Spirits in my Conscience

I have been struggling the concept of demon possession. Great, another wacko pastor-type! That is the reaction I most fear when I dare to think about this. But here is the problem.

Tomorrow I preach about Jesus binding, silencing, and casting out demons-then equipping his disciples to do the same. And now, tonight, God has cast the verse from 1 Corinthians 12:3, "Nobody can say 'Jesus is Lord' except by the Holy Spirit." And it connected for me. I understand what Paul is saying. Anyone can mouth the words "Jesus is Lord", to be indwelt by the Holy Spirit, to be truly accepting of Jesus in our hearts, to be truly in God's hands, is when those words truly carry meaning in our own lives.

Paul is fairly consistent with this concept of Holy Spirit-possession, when he talks about doing the things he does not want to do and not doing the things he wants to do. I recognize that enough in my own life. Tying back to Holy Spirit-possession, we begin a journey under that power of turning our lives over to God, of being able to live more in the love of Christ than in the life of sin we came out of.

All that is pretty sound, orthodox 'life in Christ' kind of stuff. But what about the flip side of it? Possession by Spirits that aren't so holy? Now this is a very dangerous topic, because addiction was for a very long time attributed in many instances to demon possession. Depression, bipolar disorder, how many other medical conditions have led to people being treated in cruel and vicious ways in the name of liberating them from demons?

And we are free, responsible beings, responsible for our own decisions and choices. But there is something in the middle there, something I cannot scientifically prove, but something I have seen in my own experience (so-called anecdotal evidence) of people exhibiting self-destructive, sinful, or destructive behavior with what I can only describe as addictive tendencies in ways that I cannot explain.

"The devil made me do it" is no excuse, never has been. Using that excuse undercuts the power of the Holy Spirit. But our lives contain conflicts that, I believe, rise above what we can simply see with our eyes and hear with our ears. But it is a power that runs in both directions, for good, and for ill. And as the Holy Spirit is the author of the good, it will always be victorious.