Battling the Occult

M16 Ministries receives a lot of e-mails requesting help on how to battle witchcraft. Witchcraft is one of the most difficult topics on warfare to teach. For one, battling witchcraft comes from experience. I would say this is one of those subjects that is caught and not taught. It's not so much the battle with witchcraft itself as it is working with misinformed Christians. Many times our ministry is approached by people who are in a panic and are not standing in their own spiritual authority. One of the biggest issues we deal with is determining whether there is actually a threat at all from witchcraft. Our ministry deals a lot with another subject of deliverance, called demonic obsession. This is when a person is diabolically oppressed with obsessive thoughts. In the case of demonic obsession and witchcraft, the oppressed person believes everyone around them is a witch. Through their eyes, everyone in their town is secretly a member of a coven. The ministry call always has the person requesting help and in a panic. "They're every where and their after me. They come into my apartment when I am not home..". The demonic obsession is real but it is in the form of obsessing they are under attack by a covert coven of witches, singling them out for their attacks. Working with these people involves having them wake up from their demonic lie. Some do and some don't.

Now what do we do when we establish the threat is real? First of all. Our ministry doesn't go running into a gun fight. If we establish an individual is under an attack from witchcraft we pray and talk to the Father for direction. God may give us revelation on what is going on in this situation. Perhaps this individual still is yoked to witchcraft through their past involvement with the occult or a soul tie to a witch. The yoke must be broken, and during this time you must assess if the individual is sincere about being saved from the attacks. We have worked with individuals who would rather be attacked because it brings them their identity or notoriety or attention they are seeking. Be careful of running into a fight with witchcraft. Look at the individual asking for your help.

Never ever launch an attack against witchcraft. Pray to the Father for understanding and to see if you are released into helping this person. You won't always get a yes. During this time have you and your prayer team pray to the Holy Spirit for a hedge of protection around the individual.

In fights we were called in to, I have noticed during this time of waiting and praying, true diabolic attacks or spirits show up at our doorstep looking for a fight. Again, we didn't run in and start a bar fight. This is during the time we are waiting and praying to the Lord. The spirit realm knows something is up and comes to you to investigate or to act like a gang banger to scare you off. Now you know you have a real threat with witchcraft. In all the battles with witchcraft my team has been in we have been called into the fight by simply praying for revelation and protection for the individual seeking our help. This takes experience. And I highly recommend you stay away from all prayers where you are “binding princes in heavenly places”. I never pray that prayer but inexperienced prayer warriors do.

There is no methodology in battling witchcraft. It is a Holy Spiritual lifestyle and standing in your spiritual authority. During this time we work with people to stand in their own authority. Yes. We make them fight the battle. If they don't want to stand in their own authority they are turning their dominion over to Satan and I don't recommend working with these people until they're ready to be a mature Christian. Second, the demons bypass this individual as already being conquered and come after you and your team. Many times we are working with an individual in raising their own bar in faith and authority. If there is no progress, and many times it is baby steps, break off working with the individual. In these fights I am talking about working with Christians. My wife and I have gone out and worked with non-Christians, 50% of the time, when the person sees for themselves signs and wonders in an attack they don't need much more proof to ask Jesus to be their Lord and Savior. But we have the other 50% who don't want to accept Jesus. It happens. We work with them on what they're options are. They're not a lot. Demons come back multiple fold when the house is left unclean. Sadly, after a few sessions we'll stop working with these people.

Battling witchcraft itself is praying and having a conversation with the Father. It's the Father's will be done in these battles. Many times people are surprised I am not always having discussions about warfare with Jesus. It's about your relationship with Jesus. I will fast during these battles to go deeper with Jesus in prayer life. And at the same time, as I said, pray that His will be done in this situation.

Why do I do this? Because Jesus fights witchcraft his way. The spirit was poured out on all of us. Including the person practicing witchcraft. He doesn't want this individual facing eternal separation from him. I have no clue how Jesus will fight a battle either.

Witchcraft uses spirit realms and dreams for their battles. On several occasions, Jesus has used these factors in warfare. God will use dream warfare quite often when dealing with witchcraft. I don't understand why.

Ok Mike, give us an example. Alright, ...just remember you asked!

In November of 2007 my home church was involved in a large church planting in Ethiopia. Our senior pastor at that time took a team to Ethiopia and held a conference to equip pastors in that region. A few weeks later, a couple of days after Christmas, one of these equipped Ethiopian pastors went back to his village and had a power encounter with the local witch doctor. Witch doctors have powers and are feared. The threat here is real. Don't let your western civilization way of thinking tell you other wise. The Ethiopian pastor drove the demons out of the witch doctor and all the village saw it. The result of the power encounter was the entire village then accepted Jesus – the one who defeated the witch doctor. This was big news in this part of Ethiopia.

During this time, witch doctor's in other villages heard too and put out the spiritual hit. Retribution was building a special ops force in the spirit realm to retaliate. In this, one of the responsible parties was my home church for sending our pastor to equip Ethiopian pastors. The hit was out on the streets so to speak.

One night, somewhere in the week after Christmas and a day or two before New Years eve, I was a sleep in my bed. I was in a deep sleep and all of a sudden I found myself standing in a swamp looking at a small shack. I entered the small shack and saw a woman, about 65 years old, standing next to a large cauldron. There were lots of candles lighting the shack. The woman was stirring the cauldron, and I distinctly remember, she was startled by my presence as she saw me walk into the door of her shack. Kind of like, “What are you doing here?” She gave me a sinister smile and I walked over to see what she was doing. I looked down in the cauldron. I could see she was stirring a black mirky boiling broth. I could see bones boil up as she stirred. I noticed the bones started manifesting flesh as she stirred. One skeleton formed into a large man that stepped out of the cauldron and came after me. It was a tall, big man. I decided it was time to exit -stage right!

I left the room and the man caught me. He wasn't human, he was a demon. He grabbed my right arm and forced me to the floor to bow to him. Like vin Diesel's character Riddick, “I bow to no man!”. Or in this case, to “no false god!”. The demon forced me to my knees by crushing my right hand. I fought to keep from kneeling. The demon took out a knife and proceeded to cut into, I believe it was, my right pointing finger. I felt the pain. It was real. As I struggled I heard the Holy Spirit tell me to say, “I know where you are. You're in Louisiana!” At that moment I was thrown out of the dream warfare and woke up with one of those gasps for air that accompanies a nightmare. Only this wasn't a nightmare. There was a huge adrenaline rush and a feeling of something wasn't right about what just happened.

The next morning I woke up with a weird buzzing in my head. I didn't realize it yet. But I got hexed by the witch in HER dream. It took me years of warfare and studying Christian dream interpretation to figure out it was HER dream. Hey, remember you asked!

With my mind buzzing, I did my morning routine and sat down and checked my e-mails. One e-mail caught my attention right away. It was from my senior pastor. He shared in his e-mail the testimony I shared earlier on the power encounter with the witch doctor. My senior pastor called for a fast and a special prayer meeting later this evening. As I read the e-mail, I remember hearing the Holy Spirit telling me, “You did it. You averted the attack (on your church)”. In the cauldron were the demons summoned for our church. It's interesting to look back in retrospect and see that at this time I didn't think the Holy Spirit was talking to me. And now I know all along he was there with me the whole time.

During the day the buzzing became worse and words in my mind became an obsessive disorder. It was extremely irritating. Then I heard the Holy Spirit tell me to go to the church prayer meeting tonight. This is hard to explain. But I am following the Holy Spirit's direction thinking it's my own thoughts. Later, as you work in prophetic ministry you learn the still quiet voice is the Holy Spirit.

It seemed like forever for 7:00 PM to roll around for the prayer meeting. All I wanted was this rattling out of my head. For some reason I felt the prayer meeting was the key (Holy Spirit at work here...).

When I entered the sanctuary I was surprised to find only about 7 people in attendance of this meeting to glorify God for the work done in Ethiopia. It was the senior pastor, his wife, the church accountant and his wife, one other woman, myself, and the pastoral care pastor. The pastoral care pastor lead the prayer session and he had us go to the altar of God and confess our sins. At this time I was eager to do anything. Can you tell I am a bit green in spiritual warfare in this stage of my life? I approached the altar and soul searched for the sins I needed to confess. Just me and God. I wanted to be honest with God about what I wanted to confess. Then the sins came to me I needed to repent for. I remember weeping and all of a sudden, I realized the witches mojo was GONE!!!!

The people in attendance had no idea what had just happened. I was elated and emotional and it was a side of me they had never seen before in church. I think they were even more curious to figure out why I chose to come at all to the meeting. Yep. God was really working on me during this time. I wasn't the man He needed me to be. But the Holy Spirit was working on me!

I use this as an example of how God battles witchcraft. If God is in the fight you are triumphant every time. Because of my spirit realm dream warfare battles I have experienced I no longer put God in a box . I give him free reign to do it His way!

If any of you send me an e-mail to teach you about dream warfare I will reach through your display you are reading this on and slap you silly. God handles everything His way. And that's what you must keep in mind during these battles. Above all, make sure God is in the fight with you. Witchcraft packs a nasty bite when you are operating outside the covering of God. And never ever go looking for a fight with witchcraft. Yes. Witchcraft is there. It's been there since the dawn of man. Let God deal with it.

More information on spiritual warfare can be found in our book,
 A Field Guide to Spiritual Warfare - the Power to PULL the IMPOSSIBLE from the HEAVENLY REALMS.

Blessings

Rev. Mike