-Witchcraft is the attempt to control a person
and make them do what you want them to do
by use of any other spirit than the Holy Spirit.
Witchcraft has been forbidden in the Bible.
We see this in Leviticus 19:26, 31 and Leviticus 20:6
Deuteronomy 18:9-14
God was very clear that things of witchcraft, divination, soothsaying,
familiar spirits; these things were not allowed to be practiced.
And people who practiced these things they were actually stoned to death
for doing these things because of so much open door
that this creates for the demonic spirits.
We have to understand that witchcraft's favorite target
is hunting believers' souls.
In Ezekiel 13:18 it says:
This is what God was asking.
And then if we go a little bit farther few verses down
in Ezekiel 13:20-22 it says:
I want you to notice how magic, the charms, the witchcraft
was hunting the souls of God's people.
Now, there are people and I have a whole video about it
who believe that Christians cannot be affected by stuff like that,
or Christians cannot have demons and all of that,
that's for another day, another video.
But we see that witchcraft targets the souls of His people.
Now, it cannot target the spirits of God's people
but it seeks to target the souls of our people.
To keep people in oppression,
to keep people in depression, and to keep people in bondage.
Witchcraft is the religion of the fallen humanity
that's what Derek Prince likes to say.
In 1 Samuel 15:23 it says the following:
"For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft."
We are rebels by nature.
We rebelled to God in the garden of Eden, in Adam.
And therefore part of this rebellion what it brought to humanity is witchcraft.
The root of witchcraft is rebellion.
We must understand that three things about witchcraft is that:
divination operates by revelation, by prediction.
So divination operates by predicting the future;
witchcraft operates by spells, by curses, hypnosis;
and then sorcery operates by charms, drugs and so many other things.
There is three types of witchcraft.
The first one is the work of the flesh.
And many people don't realize is that Galatians 5:19-20
it goes through the list of the works of the flesh and it says,
Have you noticed that in some translations it says sorcery,
in some translations it says witchcraft or divination?
Have you noticed that sorcery, witchcraft and divination is work of the flesh?
Now you may say, "How is that work of the flesh?
I thought it's just demonic?"
Yes, it's demonic in nature but it can be work of the flesh.
The way it operates as work of the flesh is in three simple ways:
manipulation, intimidation, and domination
where humans manipulate, intimidate, and dominate another human being.
and that is a form of witchcraft- witchcraft as work of the flesh.
God does not dominate, intimidate and manipulate
that's not the work of the Holy Spirit.
In fact, even the fruit of the Spirit is not spirit-control, it's self-control.
The Holy Spirit leads, He doesn't drive.
You drive a car but you lead sheep.
Because we are humans, we are meant to be led not driven.
And so when a person begins to drive another human being
dominate another human being, enslave another human being,
it's work of the flesh.
Witchcraft is operating there.
This is very common in families
where for example, kids or women will manipulate--
you know, kids would manipulate their parents
or women would manipulate their husbands.
Intimidation is a lot more common in men
where they would intimidate women or children.
Domination is something that could operate in both genders.
This can happen in ministry
where work of the flesh
where a boss or a pastor or a CEO, instead of leading the staff- they're leaders
but they intimidate,
they dominate,
and then they cut corners and they manipulate people
and that is a form of witchcraft,
that's a form of the flesh.
And it needs to be repented of,
and we need to embrace the fruit of the Holy Spirit
which is love, patience, kindness, long-suffering,
self-control and so on.
The second form of witchcraft is a demonic force.
It's when witchcraft is a demonic force.
Witchcraft is a spiritual power that operates by spells and curses.
So we see the first one is work of the flesh,
the second one is when it's power of Satan
working through spells and through curses.
In Job 3:8 it says:
So, Job of course is not very happy with how his life is turning around
and so he says, "Those people who do cursing
"may they curse the day that I was born.
And those who are ready to arouse Leviathan."
Something happens when spells, curses, are pronounced
by people who are in the profession
or who through their anger or their connection to Satan
are called witches or warlocks,
and they release curses and spells.
They arouse Leviathan.
They arouse demons.
These are not just empty words, please understand.
Charms, spells, curses; these are not empty things.
They have power behind them.
Bible clearly states those who do that, they arouse Leviathan.
Demons are aroused by spells and by curses.
We see in 1 Chronicles 10:13 it says:
So one of the reasons Saul died was first he didn't keep the word of the Lord
and then we see that he consulted a medium.
He went to the other side, if I could say, for direction - for guidance
'cause God stopped talking to him.
He ignored God's voice so many times
that after that God just went silent on him.
And so he went to the other side, he went to a medium
even though he prohibited witchcraft.
He drove away all the mediums but there was one that was kept there.
One that still stayed there.
And then he goes to her.
The next thing that happens is that
that same or the next day he dies.
And so this stuff is real.
Witchcraft, spells, mediums, all of that brings the wrath of God
on the person who practices it,
and it withdraws God's protection from the person.
And then demons, they begin to torment
'cause it's in the nature of demons.
No matter how much you domesticate them,
no matter how much you like them,
no matter how much you want them to be nice and good spirits, okay.
It's like taking a python in your house or keeping a snake.
A snake is a snake.
It's in the nature of the snake to attack and to kill.
And you can't change it's nature because you are good
or because you want that nature to change.
Another way that witchcraft as a demonic force operates
is through divination.
Divination, in Acts 16:16 it says:
So, in Greek mythology they believe that python serpent
guarded the oracle of Delphi until Apollo slew it;
and then he took on the name of python.
The word later was applied to diviners and soothsayers, inspired by Apollo.
So it's pretty much a demonic entity, demonic spirit.
The word divination in Acts 16:16 is actually the word for python.
It's a snake spirit.
And so this woman had this snake spirit and through this snake spirit,
she was able to fortune tell.
She was able to predict certain things.
And it's not that she knew the future,
it's that she would predict it and then people who believe it,
the demons would arrange that future like that
thus opening their life to the demonic influence.
They would open their life to the demonic control.
Now at first it seems like well, what is wrong with that?
I mean, she just predicts everybody the future and she produces profit.
You must understand one thing:
it's in the nature of Satan to steal, kill and destroy.
He will never betray his nature for anyone.
It's just the way he is.
So if he gives you something with the right hand,
he will always take it with the left hand.
and plus he seeks worship.
He seeks to get us addicted to materialism
so that we can turn our face away from God.
And that's exactly what was happening here and Paul cast that demon out.
Fortune tellers- going to see and trying to figure out your future
palm readers and all of that stuff; all of that is not only displeasing to God,
all of that will bring defeat in your life sooner or later
because it's giving access to Satan.
It's drinking poison.
You will suffer for it.
You will pay a price for it.
Satan is not going to let you succeed.
He's not the author of success.
He doesn't come to give life and more abundantly.
He comes to steal, kill and destroy.
It's like having a thief in your house.
You will have stuff missing.
Things will be broken.
And Satan is not just a thief; he's a murderer, he's a killer.
Snakes don't just kind of like make your place uncomfortable,
they kill.
And you know, one interesting things about pythons
is pythons do not kill by injection
pythons do not kill by biting.
Pythons kill by surrounding it's victim and squeezing their breath slowly.
I read a story of a python that was located on a storey
like another level of the house
and two little boys lived on a level below.
And python slipped from the cage, went through the window,
went into the bed of two boys, and squeezed the life out of them.
They didn't even scream.
And when they woke up in the morning, python surrounded them - hugged them
of course, killed them.
And that's exactly how this spirit works.
It squeezes your faith in God.
It squeezes the breath of God in your life.
And your like Saul, you start out good
and because you go to the mediums, you go to fortune-tellers
you look to horoscopes to see your future,
you lose your connection to God,
you lose your relationship with God,
and then you depart from faith heeding to deceiving spirits
and to the doctrine of demons.
The other way that this demonic witchcraft works is through sorcery.
And sorcery works through objects, charms, music and drugs.
And so, casting spells, portions, enchantments, cursing a person
anything that predicts your future or advises your life
magic practices or spiritism;
all of these things are forms of witchcraft through which Satan will enter.
And at first he may offer you something just to temporarily hook you in
but my friend, when a fisherman throws a bait for the fish
the fisherman is not intending to feed the fish,
he's intending to feed himself at the expense of the fish.
Any success or truth you find through witchcraft, sorcery, divination,
it's all a bait
but the goal behind it is to hook you
so that Satan can take you out of the water of God's truth
and into his kingdom and gorge you out
and completely destroy your life.
And God will not stop him from doing that
because when you take the bite of that forbidden tree my friend,
you walk away from God's protection.
So the first form of witchcraft is the work of the flesh,
the second form of witchcraft is demonic force,
and the third form of witchcraft is actually something
that can operate in the church when we do not trust the gospel.
Now you may say, what?
It's actually in the Bible. In Galatians 3:1 it says:
So Galatians, they moved from the grace to the law.
They moved from trusting in Jesus for their salvation
to trying to earn their salvation by good works;
which is actually another word for religion.
Every religion really has one thing in common
and that's why all religions are the same.
It's man's attempt trying to reach God.
But Christianity is different.
Christianity is God coming to man.
Christianity is about Jesus, it's not about us.
It's not about our good works, it's about His finished work on the cross.
When the church, when believers, begin to move from grace,
from the cross, from the blood, from Jesus crucified, risen savior,
that church, that ministry is under a spell.
It's a demonic spell.
You may say, church can be under a spell?
Well, Paul clearly states it can.
And demons, Satan, the kingdom of darkness, benefits from Christians
living in deception, thinking they can earn their salvation by good works.
And we need to receive the truth like Paul says in here:
"who bewitched you that you should not obey the truth."
We have to trust the truth, Jesus is the truth.
What He said is the truth.
And look to the cross, the crucified savior.
Not look to our good works, not to look to our achievements,
not look to our righteousness and holiness as a means to get salvation
because if we do, we are under a spell.
We are under an evil eye.
We are bewitched.
We are under witchcraft -spiritual form of witchcraft that can operate in the church.
And so I just want you to be educated about it.
I also want you to spot,
you know, not to allow the works of the flesh in your life
domination, intimidation and manipulation.
And I want you stay away as far as you can
from sorcery, divination, witchcraft, charms, spells, horoscopes, fortunetelling
sciences, crystal balls and palm readings, all kind of tarot cards,
Ouija boards, handwriting analyses, and all kinds of mediums,
communicating with the dead,
water witching, psychic powers, hypnosis, self hypnosis, black magic,
white magic, superstition and Christian science healing,
and all kinds of demonic things; even the books about that stuff
walk away from that.
Look to Jesus.
Why are you looking to the stars for your future?
Stars don't have your future.
The star of David- He who made the stars knows your future
and He will guide you to it if you trust Him.
Thank you for watching this video.
I hope that you were encouraged, strengthened,
and I hope the truth will set you free.
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