Source: Google Images |
Now as we journey through life, serving the Lord in this
physical world, the Holy Spirit equips us with His gifts to accomplish what He
desires and one such gift is Discerning of Spirits. Through this
gift we can “peer”, as it were, into the spirit realm.
This gift enables us to identify what spirit we are
encountering or interacting with as we walk in love towards others and serve
the Lord. There are four kinds of spirits that we can identify and distinguish
from one another through the operation of this gift. These spirits are:
1. The Spirit of God
2. Angelic spirits
3. Human spirits
4. Demonic spirits
How Discerning of Spirits operates
The short simple answer is: as the Holy Spirit wills.
As with all the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, there is no one
way that this gift operates, the Holy Spirit uses each one of us as uniquely as
we are, but the key thing is, this gift is revelational. That means one can
only be able to distinguish between spirits accurately by revelation, not by
reasoning or by logically deducing events seeking to arrive at a conclusive
identification of the spiritual entity behind a situation.
One may study all the different kinds of spirits, learn
all the different techniques of discerning spirits and as helpful at that may
be, it may hinder one from actually allowing the Holy Spirit to use them in
this gift as they will be stuck in the “techniques” and “steps” of discerning
they learned, and before long they find themselves walking in the fleshly
counterfeit of suspicion or worse the spiritual counterfeit of divination.
Discerning of Spirits is a knowing,
a certainty, an assurance of the identity of a spirit in one’s spirit by the
power of the Holy Spirit. He may reveal it by an impression in your spirit, a
word in your mind, a vision, a smell, a specific sensation in your body etc.
Bottom line is, the Holy Spirit knows how to get your attention and how to
reveal different things to different people, He knows us all, we would be
wasting our time sticking to formulas and methods, let’s just flow with Him, we
are to be in fellowship with Him after all, aren't we?
I’m sure many of us have discerned spirits even without
being aware we are doing it, how many times have you “sensed” a “presence” that
was either “good, sweet, calming, peaceful” as in a worship service or when you
were just by yourself meditating on how good Jesus is to you? You just
experienced the Spirit of God manifesting Himself and angels ministering to
you. This has been my experience countless times and even now as I type this,
I’m experiencing an angelic presence around me. From time to time I see three
angels riding in my truck with me, I know my Abba Father is taking good care of
me! Hallelujah!
Those times when we “sense” an “evil, malicious, vicious,”
presence, we should know we've encountered the host of hell, demons.
This is especially common in deliverance ministry. I've personally
experienced this many many times. For me it is usually a distinct tingling
sensation on a side of my body or a vision of the spirit we are evicting or a
putrid smell or a combination of all those things. As we seek to deliver those
that the enemy has bound, we will encounter these spirits but greater is He
that is in us! As we focus on He who is our victory – Christ – we will be
victorious every single time.
Source: Google Images |
This gift is not limited just to worship settings or just
to deliverance sessions; the Holy Spirit may reveal what spirits are operating
around us and if they are demonic masquerading as “angels of light”, we can
expose and expel them. The enemy can try to sneak into the church through
individuals saying all the right words and acting accordingly and unless this
gift is in operation in the assembly and especially in the leadership,
casualties are inevitable.
>>> TO BE CONTINUED
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