All right, I'm so glad you're here this weekend.

So we're in a series called Deliverance, and just from some of the comments that I received after last week's message, Okay, this is not a series that's supposed to make you fear.

This is supposed to make you realize you have nothing to be afraid of because you've got the spirit of the living God in you.

And whatever the evil one shows or delivers your way, you've got power over it.

But you have to understand who the enemy is, be able to identify the enemy, and go from there.

C.S.

Lewis, by the way, turn in Mark chapter 1, Mark 1.

C.S.

Lewis said that...

that we make two approaches or two mistakes, rather, when we approach the topic of the demonic.

One, we give no credence to its reality, or two, we give far too much credit to its reality.

You hear that?

We give far too much credence, or we don't give enough credit.

And that's one of the reasons conservative evangelicalism avoids this topic altogether, because in their minds, there's no middle ground.

Now, I've experienced this in my own family, and I've told you about my brother.

who used to go out every morning and cast demons out of his Ford.

I'm serious.

I mean, that's not a joke.

He went through a season where he'd go out every morning, lay his hands on the hood of the car, and cast out the demons of his Ford.

He also claimed that he saw demons every night before he went to sleep.

He never took ownership of his own sin.

He would always say, well, I did that, but the devil made me do it.

So he would not take ownership.

As if the poor decisions he made in his life had nothing to do with the ramifications he would later suffer.

As if somehow he was an innocent, powerless victim.

And then the fourth thing, that he always referred to people who did not agree with his demonology as less spiritual than him.

Okay, so every point I just made violates an important principle within the Word of God.

One, don't blame demons for poor manufacturing that comes from Ford.

I mean, okay, that's not in the Bible.

But...

You get the point, okay?

Two, demons manifest their forms in extremely rare occasions.

Rare.

To think that you see a demon every night, you're not going to convince me.

They have no interest in allowing you to see them in their physical form.

No interest.

Three, when you sin against God, the temptation may come from the evil one, but the sin is yours.

You got to own it.

Fourth, Any activity that divides the church and places more importance on one gift over and above the other gifts and destroys the body of Christ rather than builds it up is not from God.

Okay.

However, if we give no credence to the demonic world and its influence in our lives, we're just as unwise because, and this is where the journey begins.

This is why I came out from the get-go because the journey, this is what I can't believe I didn't see for the first 20 years of my life.

And I was in the Word all the time, from the get-go, starting with Matthew's gospel, all the way through the book of Acts and the history of the early church, all the way through the Pauline epistles, right into the book of Revelation.

You see encounter after encounter between the people of God and the demonic.

I mean, if you remove that out of the Bible, you'd probably lose a third of it.

In fact, in Mark's gospel, you don't even get out of chapter one.

Until we read this, I'm in verse 23.

Just then a man in a synagogue, who was possessed by an impure spirit, cried out, What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth?

Have you come to destroy us?

I know who you are, the Holy One of God.

Be quiet, Jesus said sternly.

Come out of him.

The impure spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek.

The people were also amazed that they asked each other, What is this?

A new teaching and with authority.

He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him.

News about him, that is Jesus, spread quickly over the whole region of Galilee.

Okay, something similar happens over in Luke chapter 13.

Now, I'm only giving you a couple examples because we'd be here all night.

I can give you example after example.

Here's another one in Luke 13 verse 10.

On the Sabbath, Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for 18 years.

She was bent over and could not straighten up at all.

When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.

Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, There are six days for work, so come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.

The Lord answered him, You hypocrites!

Doesn't each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water?

Then should not this woman, key phrase here, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for 18 long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?

When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.

So I want you to notice a couple of things just in these two stories.

And there's a gazillion stories, it seems like, just in the Gospels.

Number one, when Jesus taught, he did so with authority and he has authority over all things.

Amen?

Okay.

Number two, the man who's possessed and the woman with the infirmity were both in the synagogue.

So, you know, today you find a church and you go to it for a while until somebody says something you don't like and you go to another one.

And after that, you go for a while and then you go to another one.

Okay.

You're trying to find the perfect church, what you don't realize it doesn't exist.

And as I've said before, if it does exist, don't you go there because you'll ruin it.

So here's the thing.

Here's the thing.

So in the synagogue, you had to be an accepted member.

You can't just waltz in.

So this means both the woman and the man were part of the synagogue and that they were coming regularly.

They're members of the local synagogue.

All right.

The woman is even called a daughter of Abraham, which came to be a phrase, a friend of God.

So this is not somebody that's an enemy of God.

This is not someone who's not religious or not at least...

consistent in celebrating the festivals, the feasts that the Jews celebrate.

Jesus said, again, let me read it.

Should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for 18 long years, be set free on the Sabbath day?

In other words, Jesus is saying, isn't it good that she's being freed on a day of worship?

It wasn't only a day of rest, but a day of worship.

Three, what's the impure spirit?

This is the DNA of demons.

The Greek word means tainted.

So, This is a being that's not operating according to its original design.

Somehow a spiritual virus has invaded a son or daughter of God.

Okay?

Four, the demons are not cowering.

Notice, they're confrontational.

In Mark 1, 24, the demons actually speak to Jesus.

In your translation, you read the words, Jesus of Nazareth, we know who you are.

But in the original language, what they say is, you Nazarene.

It's like saying, Jeff, you hillbilly.

Don't do that.

Or Jeb, you hick.

But they're saying, Jesus, you Nazarene.

We know who you are.

Fifth, the demonic possesses superior knowledge.

They know who Jesus is, the Holy One of God.

But their accurate naming of Jesus is not actually an acknowledgement of his rightful divine status.

It's an attempt to co-opt Jesus by fearlessly identifying him.

And that's why in verse 25, Jesus says basically, shut up.

Jesus doesn't want the children of the father of lies to vouch for him.

Got it?

It's like if you are accused of killing your ex-girlfriend, you don't want OJ Simpson coming to your defense.

You got it?

Sixth, they rebel and resist, but Jesus'power and identity are too strong.

And seventh, when they do come out, they're angry and they come out violently with a shriek.

So the quick application just of two simple passages in the gospel.

One, we're not Jesus.

That's important.

Two, we can't assume that the battle or victory is going to come just because we're on God's side.

Three, Jesus dealt with the demons decisively, but never casually.

Four, it's his name and his authority that caused the expulsion.

Now, folks.

Because of time, I can give you example after example.

I tried to choose two of the best ones.

And now you move to the book of Acts.

The book of Acts is the history of the early church.

So we move away from Jesus'ministry to the apostle Paul, to Peter, the apostles, the disciples.

In Acts chapter 1, they're told you will receive when the Holy Spirit comes on you, this power, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.

So they're given a special anointing on Acts 2, in Acts 2, on the day of Pentecost, and then he sends them out.

Luke records everything that happens in the early church, and he's very quick.

Remember, when you're thinking about the gospel writers, they're writing in a modern, in their contemporary or in their, as their contemporaries would write, in form.

So when Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John began to write their gospels, they're writing those gospels as if it's a historical narrative, okay?

When Luke writes Acts, he's writing it as if it's an historical narrative.

The Pauline epistles, Paul writes, he conforms to the Greco-Roman letter writing style of the day, which is why he has greetings and salutations, and then there's a benediction.

So I'm simply telling you that they're not just writing for the sake of writing.

They have a story to tell.

And one of the things that Luke makes sure that we understand is as the gospel goes out, there's an ongoing turf war.

They're taking the gospel to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the ends of the earth.

And every time the church begins to take territory, every time there's an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, every time there's revival in answer to the prayers of God's people, guess what happens?

There's a demonic spiritual resistance that comes and tries to undo or undermine the work of the Holy Spirit.

And the first pushback, there's a pattern here.

First of all, he attacks the church inside.

That's battle number one in Jerusalem and Judea with Ananias and Sapphira inside the church.

If you know the story, you know what happened.

The church is going gangbusters.

The spirit of God is falling on the believers, inspiring and empowering people to take new territory.

Many signs and wonders, territories being taken.

So in Acts chapter 5, Barnabas and many of the others were selling some of their properties that they owned and turning the church in at the apostles'feet so that they could help the less fortunate.

Ananias and Sapphira were wealthy, had a lot of property.

And when they sold it, they brought some of the money, but not all, which there's no problem with that.

The sin is they lied and acted as if they brought everything.

So in Acts chapter 5, verse 3, Peter said, Ananias.

How is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land?

Didn't it belong to you before it was sold?

And after it was sold, wasn't the money at your disposal?

What made you think of doing such a thing?

You have not lied just to human beings, but to God.

Again, what is the sin?

Pride, arrogance, false spirituality, seeking high position, sin and deception within the church.

That it, listen.

That is Satan's first line of defense against the gospel going out.

First, he comes after the people of God.

If he can divide and conquer, a house divided will not stand.

If he can get your allegiance back into the world and away from God, then he won't have to fight any other battles.

Just rip up the church and all will be well.

We see this type of thing throughout all of church history.

This is not merely an isolated occasion.

The demonic enters when leaders hide sin.

or when they fail to seek purity and righteousness, when their motivations are wrong, when they're all about followers, likes, and status, when appearances are more important than truth, when gaining a crowd is more important than making disciples.

That's how he gets it.

Just make the church weak, and she will never be strong enough to resist.

But it also happens when everyday lay people, listen now, this is where you come in, hold on to bitterness and unforgiveness.

when they remain in a weakened spiritual condition because there's absolutely no passion for discipleship, of prayer and Bible study and worship, when they refuse to confess their sins to one another and repent from a cavalier attitude toward holiness, those types of things open the door to the demonic.

Now quickly, just as a side note, folks, your life matters.

Your life matters.

You've been called to this church.

You are in this body of Christ.

This is your house, which means you're supposed to discover your role and play it.

And your pursuit of righteousness matters because it impacts this body of Christ's ability to take territory in this valley for the cause of Christ.

It matters to every single one of you.

My father-in-law that most of you know, I'll never forget a sermon he preached.

We were in Africa and he was preaching to some of the African leadership.

And he told a story about when he came to a church in the Midwest and he was preaching.

It was a revival meeting back in the days when they used to have revivals.

So five, six, eight days of preaching.

And my father-in-law, Charlie, said, I started to preach and we were having a great revival.

But about five minutes into the sermon, he said, I could feel it.

And preachers know this.

They know, I could feel it.

Something was not right.

Just.

The spirit in the room was not good.

The people were not good.

There was something that was distracting.

And finally, he said, I just stopped.

He said, I've never done that.

I just stopped in the middle of my sermon.

And if you know Charlie, you can see him doing this.

I just stopped and I said, look, I got to stop right now.

He said, because the devil is in this place.

And everybody, what?

He said, I got to stop right now.

The devil's in this place.

And a lady about halfway back stood up and said, yeah, I know he is because I brought him.

And she was convicted because of the anger and the bitterness and just everything going on in her life.

And she said, yeah, he's here.

He came with me.

There is so much truth in that.

If we're not pursuing, nobody's perfect.

But man, if we have a cavalier, lackadaisical approach toward holiness, the door opens.

After the influence of Satan was eradicated in Acts chapter 5, guess what happens after that?

The gospel goes ballistic, full force.

So by the time you get to verse 16, we read crowds gathered also from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing their sick and those tormented by impure spirits, and all of them were healed.

Man, as the people of God go, so does God's purposes in the world go.

That's the purpose of the Holy Spirit in you.

And listen, that's why he breathed new life into you.

Satan knows that.

So he focuses, first of all, his attack within the church.

So you got to be aware, right?

You got to be aware that he wants to rip us apart.

He wants us to hate each other.

He wants us to be divided over political views.

He wants us to talk about each other, not to each other.

He has no interest in reconciliation and forgiveness.

Some of you, man, if you're sitting three rows back from somebody that you detest, that's hampering.

That is hampering what God can do with our church.

The demonic is not only open in the individual life, but it can be open in the church life.

I have a keen sense awareness of that.

Believe me, because I've seen in my own life, when I'm not walking with Jesus, we go nowhere.

I'm telling you, when I'm not watching, and when I get my focus off you and onto how many people are watching me, how many people are listening, how many likes do I have?

When that happens, boom, I know it's only a matter of time before the ship starts sinking.

And then he moves from the church.

As the gospel goes out to Jerusalem and Samaria, there's a second battle.

And it's with Simon the warlock.

Again, I'm only giving you one example of many.

So the church now is taking territory in Samaria.

Just like Jesus said, you would go to Jerusalem, Samaria.

and beyond.

And in Samaria, there's a man named Simon.

Now, this is an interesting story because he possesses great power, but the source of his power is demonic.

I mean, wait a minute, Pastor Jeff, are you telling me that Satan has power?

Oh yeah.

Oh yeah.

That's why experience cannot determine truth.

Just because someone is powerful and has great influence, and is followed by the masses does not mean they're from God.

You got to know them by their fruit.

What kind of fruit do they bear?

What kind of life do they live?

What are they truly chasing or pursuing?

What do they manifest?

There ought to be some sense of, they're not going to be perfect, but there ought to be some sense of humility and transparency.

But if all that comes out of them is pride and wealth and arrogance, run.

In Acts chapter eight, Verse 9, now for some time, a man named Simon had practiced sorcery in the city and amazed all the people of Samaria.

He boasted that he was someone great.

And all the people, both high and low, gave him their attention and exclaimed, this man is rightly called the great power of God.

They followed him because he had amazed them for a long time with his sorcery.

But when they believed Philip, as he proclaimed the good news of the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women.

And then watch this, Simon himself believed and was baptized.

And he followed Philip everywhere, astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw.

Now the question is, what is sorcery?

Quickly.

Okay.

What is sorcery?

Sorcery is attempting to control and predict the future through power given to you by evil spirits.

Okay.

We're getting this right out of the Old Testament.

Sorcery is to produce magical effects on people through the use of drugs and potions.

What, Pastor Jeff?

Are you saying that potions can work?

Absolutely.

But the power doesn't come from God.

You think there's no power with the evil one?

Conjuring spells and binding other people by magical muttering?

One who claims to communicate with the dead, but actually communicates with demons.

Listen, you get a seance together and you start praying to talk to the dead.

Oh, they'll show up.

It just won't be them.

One who uses demonic power to perform signs and wonders.

The point is the demonic world is limited and is bound in some sense, but it is not powerless.

Now, where Simon is concerned, he was impressed with the power of the disciples.

He noticed that the disciples had no need for potions or spells or mutterings.

They simply proclaimed the name of Jesus.

And sometimes they would sing a hymn and boom, that's it.

The power of God came down.

That impressed Simon.

So the Bible says he came to believe and was baptized.

Now it doesn't explain what that means, but we do know, as we look at the story in verse 13, Simon himself believed and was baptized and he followed Philip everywhere, astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw.

So Simon heard the gospel, saw the power of the apostles, and said, I'm in.

But it's for the wrong reasons.

He's after something he thinks Jesus can give him rather than Jesus himself.

When he sees the power of the Spirit, he wanted that power.

Now quickly, another time out.

What the world has created in you will not go easily.

Somewhere along Simon's life, he became addicted to applause, to power.

He was worshipped, small w, because of the influence and the power that he possessed, even though it was from sorcery, not from God.

He loved power.

He loved recognition.

He was addicted to it.

And he could not live without the accolades and the attention.

What I'm simply saying is everybody in this room and everybody listening, your life's history and story has created things in you.

And it comes from a world system that is governed and held under the sway of the evil one.

When you become a Christian, the Holy Spirit of God comes in.

Don't you wish miraculously all those things went away?

That is the process of sanctification, and it takes a lifetime.

But make no mistake, each of us has to deal with those things.

Or when we do come to Christ, we're coming to Christ for our power and our accolades and what we think he's going to give us rather than Jesus himself.

Now, the question is, does Solomon see his error?

Verse 20, Peter answered, May your money perish with you because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money.

You have no part or share in this ministry because your heart is not right before God.

Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart.

For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.

And then Simon answered, pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me.

Now that's the wrong prayer to pray, isn't it?

What he should have prayed is pray to God somehow.

that the Lord would heal my addiction to power as a way to prove my self-worth and significance and my worship of money.

But instead, he's not praying that he'd be healed.

He's praying that nothing bad will happen to him.

Now, the reason I hone in on this one story is because Simon will go on to do great damage to the church.

The demon of self-aggrandizing power is in so deep and it's never extricated in his life.

I wish we had time for me to go down a rabbit hole.

Because this is the weakness of the church in the West.

Far too many people like me are in it for the wrong reasons.

And if you're in it for the wrong reasons, you may get a massive crowd.

But if you're not making disciples, that's not of God.

That's some kind of sorcery.

And here's the thing about the devil.

If he doesn't fear you and you promote his agenda, he'll reward you.

Experience.

Doesn't determine truth.

Truth is objective.

And Simon will not be able to get rid of this because he will go on and he will come up, early church history tells us this, he will come up with a doctrine that has a little bit of Jesus and a little bit of how he thinks the world should go.

Simon is known as the first syncretist in the Christian faith.

That is, that you don't have to give up other beliefs when you come to Jesus.

You can have a foot in both worlds.

They may appear to contradict, but they're simply side roads that lead to the same direction.

So Joseph Smith, the founder of the Mormons, demonic influence.

Charles Taze Russell, the founder of Jehovah Witnesses.

Both are doctrine of demons because they combine what these individuals believe life should be with a little bit of Jesus.

And they have just enough truth to deceive, but are ultimately doctrines of demons because they deny the deity of Jesus, which we've already learned is the spirit of the Antichrist.

However, secretism is perhaps the most effective.

effective weapon being used by the demonic to oppose God today.

This is one of the ways the demonic forces have infiltrated the church over 2,000 years.

When I was in Africa, so I was pastoring an English-speaking church.

One day, one of my elders came to me and said, Pastor Jeff, we need to talk.

He said, I want to talk to you about Stephen.

I said, now Stephen was, oh, he was one of our best disciples, demonstrative in worship service.

Never missed a prayer meeting.

This dude was awesome.

We had big plans for him.

And this elder says, look, man, this guy's living two lives.

I said, what do you mean?

Well, he hasn't let go of all the things associated with animistic cultures.

I said, well, let's go to his village.

So we went to his village to see Stephen.

And I started talking to a translator because in the village, most of the time you speak Shona, not much English.

And I found out from the people who live in Stephen's village that he had multiple wives.

He engages in witchcraft for healing, and he prayed to and gave offerings and sacrifices to his ancestors.

Okay.

So I confronted him.

I said, dude, man, you've been a Christian long enough to know this isn't acceptable.

I couldn't understand how the two were talking or what they were saying, but finally the translator said to me in a language I could understand, Stephen doesn't understand what the problem is because they're all on the same team.

If the Pope, if he really said that all roads lead to God, if he really believes that The blood of Christ is not necessary for the forgiveness of sins.

That there are other ways, other religions.

If he said that, and if that's an accurate reflection, I don't trust much of the media, but if he said that, then he's engaging in a 2,000-year-old heresy.

And you have to wonder why.

Money, power, influence, he's no different than Simon.

And the demon is in too deep.

Here in America, we too in the church are becoming more syncretic.

Christians buy just as many Eastern-inspired self-help books than non-Christians.

Forty percent of Christians believe in psychics.

Twenty-nine believe in reincarnation.

Twenty-six believe in astrology to determine your future.

And yet the Bible describes each of these as being empowered by the demonic world, and if you delve into any of these, you are opening a huge door into the demonic realm.

You cannot play on the bully's playground and not get bullied.

Sooner or later, he's going to turn his attention to you.

But that's not the only way the demonic enters.

Think about the world in which you and I live right now.

What attracts you?

Be honest.

What attracts you?

I mean, if you meet a person, what appeals to you?

What draws you to them?

Let's be honest.

I mean, we're in LA.

We can't lie.

We're going to look at their clothes.

We're going to look at it.

Are they beautiful?

We're going to look at how much plastic surgery.

Is it just enough to make you look good?

Or did they ruin you and make you like a clown?

But you know what I'm talking about.

When we look at somebody, we look at somebody, that's how we judge them.

So I spoke to the young adults on Tuesday night.

They let me on this stage.

I couldn't believe it.

The old guy.

And packed room, packed house.

Alan and Marissa and Drew, these guys are doing a great job.

So I...

But I needed to communicate something to them because I love them and I'm the old guy.

So I showed them a couple of photos.

I said, here is how the world defines success.

Let me show you how Jesus defines success.

One lives for himself.

The other lives for the purposes of God, even a willingness to die for the purposes of God.

Here's how the world defines cool.

So here's a cool guy dressed up nice speaking to a large audience.

Here's how Jesus defines cool.

Those are two totally different kingdoms, man.

I went back this week and I thought, man, I should have read Isaiah 53.

This is speaking of Jesus.

He grew up before him like a tender shoot and like a root out of dry ground.

He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him.

Nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering and familiar with pain.

Like one from whom people hide their faces, he was despised and we held him in low esteem.

When you idolize the wrong things, folks, Satan gets a foothold and you begin to pursue them at all costs, at the cost of your relationship with Jesus and at building the kingdom of God.

And then the demon gets into you so deep.

Listen now, the demon gets into you so deep that you're no longer attracted to spiritual things.

And then you wonder why you're numb when you come to church and you don't feel anything.

Here's the answer right here.

You can't serve two masters.

Either you will hate the one and love the other.

or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other.

You cannot serve both God and money.

And if you're serving money, you ain't going to feel God.

Battle three, the ends of the earth.

Now, here's what we notice in the book of Acts again.

So we've gone through the gospels.

Let's go to the book of Acts.

And in the book of Acts, every time the gospel begins to penetrate culture, the evil one shows up.

And the demonic forces fight against the advancement.

Paul is on his third missionary journey.

These top stories happen in the first and second journey as well.

But now he's in Ephesus, a Gentile pagan culture.

And in chapter 19, we read, while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus.

Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God.

But some of them became obstinate.

They refused to believe and publicly maligned the way.

So what we're trying to be told here, what we are being told here is that there are four key occultic elements prevalent in Ephesus.

We know that by history as well.

Number one.

Spiritual powers were rampant.

Evil spirits were everywhere.

I mean, you had some wicked, weird stuff happening in the Agora, the marketplace and in the temples.

Two, Ephesian writings were often used in antiquity to record spells and incantations.

So a lot of the spells and a lot of potions came right out of Ephesus.

Temples built to the false gods and goddesses were representatives of Satan and the demonic power.

They were everywhere, everywhere.

And finally, The temple of Artemis, the center of pagan worship, the sex god, was here in Ephesus as well.

So we're being told in this historical account that the demonic owned Ephesus, but Paul is here to take some territory.

And here's what we read.

I love this story, the second part of verse 9.

He took the disciples with him, that is Paul, and had discussions daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus.

This went on for two years so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord.

God did extraordinary miracles through Paul so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken up to the sick or taken to the sick and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.

Oh man, the kingdom of God is taking territory so that the demonic are being bound up while others are being loose.

And Christ's power is overwhelming demonic influences.

Jesus is tying them up and plundering their house.

Let me say it one more time.

Jesus is demonic city and he's tying them up and plundering their house.

And that's exactly what he said he was going to do in Mark chapter 2, chapter 3, verse 27.

No one can enter a strong man's house without first tying him up.

Then he can plunder the strong man's house.

This is the strong man's house.

This is his territory.

but the kingdom of God is coming in and it's gonna kick some serious butt.

I said butt last week, so I can say it this week.

Jesus says that a big part of his ministry is going to be binding Satan and plundering his house.

Don't you love that imagery, man?

Satan is getting his backside kicked by the kingdom of God in Ephesus.

And that tells me that I too, if I'm intentional, can also plunder his house.

I can take those he owns.

right out from under him through the power of Jesus Christ in his name.

And if the demons, listen, here's the key for us, because you're wondering, okay, get to the stuff where it affects me.

I hope you've seen that already.

But if the demons have entered through an open window in your spiritual house, the name of Jesus can kick them out and close the door.

That's what we read.

That's what we understand.

So back to Acts 19, verse 13, some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits.

Tried to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who were demon-possessed.

They would say, in the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out.

Seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, were doing this.

One day, the evil spirit answered them, Jesus I know, Paul I know about, but who are you?

Then the man who had evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all.

He gave them such a beating, they ran out of the house naked and bleeding.

So I'm assuming he stole their clothes.

Okay, stay with me.

Then a man by the name of Demetrius, a silversmith, he gets involved.

And then we're told that there is a danger.

So the silversmith says to the local people in the community, not only that our trade will lose its good name, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be discredited and the goddess herself, who is worshiped throughout the province of Asia and the world, will be robbed of her divine majesty.

When they heard this, they were furious and began shouting, great is Artemis of the Ephesians.

Soon the whole city was in an uproar.

The people seized Gaius and Aristarchus. That's a hard name for me to say.

Aristarchus.

Paul's traveling companions from Macedonia.

And all of them rushed into the theater together.

Paul wanted to appear before the crowd, but the disciples would not let him.

Even some of the officials of the province, friends of Paul, sent him a message begging him not to venture into the theater.

The assembly was in confusion.

Some were shouting one thing, some another.

Most of the people did not even know why they were there.

Okay, now we get a little insight of demonic resistance here in Ephesus.

The demons inspire a riot that is meant to kill Paul.

Now, what do we take away from this?

Stay with me now.

Come on.

If you're having trouble paying attention, it's the devil.

All right.

Come on now.

You got to hear this.

What do we take away from this?

First, when the gospel takes new territory, the demonic rise to the occasion, it will always be a turf war and they will not go without a fight.

And they will inspire ungodly riots and mobs to violence.

And some people will attack the church.

They don't even know why they're there.

The demonic forces enjoy inspiring those under its control to persecute, kill, and oppress Christians.

Most of the people who shouted crucify Jesus didn't even know why they were shouting it.

Our friend Ajay Law right now has been hiding for months.

I think he's back in the States now.

Finally, he's in safety.

But for months he was hiding, had to get rid of his cell phone because extreme Hindus were trying to kill him.

Because he was a Christian.

But here's the thing, and here's where you come in.

The demonic doesn't only attack the church corporately, but it attacks the individual.

And attempts...

to take territory from people.

Now, here's the thing.

I'm amazed when somebody comes up to me, you know, Pastor Jeff, when I became a Christian, the next day was the hardest day of my life.

Or I got baptized and you know, then the next day my car broke down.

I lost my job a week later.

What good is God?

Oh man, what do you think is going to happen?

You give Christ your life and you die to your own way, be resurrected.

You think he's going to leave you alone?

In fact, the reason he's not bothered you before is you're no danger to him.

But now you are.

Now you're a Christ follower.

My greatest victory in my life, and I've had a lot of them, but I've had a lot of failures too, but the victories come when I stop and I ask the question, okay, who's really behind this?

Who's really behind what's going on here?

Second, the demonic are no match for the spirit of the living God.

Acts 19, many of those who believe now came and openly confessed what they had done.

A number who had practiced sorcery brought their scrolls together and burned them publicly.

When they calculated the value of the scrolls, the total came to 50,000 drachmas.

In this way, the word of the Lord spread widely and grew in power.

So the demonic are no match for the spirit of the living God, and strongholds will be defeated, and the demonic can be laid to waste.

Three, invoking the name of Jesus is the primary way to defeat the darkness.

In Acts 19, some Jews who went around driving out evil spirits tried to invoke the name of Jesus over those who were demon-possessed.

They would say, in the name of Jesus, whom Paul preaches, I command you to come out.

Now, why would they do that?

Because they have seen where the name of Jesus stated, the demons are afraid and it drives them out.

But the problem is they're still approaching this as if the name of Jesus is a magic code or formula.

And they don't know who Jesus is.

Man, if you're going to speak the name of Jesus to the demons, you better make sure Jesus knows you and you know him.

Otherwise, you might get beaten up and run out of here without any clothes on, and you'll scar all of us.

Okay?

Fourth, deliverance is a communal act, not an individual work.

When individuals attempt to make a show out of the demonic, the demonic will cooperate and give you what you want, your glory.

Anything he can do to keep the glory away from God, if he can give it to you, he'll do it, even by giving you power.

But when those representing the church of Jesus Christ operate in the name of Jesus, by his authority, by his power, denying their own glory and power, and confronting the demonic, amazing things happen.

And that's what we're chasing.

That's what we're after in this series and in our church.

Fifth, many, if not most, encounters with individuals require more than one encounter.

You'll notice the passage in Mark 9, a wonderful passage.

We read verse 17, Teacher, I brought you my son who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech.

Whenever he seizes him, it throws him to the ground.

He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid.

I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit, but they could not.

After Jesus had gone indoors, his disciples asked him privately, why couldn't we drive it out?

He replied, this kind can only come out by prayer.

What do you mean?

When there is desperation, this is the word for prayer that comes from a deep motivation of the heart.

When there's desperation by the one who has been influenced by the demonic world because they've left the door or window open in their own spiritual house, and the desperation of the one who is confronting or participating in the delivery ministry, when that happens, it takes prayer again and again and again.

And sixth, while the conditions that set off or cause an encounter vary.

The presence of Christians engaged in the reading of scripture, preaching, baptism, singing, prayer with fasting, and reciting creeds are all used to reveal and deal with the demonic.

Now, wow, there's no way I'm going to finish this message, Michael.

There's no way.

Can you let me have a thought so that I don't lose you?

Why are all these things important?

And let's finish this.

We're not finished.

We're just scratching the surface.

We got two more weeks.

Why is all this important, folks?

The call on this church is to take the valley for Jesus Christ.

And you got to expect turf wars, if that's what we're going to do.

I'm calling on the men of our church.

The men of our church are meeting quite regularly and they're praying outside of our regular prayer meetings and I'm glad about that, but I'm calling on you men to stop going into your holy huddles and to go up the top of Glendora Mountain Road and to go up to the top of Euclid and go up to the high places all around this valley with your prayer meeting and you start confronting the demonic and you start praying the name of Jesus and you ask Jesus to cast out the influences.

that are over this valley so that the gospel may be able to penetrate and come in.

Second, there's a call on our church to help people far from God come near, unbelievers.

We know that our gospel is being veiled and we know that Satan, the God of this world, blinds the mind of the unbeliever.

That's why next year, we're going to go to a point where the fifth Sunday of the month, when that happens in any month, is going to be a call.

for you to bring your one life, and the gospel is going to be preached, and there's going to be baptisms, and we're going to call on heaven to open the eyes of the blind.

We're going to get more serious than we've ever been about going after people far from God because we love them, but we know we should expect a turf war.

We should expect a fight.

So therefore, I need you to protect the unity of our church.

Protect the unity of our church.

When you hear something about your leaders, don't just pass it on.

Don't talk about people.

to them.

A house divided will not stand.

He will try to come in.

He will try to divide us.

He will try to sway us in a certain direction, protect the unity of the church.

What Jesus prayed for in John 17, his last prayer before he goes to the father was what?

I pray that they be one.

Satan doesn't like it when we're one, because when we're together, he knows he's powerless.

Third, there's a call on our church to minister to the people of God.

You, you and I, Do not instantly become sanctified when we're saved, right?

So post-conversion demonization is a matter of sanctification, not justification.

Now remember what I said.

You were previously owned by Satan and now you're owned by Christ.

But there's going to be a battlefield.

There's going to be carnage everywhere and death and the battle against the old man and his desires.

It's going to be tension.

It's going to be conflict.

And many of us in the room, listen now, this is the climactic point of this message.

Many of us in this room came in with a lot of baggage.

And a lot of us are still to some degree under the influence of Satan's world system.

There are things that have been deeply ingrained in us.

Think about it.

I saw the look on your faces last week when I told you you shouldn't be entertained by some of the things that entertain you.

I got that look.

I've been preaching far too long.

It's the look that says, He's got the goods on me.

He's got the goods on me.

He knows what I'm watching.

He knows what I'm watching.

We love his entertainment.

We have learned ungodly behaviors.

We're not faithful in our marriages.

We're not faithful in sexual purity.

We're not faithful to forgive.

Those are all things that have crept in from the outside.

Some of us have coping mechanisms to deal with the fact that we feel so lost.

Hurts, habits, hangups, drugs, alcohol, pornography, whatever it is, and the thirst for money and power and significance.

That's a part of our culture.

When a person comes to Christ, the battle between the spirit and the flesh begins.

And I am hoping this series will open your eyes wide, that if you're not engaged in the spiritual disciplines, you're going to lose.

You're not strong enough by yourself.

With the power of Jesus Christ, you can do all things.

Now, let's be honest.

There's a lot of you in the room, a lot of you listening, a lot of you on our other campuses.

The devil has gotten a foothold into your life through willing disobedience or sometimes unwilling darkness.

For some of you, the demon is in so deep, and that's why you want to change, but you almost find it impossible.

This is especially true in addictions like pornography.

And the Pew research tells me that almost 70% of the men in our church, in all churches in the evangelical world, have some form of addiction to pornography.

That's amazing to me.

And then we wonder why the church is not taking territory.

However, I'm not here to berate you.

I'm here to tell you, you can be free.

The ministry of deliverance can be seen in the gospels, in the acts of the apostles and in the Pauline epistles.

So I want to leave you with great hope.

Okay.

It's not the end of the series, but I want to leave you with hope.

If you're dealing with something and you've tried and you've tried and you just almost given up.

I want to tell you it's possible the demon's in too deep.

He came in through a window.

He came in through a door.

You disobeyed.

You gave him a foothold.

You gave him a place to reside.

And now he's trying to take over the whole house.

And now you can't let go.

The addiction that you began, it started as a coping mechanism.

Now, you really believe.

I mean, you want to stop, but there's a part of you believes you can't live without it.

It's so much of your identity now.

There's no hope.

This porn addiction you know will destroy everything sacred.

And while in the beginning you told yourself, I'm not harming anyone, now you recognize that as the voice of Satan, but it's too late.

The demon's in too deep.

Others of you ignored the voice of the Spirit to work on your marriage before it would crumble, but now it's crumbled.

It's in shambles.

The demon's in deep.

The Spirit warned you in crucial areas of your life not to go that direction, not to do that, not to talk to her, not to talk to him, not to look at that website.

But you disobeyed because the flesh wants what the flesh wants.

And others of you are so steeped in the material world that you are now numb to spiritual things because you're trying to serve two gods.

And you're either going to love one and hate the other, or love the other and hate the one.

The demon is in deep.

But this is the context in which Paul said in Ephesians 3, now to him who is able to do immeasurably more with all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever.

And in Luke 4, Jesus said, the spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners.

and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

I have so many stories as a pastor that I can tell you, but because of time, I'm only going to tell you 12.

Listen, almost done.

Please stay with me.

I'm not going to use any names here.

But a few years ago, I came in to go back and preach on a Saturday night, and there was a young lady sitting right over here.

And the spirit spoke.

Yeah, it wasn't audible, but sometimes, you know, God says, you need to go talk to her.

So I sat down with a chair in between us.

Got to watch that too.

As soon as I sat down, I could smell the alcohol.

And this was a young girl, beautiful young girl, who you could tell was at the end of a rope.

And that she had this addiction for one reason or another, and there's no hope, no way out.

And beautiful young lady, and just at the end of her rope.

Seriously, I think, I don't know what was going on, but I could tell that this was the end for her.

And I talked to her and I prayed for her.

And I started going home.

I got her name.

So I started going home and I just started speaking the name of Jesus.

I prayed the name of Jesus over her life.

I don't know who she is or where, but I prayed and then she started coming.

I saw her more often.

I just kept speaking the name of Jesus.

Didn't do it to her.

Just every time I was beside her near, I just, God, I don't know the story.

Now, I just want to take you forward.

Now we come forward and it's been years.

This lady has totally changed.

You'll see her almost every weekend right here, if I told you, but I'm not going to.

And now she's actually educating herself to try to be a therapist or a counselor to people who struggle with similar addictions.

But speaking the name of Jesus and speaking the name of Jesus and speaking the name of Jesus, then a friend of mine, a couple of friends of mine started investing as well, speaking the name of Jesus.

There's another young man came to me in a prayer meeting said, Pastor Jeff, I want to stop, but I can't.

I know when I get home, I've tried to get the computer out of my room, but that doesn't matter.

I'll find it on my phone.

I've tried to go without a phone, but I'll find somebody else's phone.

I can't stop.

This pornographic addiction has got me.

I don't know what to do.

So a couple of my friends got together, and we just began.

praying over him.

Now, this is before I even thought about deliverance ministry.

We just started praying.

We got two or three guys in a room, not out front, not in front of you.

We're not making a show, just privately.

Started praying, started praying, and we started praying scriptures.

So if I take you ahead, it's been about six years now, totally free.

But if you ask him, how did it happen?

Here's what he would tell you.

And I took some notes here just to make sure I was truthful because he may be listening.

He said, ministers began to pray for me.

And over the course of their prayers, I started hearing scriptures as if God were speaking.

Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of weakness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.

And he said, I've heard that scripture a thousand times.

But as these people started speaking the name of Jesus around me, it's like that scripture ignited something.

And I had what alcoholics call the click.

And the part that.

the Holy Spirit spoke to me was this, wait a minute, I can use my desires as an instrument of righteousness.

Now, I would have never thought that was the part that got him.

So he began asking God to help me.

How can I turn this in to something good?

When we engage in exorcism, a number of things can happen.

A reminder of who Jesus is, a reminder of the power you have in him, a reminder of the reality of the evil one.

As I've said before, The successes in my life have come when I've stopped and think, wait a minute, I know where that's coming from.

You're not going to give me devil.

No way.

You're not bringing me down.

I know, I know what you're doing.

I got you.

It's the spiritual click.

Peggy Joyce Ruth, the famous author, an amazing woman.

She's older now.

She had years of trauma in her life and knew something was not right.

So her pastor and a team involved in deliverance ministry placed her in the middle of a small room and began praying for her, pronouncing Jesus'name, scriptures over and over.

And then she heard a voice in response to something she said.

She said, Lord, why don't you do something about this?

And the voice said, I have done all I needed to at Calvary.

And somehow that was the click she needed and she never turned back.

We are going to go, we are going to do deliverance ministry, and I'm going to tell you what that's going to look like, not next week, but the week after.

But I need you to stay the course on this.

I wanted you to know that we're not doing anything that church history is not filled with.

We're not doing anything that Jesus himself did not do.

We're not doing anything, the acts of the apostle, and we're not doing anything that for the first 650 years of church history, they weren't doing regularly.

Okay.

But let me give you some comfort.

It's not going to be a show.

It's going to be done in hidden and private places where it should be done.

Nobody is going to get the glory except for God.

But it has to be done in such a time as this because the demon might be in too deep.

The prison sometimes that we're in might seem unbearable and impenetrable.

But I just read to you, Jesus came to set the captives free.

And I believe that.

And I believe deliverance is coming if you'll just hold on.

Father, thank you for your love for us.

And thank you for the reminder that your kingdom is more powerful than any kingdom we could ever imagine.

That yeah, there are strongholds.

And yeah, it's a turf war.

But the gates of Hades will never prevail against the church of Jesus Christ.

And you're looking for men and women to stand up, to be counted, to be strong.

and to pray the name of Jesus, and to sing the songs, and to pronounce the creeds, and to remind ourselves that it's a battlefield of the mind.

And when we remind ourselves that your power is greater, that he who is in us is greater than he that is in the world, we speak the name of Jesus, and Satan has to flee.

And Father, I pray as individuals, if there's anybody here this weekend, and they're acknowledging, God, I've got this area in my life, and I just don't think there's any hope.

that somehow the spirit of the living God would open their eyes at this moment in this place, that they can be delivered.

But it's going to have to be something that they engage in.

And they're going to have to confess.

And they're going to have to, in humility, approach pastors and ask them, please, please help me and deliver me from this.

Because I know God has the power over any decision I've ever made.

And any demon that's entered through the windows and walls and doors of my spiritual house, he can come in and plunder.

In Christ's name, everybody said.

We hope you enjoyed today's message.

If you want to know more about what it's like to be a Christ follower, I want to encourage you to go to oneandall.church.com to get more information, as well as to reach out to us to walk alongside you in this step.

I also want to encourage you to download our One and All app, as we have so many resources there for you, like our daily devotionals, our conversations, podcasts, as well as the sermons and...

to know what is happening here at our church so you can get plugged in.

We hope you have a great rest of your week, and we'll end as we always do with one hope, one life in Christ.