More Than Stone

I was taking a look at my referrers the other day. Someone did a yahoo search on epilepsy and spiritual warfare and my site happened to be the first to come up, which I find kind of funny, considering that attempting to use “spiritual warfare” to win the battle against epilepsy in my daughter almost made me lose me mind.

We all know that Christians can take the spiritual warfare and “name it and claim it” type of thing too far with illnesses, but try battling a disease that Jesus specifically casts out as a demon in the New Testament. You might as well hang it up. It must be unconfessed sin, or a demon, or a negative spiritual influence, or drugs, or sexual abuse or past use of a ouiji board. Go ahead. Do a search on epilepsy and spiritual warfare or demons. There is no shortage of information out there. I had never considered what it must be like to have a disease like deafness or epilepsy that Jesus uses demonized language to heal. Until recently.

One Christian website actually says that demonic manifestation of a believer can take the form of:

Physiological imbalance & physical inability, such as blindness, deafness, dumbness, epilepsy, faintness, foaming at the mouth, change of voice & character, etc.

OH. REALLY?????? COULD it be that the person is actually blind or deaf or dumb or has epilepsy?

Perhaps if we quit seeing God as a gumball machine that just responds to our every whim and wimper, perhaps if we realize that, as painful as our suffering is, there are others that suffer more, we will stop acting as if every illness, every financial difficulty, every job loss is a personal attack from an enemy that we must battle. Perhaps we will realize, that as Job says in chapter 42,

2″I know that you can do all things,
and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
3′Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
4′Hear, and I will speak;
I will question you, and you make it known to me.’
5I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear,
but now my eye sees you;
6therefore I despise myself,
and repent in dust and ashes.”

Both John Smulo and Phil Wyman have posted on spiritual warfare. Phil has several other posts on spiritual warfare here, here, and here. I find this topic fascinating.

I was at a friends house yesterday. I picked up a little magazine and began to leaf through it. It was a magazine put out by Derek Prince Ministries. The article was about healing. I don’t need to go into it, but the bottom line was that we are sick because we do not believe and we do not ask for healing. I have always met these types of statements with skepticism. However, after dealing with a child with a chronic health problems this past year, I now believe these types of beliefs are not only deceptive, but hurtful and dangerous.

Generational curses, demonic harassment, strongholds, unforgiveness, and sin are a few of the “reasons” given for sickness by those who hold this belief. If we battle against these things, does that mean we don’t get sick? If so, why do we all die? What do you think of healing and spiritual warfare? Why did Jesus give us so many examples of healing during His ministry and what does this mean for us, as believers?

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