The lady stood in her doorway with mixed facial expressions, but she seemed to be very open to my message as she allowed me to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with her. I could see the Lord was ministering His reality to her. As I continued to speak, those expressions were changing and it was apparent that some of her immediate needs were being met.
I said to her that regardless of who or what we are or what we might have been or done, it was Jesus’ desire for each of us to have a beautiful and powerful relationship with Him. She said, “Yes, I’m beginning to find this out for myself.”
The lady was a little weary of my church association at first, saying she’d had a “very bad experience in a charismatic church.” She spoke about a friend of hers who was told some rather personal things in front of the whole church, by the priest. I thought that perhaps “the friend” was herself, so I used the opportunity to inform her that the Bible tells us God is not the Author of confusion – that being made in His image, He has great love and respect for all people – and as such, all things in the church are to be done decently and in order.
I also gladly explained to her that when we look at both Jesus and the apostles in the gospels and the epistles, we see their ministries were that of edification – to build people up, not to tear them down and destroy them. It was quite evident to me that the Holy Spirit was touching her with the words I spoke. She said she too had a bad experience and wanted to know if the church I was associated with was a “speaking in tongues and laying on of hands and all that rubbish, kind of a church.”
I responded by saying that the Holy Spirit has given the church various spiritual gifts, including spiritual languages and the laying on of hands etc, but once again, they are to be used according to the Spirit’s leading – for building people up in their faith in Christ, not for pulling them down or to bring condemnation or embarrassment.
I said to her that it is religious man who brings the disorder through lack of spiritual discipline, maturity, wisdom and discernment – not God. She smiled as the Spirit confirmed to her what I was saying.
The lady then told me she was a Catholic and the bad experience happened in one their churches “some time ago.” She said that she had since left them, but found their “hold on me hard to shake off.” On that first visit she didn’t say what her name was.
Three weeks later this lady phoned my church introducing herself as Eileen. She phoned to say thank you for the New Testament we had sent her, plus she wanted to meet with the minister. The meeting was arranged and I was asked to attend also. Eileen was a lady in her late fifties, telling us she had twin daughters in their mid-twenties and two sons in their late twenties.
She gave us a brief picture of events of the last ten years. Her husband had died and being Catholic people, they looked to the church for support during their grief. It was here she said, that they got “caught up in the charismatic movement” and were seduced into “giving money to the church.” They sold some land and a holiday house, but unfortunately “all the money went straight into the hands of the priest’s alcoholic brother.”
Eileen, needless to say, said this event destroyed the family for many years. She said that at the time, she was bringing up three or four teenage children on her own and this experience shattered her faith in the Catholic church, in priests and in God Himself.
The minister then made a comment that Eileen immediately identified with. He said to her, “Satan the devil can infiltrate any movement (church, gathering, group) purposely to destroy our spirit.” He went on to explain that this was one of the reasons for the importance of knowing the Bible and the Lord Jesus Christ for one’s self. This was the answer to her own question which she said, “had thrown me for many years.”
Eileen then said to us, “I knew wasn’t going mad, but I just couldn’t control myself and my thoughts at times.
We shared how both the apostles Paul and Peter in the New testament give us several warnings about the need to be aware of and awake to Satan’s tactics in the church. We explained that the devil loves religion and that we’re warned of his deceptions, half-truths, lies, false doctrines etc, and that he is an “angel of light” who’s primary purpose is to usurp the true Lord Jesus Christ.
The minister had to go at this point but I stayed on continuing to give ministry to Eileen. I gave her a systematic explanation of the “fall of man” as described in Genesis Chapter 3, plus the real purpose of why Jesus Christ came to earth – which was to destroy the works of the devil.
I then expanded on the tactics of the devil by saying, that because many churches and leaders discount and devalue the real truths of the Bible and substitute these with their own teachings, traditions, rules, formulas and observances – that this is the reason Satan is so successful in his infiltration. Further saying to her, that if Christians devalue the true God, then we give Satan a legal right to do whatever he wants.
Two hours later Eileen was ready to recommit herself not to any church or religious man, but to the Lord Jesus Christ and to Him alone. In our prayer I commanded every demonic presence to “go out that window” in the name of Jesus Christ. When we finished praying Eileen said she saw them go out the window and out the front door. I explained that God, in His mercy, showed her this to build her faith in Christ’s power and authority.
In January the following year I was doing Bible a study with Eileen and she spoke of her daughter’s sore neck, saying, “she’s had it for a long time.” The young lady happened to be in the next room, so we invited her in, whereby I explained the spiritual reality of demonic activity. I told her that I thought her pain was caused by a demonic presence and that if she was willing, Jesus would heal her by casting it from her body.
She gave the approval, I prayed to God, and then commanded the demonic presence (spirit of pain/affliction) to go in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. With that she sneezed, blew her nose and tears came into her eyes. Then she began to silently laugh – before our eyes she was being healed spiritually, mentally and physically.
Her mother said it was “the first time she had laughed in ages.” It was indeed a time for God to show His reality, love and superiority over all that she had been exposed to. It was good for Eileen to witness this power yet again.
I would love to report that as a result of what the Lord did in the lives of these dear people, that this was the end of their problems, but it is never that simple. Because of their lack of Scriptural knowledge and ignorance of their authority in God’s word, they continued to experience spiritual attacks. I spent many a long hour on the phone encouraging Eileen, as well as undertaking a couple of visits with my wife.
It was clear to us that she had a long way to go before it could be said that her faith and trust in Christ’s Biblical word was really strong. But she was always amazed at the ministry we gave, saying that we were confirming her answers to her prayers.
Eileen frequently spoke of the hurts they’d endured and we spent a lot of time talking about the need of the Holy Spirit’s enabling in bringing her to the place where she would be able to grant forgiveness to those who had wronged them.
We encouraged her by explaining that we cannot do this on our own, but that if she was willing to simply trust in God and pray and read His word, then in God’s time she would know she was on a pathway to spiritual and mental freedom.
Just a little over sixteen months from our first meeting, Eileen decided to put her house up for sale and relocate to another suburb. “Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.” Galatians 5:1.