Transcription
We thank the Lord for being here. We greet you in the name of the Lord. Amen.
We thank the Lord that He's made this opportunity. Uh, we're here to speak to you about the discerning of spirits. Uh, I could say I've had some experience in it and uh, we're going to share with you a few verses and a few things. We thank the Lord for His goodness and mercy. Thank the Lord for Brother Rodney, Sister Rosie giving us this opportunity. And we're glad when they said unto me, "Let's go into the house of the Lord."
Somebody say, "Amen." Amen. Were you glad when they said to you, "Let's go unto the house of the Lord?" Amen. Or were you sad? I think you were glad. I hope you were glad because the Bible says, "I was glad." Amen. They said unto me, let's go onto the house of the Lord. Thank you. Amen. Amen. Amen.
And um, I again want to say thank you to Pastor Rodney and we thank the Lord for this opportunity. He gave me this time to share. Um, we've been busy working and the Lord has been with us. The Lord has delivered us and saved us and kept us and keeps on working through us. So we praise the Lord for His goodness and His mercy, for it endures forever. Amen. Amen.
Let's pray. Father, right now in Jesus' name, we ask You to invite again Your presence. Lord Jesus, be with us. Father, guide us. Lead us. Show us. Open to us. Lord, bless us. Lord, guide us. Lord, help us. Lord, bless this congregation. Bless Brother Rodney and Sister Rosie and their children, their grandchildren. The blessings of the Lord be upon this place here in Army of God. Move according to Your will, Father. Let Your will be done, Holy Spirit. Not our will, but Thy will be done, Lord. Amen. Father, in Jesus' name. Amen.
So, uh, discerning the spirits, huh? It says, "He who sins of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning of uh, from the beginning. For this purpose, the Son of Man was manifested that we might destroy the works that he might destroy the works of the devil." First and foremost, it says, "For this purpose, the Son of God was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil." When Jesus rose from the dead, shed His blood, got the keys of the kingdom, and we believe went down to hell and took the keys of death and Hades from the devil.
We praise God for that because Jesus is the one. He's the true Savior. He's the only one that can help you, save you, and keep you. He's the only one that cares about you more than anybody else. That's right. You know, a lot of people say they love you, but in the end of the day, it's all about Jesus, right? Amen.
So, um, I spent some time on the streets as a young man and I was leaving the vida loca and, uh, went through a lot in the East Side San Jose where they said nothing good has ever come out of the East Side San Jose, but praise God, God is good and His mercy endures forever. Amen. And uh, we want to show the next slide, brother. Number two, the war. I want to talk to you about spiritual battle.
It's spiritual warfare is a Christian concept of battling unseen forces and evil forces. Unseen evil forces, demons, Satan that oppose God's kingdom and has influenced human thoughts, societal values based on biblical principles. It emphasizes utilizing spiritual armor, truth, righteousness, and faith to overcome temptation, uh, temptation and demonic influence, focusing on the victory through Christ rather than fear.
Now, uh, we're all in a war, in a battle. No. No. Some mornings you think, "Oh, I'll just get up and have some breakfast and go to work and everything's cool." But the devil, like I've said many years, many times, the devil's a liar, though. He'll attack you. He'll come and put evil thoughts in your mind. And you might think they're your own thoughts, but they could be thoughts of the enemy. Amen. Thoughts of destruction, thoughts of craziness. How many have a mind that is on Christ? Amen. Or a mind that has to battle? We're all in a battle. You know, I thought when I get older, the battle would get easier and it'd be over. I said, "That's it." But now there's still warfare. There's still battling the devil. There's still fighting. There's still having to not go to fisticuffs. There's no uh fighting in the flesh. You know, some men want to get down and dirty and fight in the flesh like we used to when we were young people. Anybody look at us wrong? We want to fight. Have you ever been in that situation when you were younger maybe and you want to throw down? Well, I used to want to throw down, but I learned the battle is spiritual. It's not physical. It's not It's not about fighting in the natural. It's not about fist of cuffs, even though last Sunday we saw a little bit, and I'll just leave that right there. But the Lord, He's the one that fights our battles. He's the one that helps us. He's the one that leads us and guides us and shows us and directs us and helps us and saves us and keeps us. He's our helper in the time of need.
So we have here 2 Corinthians 10:3, if you want to go there in your Bibles. 2 Corinthians and uh, we'll look at that for a moment. It's a famous scripture in the Bible that talks about spiritual warfare because our nature is to go to fist of cuffs. It's it's to go and think in the natural man. But the thing is, there's a spiritual man and there's a natural man, and you have to decide in your mind, like Brother Monica was saying, make up your mind, what are you going to do? You going to fight in the natural or you going to fight in the spiritual? That's right. And you have to consider that we're called to fight in the spiritual. The Bible says, "For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty in God for the pulling down of strongholds, casting down arguments and everything high that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing into captivity in the uh, to the obedience of Christ."
Now, not one's here. It says there strongholds. What's a stronghold? It could be, "Wow, my father's a drunk. I'm a drunk. And I'm always going to be a drunk." That's a stronghold. You know, my father told me, "You're going to be a player because your grandfather was a player. I'm a player and you're going to be a player." But I'm coming up on 40 years marriage. That's right. In Christ Jesus. March 7th coming up next year, I might have 40 years. And I thank God because I know it's Him that kept us. We give God the glory. Give God all the praise because He's the keeper of our home. He's the one that sets the stage and keeps us. So strongholds could be anything. Some lie of the devil, something holding you back from going forward in Christ. Whatever it is, it's a lie of the devil. Devil's a liar. Liar path on fire hanging from a telephone wire. Amen. Amen. Amen.
For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty in God, fully pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. Think about that. Every thought you get, you have to say, "Is this the Lord? Is it in His word?" That's why it's important that we read the word like Brother uh Wanito was saying, to know the difference. Like he, he forgot he read eight p uh eight chapters, but he saw that Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He's the same. He hasn't changed. People change. You change, but God remains the same. He's faithful and true. No matter what people say, God is the same. If you ever made your promise, He's a promise keeper. He's the original promise keeper. Amen. He's never lost a battle. He's never uh lost any wars. Every fight He's in, He wins. So, we're on the winning side. That's right. Hallelujah. We're overcomers in Christ Jesus. We don't let some dumb thoughts control our lives. We know we have learned through the word that the word is like a mirror. When we look at it, it'll show us what to do. If you have a question, look in the word of God. It'll tell you the truth. Amen. It'll tell you the way you should go and what you should do. There's no doubt in my mind that Jesus is the only way, truth, and life.
So we could go to the next slide, brother. Okay. Key aspects of spiritual warfare. The nature of the battle is not against flesh and blood, other people, but against spiritual forces of wickedness. You know, we think we were dealing with this person. It could be the spirit behind that person that's mad at you. Like say you're going to go to McDonald's and uh, all of a sudden somebody gets upset with you and you don't know why. It could be the presence of the Lord that's that's with you and their evil spirit is responding to the devil. Amen. That's good. You know, Joe Rank went to a McDonald's one morning and he was going to have his little muffin and some guy came in arguing with the lady behind the counter. And then he went out and started cussing her out, using foul language, and he threw a bunch of bones on a table and started doing incantations. And the Lord told Joe Rango, which is my father, He told him, "Everything he's doing is going to come to nothing because you're here." So, you carry the presence of the Lord with you. Amen. When you're a believer, you walk in His presence. You live in His presence. God is all-seeing, all-knowing, and He's everywhere at once. So, He is always with you. You don't maybe feel Him at the moment, but just recognize God sees everything. Even if you're in darkness, you go in your room and you try to hide, He's there. If you make your bed in hell, He's there. If you make your place up in heaven, He's there. Wherever you go, the Lord is at. Amen. Amen. You have to realize that.
So, uh, we don't fight confessing blood. The goal, the aim is often to disrupt a believer's purpose, cause division, or hinder spiritual growth. See, the goal, the aim at spiritual warfare, the aim is often to destruct, how do you say that? Disrupt disrupt a believer's purpose to cause division or hinder hinder spiritual growth. You might not be looking for trouble, but all of a sudden, something could happen, throw you off your track, and destruct disrupt a believer's purpose. You know, you're just going down the road, minding your own business, and somebody cut you off. They disrupt your purpose, and it gets you all upset. And next, you want to think about getting physical and natural. But you have to remember we don't fight against flesh and blood. We fight against principalities and rulers of darkness.
The three enemies tradition holds. The three enemies of the believer are the devil, spiritual; the world, systemic temptation; and the flesh, personal sin. Those are the three levels of warfare. Ground level is personal deliverance and overcoming individual temptation. Occult level, engaging with direct satanic or demonic forces. Strategic level, combating spiritual strongholds that influence cities, nations, or cultures. Now, when I was in the East Side, the Lord showed me that the major demonic spirit there was witchcraft, cuz a spirit of rebellion. So, I won't get ahead of myself, but I'll just say that there are spiritual forces above us that we can't see, the devil is in control of, and he's monitoring. And he has, like in San Francisco, we know what spirit of drugs is there and other kinds of spirits. Like he got too much sugar in his tank. That's Brother Randolph is coming. He got too much sugar in his tank, you know, that's a spirit. It's a spirit. When you go there, you can feel the difference in the spirit. And if you're in different locations, you'll deal with different spirits. Now, the enemies again are demons, Satan, the world, self. And the world is another word for cosmos, which is a generation that now lives apart from Christ. Like CNN, they don't get up and say, "Oh, we'll give God the glory and praise to Jesus." You don't see that because they are, they could say, infiltrated by the demonic spirits, by the worldly system. They talk about the world, they love the world, but we are not of this world. We are pilgrims passing through. Amen. Now, I don't know about you, but this world is not my home. No. I'm just a passing through. Just like the song said, "This world is not my home. I'm just passing through." Are you just passing through or you don't make your riches on earth but in heaven?
He said, now, uh, first things first, let's go to the next slide. I want to show you something. And He said to them, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I give you authority to trample on serpents and scorpions and over all power of the enemy, and nothing shall be enemy by any means hurt you." Now, think about this. Whatever devil comes your way, you have to realize Jesus said, "Behold, I give you authority to trample on serpents and scorpions," which are demonic forces, "and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall be by any means hurt you." So, there's no devil that can do anything to you because you're in Christ. They could try to fool you. They can mess with you. They can give you bad dreams. I've been attacked by monkeys, by dogs, by lions, and tigers. Oh my. That's right. But the Bible says, "Greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world." Amen. If God is for you, who is against you? Who could be against you? Nobody. Think about God is with you. He's for you. Amen.
Now, this is something you have to settle in your heart when dealing with demonic forces: that greater one lives inside of you, and the devil has no place in you. And at the command of Jesus, he has to flee at that name. Because when you're dealing with demonic forces, you better know the name of Jesus. Amen. Call on Jesus. Jesus. And rebuke those devils in Jesus' name. Amen. And take authority with the power of God. Amen.
Let's go to the next slide. Now, I've never shared all these, but I'm going to share some of them with spirits that I've dealt with, spirits that I've fought with. One of the first spirits that I dealt with was the spirit of suicide. Cuz when I was a young teenage boy, the devil came and said, "Well, I didn't know it was a devil at the time. Told me, 'You're no good. You're never going to be anything. Why don't you just kill yourself? Everybody you love hurt you. You hurt everybody you love. Why don't you just kill yourself?'" So, I was sitting in my bedroom waiting till I went to sleep and I was going to go jump off a bridge. That was my plan. But then my father came in the room and said, "You're thinking about suicide, huh?" I go, "Yeah, how'd you know?" He says, "I see the spirit of suicide on your shoulder." The devil was literally talking to me, and I thought it was my thoughts. I thought I was the one thinking that, but there was a literal spirit on me, telling me to kill myself. But he called another preacher and they broke it off of me in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.
Then the spirit of drugs. I told this one before, but I was out at a big field and it was the old house, like Adam's Adam's uh, family house. It was an old house, and I was smoking drugs without without another man. And we were saying, "Go ahead and light it up, spark it up." And we're outside the house. And I looked and I told him, "You know, there's something in the house." And he goes, "Nah, nah, nah. Just keep smoking." So in the dream, I was smoking PCP, cuz that was our one of our church drugs in the East Side, cuz East Side San Jose was the capital of the world for PCP. And I had been on it for several years, not knowing. And then I kept smoking it. And I looked again and I saw that the spirits were coming after me. So I started running the field and I had the joint in my hand. And he said the joint, something told me, "When you're the when you're running, the spirits are after you, are in the joint, and when you smoke the joint, they went inside you." So I said in the dream, "In the name of Jesus Christ, I rebuke you, spirit of drugs." And I woke up and I saw a shadow leave my body, and I've been drug-free for 43 years. So that was another experience I had. The Lord set me free from one day to the next. I didn't take 10 steps, one step. I took one step. It was Jesus. No withdrawal. Just set free, delivered that day through power of Christ. What an awesome God we serve. Amen.
Then the spirit of confusion. Was I was um, I had a dream and in the dream I was this young lady that we used to party with from the East Side, and she was confused about something. Then I saw a spirit sitting on her bed, and she was confused. She was walking back and forth, but all of a sudden I said, "I rebuke you, spirit of confusion." And all of a sudden, something grabbed him and shackled him, and he couldn't move, and he started to levitate off the ground. And the next day, she called me, and I hadn't talked to her in months. And she said, "I told her, were you confused about something last night about 11:00 that all of a sudden you were set free?" She goes, "Yeah, how'd you know?" I go, "Cuz it was a spirit of suicide that I saw, and as soon as I said, 'In Jesus' name, I bound him,' and she was like, 'Wow, I never knew that.'" Then the spirit of fear, which is one of the oldest spirits, is fear, because Adam was in the garden hiding, and God said, "Where art thou?" Because I was afraid. So that was one of the oldest spirits, a spirit of fear. But God hasn't given a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind. Amen. Amen. God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of love, power, and a sound mind. Hallelujah. I had a young preacher that I was ministering to, training, teaching him, and he was getting panic attacks, and he went to the hospital because he kept on having panic attacks. So he took that verse, "God hasn't given us the spirit of fear, but of love, power, and a sound mind." And after a few months, the Lord set him free. And now he's a pastor to this day. Amen. Because the Lord set him free. Spirit of spirit of fear. Amen. Spirit of death. I uh, was preaching again in the East Side because that's where I'm from. I was at church and I was just preaching and this young man asked me, "Pray for my cousin." So I started praying, and right away the Lord told me it was a spirit of death. So I said, "I rebuke you, spirit of death, in Jesus' name," and cast it off of him. And he goes, after he goes, "How did you know that?" I said, "The Holy Ghost told me." And he said, "Yeah, but I was in prison and somebody gave me a shrunken head, and everywhere I go, people try to kill me, but now I've been set free in Jesus." Amen. And to this day, he's been set free through the Lord Jesus Christ. And it was a spirit of death.
Now, you say, "Well, how does this come? How do you hear?" Well, it's very simple. It's the same voice you hear when Jesus told you to get saved. Did anybody ever feel in your heart to get saved and say, "I want to believe in Jesus. I know Jesus is alive and He resurrected from the dead?" Amen. That same spirit is the one that works in the spirit of the discerning spirits. Amen. And uh, His voice is the same. It's not a new voice. It's the same spirit. It's the Holy Spirit. So I was in church another time and I was praying for people, and this young lady was there praying, and there was a preacher over there rebuking the devil out of her, and she was praying, and all of a sudden I went up to her, and the Lord told me, "Spirit of perversion." So I rebuked it, and she immediately began to throw up, because while this preacher was praying for her, was doing okay, but the Lord gave me the secret of her heart. And I said, "Spirit of perversion, come out of her in Jesus' name." And immediately she began to throw up. Wow.
Then the spirit of bondage. I had another dream. You know, I don't know about you, but God has always dealt with me in dreams. I've always seen the future or seen what's happening or somebody's doing something. And the spirit of bondage, I had a dream where I was in those old army tents, and there was people in the tent getting high, drinking, smoking, doing all kinds of crazy stuff. There was a girl crying for her father. There were people doing all kinds of like vida loca stuff. And all of a sudden, I saw a man was full of ropes, and it was a spirit of bondage. Wow. And I went up to him. I go, "I know who you are." And I pulled off a rope, and I realized that bondage has to be taken apart. You have to take it off strand by strand. You have to get out of it yourself. You have to pull, wow, the strands of bondage off of him. So I began to do that in the dream, and I saw that the spirit of bondage is drinking. It's young girls crying for her father. It's people that have messed up lives and living loca, "Oh, I'm just going to do whatever," and it ends up being a bondage. And you think, you know, what are you in bondage to? What has you in bondage or trapped? You have to think about that. So I saw the spirit of bondage, and he's full of ropes, thousands of ropes all over him. And uh, we rebuked him and tore off some of those ropes. Amen.
Now, the spirit of witchcraft. I dealt with about, actually, sometimes I'm preaching, I'll give one story about my pastor when he called me in a Saturday night, but I'm going to give you a different story. I had a Bible study in San Jose. There was people praying, and a young lady came, one of their cousins came. I was rebuking her, and all of a sudden she said, "You're lying." And I started preaching Jesus and praying for her in Jesus' name. She says, "You're lying. You're lying. You're a liar." And she started cussing me out. And I realized the Lord told me it's a spirit of witchcraft. So I began to rebuke it for an hour. Wasn't 5 minutes. It was a whole hour I prayed for her. Just that one young lady. I prayed the Lord delivered her, and in Jesus' name, I kept praying. And the Lord, she told me after that, she saw horns behind her, but when I came, there was a light behind me, and when I came, the light overshadowed her and took away the horns and took away all the darkness. Amen. Because greater is He that is in us than he is in the world. Amen. Greater is the Lord Jesus Christ, even with the spirit of witchcraft.
Now, witchcraft is a hard spirit because it will fight you. It fights for its right. It doesn't believe that Jesus has all authority. But He does. He does. He has all authority in heaven and earth. He's the same. He hasn't changed. He's still the same. And uh, spirit of divination. I'm going to go to Acts 16. If you would open your Bibles, Acts 16. And 16. And this or now it came to pass, or it happened, when we went to prayer, a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination met us, who brought her master's much profit by fortune-telling. This girl followed Paul and us and cried out, saying, "These are m uh, men of the servants of the Most High God, who proclaimed to us the way of salvation." And she did this for many days. Please take note. It says she did this for many days. She followed Paul and Silas and said, "These men show you the way of salvation." And Paul turned, annoyed. See, it says that Paul was greatly annoyed. Sometimes the devil has to annoy you to get you to move. Sometimes you play footsie with the devil. But we don't do breakfast with the devil. We don't hang out with the devil. We don't talk to the devil. We don't ask him what he had for breakfast. Huh? We say, "Come out of him in Jesus' name." Amen. And right here, Paul, being greatly annoyed, turned and said to the spirit, he said to the spirit, "I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her." And he came out that very hour. Notice it says he came out. It wasn't the girl's. It was a spirit inside the girl. And it was a he. It was the spirit of divination. And he rebuked it and commanded it. And that's another thing you have to, if you don't feel that you have authority, then you ask God for authority. The first, the first big fight in the Bible was they healed the man at the temple, beautiful. And he said, "We don't want you to preach or say Jesus' name anymore." And Peter said, "If in your sight, it might be all right, but we're going to preach Jesus Christ." That's what we're here to do. Amen. Lift up the name of Jesus. Hallelujah. Talk about the name of Jesus. Tell people your testimony. And that's how you're going to win them. That's right. Is you have to tell somebody. You know how good you feel when you tell somebody about how God saved you, how God delivered you, how God is with you, and how He can be with anybody. Cuz God is not a respecter of persons. He's not. He doesn't say, "Well, I like this one 'cause he's rich or he's got a good name." I like his name. You think the Father in heaven is up there choosing? No. He called the average man, everybody, the ones that are least among the society, not the rich ones, but the poor ones. He said, "I didn't come to save the rich, but the poor, those that need a doctor." How many need a doctor? Amen. You need Dr. Jesus. Amen. Amen.
So, we see here, I'm going to add one more. I, I don't know, this is going to trip you out, but one time I had another dream. I was taken up to the second heavens. It was pitch black, and there was water on the ground where I was walking. It was perfect black, and I saw some little children in the second heavens, and it's where the devils are at. And what I saw was children up in the second heavens, and they were just playing. They were little children, but in the far away distance, I could see like 50 feet away, there was a young lady about 13 years old, and up there she was like a principality, a ruler of darkness. She was powerful. And she told me, "Leave the children alone." And then they invited me to an old house, and they said, "You want to play some games with us?" They started playing games and putting their fingers through a mirror. It's called Sky. They use mirrors. I go, "No, I don't want to play your games." And then this man showed up and started kicking me and fighting against me. But he des, he didn't think I was supposed to be there. But the Lord showed me. See, when you think about this, you have to realize, what's the scariest movie out there? Isn't The Exorcist? Uh, 13-year-old prom? How about Children of the Corn? Why is it always children or any scary movies? Because in heaven or second heavens where the devils abound, there are spiritual forces, and they're usually children. They're children that really are demonic. And I don't know why that is, but you'll see that every time you see a scary movie, there are demonic forces. Like we went into a house, and me and some of the youth, and uh, we wanted to pray for this lady. She said something was grabbing her at night and turning off the light. And she showed me a picture of her daughter, and behind her daughter in the mirror were two men dressed as like priests or something, or like Ku Klux Klan, but they were wearing purple. So I went to the daughter's room, and she had that smile now, cry later poster. She had a lot of demonic stuff in her room, trees that looked weird. They had movies on spread out on their table that were all demonic movies. And I told the lady, "Get rid of these movies. Clean out your girl, your daughter's room, and the devil will leave." And they started laughing at us. She started laughing. The girl started laughing. And so we left. We could never cast the devil out because she wanted the darkness. See, if you want the devil, you can have the devil. That's the thing about God. He gave them to my affections to repate my. If you want to play, you got to pay. You want to fool around and say crazy things and act crazy, then the Lord says, "Okay, not only you going to do this, but seven worst demons will come." So, it's a scary thing to fall into the hands of a living God. It's a scary thing to fall into the hands of a living God.
So, uh, let's go to the next slide. So they come into the land which the Lord God is giving you. You shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. There shall be not found among you anyone who makes his son or daughter pass through fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or sorcerers, one who conjures spells, or a medium, or spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. For all these things are abominations to the Lord. And because of the abomination of the Lord your God drives them out before you. You shall be blameless before the Lord your God. For these nations which you will dispose, listen to sus dividers. But as for you, the Lord has not has not appointed uh, such for you. So we see here in Deuteronomy 18:9-15, it says, "You shall not listen to witchcraft, or soothsayers, or interpret all minds of sorcerers, or conjure spirits, or mediums, or spiritists. You shall not give yourself to these things." So I went to another house. They asked me to go pray for a woman. And there's another devil. I show up and I just read Deuteronomy 18. And all of a sudden, what I found out was this mother and daughter had saw a spiritist, a curandero in Spanish, a witch doctor. They had paid him $500 to get the devils out of her house. Instead, he imparted to them demonic forces, evil spirits. I read this verse I read to you, and their tongues came out like snakes. They started, you know, acting like snakes. So I said, "I didn't say Jesus, nothing." All I read was Deuteronomy 18. And the devil began to react. So then I said, "We better pray." So we started praying. I rebuked the devil, spirit of the curandero, a Mexican witch doctor. And a few minutes later, the mother ran into the restroom and threw up a fur ball. The Lord set her free to the power of Christ. Because greater is He that is in us than he is in the world. If God be for you, who could be against you? Amen. So that was, that was quite an experience. And the young man came to me, "You want to see the fur ball?" I go, "No, I don't want to see the fur ball. The Lord set her free from the spirit." Uh, that quote in that.
Now coming up to the end of the sermon, uh, James 4:7, it says, "Therefore submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your heart, you double-minded." Now, uh, one of the thing when dealing with spiritual warfare, uh, you have to realize that the person has to be willing to submit to God, cuz you could resist the devil and they say, "Just resist the devil and he'll flee." So, I had a young man call me and said, "Uh, my wife, wife was praying for a woman that was on her deathbed, and she was about ready to die." And his wife then told the spirits that were in the woman, "Jump on me and leave this woman alone." So, the spirits jumped on her, and she couldn't sleep for days. So the young man, real bright, told the Lord, "Tell those spirits to jump on me and leave my wife alone." So they jumped on him, and then he had no peace. Wow. He had no comfort. He was in turmoil and derision. He was in trouble. He had problems. And uh, he called me and I told him, he goes, "Most men tell me I just need to pray and seek the Lord, resist the devil." And I, I told him, "Did you submit to God though?" And he said, "No." I go, "You need to submit to God, then resist the devil, then he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He'll draw near to you. But first, submit. That's the most important thing. You could do all the talking you want, but until you submit, nothing's going to happen. The devil won't leave, even though you resist him, will do no good. You have to submit to God." Amen. You have to say, "Father, I submit to You and do Your will, Father, in Jesus' name." And then he did that, and the Lord delivered him. I saw him some years later, and he's walking around all fine and good. Has his kids with him, still married, but uh, he had taken on those devils for a minute and was in torment. Wow.
So let's go to the last slide. The seven sons of S.A. How many remember this? Let's go to Acts 19. 19:13. "Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists took it upon themselves to call the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, 'We exercise you by Jesus whom Paul preaches.' And there were seven sons of S.A., Jewish chief priests, who did so. And the evil spirit said and answered, 'Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you?'" Huh? Then the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped upon them, overpowered them, prevailed against them, and sent them f them out of their house naked and wounded. It's no, it's no joke to try to cast out devils. It's like this pastor said that one time there was an evil possessed man, and he took all his deacons. He had like some deacons with him, and they didn't know what to do. So he threw the Bible at the devil. So all his men looked, and they got their Bibles, and they threw them at him. But they couldn't cast out the devil. They, they didn't know how. They just threw their Bibles. That was it. Jesus made the way for us through these gifts to empower us to make us stronger and healthy Christians. And uh, the spirit of Christ will dwell in you, but you have to do things God's way. And one of the ways is knowing Jesus personally. Have you been saved by Jesus? Amen. Has He sanctified you and set you apart? Well, then you've been saved. Amen. You've been delivered. And with God, the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable. That means once God gives you a gift, that's forever. Even till your old age. God doesn't forget. God will always honor His gifts, and He'll always be there for you. That's why I love Jesus. Amen. Cuz nobody wanted to give me a taco on the streets or I was walking around. I was hungry doing the vida loca, and not too many people want to share tacos with you. They'll say, "Go home, back to your your own people." He'll say, "Get out of here until you go to Jesus." And the Lord, He'll take good care of you. He'll watch for you. He'll take care of you. He'll look after you. You pray to Him, and He'll answer. God hears and answers prayer. Amen. Amen.
All right. I think that's all I have, brother. Amen. I better stop here 'cause I have more, but I don't know where you guys are today. I think I gave you enough information. I usually don't share this, but I told Brother Rodney that I would share some so that uh, we could give you the understanding that the reason why the spirit of discerning spirits was my father had the discerning spirits and the word knowledge, and when I was younger, he prayed that the Lord would give them to me, and the Lord did. Amen. So, I thank God for it, and I expect that maybe one day, we've already seen Rock stand up and be counted, but I want him to think about spiritual warfare and become a spiritual man and do a spiritual fight. Amen. And my son, Jonathan, and my girls, we believe for them. We pray the Lord saves them all. The Lord keeps His promises. Amen. Amen. Amen. God bless you.
Give up for Pastor Rainy one more time. Amen. All the wisdom that God has given him. You know, imagine going through what he went through and God brought him, brought him through. Amen. Amen. I just love that we serve a a true living God. Amen. You know, the Lord woke me up this morning. What? This is a verse I want to share with you guys. And He was telling me about lies, letting in evil. And that's what I came with. It's so easy to lie. It's so easy to white lie. Sometimes we white lie to make somebody feel good, but it's still a lie. A sin is sin. Black magic, white magic is still magic. They say white magic is better than black magic, but it's still magic. Amen. It's against what God wants.
So in in Proverbs 6:16, it says, "These six things the Lord hates. Yes, seven are an abomination to Him: A proud look, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that are swift in running to evil, a false witness who speaks lies, and one who sows discord among brethren." Amen. And we see that a lot today. Amen. Amen.
And on discerning of the spirits, I had a um, I had an issue, not an issue, but I ran into a a spirit that called me this week, and I was mentioned to Brother Juan, and I was saying that I was at Panda Express. I was eating my salad, and I'm here in Pixford, and I get a phone call, and this gentleman said, "Why did you cut me off?" yelling at me. And um, I'm over here on Contra Costa Boulevard. "Why'd you cut me off?" I said, "Well, wait a minute." I said, "I'm in Pix." He said, "Well, which one of your drivers cut me off? They flipped me off and all this stuff." I said, "Well, I don't know who it could be." He said, "Are you going to fire one of these guys?" I said, "No, 'cause I don't know what the what's going on." And uh, next thing you know, he went, and I'm like, "Whoa, that was a spirit. That was an evil spirit that contacted me through my phone." And my son, our son Angela, was on Contra Costa Boulevard, went to get Casper's. I said, "The one, did you cut somebody off?" He says, "No, I wasn't in that hurry to get a hot dog." He said, "No, I didn't cut no one off." And we know that he wouldn't flip nobody off. So, it was just how you have to discern what's coming at you and know it's not the person, it's the spirit. Amen. Amen.
So may the Lord bless you as you give. I thank you for coming. I thank you, Pastor Angel, for sharing your your wisdom, God's wisdom. Sister Rebecca and Brother Walk Rock, we thank you guys for always being here, and everyone showing up today. And uh, if you need any prayer, we're here to pray for you. But I pray that the Lord continue to bless you and guide you, because we're all going through something. But best to know that Jesus is for you. Who could be against you? Amen. Amen. So may the Lord bless you. Thank you. Amen.