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162 | Do We Need Deliverance Prayer?
469 Plays15 minutes ago
Is deliverance prayer biblical? What makes it healthy versus unhealthy? In this episode, we explore what Scripture says about spiritual warfare, freedom from sin, and deliverance ministry.
In this episode, we examine: ✓ What is deliverance prayer? ✓ Biblical foundations for spiritual warfare ✓ The difference between healthy and unhealthy deliverance practices ✓ Warning signs of manipulative deliverance ministry ✓ How Christ secures our deliverance and freedom
Whether you're charismatic, cessationist, or somewhere in between, this episode will help you understand how to pursue freedom from sin in a biblically grounded way.
--- PRAYER SERIES EPISODES: - Episode 0: We're Back! Prayer Series Announcement - Episode 1: Can the Saints Pray for Us? - Episode 2: Do We need Deliverance Prayer? (this episode) - Coming soon: God's Sovereignty & Prayer, How to Pray God's Will, and more!
--- #VerityPodcast #DeliverancePrayer #SpiritualWarfare #ChristianTheology #BiblicalPrayer #EveryWomanATheologian #CharismaticTheology #FreedomInChrist #ChristianPodcast #TheologyForWomen #DeliveranceMinistry
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Transcript
Introduction to Spiritual Warfare and Unforgiveness
00:00:00
Speaker
Unforgiveness is a huge door to spiritual warfare. It sets you up for bitterness. It sets you up for lies about yourself and about others. It sets you up to remain perpetually offended and angry. It opens all sorts of doors for the enemy to work.
Verity Podcast Series on Prayer and Deliverance
00:00:19
Speaker
Welcome back to Verity Podcast, friends. I'm Felicia Masonheimer, your host and the founder of Every Woman a Theologian, the ministry associated with Verity. Today, we are in the second episode of our new series in 2026. This series is all about prayer, answering your questions about the nature of prayer, the practice of prayer, how to understand it biblically, and how to actually pray.
00:00:47
Speaker
Our first episode was about whether or not the saints can intercede for us in prayer if we should be praying to the saints. If you haven't watched that one yet, you can head over to my YouTube if you're watching there and find it, or you can head to your favorite podcast app, Spotify, iTunes, any of those, and you can listen to that episode before we jump into this one, which is about deliverance prayer.
Understanding Deliverance Prayer
00:01:13
Speaker
Now, not every Christian who's watching this or listening to this episode will know what deliverance prayer is. It's a very specific type of prayer specifically found in more charismatic or Pentecostal church traditions.
00:01:28
Speaker
So if you have been in the Baptist church tradition your whole life, or maybe the Reformed tradition, you might not have heard of deliverance prayer before. So I'm going to hopefully give you a better understanding of what this is, and then walk you through how it's practiced in both unhealthy and healthy settings. And then we'll figure out based on what we see in scripture on if this is a
Felicia's Pentecostal Roots
00:01:54
Speaker
biblical practice. Personally, I'm familiar with deliverance prayer because I grew up in the Pentecostal tradition. I was fourth-generation Pentecostal.
00:02:06
Speaker
So my great-great-grandmother was involved at the very cusp of the dawn of the charismatic church at the turn of the 20th century.
00:02:17
Speaker
And so that um tradition has been carried through my family for generations. And while I'm no longer in a Pentecostal church or charismatic-leaning church, I do have a lot of respect for the good that has come out of this denomination and their passion for believing God capable of the miracles that He can do. And that's an important thing that I want to preface this episode with.
00:02:42
Speaker
When we're looking at a topic like this, like basically all the topics I feel like we talk about on Verity Podcast, ah it can be very polarizing. People who are Pentecostal or who have been blessed by the Pentecostal church can feel very threatened when we look at Scripture and allow it to critique certain practices. And those who did not grow up in or around or have never been in any setting um that was charismatic or Pentecostal leaning can be very doubtful or critical of the church and critical of um believing in deliverance, believing in miracles and healings and things like that.
Miracles, Healings, and Scriptural Interpretation
00:03:22
Speaker
But what we see in scripture is that miracles and healings are gifts of the Holy Spirit. that the Holy Spirit is the one responsible for doing these things and that we see these things happening around the world. And so I think we need to be very careful when we study something like this to let scripture speak for itself and not just let our experiences um be the lens through which we understand these things. So despite the fact that I am a fourth generation
00:03:49
Speaker
that Pentecostal, no longer in that that church tradition, um but still valuing what it offered me and the and the foundations that i I received from it, I'm going to be coming to this um with that experience, but also knowing that I have seen some really negative things come out of that experience. So I've seen good, but I've also seen bad. And kind kind of holding those things in tension as I look at what scripture says about this. And I think, you know, for um my listeners, I just encourage you to do the same thing. um If you grew up or you're currently in a Pentecostal church, Let's ask ourselves, is my church operating according to how Scripture says the spiritual gifts are to be used? If you are not in a charismatic Pentecostal church, um I would encourage you to also listen through what I'm sharing here, what we see in Scripture around the idea of deliverance, and consider this um as you check your own ideas and viewpoints.
Biblical Roots of Deliverance
00:04:52
Speaker
Alright, so as usual, whenever I start one of these episodes, I want to start with what Scripture says about it. So we want to start there, and then we will move to understanding um deliverance ministry as it is currently practiced.
00:05:07
Speaker
So we're going to look at what Scripture says about deliverance. And first, let's define define deliverance. In the Bible, deliverance literally means rescue.
00:05:19
Speaker
It means to be saved from something. And When I hear the word deliverance or deliverer, my mind immediately starts playing that song from the Prince of Egypt. So good. If you haven't ever heard it or watched it or listened to it, that's your next YouTube video is to listen to Deliver Us from...
00:05:39
Speaker
the Prince of Egypt. But what this song and what scripture is is depicting is this saving rescue, this divine intervention by God. And in Prince of Egypt, which is based on the book of Exodus, specifically, it's looking at the Exodus from Egypt. It's looking at God rescuing his people people out of slavery, bringing them across the Red Sea through the desert to the promised land. And this image of the Exodus and the deliverance from Egypt is an image that's used all throughout the Old Testament to illustrate God's faithfulness and to promise his future deliverance. So looking back to God's past deliverance as a promise of his future deliverance, that physical deliverance from from Egypt is also a prototype in a way of the spiritual deliverance that was to be offered in Christ. So Jesus is a new and better Moses delivering us from the slavery to sin and offering us a new life in the promised land of the kingdom of God. And that kingdom of God is a spiritual reality, one day a physical reality when we are in heaven with him. So this idea of deliverance
00:06:58
Speaker
modeled in Exodus is talked about in the Psalms, is talked about in Isaiah, and then in the New Testament is talked about through um the perspective of Messianic Judaism, looking at Jesus as the ultimate Messiah, the promised one, the Savior, the deliverer. who is the new and better Moses. So deliverance is definitely something we see in the Bible. um and And deliverance ministries or ministers, they are using that term to talk about spiritual deliverance. So being rescued or saved from a spiritual slavery or bondage. Often the word that's used is bondage in the charismatic world.
00:07:43
Speaker
So we're going to look at a couple passages that specifically talk about this, starting with Psalm 91.
Psalm 91: God as Refuge and Protector
00:07:49
Speaker
Like I said, the Psalms talk a lot about deliverance, most of them written by David, who was fleeing literal, physical enemies, namely King Saul. And so he's talking a lot about how the Lord is his deliverer, his savior. It says this in Psalm 91, He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress. My God in Him I'll trust. Surely He will deliver me from the snare of the fowler and from the pestilence.
00:08:20
Speaker
So this passage goes on to say that he'll cover you with his pinions or with his feathers and under his wings you'll find refuge. um His faithfulness is a shield and a buckler. So he is the protector. He is the guard. He is the the refuge, the safe place, the the savior and deliverer. And this will continue in that vein throughout the rest of that passage. We can also look at Romans 8, which is a New Testament passage that's giving us a um
00:08:51
Speaker
messianic take, so a look at this idea of deliverance through the lens of Jesus. So this says, therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus, the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.
00:09:09
Speaker
want to pause there. This is verse 2. This is a passage describing the fact that Jesus has essentially changed intervened as this deliverer who has set us free from the legal obligation that we had to sin and death. So because we are born with this bent towards sin that inevitably one day we will act on, and we will then be separated from God. We are and lawfully betrothed, if you will, to sin and death. And Christ has offered us salvation, deliverance, setting us free from the law of sin and death.
00:09:52
Speaker
So God sent his own son, verse 3, in the likeness of sinful flesh, to be a sin offering. And by doing this, he condemned sin in human flesh. So, you know, veiled in flesh, the Godhead see, as the Christmas carol says, you have Christ in flesh, God in flesh, in the human body, offering himself as our substitute, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
00:10:26
Speaker
Now, after this, it goes on to say that those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires. So your old sin, the sinful um
Spiritual Warfare in Ephesians 6
00:10:36
Speaker
habits, patterns that were pre-Christ, those are are still pulling at us. um But he says, those who live according according to the Holy Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. This is an important section that we're going to come back to when we talk about the deliverance process that is used in deliverance ministries. now Let's now look at Ephesians 6, 10 through 18.
00:11:03
Speaker
Okay, so this passage is on the armor of God. So some of you are very familiar with this passage. It says, finally be strong in the lord and in his mighty power put on the full armor of god so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes for our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers the authorities the powers of this dark world and a the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms Therefore, put on the full armor of God so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground. And after you have done everything to stand, goes on to say to put on the belt of truth and the breastplate of righteousness, et cetera. So what this passage is talking about is this image of being armed, right?
00:11:46
Speaker
like a soldier to go into battle, but it's a spiritual battle. And it's a battle against not other human beings, not against political ideas, not against um people who've offended us, but against people.
00:12:03
Speaker
rulers, authorities, and powers of a spiritual world, spiritual forces of evil. That is who our battle is against. Um, this is a good reminder just in general with everything that's going on in the world.
00:12:16
Speaker
So much is happening, so much heaviness, so much evil. Remember who the real enemy is. Remember who the real enemy is. Now, when it comes to deliverance being delivered, um Deliverance ministers, or those who practice deliverance prayer, they focus on passages like this to say that we need, as Christians, um to be delivered from the rulers, authorities, and powers of this dark world, the spiritual forces of evil. And that some of the things we struggle with in our life, strongholds, areas of besetting sin, are due to these things. And therefore, we need to be delivered from them.
00:13:00
Speaker
And we'll talk about that when we get to the the later section. Let's go back over to Romans and look at Romans 6, 14 through 19. All of these passages are in the New International Version, by the
Freedom from Sin in Romans 6
00:13:12
Speaker
way.
00:13:12
Speaker
So Romans 6, 14 through 19, for sin shall no longer be your master because you are not under the law, but under grace. Grace is another word for God's favor. This is given to us because of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. We receive that grace through faith, which is a shift of allegiance from self to Christ.
00:13:34
Speaker
What then? Shall we sin because we're not under the law but under grace? By no means. Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves to the one you obey, whether you're slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance.
00:13:58
Speaker
Faith is allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness.
00:14:15
Speaker
So this passage really summarizes what should be happening in the life of a Christian. That when you have had this shift of allegiance from self to Christ— When you have put your faith in Christ, what happens is he, by by faith and grace, he delivers you from slavery to sin.
00:14:36
Speaker
But what's pointed out here by Paul is that you then have to obey. Out of that faith, you obey and you walk into greater and greater freedom.
00:14:47
Speaker
My pastor once told a story about a man who became a Christian. And at the time he became a Christian, he struggled with two things. cursing and swearing and gambling.
00:14:58
Speaker
And immediately when he came to Christ, he he was freed from his temptation to swear. He just, not tempted at all, completely freed from that aspect. But his temptation to gamble was still there.
00:15:15
Speaker
And he had to walk in obedience to live out the freedom that Christ bought him, to be delivered from his addiction to gambling. He was delivered from both.
00:15:27
Speaker
He was delivered from his his you know coarse mouth instantaneously. His deliverance from gambling was something he had to walk out progressively. So I wanted to read you these passages because these passages frequently are used in deliverance ministries to illustrate a concept that the the idea of which is that we need deliverance once and for all through salvation.
00:15:56
Speaker
But we also need an ongoing deliverance from the presence of sin in our lives.
Deliverance as Part of Sanctification
00:16:04
Speaker
The language that is used in charismatic and Pentecostal settings is very unique. They have their own terminology that if you did not grow up in it or you're not familiar with it can be very confusing or even off-putting.
00:16:18
Speaker
Words like the word deliverance, breakthrough, anointing, bondage. These are are words that are frequently used in conversations around spiritual life. And if their equivalent truth was communicated using Baptist terminology, you would be going, oh, I see what you mean.
00:16:42
Speaker
But because of the terminology, it can feel confusing. And sometimes the terminology that's used is simply unbiblical. And and so that, of course, makes it um confusing and leads to some some really wrong and harmful theology. Not always, but sometimes.
00:16:59
Speaker
So when we're talking about deliverance prayer and if we should be practicing it or receiving it, I want to first lay the groundwork that Scripture does make a case that we should be once and for all delivered by Christ and secondly delivered from ongoing addictions, ongoing besetting perpetual sin. We should be seeking to be freed from that. And the language that we use in our church denominations is going to be different. It might not be, i need deliverance. We might say, i need to overcome this besetting sin. I need to
00:17:36
Speaker
ah find freedom from this stronghold, or I need to, whatever it is, I need to obey, trust and obey. That's what I need to do. Whatever the terminology, the in essence, the concept is the same.
00:17:48
Speaker
We are justified in our conversion, if you will. We're justified by putting faith in Christ, receiving his grace, and before God, we have a righteous identity. But that righteous identity has to be walked out, and that process is called sanctification. So deliverance prayer and deliverance ministries are seen as a part of the process of sanctification in charismatic settings.
00:18:14
Speaker
Does it always stay that way? No. And we'll get to that. So let's look at some characteristics of deliverance. And these, what I'm going to share with you here, some of them are biblical and valid and some of them are not. And we'll kind of break down this as we get further into the episode. Some characteristics of deliverance prayer.
00:18:35
Speaker
Number one is renunciation. So specifically renouncing areas of sin or areas that are considered a stronghold. What is a stronghold? a stronghold would be an area of sin or participation in evil that a person just can't or won't give up.
00:18:54
Speaker
This could be participation in witchcraft or doing tarot card readings, seeing a medium. It could be something like that. It could be gossip, something that seems harmless, but you just can't or won't give it up. um It could be sexual sins, pornography addictions. It could be gambling addictions, swearing, whatever this issue is that is perpetually being engaged in, during a deliverance prayer, you would be renouncing it. So speaking it and saying, I renounce this or I will not engage with it. I'm giving it to you, Lord. I'm inviting Jesus' holiness, his sacrifice to free me from this thing. But in charismatic traditions, you'll often hear them use the word renounce.
00:19:39
Speaker
um Secondly, claiming Christ's authority. um You might be familiar with the phrasing, I plead the blood of Jesus. What what they're saying is, I am applying the blood of Jesus to this situation.
00:19:53
Speaker
Again, going back to that Exodus picture where... They painted the blood of a lamb on the lintel, so on the doorframe, to tell the angel of death to pass over them.
00:20:05
Speaker
It's the same concept. Christ has the authority to free us from sin based on the passage that we've read. This is what he did on the cross. And so you are pleading the blood of Christ over that situation.
00:20:18
Speaker
Sometimes you will see deliverance ministers, those leading a deliverance prayer, saying that they have the authority to cast something out, bind and loose. We'll get to that too in a second.
00:20:29
Speaker
The only authority to cast out anything, to cast out a demon, to to pray for forgiveness, to be cleansed from sin, the only authority is Christ's.
00:20:40
Speaker
No one else has that authority, just Christ. And one of the dangers here is that in walking out the authority that Christ has given believers to pray in his name is beginning to actually co-opt his authority and attribute it to self. That's that's something to watch for.
00:20:59
Speaker
The third thing that you'll you'll sometimes see in deliverance prayer is, declarations against disorders, pain, sickness, etc. You know, i I declare in the name of Jesus that your sickness be gone, that you be healed. And while I commend the faith that many people who pray this way have. um And I even have been prayed over by individuals who who I trust who pray this way. And I believe that that's a beautiful way to pray. And I think that it's not inherently unbiblical or wrong.
00:21:35
Speaker
um It can also be cultural. Different ways that we pray can be innate to culture, and we want to leave room for that. But if someone is declaring that a sickness or pain depart and believing that just saying that, just saying that they declare that it should go away means that it will, we do tread into some territory that's, I think, biblically dangerous because we're starting to, again, take on the authority of God or the authority of Christ as if our verbiage, our words, saying it enough, repeating it enough is what's going to result in the answer that we want. So
00:22:18
Speaker
Declarations are characteristics of deliverance prayer um sometimes, and they can be handled in a biblical way that's affirming the truth of Scripture and simply praying Scripture, or it can be in an unbiblical way um and possibly even a blasphemous way when we use them to kind of take over the authority of God.
00:22:38
Speaker
ah Fourth is promising God's intervention. I kind of already talked about this. It's when we basically say God is going to meet you here. You are going to feel his presence. Again, we don't get to dictate how God is going to move, how his spirit is going to move. We don't get to tell people what they're going to feel. That starts to feel like psychological manipulation, promising his intervention, promising he's going to do this. We don't get to force God.
00:23:05
Speaker
to do things. We get to ask him, plead with him. We get to fast and pray and request, engage with his spirit, but we do not force God to do anything.
00:23:19
Speaker
Fifth, breaking generational or word curses, maybe even references to soul ties, um to detach from sin. These are a lot of terms. If you are not familiar with charismatic verbiage, let me help you out here. So generational curses are simply generational sin patterns that when perpetuated pass down from father to son to grandson, etc.
00:23:47
Speaker
Word curses are things that people spoke over you as a child or as an adult that have stuck with you and have shaped how you view yourself.
00:23:58
Speaker
So right here, if if you are not in the charismatic tradition, these these terms are describing concepts that we're actually familiar with in other denominational traditions. And I've been in over a dozen denominations over the course of my life in ministry. So I've seen these same concepts talked about, but with different words. So in deliverance ministry, deliverance prayer, you often hear the word generational curse. word curse, soul tie. It's basically all just talking about patterns of behavior, patterns of sin, words that were identity shaping that you took on and perhaps opened the door to a pattern of sin or a lie about yourself that you believe that is limiting you or keeping you from walking with the
Generational Curses and Soul Ties
00:24:46
Speaker
Lord.
00:24:46
Speaker
It's actually quite simple. It's not as mystical as some teachers make it sound. Another thing that might come up is something called canceling covenants of death. Again, terminology.
00:24:59
Speaker
What's a covenant of death? Well, in Christ, we have a covenant of life. That's where Christ died on the cross to offer us eternal life. And it is called the new covenant in his blood. He talks about this in the gospels when he institutes the last at the last supper, he institutes um the sacrament of communion. So that's a covenant and of life. It's the new covenant in in Jesus blood. So if we are partnering with evil, if we have been, again, participating in witchcraft or participating in an ongoing hatred for someone, um believing a lie about ourselves. I'm i'm unworthy, unlovable because I have a sexual past.
00:25:41
Speaker
These are um what charismatic deliverance ministers would call a covenant of death. And so they would cancel that by the power of Jesus. I would simply say, if I were praying with someone,
00:25:56
Speaker
Are there any lies that you're believing that don't line up with biblical truth? Let's talk about them and then let's pray over them. That's the verbiage i would use. It's simpler. It's straightforward. It sticks with scripture. But charismatic traditions tend to like a little flair for the dramatic. So canceling covenants of death.
00:26:15
Speaker
The next one is any spirit that's attached quote-unquote, attached to um things that you're renouncing is commanded to leave. So there's often commanding. I command you to leave in the name of Jesus. I don't see any biblical problem with commanding an evil spirit to leave if you were to encounter one or to pray over someone in this way. um But there can be a little bit of, again, drama attached to the idea of specific spirits being attached to um specific sins. So they'll often use, and this leads me to my next point, use a verbiage of the spirit of lust or the spirit of anxiety or the spirit of Jezebel. That's another one. um Spirit of religion to describe a an issue that they believe is caused by a demonic spirit.
00:27:12
Speaker
And In my studies around this, both in scripture and in um you know reading through how deliverance ministers operate, what they what they say, what they pray, um I've kind of gone back and forth on this. Because, first of all, I don't think every single issue we struggle with, every sin that we encounter, is the product of a specific de not demonic spirit. Some of it is the habits of the flesh that are still being pushed out by our obedience to Christ. um But other times, definitely, there is a spiritual reality of of the enemy, a spiritual enemy who is truly trying to attack us, which is what Ephesians 6 tells us, that we need to be prepared to fight back in the spirit because our enemy is a spiritual enemy. So I think that there can be a spirit of lust, spirit of religion, um you know, that is
00:28:07
Speaker
is plaguing someone or oppressing someone, or in the case of unbelievers, is actually indwelling them. But i wouldn't want this to become a language that led people to when they're praying, they're constantly focused on identifying a specific spirit. One um article I read that was talking about like a deliverance prayer process, as I was reading through with their deliverance prayer process, it was saying that demons can be like gathered together in like little nests and like cast out all at once. And it's stuff like that that I go, where do where are you getting this? How are you getting this? The only time that we see Jesus casting out multiple demons, I believe it's twice, once with Mary Magdalene and then another time with the lesion of demons cast out of the man in the graveyard where he threw them into the pigs. And in both times,
00:29:02
Speaker
Jesus didn't have like a system for how he cast them out, which is what this particular article was saying. It's like, you can actually like, kind of like gather them together under the type of demon and you can pray them out by nesting them together in little categories. And I don't know, you know, I'm, I'm not an expert in demonology, but I just, get the sense that demons really don't care if you categorize them by their particular area of expertise, that the name of Jesus alone is probably powerful enough to cast them out.
00:29:37
Speaker
So the last point is anointing. um The word anointing um is like ah the favor of God or the power of God resting on a person. That's how that word is used. It's a moment. It's often used to describe a moment. Oh, the anointing is here. The anointing can be felt. It's a moment that is caused by God that leads to deliverance. So when someone is praying over someone, they might say, oh the anointing, I'm praying for God's anointing. His anointing is here. or the anointing is upon us.
00:30:08
Speaker
And this is taken from Old Testament terminology. Pentecostals pull a lot of their theology from the Old Testament. They use the New too, but a lot of the Old Testament is often used in conversations around this. And um The word anointing is used the way we see it in the Old Testament, where it comes upon someone. Someone is anointed. um Sometimes they prophesy after they're anointed. And it's the favor and power of God for a specific task.
00:30:37
Speaker
um In this case, it's the call to deliverance from sin. So anointing it comes upon someone But it also comes and goes, so it's not always there. um And this would be a point of disagreement between a lot of Christian traditions because, you know, we can say that in Christ, we are a holy priesthood. We are a chosen nation. That's an anointing that never leaves. However, um this is the difference, both in charismatic understanding, but I would say across the broad church, that what could be in view here is the idea of the Holy Spirit's indwelling versus his filling. So the Holy Spirit indwells every Christian upon salvation. The Holy Spirit is living within you. He is the seal of salvation, Scripture tells us. But his filling is when he comes upon someone for a specific task, empowering them to do it. So perhaps before an evangelist preaches, he is filled with the Holy Spirit. He never lost the Holy Spirit. He was always indwelt, but he's filled with the Holy Spirit to speak the words that need to be spoken. So this could be what's in view with anointing, and that is an aspect of deliverance as well.
00:31:47
Speaker
So this is just to give you some characteristics of a deliverance ministry and deliverance prayer. Also, some of the terms that are used within it that might be confusing if you have somebody do this for you or you've ever encountered this online or have attended a church that used these words. These are all words that would be coming up.
00:32:04
Speaker
All right, now let's talk about some assumptions of deliverance ministry and deliverance prayer. One of the primary and and really big assumptions that is foundational to the practice of deliverance prayer is the idea of the tripartite soul. So I get this question almost every time I i do theology questions on Instagram Is the soul bipartite or tripartite? And I might be mispronouncing that. I mispronounce words all the time because I read a lot and don't I don't use audiobooks. So pardon me if I just made myself sound really dumb. But the tripartite soul is, is this is the idea that every human being is made up of a body, a soul, and a spirit.
00:32:51
Speaker
The bipartite idea is that it's body and soul, but the spirit is just another word for soul. So two parts versus three parts.
00:33:02
Speaker
Charismatic theology, specifically as it is manifested in deliverance ministry and deliverance prayer, depends on tripartite theology. So the spirit is the essence of a person that connects them to God.
00:33:19
Speaker
The soul is like your personality, your your will, your emotions, etc. And then your body is your physical body. So the soul would be, the Greek word for soul is psyche. It's your mind, emotions, will, personality, reasoning, connects the spirit and the body together.
00:33:37
Speaker
The spirit is pneuma. This is the deepest part of man. It connects with God. This is what is dead to God before salvation and is made alive in Christ.
00:33:47
Speaker
So the very first assumption here is that you have a body, soul, and spirit. And the way I've seen this explained is that even when a Christian has you know Their spirit is renewed by Christ, has been bought by Christ, um made alive with him.
00:34:08
Speaker
Your soul can still be in bondage to demonic strongholds. So your mind, emotions, will, personality, reasoning. And this is the basis for why you will see some deliverance ministers try to cast out a demon from professing Christian.
00:34:32
Speaker
Not because they think the person is... necessarily demon-possessed, because you can't be possessed by a demon if you're possessed by Christ, but that you are instead demonized.
00:34:43
Speaker
What's interesting is that the word demonized is the actual word that's used in the New Testament whenever it's referring to a person who has a demon. It's not demon-possessed. That's how the word was translated in the KJV into English, the old English KJV, but it's actually demonized. So that's interesting because um It doesn't actually mean necessarily possessed or owned by the demon, but afflicted, oppressed. And afflicted is a really good term for understanding this because everywhere we see um the demons operating in the Gospels, I'm reading Matthew right now, um that is what it is. It's an affliction throwing people into the fire, into the water, and um causing them to scream and and make fools of themselves. And um it's very much an affliction.
00:35:34
Speaker
So the assumption here for deliverance ministers is that you a person could be demonized in their soul in a specific area, even if they are a Christian possessed by Christ, and therefore they need to be delivered from that demon's oppression. And this is why you would see deliverance ministers doing, you know, leading prayers or leading um times of worship where this is encouraged, where they're encouraging people to come forward and be set free from demonization. and
00:36:11
Speaker
You know, churches are very divided on this. Some are going to say, look, this is a matter of people actually reaching sanctification, like finding freedom from sin. And you'll even read testimonies of people saying, like, I was not free until I went through this process. um i I believe that some people probably benefit from this, and it can be done in a in a way that, you know, emulates Jesus' ministry. but there's an equal amount of deliverance ministry and deliverance prayer that is is damaging and is not operating biblically and is is teaching things that are extra biblical, that go beyond what scripture says.
00:36:52
Speaker
I don't think there's truly a convincing case in scripture either way for the tripartite or bipartite view of the soul. I think it could go either way. um I do think we're taking some significant leaps from when we say that the soul is where demons can possess us or vice versa, the spirit. we There's a lot of claims that are made by deliverance ministers in this regard that are not found in scripture. they're They're literally not there. And it's an assumption that's made. And then whole ministries and whole books are written about it based on assumption.
00:37:30
Speaker
So what do we do then? Do we just leave people who are being oppressed or who are being um struggling and have a stronghold? Like, what does that look like? um How do we understand demonization?
00:37:43
Speaker
Well, one thing that I noticed when we're looking at um demon possession or you know demonization in the Bible is that demon afflicted people in the Bible don't initiate their own deliverance.
00:38:01
Speaker
They don't go out and find Jesus and say, Jesus, free me from my demon. Someone else brings them to Jesus because why would a demon come to Jesus to be cast out?
00:38:12
Speaker
And this is probably one of the more convincing um arguments for me against um deliverance ministry for the purpose of casting demons out of Christians.
00:38:23
Speaker
Because these Christians are coming into the presence of a person who supposedly has the power and authority of Christ. A demon does not want to be in the the presence of Christ. So when you see people um being baptized, for example, and people saying, you know, a demon manifested as they were being baptized, I have a problem with that because I think why would someone come to the point of being baptized sincerely, if they're sincere, if they have a demon, you know, why would they, why would they get to that point?
00:38:57
Speaker
We really don't see that here in in scripture where someone who has demon oppression um initiates their own deliverance. The second thing that we see is You know, we don't see um demons behaving nicely like little Christian people until it's time to be delivered. So that kind of is echoing that first concept that we're not seeing godly people um coming to Jesus and saying, ah you know, I need to be delivered from a demon. You know, or people who are like, I believe, Lord, let me follow you.
00:39:36
Speaker
Let's use an example. His own disciples. ah Is he casting demons out of his own disciples? Some of them did really evil things. So that's an example to me of what if this was happening, if there it was possible for a Christian to be demonized, why don't we see more evidence of this in Scripture?
00:39:58
Speaker
um When, this is the final point on demonization, when those who are demonized encounter Jesus, they run away. They often run away or they try to attack. So like the the man in the graveyard, when he saw Jesus, he came out screaming to attack Jesus and his disciples. And then when he approached Jesus, he fell down um and and begged to flee into the pigs. So these examples we see in Scripture really don't line up with this idea that you could have a whole room of Christians who all are demonized in some way and need to be further delivered beyond what Christ did on the cross. And so even a deliverance minister who says...
00:40:42
Speaker
Only Christ can deliver you. Only Christ's authority is good enough. But his authority on the cross, his death on the cross, wasn't good enough to set you free. You need to do these extra steps. That does that does raise some significant red flags for me.
Earthly Suffering and Deliverance
00:41:00
Speaker
The last assumption of um deliverance ministers, deliverance prayer, is that we are meant to bring heaven to earth. And it's true that in the Lord's Prayer, it says, you know, let it be on earth as it is in heaven. But does that mean that earth will become heavenly utopia? Or does that simply mean that God's will will be accomplished in a fallen world?
00:41:24
Speaker
I would say it's the latter. Because we know that in this world, Jesus said, you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. He's over overcome it, yes. He is king over it. He has authority over it.
00:41:39
Speaker
Yet he said there would be trouble and he promised that we would suffer as he did, which means that sickness and death and pain are not going to be completely removed this side of heaven in the final restoration.
00:41:52
Speaker
In fact, we're promised that it won't. So when it comes to deliverance ministry, I think it's commendable to pray boldly, to pray specifically. I encourage you to do this and we'll talk about this more throughout this series. But we have to be careful not to believe something that God did not ask us to believe, that he did not promise. He did not say.
00:42:14
Speaker
We're going to usher in a utopia. It's not my will that you ever be sick. By my stripes, you will be healed. I was talking about spiritual healing that may sometimes manifest as physical healing, but not always. I say this as someone who had a chronic illness that was eventually healed after six years, but by no specific prayer or process or diet or anything that I did for that to happen.
00:42:42
Speaker
also had secondary infertility, also eventually healed after five years. But again, was there a specific prayer I prayed, a magic pill? No.
00:42:53
Speaker
A lot of what we experience in this earth when it comes to sickness and health and understanding how we pray over such things for deliverance has to recognize the nuance that the Bible takes with these things.
00:43:10
Speaker
Now, I've worked with Dr. Rachel Rausch at Aira Wellness, um She's a Christian naturopath who um specializes in anxiety and depression. And she had a really amazing chart that um I thought was so helpful. It had verses and it had um just a summary of how when we're praying spiritually, thinking about sickness, that we have to remember that there the Bible gives multiple reasons why sickness exists. So sickness can be a consequence of sinful choices. For example, if you are an alcoholic or you overeat sugar and unhealthy you know processed foods, you may end up sick.
00:43:53
Speaker
And those that sickness is the result of sinful choices. um But sometimes sickness is not a result of our sinful choices. It's the result of others' sinful choices, where we're dealing with something someone else did to us, and and now that's affecting us long-term.
00:44:12
Speaker
um Sometimes sickness is is part of ah um our own journey where God is glorified through a miraculous healing. This would, to me, be the case of our secondary infertility.
00:44:25
Speaker
Now, I'm still dealing with consequences of that infertility, but we were able to miraculously um get pregnant and have a baby. And John 9 specifically talks more about about this idea. Another reason we may you know, we may be sick is we may be sick unto death where we're healed eternally and we glorify God in that way, but we're not healed on this earth. The Bible talks about that, that sometimes we're we're sick unto death. Sometimes we're sick and it results in greater character. This is how I view my chronic illness that I had. it It was a skin disease. It was so painful I could not get rid of it. I could not figure out the reason for it. um But through walking that road, it really changed my view of myself, my body, people who suffer. um It helped transform me into a different person.
00:45:16
Speaker
It can also be that sickness is just physical. There is no spiritual part of it. It's just part of being in a fallen world. But sickness could also be spiritual attack. The Bible leaves room for all of these different reasons. And I love that Dr. Rausch kind of broke it down. um All these reasons why you can have sickness in your life. And so when you're praying deliverance from sickness, we have to remember that um there are many different reasons why. that may remain in our lives. For instance, when Paul is talking about ah the thorn in his flesh that he asked God to remove three times and God said, I'm not going to remove it. um My grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in your weakness. He did not take it away.
00:46:04
Speaker
And this is Paul. So when we're praying for deliverance from something, just like Paul did, it's not a matter of, oh, I need to be more righteous. I need to pray with more faith. I need to say the right words. If I only prayed at the right time of day or with the right people or from the right person, then I would be healed.
00:46:21
Speaker
That is not what scripture teaches us. And that's where we need to be just so careful in our deliverance um prayer that we don't veer into basically the prosperity gospel So as we get towards the end of this episode, let's talk about healthy versus unhealthy deliverance prayer, because I actually do believe that there is such a thing as healthy deliverance prayer.
Christ Secures Our Freedom
00:46:46
Speaker
um I've actually experienced it. That's not the basis of why I believe that, um but I have experienced it, and I think that it's important to leave room for that um in our theology.
00:46:59
Speaker
So let's start with unhealthy deliverance prayer. What does it look like? Well, in unhealthy deliverance, um it must be enacted by you or by another human being, and it must be maintained by you.
00:47:12
Speaker
So oftentimes when I was reading through the descriptions of deliverance by some famous deliverance ministers, one of the things they continually said is you have to maintain your deliverance. And that throws up some red flags because who is the one who maintains our salvation?
00:47:30
Speaker
It's Jesus Christ. And they would say, no, no, your salvation is secure. It's about remaining delivered. I would say salvation is deliverance and the one who maintains it is Jesus Christ. So do you mean sanctification as in remaining in, you know, choosing holiness day by day? Is that what you mean? Or do you mean that I have to keep on doing some kind of work to remain free? It says those who put faith in Christ, who the son sets free is free indeed. That is where our freedom comes from, from Jesus himself. He maintains that and all we have to do is walk with him every single day. Galatians tells us if you walk by the spirit, you will not give in to the desires of the flesh. That's it. You don't have to have a checklist of ways that you maintain your deliverance. So that's number one. Unhealthy deliverance requires a lot of works to maintain it.
00:48:22
Speaker
Secondly, you must continue to maintain the same level of faith to keep that deliverance. So if you achieved deliverance by your own faith, by conjuring up enough faith, oh, I believe enough. I'm strong enough. I can, I can believe my way into being free. You have to maintain that same level. And oftentimes, because this happens in very emotional settings, the idea is if I don't feel emotionally like I am still delivered, I no longer am.
00:48:53
Speaker
And that is not what Jesus said. Jesus has said, who the Son sets free is free indeed. And that means that his work on the cross is enough.
00:49:08
Speaker
um Kind of coupled with this, number three, healing is dependent on the constant work of declaration and faith. So continuing to declare over and over and over again that you are free or you are not engaged with this. Now, I'm not saying that praying boldly and specifically is wrong or unbiblical. I pray boldly this way. I do pray over my home, over my children, over my ministry, over all these things. Lord, you have said, I pray what God has said.
00:49:38
Speaker
You have said that you are a shield and a buckler. Be my shield right now, Lord. You are the shield for my children when I fear for them. That is praying boldly directly from scripture.
00:49:50
Speaker
But if you're constantly declaring things that the Lord has not revealed or that you just wish would happen, what we're treading into is manifestation. Right?
00:50:02
Speaker
Secular manifestation is saying, this is what I want. This is my will. Lord, I declare that I will be wealthy. Lord, I declare that I will have so much money. I can be generous for you. No, what we do is we look at scripture and we pray and we only declare what God has already declared.
00:50:22
Speaker
And if that's, Lord, you have saved me. I am i am in your family. i am sanctified. I am made holy. All of those things are in scripture. Go ahead, pray them, declare them. That's true. But don't declare things that you wish would happen that you do not know are God's will.
00:50:40
Speaker
I watched a video by a really well-known deliverance minister, apostle, Catherine Crick. And in this specific video that she did that was a deliverance prayer, She was saying in the video that if you prayed this prayer with her, she would help you get deliverance from all of your um strongholds, ailments, etc.
00:51:03
Speaker
And so in the video, she said, speak these words right now to receive and maintain your healing and freedom. But they were her words.
00:51:14
Speaker
And that is where we go wrong with deliverance prayer. It's when we're praying our truth, our desires, or we're praying it to maintain something out of fear that we will lose it if we don't.
00:51:30
Speaker
Instead of praying in full confidence and peace that we're praying what Christ has said about us and we can trust that it is true. Another video I watched was by Derek Prince, another really well-known deliverance minister.
00:51:45
Speaker
And I watched through the whole the whole session where he was doing a deliverance prayer with people And there was a lot of interesting stuff in it. um But one of the things that I noted was that he said you needed to pray a prayer that he he scripted, but he's he made sure to say it was directed toward Christ.
00:52:04
Speaker
But he he gave them the words. They prayed those words. But he said, then breathe out and it releases the demons. Don't keep praying afterwards and don't speak in tongues because if you keep praying or you speak in tongues, it prevents the demon from escaping you.
00:52:24
Speaker
And this is an example of something that is absolutely nowhere in scripture. There's absolutely nothing in the Bible that says that a demon cannot leave you because you're still talking or you're speaking tongues or praying. um And nothing that says if you breathe out and you just keep breathing, then they will leave you.
00:52:45
Speaker
This is why I put this under unhealthy deliverance prayer.
Jesus' Role in Deliverance
00:52:50
Speaker
Because when you start adding stuff on to scripture, you start adding things to what the Bible says about salvation and freedom from sin. You start getting into dangerous territory.
00:53:02
Speaker
When you see a you know, repeat this prayer after me, that's not always bad. But when the words are only the words of a human being and they're no longer the words of scripture in regard to deliverance, now we're in dangerous territory. We're starting to become dependent on a person to lead us to Jesus, to lead us to freedom, instead of depending on Christ to lead us to freedom. He is the one who delivers. He is the deliverer. Not Catherine Crick, not Derek Prince, not any other person.
00:53:34
Speaker
deliverance minister, deliverance writer. The work of deliverance is Jesus alone. He is the one who saves. He is the one who frees us, not individuals who give us certain words to say. All right, what are the marks of a healthy deliverance ministry or healthy deliverance prayer?
Characteristics of Healthy Deliverance Prayer
00:53:50
Speaker
Healthy deliverance is executed by the power of Christ and is maintained by remaining in step with the spirit. If you remain in step with the spirit, you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. Your emotions, your mental response to God, it has nothing to do with your level of victory.
00:54:06
Speaker
Christ secures your victory over sin and his work is finished. Now you have to submit to that work. And that is the hard part. That's the part where you're walking things out every day. You're getting in the word of God. You attach to a local church. You're accountable to Christian friends. You are spending time in prayer.
00:54:23
Speaker
If you're doing these spiritual disciplines, they will lead you further and further into confirmation to Christ himself. That's the purpose of them. The purpose is not to do it out of fear of losing salvation or fear of not being delivered, but to do them because you are delivered and you want to walk it out.
00:54:45
Speaker
Healing is secured by Christ eternally. It might manifest physically on earth, but it cannot be conjured or manipulated with enough effort. Submit to God's will in this, in your understanding of sickness and healing on earth.
00:55:00
Speaker
So a healthy deliverance prayer by someone over you or by yourself is going to recognize that God's will is supreme. Next, remember, in a healthy deliverance prayer, specific words and prayers are not necessary to secure healing, favor, deliverance.
00:55:17
Speaker
God works through simple faith and obedience. He's not looking for a perfect combination of words. This is about the leader, whoever is leading you through deliverance ministry or deliverance prayer. ah Make sure that the person is a godly man or woman who's grounded in Scripture and good character. When I was much younger, when I was a new mom, i i went through deliverance ministry at my local church.
00:55:42
Speaker
And at the time, I didn't know that's what it was. um It was simply a prayer time with um my pastor's wife and um in my Bible study leader. And one of the markers of that time was that both these women are righteous women who spend time in God's word, who are godly women, who were already mentoring me and discipling me to be in the word and to grow in holiness and forgiveness and to see myself the way God saw me. And one of the things they focused on in that prayer time specifically was forgiveness because unforgiveness is a huge door to spiritual warfare.
00:56:22
Speaker
It sets you up for bitterness. It sets you up for lies about yourself and about others. It sets you up to remain perpetually offended and angry It opens all sorts of doors for the enemy to work. And so they really concentrated on praying with me through that, but also helping me pray and ask a Lord to identify what areas of my life I was withholding from him.
00:56:44
Speaker
And in my case at that time, i struggled deeply with a fear of disappointing others. Now, I still struggle with this today. But their identification of that and their prayers over me in regard to that delivered me from area that I had not recognized before.
00:57:05
Speaker
So it wasn't them. It was them leading me to Christ who then delivered me from something I had struggled with but could not put words to. There was nothing flashy about it. There was nothing dramatic. There were no lights. There was no music.
00:57:19
Speaker
They were simply in my little duplex kitchen praying over me. And that's how I know it was real. Godly women leading me to the Lord with a Bible open and no drama, just the Holy Spirit.
00:57:32
Speaker
That's what a healthy deliverance prayer looks like. It's not something that's done to conjure and excite and and get everybody, you know, flashy trying to figure out what the dramatic next step is. It's simply the work of God through the Holy Spirit, not dependent on man's effort or will.
Clarity in Deliverance Prayer Language
00:57:50
Speaker
I hope that this episode was helpful to you as you seek to understand deliverance prayer. I know that it was a lot. I know that for some of you, this was really offensive because maybe you absolutely love deliverance prayer, deliverance ministry. Maybe you practice it. If you do, I hope that this just encourages you to keep it grounded in scripture itself.
00:58:10
Speaker
And honestly, if I can ask you one other thing, if you are in deliverance ministry or you do deliverance prayer, please use words that everyone recognizes. I'm not trying to be funny here. I'm saying this because a lot of these terms are unrecognizable outside of the charismatic church. And having grown up in the charismatic church, In that tradition, four generations deep, I can tell you that it is actually sometimes off-putting or puts up a wall between the work ah the work of God, when it truly is the work of God, and people who truly do need prayer and truly do need to recognize the strongholds and areas of sin that they need freedom from.
00:58:51
Speaker
So just describing what these things are that you're trying to do, that you're trying to pray for freedom from sin, from addiction, that you're inviting in the power of the Holy Spirit to to actually do a work of healing in their hearts and to show them the lies that they've believed and using terminology they recognize to do that.
00:59:13
Speaker
For those of you who are very gun-shy of deliverance prayer, I would encourage you to focus on where Scripture tells us it's biblical, and that's to actually ask the Lord to free you from sin. Just because you are earthly and you are on the earth does not mean that you have to live properly.
00:59:33
Speaker
continually in bondage to the sins of your past. In fact, Christ has said he wants you to grow progressively more free, more mature, to grow up, to grow into someone who is less and less like the world and more and more like Christ.
00:59:48
Speaker
So if that's not happening, then deliverance prayer, whether you're praying scriptures over yourself or someone's praying them over you, can be a pivotal part of your maturity and your growth in the Christian life.
01:00:02
Speaker
As always, thank you so much for listening to Verity Podcast. If you would like to see more of what we do at Every Woman a Theologian, please go to FeliciaMasonheimer.com and check out our bookstore. We have verse-by-verse Bible studies. We have multi-sensory Bible studies. We have a hospitality line. We have kids' discipleship resources and so much more.
01:00:21
Speaker
The podcast is just where it starts. So I would love to introduce you to one of our five verse-by-verse Bible studies if you are ready to dive into Amos and Micah, 1st through 3rd John, Galatians, Revelation, or Leviticus. And of course, you can check out my book, Every Woman a Theologian, for a breakdown of some of the basics of Christian theology.
01:00:44
Speaker
Until next time Verity Podcast.