In my last post, I talked about the spiritual battle that ensued in our Tuesday prayer time last week.   Saturday night we held a Christmas open house for those who have taken an interest in our ministry.

The man who had brought such a spirit of distraction with him on Tuesday showed up with a “friend” accompanying him.  This second man brought with him a demonic presence unlike any I have ever encountered.  As this man would speak, he would begin to speak unintelligibly.  He would call himself by different names and he would throw around Bible verses like a rapid fire machine gun.

When I asked him, who Jesus was?   He gave a myriad of answers, but never said “Jesus is Lord.”   The spirit within this man began to directly antagonize me and challenge me.   “Who do you say Jesus is?’   “What makes you a follower of Jesus?”  “What is your favorite Bible verse?”

The Lord told me to be quiet and not contend with this spirit.  Over the next few moments, this man patted our children on the head and touched each wall, each table, etc…  The Lord instructed me to begin worshiping Him, so I began to sing the words that the Lord was giving me.  Immediately both of these men got up and left.

The Lord showed me that this was a testing of the spiritual defenses of our ministry.  We prayed over the children once these men had left and spoke a word of blessing upon them.

Last Thursday we had a guy walk into our Organic Group who just wanted to talk incessantly and pull us away from our Bible study.  It took nearly an hour before he chose to leave and the whole time he was there, you could feel a spiritual battle going on.  As soon as he left, I remembered this man had been encountered a year ago and continued to interfere as I tried to minister to a hurting man at one of the local missions.

Tonight when I arrived for prayer, I found Mike engaged in conversation with a man.  About 10 minutes later, the man from last week re-appeared and began to commandeer the conversation.  The Lord instructed me to begin worshiping Him.  I sang for the next two hours.  Singing until it hurt….the defiant spirit within this man refusing to yield to the glory of God.  The Lord continue to tell me that I could not quit until both of these men left, as the first man was drawn in by the spirit of the 2nd man.

After 2 hours both men left and we continued to worship, but I was exhausted.  I have never been in such a prolonged, intense spiritual battle as I was tonight.