressive Authority |
http://www.awmi.net/store/usa/cd_albums/1017_c
We have read how Jesus used His power and authority to preach the
gospel to the poor, heal the sick and cast out demons. We have not
previously discussed how He did not use His power and authority. So here
are some of the objects/actions on which He did not use His power and
authority.