11. ENCOUNTER WITH A DEMON

     Bible believing christians, by definition, believe in angels and demons.  Why don't we see more of them today?  They were all over the place in Jesus's travels.  Where do they come from?  I'm a seeker of God and follower of Jesus looking for answers and understanding.  I have much to learn.  As a smart man of science once told me, "The more we learn, the more we realize how much we don't know."
     The Bible tells us where satan's rulers or princes come from.  God made them and they are fallen angels, 1/3 of the angels God created, the generals in satan's army.  The Bible doesn't tell us everything but sometimes God teaches His people on an individual basis.  Maybe the demons are leftover beings from a previous world God created, perhaps satan is able to create them though the Bible doesn't tell us that.  Maybe we have the power to create them with our sin.  I haven't found a definitive answer on the source of demons but do have some interesting information on their appearance and functions.
     Several years ago I encountered an incredibly powerful woman of God named Dr. Bree Keyton who "moves among" all nine supernatural gifts described in 1 Cor 12.  I watched as she miraculously healed many in a couple small groups and I helped catch women as she prayed for them and they passed out or were "slain in the spirit."  None of us men passed out though, maybe women are more receptive or sensitive to the holy spirit.
     In her book, Stripes, Nails, Thorns and the Blood, Dr. Keyton describes much of satan's hierarchy and the appearance and function of many of these beings.  As the prophet John writes in Revelation 16:13, "Then I saw three impure spirits that looked like frogs; they came out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet."  A few years ago a lady mentor gave me a description of a demon she'd seen and described it as being about waist high and frog like in appearance.  A couple days ago, late April, 2015, I encountered the fourth person in my life who described a demonic encounter.
     I've recently moved from CO to a small northeast GA mountain community where I have family and property.  I've been visiting different churches and bumped into a mother and two of her near grown daughters at McDonalds.  I sat with them a while and we chatted.  I told them I wasn't interested in a mainstream church that didn't believe in the real God, the one who still moves among His people with the gifts.  It seems most large churches believe the gifts stopped with the disciples I shared, and I'd already had a message from God by word of knowledge at their church through a gifted older country lady.
     The mother piped up that one of the daughters had the gift of discerning the spirits.  I was leery at first.  Some think this is limited to an intuitive feel about a person's character, direction a church should take, etc. but that wasn't the case here.  This intuition may be a lesser form of the gift but God gives some the ability to glimpse into one of the unseen dimensions of our world and see, through spiritual eyes, the girl mentioned, angels or demons.  She described a demonic encounter.
     The father and husband in this family has gotten into some serious sin and is leaving his family, apparently bringing evil into the home.
     The girl says she abruptly woke up in the middle of the night, something she never does and felt compelled to get up or she may have said she was told to get up.  She says she went into the hall towards the main living area and could see a dense fog.  She could see a trail of this thing's footprints, leading to all the bedroom doors but it hadn't been able to get into any of the bedrooms.  She saw it in the living room in some dense fog. She described it as being amorphous, attempting to take a shape with arms but it couldn't seem to form them.  It flashed words at her, "ADULTERY, FORNICATION, DESTRUCTION."  She mentioned another set of words ending with "DESTRUCTION."
     The mother mentioned that the words were pretty much what the man had been getting into.  The girl says God told her to pray and to tell it to get out in Jesus's name.  She describes it wincing, says she was told to tell it to get out again in Jesus's name, which she did.  This time it left.

     Why don't we see demons as clearly as they are described in the Bible?  I have an incomplete answer to this question.  I've described my encounter with Dr. Keyton more thoroughly in previous postings so will not repeat all here.  Dr. Keyton says she was told by God in an audible voice to "Save the Pygmies."  That's her mission.  Amongst many other miracles God did through her while in the Congo, at the time I encountered her, she'd raised 6 pygmies from the dead in Jesus's name.  Now wouldn't that be a fast way to bring a whole village to Christ in a hurry?  Raise their dead chief back to life.
    I realize very few of my readers will be able to believe this, I was incredulous also but after seeing her do some lesser miracles came to believe her.  Jesus tells us in John 14:12, "Truly I tell you, those who believe in me will do the works that I have been doing and they will do greater things than these for I go to the Father.  And you may ask me for anything you want in my name and I will do it for you so that the Father may be glorified through the son.  Ask me for anything you want in my name and I will do it."  Ok, Jesus tells us it's possible.  Do you really believe in Jesus?
     I partnered on a house once with a man who's parents had been missionaries in Mexico.  He described to me having seen a girl throwing around grown men by demonic power.  I once read in a mainstream publication, I believe it was National Geographic about a ceremony in a third world country at the end of which knives were pointed at a chicken and the chicken died.  A bit of research suggests demonic activity is much more common in third world countries than in western cultures and so are God's powers.
     On the plane ride home from my encounter with Dr. Keyton, I sat next to a man and described her to him.  He didn't seem to have any trouble believing about the dead pygmies being raised but was curious to know if she'd done that in a western culture.  I told him I didn't think so.  He explained that there's something about our western culture or beliefs that insulate us from the supernatural.
     It's my current opinion that we have the same angels and demons that were around in Jesus's time but we just don't see their manifestations as demonstrably.  I've often wondered why God seems so hard to reach.  There seems to be some sort of blockage for me.  So another girl in the U.S. with the same set of demons as the girl from Mexico may just exhibit horrible, out of control behavior but may not be anywhere near as extreme as the girl in the Exorcist or the actual girl in Mexico.

Edit: God seems to be giving me information as I'm writing or shortly after to correct what I've stated.  I just spoke with a missionary briefly and asked her about the third world vs. western phenomenon.  She told me that a spirit of heaviness and slumber has come over America.  More on this in another posting.

     I believe we all have our own collection of demons behind our various quirks, disorders, addictions and compulsive and habitually sinful behaviors but we keep them stifled better than is done in other cultures.  When we sin enough, hate enough, fear enough, etc. we let in large enough strongholds of them and  they start to take over. Unfortunately, we have the same stifling effect with God and the holy spirit.
     I hear many pastors including some very prominent ones claim that we can't have the holy spirit and a demon at the same time.  From my studies and life experiences, I disagree with this and I think it's demons with an s, not demon.  Has a pastor ever cheated on his wife or run off with another woman?  That wouldn't have been from the leading of the holy spirit.  As Dr. Keyton explains, we are three part beings, soul, spirit and flesh.  Maybe the holy spirit drives the demons out of our spirit where he joins with us but the demons just go into the soul or flesh.
     Using my description of my own behavior from years ago, "It was like my consciousness was there witnessing it but not in control."  I can recall numerous instances where I didn't have good control of myself, my thinking or actions.  Something else did.  It's been several years since I've had such a bad experience but they were common with my recent companion the Sad Lady.  Her out of control episodes happened once or twice a month.  The woman has the gift of tongues and interpreting tongues and healing from God has flowed from her so she has the holy spirit.  She also seems to have some demonic strongholds.
    Reflecting back on myself, I mentioned in the Baptism of the Spirit posting that after it had happened to me, I seemed to be cured of the obsessive disorder but after a couple weeks, "it crept back in."  I didn't use that verbage deliberately but I believe that's exactly what happened.  The demons crept back from the recesses they fled to when the holy spirit came on me in a big way.
     A few months after my baptism of the spirit, at the advice of my new lady mentor, I went to the Healing House for both healing and a prophetic reading.  A small group of gifted people prayed out what seemed to be dozens of demons.  One guy seemed to be able to see them coming out and maybe could if he had the gift of discerning the spirits.  He was swatting them off my back, one after another for some time.  Don't try to tell me we can't have the holy spirit and a demon(s).  I know better.
     I haven't had an episode like I once did, since then.  It may have been because of getting the demons kicked out or because I wasn't in a situation that gave me as much negative stimulation. I'd had a baptism of the spirit, certainly had the holy spirit and had a big collection of demons, believe I still have plenty, that we all have a number of them with or without the holy spirit.
     I'm having an epiphany as I write this.  I looked up the word "epiphany" to make sure it was the right word.  The root meaning is "God experience", yes, that's the right word.  It's all coming together for me.  I wrote earlier about Dr. Keyton's statement that there are 4 levels of understanding to the Bible and wondered if getting to a higher level came from study or God.  A little of both I'm seeing.
     I was going to write I think we let in demons by sin and emotions incompatible with the christain walk such as fear.  I researched the spirit of fear in Dr. Keytons's book, Stripes, Nails, Thorns and the Blood and found obsessive disorder as one of its manifestations.
     As I wrote earlier God is communicating with me again though not directly yet.  The message from the connected country woman at Wiley Church of God, "Keep seeking Him, (she didn't know I was earnestly doing just that) and a big issue would be resolved for me, (she knew about unforgiveness of my father but I don't think she was aware of the obsessive disorder that's plagued my life for decades, which I was hoping was what God had meant) and I'll find my purpose, (life is looking up for me now but she didn't know I've spent much of the last 3 years earnestly praying for death with nothingness vs. hell if God couldn't give me a purpose - writing this blog for now I think, maybe more later.)  Wow.  This book is incredible, the Bible too.
     The spirit of fear isn't a demon but a chief prince, (fallen angel).  I'm going to quote from her book, pg. 89, "Fear is a chief prince that has destroyed many.  Because of fear we allow ourselves to become subject to bondage."  Before I left CO, I thought it might have been the spirit leading me to pray for deliverance from the bondage of self as I was drunk and stoned and not liking it.  "Fear can be very real, extending to phobias, addictions, fear of authority, worry, nervousness, paranoia, schizophrenia, stress, confusion.  A root of fear may cause an inferiority complex or bedwetting.  It may cause a person to be unable to speak in public or forget what they were supposed to say...A person with this spirit will not feel safe and secure, and may transfer this fear to their children.  Demons will congregate around a fearful person and begin manifesting in their house, or appear by the bed at night."...
     "The spirit of fear gained access to mankind through guilt from sin.  Fear entered the human heart in the Garden of Eden."  "...I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked."  Gen 3:10
     We just got to a deeper level of understanding of that verse, Adam was afraid, the fallen angel named fear just entered him because of his sin.  We can apply this other places as well.  Now we know when we read that Jesus's love casts out fear, the reference is being made to the fallen angel as well as its manifestation, our human emotion of fear.  
     The more you learn, the more you realize how much you don't know.
     Some spirits, such as the Jezebel spirit are comprised of numerous other spirits according to Dr. Keyton.  I just learned that we may be afflicted by fallen angels, not just demons.  Here's the list of spirits in Dr. Keyton's book: Rejection, Divination, Python, Suicide, Death, Fear, Anxiety, Confusion, Religious, Controlling, Jezebel, Ahab, Unbelief, Doubt, Korah, Antichrist, Lying, Deception, Error, Seducing, Heaviness, Haughtiness, Blindness, Critical, Strife, Envy, Jealousy, Hate, Unforgiveness, Infirmity, Mammon, Greed, Devouring, Buffeting.  She gives their purpose, description, manifestations, ways to repent from them and cast them out.
     James 3:1 warns teachers, "Not many of you should be teachers...we teachers will be judged more strictly."  I'm careful to qualify myself as in "I believe" or "in my opinion" or "I know with certainty."
     If your pastor tells you something you find suspect, research it for yourself.  We are all saints and he has no more authority than you and for heaven's sake, (I mean that literally), don't follow church doctrine just because it's doctrine, much of it is wrong.
     For instance at a funeral in my non denominational church where I spent many years in the CO mountains, the pastor said, "We believe that once saved always saved."  I can point to a lot of scripture that makes me believe otherwise.  Heb 6:4-6 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of god and the powers of the coming age and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance."  ...verse 8, "But the land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless and in danger of being cursed.  In the end it will be burned."  Also 1 John 5:16 If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to deah, you should pray and God will give them life.  I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death."  EZ 3:20 "Again, when a righteous person turns from their righteousness and does evil, and I put a stumbling block before them, they will die...The righteous things that person did will not be remembered..."
     I'm not certain but I don't think we should feel too confident in our salvation just because the pastor tells us so and take grace as a license to sin.  From what I've read, I think we can lose our salvation. There's another verse that says just as a man can go from bad to good, he can also go from good to bad, but I can't find it with a quick search.  I choose to believe my salvation isn't a guarantee but can be lost.
      Regarding the member who committed suicide, it was puzzling why this man drove into the national forest and hooked a pipe up from his exhaust into the cab and had himself a peaceful death.  I'd do it that way too if I were going to end it all.  He was successful, had a big house, gorgeous wife and beautiful kids.  We never know what demons people are living with and most of us try hard to keep the world from seeing our defects of character, driven by demons and spirits or fallen angels.
     The Catholics believe that suicide is an automatic ticket straight to hell, but my pastor said, "once saved always saved."  Somebody's wrong.  As in the Dire straits song, "Two men say they're Jesus, one of them must be wrong."  In my example, I'm going to think for myself and I believe both are in error.
     I don't know exactly how we let in demons.  I've heard it said that there's a demon for each sin.  If that were the case we'd all have thousands of them so I don't believe that. They can be in us or influencing us from outside.
     Maybe we do get a demon with each sin but kick them out when we repent.  However,what about those huge strongholds that have developed over years with childhood trauma or ongoing anguish of some kind, or other issues such as the lying spirit I've previously described?  I've had two women in my life who were compulsive liars, my second wife and the Sad Lady.  They couldn't help themselves.  These strongholds don't come out easily or leave with a simple prayer of repentance.
     James 1:15 tells us, "Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when full grown, gives birth to death."  I think somewhere in this process we let in a demon.  I don't think one single demon has much power but if we let in a large enough group of them, a stronghold, they start having a serious influence on our behavior.
     A group of demons will give themselves a single name.  The Jezebel spirit for example is comprised of 17 lesser spirits.  When Jesus asked the demoniac what his name was, he replied, "Legion, for we are many."  Then Jesus cast them out into the herd of 2,000 pigs.  I think we can assume the man had a collection of thousands of demons to cause his behavior.  If I'd been the owner of the pigs, I wouldn't have been too happy with Jesus either.
     Writing this posting has been an incredible God experience for me.  I hope you got something out of it too.