-I'm going to read you a verse from Ephesians 4:27
it's a very short verse.
It says, "nor give place to the devil."
I had a situation I described it in my book
about how one time one person that stayed in my house
left the window in the house open,
and somebody broke into the house and stole a car.
Now, the situation ended with the person returning the car
with a note saying, "Forgive me for stealing your car."
But I've learned very importantly
that even though I was the owner of my house
but because I left the window open, the thief came in.
Now the thief did not possess my house,
the thief took something from my house.
The Bible says in John 10:10 that I came to give life and more abundantly
but the enemy has come to steal, kill and destroy.
See so many Christians are so focused on the part on
can a Christian be possessed by a demon?
Can they be oppressed and all of that stuff?
We must understand
if you are a Christian, the Holy Spirit is the owner of your house
kind of like when I was the owner of my house.
But you still have the ability to open the doors and the windows
to the enemy.
And that's why Paul says to Christians here, "don't give place to the devil."
In other words he's saying I want your life to be locked.
I want your windows to be closed.
I want your doors to be closed.
I want you to live holy before God
so that the enemy will not have access to your life through
whether it's witchcraft,
whether it's offense,
whether it's addictions or willful sin,
or whether through allowing generational patterns to continue in our life.
And so the idea that if somebody is a believer and they will never be attacked
or will never come under harassment or oppression of the enemy
is not scriptural.
Because if that could be,
the Scripture wouldn't encourage us not to give place to the devil.
We as Christians are still fully capable
of opening and exposing our life to the enemy.
As a roommate in my house did that,
she opened the door to the enemy
and the enemy came in and stole.
I noticed something was missing
the moment me and my wife came back to the house.
The wind was blowing in the house
and I first I thought it was the Holy Spirit.
But then it dawned on me it wasn't the Holy Spirit,
the window was open.
When I looked over I saw marks like hands, like of gloves besides the window.
And I saw somebody going through all my stuff
and the car was missing.
So maybe you are noticing that in your life.
That Jesus is the owner, my stuff is missing.
Joy is missing.
Purpose is missing.
Maybe it's because a thief has been in your house.
Maybe the enemy has had an access in your life.
What are those open doors for his access?
We've discussed that in the first week
that it could be our involvement with the occult
or bringing occult things,
it could be open doors of forgiveness, bitterness and offense,
it could be an addiction in our life,
or it could be generational patterns that we allow.
There is many other windows and doors but those are the major ones
that the enemy would use to gain access into our life.
But what I want to talk about right now
and what we are going to pray for today in this discussion
is not the access
but something else that I believe is stronger than the access of the enemy.
It's the authority of the believer.
See when a thief broke into my house,
he didn't steal my house.
In fact, he didn't even kick me out of the house.
He took something and he left.
But because I have the authority in my house,
and secondly because I have police on my side,
together with the police, we were able to recover things that were stolen.
I want to let you know
even if the enemy stole something from you
your purity, your joy;
even if the enemy has stolen your peace and you can't sleep at night,
even if you feel like the enemy has stolen your health
and your relationships,
even if that's been a long time,
the access the enemy has had is not as powerful
as the authority you have.
The Bible says you are children of God
and you belong to God.
And He who lives in you is greater than he who is in the world.
Jesus says, "I saw Satan fall like lightning
and therefore I give you the authority to trample upon serpents and snakes."
That tells me every access you have given to the devil
today you can close that and return that to the devil
and pretty much say, "Access denied."
You can close those windows.
Put the reinforcement in your spiritual life
and not only protect your life, but recover what's been stolen.
And how is that done?
It's done practically.
First as we mentioned, we have to identify the enemy.
Secondly, we have to confront the enemy.
And then thirdly, we have to resist the enemy after we have confronted.
Let's break this down a little bit into more practical steps.
First, we recognize that we have opened the door to the forces of darkness.
We recognize that we willfully or unwillfully have committed sins
that have allowed the enemy to come in.
And I can tell you different stories of people through different acts
who they knew it, somehow they felt it
and sometimes hearing a teaching like this
the Holy Spirit brought certain things to their attention.
The first time when they committed that sin that that was the open door.
Repentance is not just blaming your sin on someone.
Repentance is not just apologizing and saying I'm sorry.
Repentance is owning your sin.
Repentance is coming to God without excuses,
without blaming anybody and saying, "Lord, please forgive me."
Through repentance, you cause the access of the enemy to be denied.
Through repentance, the access card that the enemy has
gets broken.
The windows get closed,
the doors get shut,
and then the enemy no longer has the access.
When you repent--
now maybe some of you had sins committed against you
or sins committed by your forefathers.
You can repent for them as well.
Not so that they can be forgiven,
but so that the enemy can loose the access card toward your life.
If your grandparents or your parents took you to a witch doctor,
or took you to somebody to read your palms or to look into your future,
and you know or aware of that,
repent on their behalf.
Not so that God can forgive them and bring them to heaven,
but so that the enemy can have no more access into your life.
Repentance is the key that breaks the access of the enemy.
After repentance you have to disconnect yourself
from the grip of the enemy through renouncing.
What is a renouncement?
The Bible says, "We've renounced the hidden things of shame."
Means we disconnect ourselves from the enemy.
We say that devil, we have nothing to do with you.
We serve you a notice that we are done.
We belong to Jesus Christ.
We want nothing to do with you.
Queen Esther is a good example to me.
It gave me a source of encouragement
when I studied this topic about access and authority.
Haman was the enemy.
He had the access to the palace.
He was actually not very far from the king.
He had influence in the palace.
But one thing Haman did not have,
he did not live in the palace.
You know who lived in the palace? The king and the queen.
Esther, whose life is about to come under attack by a guy who had access,
but she had authority.
It was her house that the enemy came to attack.
And Esther started to pray,
she started to fast,
and then Esther did something that was so amazing.
Instead of feeling crippled by the fact that the enemy had access to her palace
she rose up in her authority as a queen and says, "This is my house.
"And Haman, you are not going to rule this house.
Your access will be denied."
And through her authority, she broke the access of Haman
because authority trumps access.
Whatever access the enemy thinks he has,
that access will be denied because of the authority that you have in Jesus.
So now I'm going to lead you in a prayer of repentance
and then I'm going to lead you into a prayer of renouncing
anything that you might have had in connection with the enemy.
But I want you to know, you have authority.
I want you to know, you belong in God's palace.
And I want you to know
whatever demon, whatever curse,
whatever demonic intrusion,
Satan is a thief.
He doesn't own you,
you don't belong to him anymore
than a thief cannot steal your ownership of the house when he robs you.
And not only we are going to repent,
not only we are going to renounce,
but I believe through the grace of God
you will recover everything the enemy has stolen.
So let's pray together
and then your group is going to continue the discussion
in ministering to you and breaking this teaching even more.
Father God, we just ask You right now
that You will forgive us for all the sins we have committed
that have opened the door to the demonic intrusion.
Forgive us for the sins that we did willfully, knowingly,
where we have opened and gave place to the enemy
forgive us Lord.
Wash us with Your blood.
We don't blame anybody,
we don't make excuses,
we acknowledge our faults.
We have sinned against you and the heaven.
Please wash us from our sins.
We also repent on behalf of our parents, grandparents and great-grandparents
who maybe have served the devil,
practiced witchcraft or practiced witchcraft on us,
Lord, wash us with Your blood.
Lord, cleanse us.
For what they did, they offended You.
What they did is they caused You to be mad, Lord.
Forgive them for what they did.
And please disconnect every access the enemy has to our life
because of the actions of our ancestors.
We are deeply sorry Lord,
we are repentant before You,
and we are asking for Your mercy.
And right now we come against every force of darkness
and we renounce every hidden shame, every hidden work.
We renounce spirit of depression.
We renounce the spirit of fear.
We renounce the spirit of infirmity.
We renounce every generational curse,
every curse that has been pronounced on us by other people.
We renounce every curse that we have earned through our own
willful disobedience.
We renounce every access the enemy has had to our life
through witchcraft, unforgiveness, addiction or generational curses.
And we tell you devil, we don't belong to you.
We are not your property,
you don't own us,
we don't belong to you,
and we cause your access to be denied right now.
We take authority over you in the Name of Jesus Christ.
And we command you to be gone from our life,
to be gone from every part of our life in the Name of Jesus Christ.
Amen.