Journal of James's Journey with Jesus

I am working on my mission trip post and will have it up soon. But what I really want to share now is about what happened to me last night. What I am about to share is from my own experiences. Do not be afraid or take my word as gospel truth. There are still many things I am wrong about.

After the missions fundraising meeting, I ate supper and went home. I was going to bed at eleven after praying on my bed when I suddenly felt a strong demonic force in my room. Fear and dread of death came upon me as I felt the presence of at least two spirits.

This is the first time I have ever sensed evil spirits and I was not paranoid because I did not watch horror movies anymore and had no fear of demons or darkness. This is also the first time a spiritual attack is so physically visible and obvious.

What I did next was praying in tongues and commanding the demons to leave in the name of Jesus, but it seemed futile as they lingered in my room. I even challenged them to manifest and reveal themselves while declaring my spiritual authority as a son of God and stuff about how God will protect me. I decided to ignore them and sleep but then sounds of a pen rolling on the table, footsteps and other weird sounds in my perfectly quiet room prevented me from going to sleep.

I was still a little fearful, wondering whether I will get oppressed, when I started trying to cast out the demons in my room by name. I started with spirit of fear and death but to no avail. The moment I said, "In the name of Jesus, spirit of malice get out.", I felt the spiritual atmosphere change and the spirit which imposed dread on me leave.

The spirit of malice, which apostle Paul mentioned and Pastor Mark studied and wrote about in his book Attack Lambs, is the really evil spirit that works in abortions, suicides, murders and the like-the one responsible for many of the loss of lives. I was really glad it left because the other demon was possibly a lower ranking demon which had a lesser effect on me.

The funny thing is that I could not identify or cast out this spirit, which was really mischievous in trying to scare me. I wonder whether this is the kind which the Bible says can only be cast out by prayer and fasting.

The episode continued with me trying to sleep and the spirit of mischief moving things in my room and making weird sounds. Finally I got irritated by the time it got to one a.m. or so in the morning.

I got out of bed, switched on all the lights and challenged the demon to give me his best shot. I got out my guitar and started worshipping God with “Jesus, We Enthrone You”, “Reign In Me” and my own songs. I read aloud Psalms 70 and 71.

It did not end there as I saw my curtain move as if lifted by the wind when my windows were closed. When I went into the toilet, the hanger fell on the floor. I have got to be honest with you. It was getting to be more exciting than scary by now.

After last night, I have become less fearful of demonic influences because I have met them face to face and they were not able to harm me. You might think I am crazy but I actually am looking forward to another sleepless night understanding more about spiritual attacks like oppressions and demons, as long as I do not have class at eight a.m. like today. I will then be fully confident to call their bluff if they try their scare tactics on other people.

I knew that God had set a hedge of protection around all of us and the devil cannot touch us unless He allowed it. However, we can open the door to the devil by having unconfessed and unforgiven sins and being unrepentant. But I had none of that, so I knew it had to be a trial.

I recall to mind a certain testimony of Ru Xiang when we talked in the hospital months ago. She had an oppression one night and a voice spoke, “Your God can’t save You. I am going to kill you.” or something to that effect.

The funny thing was that the demon left her without harming a hair on her head. You know why? Because the devil does not have the authority to harm us. If he had it, he would have murdered all of us in cold blood with his hands and sent us to hell straightaway. That is why he is working through human hands-abortions, murder, suicide, AIDS, terrorist attacks and the like.

God works on the principle that He will not let us be tempted beyond what we can bear. But He allows temptations and trials to test, strengthen and spur us on in our walk.

These can be wake up calls for the spiritually asleep to return and depend on God. Ian, my mission team leader from Brighton church, told me his testimony about how he had been a Christian in name for 10 years and only started to be serious about God two years ago. He used to love Indian arts like yoga and collecting Hindu artifacts in his home. One night, he heard two demons discussing about how to destroy him, with the gift of interpretation of the demons’ tongues. He prayed hard and disposed of the artefacts immediately the next morning. This brought him one step closer to reconciliation with God.

What cannot kill you will only make you stronger.

Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose.”

When troubles come, we just need to trust and love God more because He is the One in control of all things. He makes the devil look utterly stupid when his plans to harm us prosper us instead, by God’s infinite wisdom.

I called my sister, who was still outside with my mom and dad, and found out that she had heard voices speaking in a strange language and saw something move in the hill leading to our house that afternoon.

My sister has the gift of discernment, as I would call it and many people would disagree with me, and can see, hear and sense spirits. Someone many times more spiritually mature than me have tested her and said that she was telling a lie either to get attention or because she was a bit nutty.

But I chose to believe her claims of spiritual harassment because I believe people do not lie about such things. If I were to disbelieve her claims like my parents, am I not tempting her to lie and hurting her by not trusting her? Who would she go to if I do not believe her? Besides, she had a manifestation in my house before, saw a spirit surrounding a particular manifestation that happened in church and she had a really special gift to prove that I am right to believe in her.

The first time she had to do praise and worship for cellgroup, she received little or no instructions from her cellgroup leader. I asked her to pray, offering to help only if she was at her wits end after praying. What happened I did not expect.

She said that when she closed her eyes to pray, words appeared and these were titles of older songs and bible verses in the Old Testament she never heard or read before. And my sister never was keen on reading the Bible because she did not understand it. You know what is the best thing? When she constructed it together, the theme was there both in the bible verses and songs.

There was once when my parents had a big fight over Christianity again and my dad left the house, leaving us really worried, perplexed and frustrated. After we held a family prayer meeting, she saw a dove, a symbol of peace and the Holy Spirit, come into our house. She also saw a small crucified man on my forehead. I assume it to be Jesus and this sign to mean suffering for the Gospel. So God was telling us that He will give us His peace amidst our suffering because of His Word.

I do not know if what I am saying is completely correct. So please do not base matters pertaining to your salvation on what I have written. Please do not ask Ann about her gift as she is still young, easily embarrassed and might not have a theologically correct idea about her gifting. And please do not ask her if she can see anything whenever you feel a goosebump. She is not a medium.

One last word I like to share is that the Bible in its physical form does not have power over demons. Only the Word of God written upon your heart can help you claim your God-given authority over demons. Do not believe that hugging the Bible will keep demons away. That is what my mom did the last time she was oppressed. She even gave me this advice last night when I called her. But this is a lie of the devil to instill a counterfeit faith in you that all you need is the Bible in its physical form. Neither should you believe that wearing a police or army uniform will ward evil spirits off. Superstitions lead to syncretism. Try faith.