The Battle With the Powers of Darkness — Joshua Daniel

Jesus Gives His Disciples Authority Over Unclean Spirits

Now folks, you know our battle really is with the unseen forces of darkness. The Lord equipped his disciples. If you turn to Matthew 10 chapter and the first verse please. And when he had called unto him his 12 disciples, he gave them power against unclean spirits to cast them out and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease.

You know, I did not realize that one of our sisters is here who some years ago came to this retreat having had an appointment to follow this retreat for knee surgery. And of course she was very dependent on her stick.

I wish you would tell that yourselves rather than my narrating it. And the Lord healed her. And she never needed that operation which she had fixed earlier with the NHS I presume. Well, once again let's remind ourselves it is the Lord.

It is the good Lord. Now, what does the Lord Jesus say to do with his disciples to equip them? He gave them power against unclean spirits to cast them out. Now, that people have been practicing these black arts in Britain in the Stonehenge and other areas is well known today.

In fact, the practicers of these black arts have even appeared on the BBC saying I'm a witch. As though it is a very legitimate thing to be casting spells upon others and selling yourself for money to do evil.

And now, you know, I have to, I confront many of these people who are black magicians by trade. And some of them say I receive money to kill people, to cast spells. And it is amazing that all kinds of people suffer suffer greatly because of these powers of darkness.

One medical student came to me. He said he was a Hindu. I have an awful headache. No doctor is able to heal it. But I know that my uncle who is jealous of my advance in education, he is responsible. He has had some spell cast upon me.

Well, I said the Lord is able to heal you young man and we prayed for him and he was free. Some of these naughty cases are not at all easy and sometimes we have to struggle and pray much before these powers of darkness are thrown at us.

Confronting the Spread of Black Arts

Now, what do you do in a situation like what we have today when little children are being conditioned for the black arts? What do you do for that? Now, as I was about to take my flight, catch my flight in Bombay, I saw the captain of some other craft with a big book in his hands.

What was it? The latest release? Harry Potter. You see, I do not know how some pastors have interpreted it, but one thing the media itself admits that here is a delving into the black arts. Is it ennobling?

Does it free people from fear? I can see a nation of psychopaths ahead. Has the government taken the precaution of quadrupling the psychiatrist facilities in the country? Although I know psychiatrists cannot handle this, I know this.

That's not their field, that's beyond them. However, I have to deal with many of these things and what I say, what they did in the Book of Acts was, if you turn to the 19th chapter of the Book of Acts, you will find that in the city of Ephesus, when there was a demonstration of God's power, this is what happened.

And this was known 17th verse to all the Jews and Greeks and also dwelling, Greeks also dwelling at Ephesus. And fear fell on them all and the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified. And many that believed came and confessed and showed their deeds.

And many of them also, which used curious arts, brought their books together and burned them before all men. And they counted the price of them and founded 50 ,000 pieces of silver. So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed.

So when the word of God prevails, you will have some bonfires. You know, there are fellows who come to my meetings who used to have afflictions of all sorts. One young man said, I used to find my sheets in tatters in the morning.

I would rip up the sheets. One man said to me, as I was being driven to a meeting near Chicago, he was a pastor. He said, after my son saw the exorcist, he got berserk. He was beside himself. We couldn't control him.

Now, just recently, there was the case of a little child in kindergarten in the United States who would scream, carry on, beat her teacher and the principal could not handle it and so called the police.

And she was criticized for calling the police. But the poor principal was called in by the teacher, found that she could not control the child, absolutely out of control, screaming, harming others. What could they do?

Just think of calling the police for a little girl of five or six. Now we had it. So the psych ward is full and we had to repeat patients. No room. Nobody qualified to deal with these things. And many pastors say, oh, I don't know how to deal with these things.

Christ's Authority Over Demonic Powers

You know, they pass the buck. But what did the what does the Bible say? Now let us turn to the 10th chapter of Matthew. So he equipped, the Lord Jesus Christ equipped his disciples for handling these situations.

He was manifest to destroy the works of the devil. Now, I'm sorry, Luke 10, please. And the 17th verse, Luke 10. We've already seen Matthew 10. And the 17th returned again with joy, 17th verse, saying, Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through your name.

And Jesus said, 18th verse, I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven. Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the enemy and nothing shall by any means hurt you.

Nothing. A woman said to me in Toronto, a very normal person. She said, suddenly I begin to smell so bad, like something which has decomposed and all around me. I get that horrible stench. Well, the Lord healed her after a prayer.

Now, there are so many manifestations. I don't know some of those manifestations. One young woman met me in Canada at one of my conferences. And she said, well, I was with a Shakespearean company of Shakespearean actors.

They have a place in Oro in Ontario where, you know, Shakespeare is enacted. But many of those people were into drugs of all sorts and a variety of black arts. I had never heard the like, never seen anything like that.

And here was this woman, suffering, young, beautiful girl. So when I prayed for her, there was one thing. She was not willing to humble herself. So to my great sorrow, the demons did not leave. You see, she was all the time saying, oh, I'm a fine believer.

Discerning Spirits Through Holiness and Truth

So there are fine believers with these kinds of evil spirits. My dear friends, Satan appears as an angel of light, says the Bible. So I have no hesitation in saying there are some who use gifts which are not of God.

Because you can easily say what spirit it is. The spirit of God puts an end to a lying spirit. Lying lips are an abomination to God. So you will not speak a lie. Two, holiness, because he is the Holy Spirit.

So whatever other gifts you might have or not, you are characterized by living straight lives. Listen, folks, this is missing today in a greater part of the church. What you call the church, I don't call it the church.

I call it the synagogue of Satan. Listen, if you can't live straight, don't you talk about the Holy Spirit. As someone said, it's not how high you jump, but how straight you live. Today, it's all a question of a fusion and emotion and a nice feeling.

I have a nice feeling. You know, there are some people who barge into a family and take away a husband from a wife. But I have a good feeling about it. You know, maybe you can say the same of the palace today.

Oh, my beloved people, when it is the gospel, it goes from top to bottom, not as most people like it to be. You know, start with the poor, start with the people who are disadvantaged, socially backward, nothing of the sort.

What Britain needs is top to bottom. If there is a bad example in the palace, it is going to vitiate the atmosphere on our streets. It is going to poison the nation more than any poison gas. Holiness, my dear people, we want to play games with God.

So this law applies to this poor disadvantaged boy who had only a dysfunctional family, but it does not apply to the royalty. Where do you get that? Not from the Bible. Truth applies to the man in the pulpit first.

I often say, if the preacher is right, the people are right. That's all it takes. So, my dear friends, there was a bonfire in Ephesus of all these things. Holiness, it's a hallmark which is upon a regenerate person.

How are you regenerated? What? By waving of hands and jumping and shouting hallelujahs? No, you're regenerated by the Spirit of God giving to you a broken spirit which makes you put away all evil. So, if you turn to the fourth chapter of Mark, you will find that when the Word of God is sown, who springs into action first?

Satan's Opposition to the Word of God

The Lord Jesus Christ said, 14 and 15 please, Mark 4, 14 and 15, The sower soweth the Word, and these are they by the wayside where the Word is sown. But when they have heard, Satan cometh immediately and taketh away the Word that was sown in their hearts.

Satan cometh immediately and taketh away the Word that was sown in their hearts. I don't know what is happening to the good preaching in Britain today. Now, my dear friends, many years ago on the doorsteps, or a lady said to me in no less a place than Westminster Chapel, one of the leader's wives said, we lose most of what we receive right here on the doorsteps.

Why? Yawping talk. Keep on yawping about this, that and the other. If the Word of God registers, if the Word of God goes into your heart, what you would like to do is to get alone with God and put things right with God.

And now if you are disinclined to do that, must you do the devil's work and engage somebody in a yawping session? Is that all your usefulness and functionality? No, but that's exactly what happens. You give them lovely grounds, you give them quiet places, make it an excellent retreat place, but will not go alone with God and pray.

What's that? It's the devil's work. The devil does not want you to come right, to put things right. And there you are. The devil is taking away the Word that was sown in the heart. Should I help the devil to do his work?

No, certainly not. So the Lord Jesus said, these are they by the wayside, then the seed is sown, but when they have heard, Satan cometh immediately and take away the Word that was sown in their hearts.

Spiritual Warfare Against Principalities and Moral Corruption

So, our fight, Ephesians 6 and 12 tells us, is against principalities. Did you ever find yourself fighting against the mayor? Did you find yourself fighting against the government? Sometimes there are certain abominable statutes or laws which get into the law book.

Back in 67, before some of you might have been born, before you were born properly, but back in 67, over the intercom of the ocean lineup in which I was, after the six-day war, the ship was rerouted around the Cape of Good Hope.

And as we were in an awful storm there, however, this is what I heard. BBC News, homosexuality made legal. I heard of some godly minister who went to his pulpit and wept. My dear friends, my legislating something as being okay, never sanctifies an abomination.

Never. Legislators can't do it. When God has said this is an abomination. All right. If all your children, some of you evidently have children, turn out to be lesbians and homosexuals, perfectly legal, perfectly legal matter.

And Britain produces, you know, 90 such young people. What's the outcome? What's the outcome? Extinction. Moral, physical extinction. In the bargain, an explosion of AIDS. Some of the people who are stricken with AIDS today are top-notch people, names, in the entertainment world and the business world.

Bankers, a great legacy to give their children and their wives. You know, I have to pray for new type of patients today, AIDS patients. Some of the first people that approach me today are AIDS patients.

So tragic, so tragic. But I want to see the more crack AIDS, and so we see some AIDS patients healed. But, as you know, medically, there's no cure, and AIDS patients are proliferating around the world.

What for? How come you legislate an abomination as being a perfectly healthy lifestyle? And who elected these legislators? A nation of wise people, I presume. Listen, friends, you hold the key. You never had the courage to express your dissent.

Silence is consent. Those that were called dissenters in Britain back in the 17th, 18th centuries were hunted, badgered, persecuted. All right, never mind if you're going to be persecuted, laughed at, and people are going to say it's perfectly my right to be an AIDS patient.

Oh, you tell them, go ahead. But you are infecting your wife, you're infecting your babes. What are you doing? You have no right to do that anyway. All right, find yourself a place, a precipice, or a cove where you can hide yourself with your partner and live in seclusion till you die.

And of course, you must make sure somebody comes along to bury the last person to die. Folks, you know, this has become a laughing matter. No thinking about it, no concern, no tears, no word of warning, nothing.

Oh, that's your life. You know what people say today? This is my life. Okay, but you don't infect the atmosphere, pollute it. There is worse pollution around than the car emissions in the land. Worse pollution.

And nobody seems to address that pollution, the moral pollution, killing the nation. Friends, it's time to blow the trumpet of warning, the works of the flesh. Here we are told that we should, we fight against principalities and Ephesians 6, 12, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

Prayer for Repentance and Godly Leadership

Many years ago, I was invited. You know, there was an attempt made to get me to speak in the houses of commons to a group of MPs, but it didn't fit into my schedule at that time. And I had to say no, but I do regret it.

We need godly men in high places, not spiritual wickedness in high places. Let us pray. Loving father, when Britain is poised in the last moments of a deadly leap into the abysm, why are we living without a trumpet and sounding it?

Gracious father, forgive us. Are we just to mint a little money to fill our little bellies or run a trade from the pulpit? Or is the pulpit going to be the repository of the truth and the conscience of the nation calling people to repentance?

Save us, we pray, from all cowardice, moral cowardice, and spiritual irresponsibility. Forgive us in Jesus' holy name. Amen.