Ephesians 6:12
“When the enemy comes in like a flood, The Spirit of the LORD will lift up a standard against him.”
Isaiah 59:19
“Or how can one enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house.”
Matthew 12:29
If you drive east of Madras a couple miles on one of the back roads you cross a ridge and descend into a small valley. It is rather pretty and there are a couple of ranches there. Not long after we first moved to Madras I was out exploring and found this route into the hills. As I crossed the ridge, I discovered that I was entering a cloud of spiritual oppression. I tend to be rather sensitive about such things and by the time I got to the bottom of the valley I was so bothered by the oppression and the dark presence (that was apparently resident there) that I turned around and drove back into town. I was just out on a lark of a drive and that lark turned into a scouting trip -- a first look at the spiritual geography of Madras.
I had just discovered the big guy.
Eventually I came to call this strongman "Big Piggy" because its nature was to surround itself with misery and vice and corruption and feed on these things. As God continued to reveal these things to us step-by-step, we found that Piggy had gathered a whole troop of powerful strongman/powers that ground out all kinds of evil to dump into its feeding trough. For example, I mentioned before that the hospital was a center for one of the dark powers of Madras. A young man in our prayer group identified it as a spirit of death. That really fit because everyone in Madras knew that the Madras Hospital was a good place to die. If you wanted to live you went someplace else. This spirit of death at the Madras hospital ground out suffering and sorrow for Big Piggy to feed on. (Just so you know, when we were finished with our spiritual warfare over it, the hospital was clean of this thing's influence and the light was established there. We still occasionally get reports from Madras and the hospital has indeed become a place of life and light.)
Other strongholds were also identified -- greed and corruption centered over the city government and business community (especially the real estate businesses). There was a spirit of witchcraft centered over one of the elementary schools. K., when she went on her spiritual foray around Madras, revealed another dark stronghold (the imagery was snakes) that she said was "very ancient". (We never did figure out what that one was!)
Remember what I said earlier about how the strongholds of Butte are the same as what we saw in Madras -- only Butte's are bigger? The dark powers here have a structure and mode of operation that is nearly the same as what we saw in Madras. These strongmen are grinding out misery, vice, corruption and oppression of all kinds -- and the Spirit of God is raising up a standard against them.
Remember what I said earlier about how the strongholds of Butte are the same as what we saw in Madras -- only Butte's are bigger? The dark powers here have a structure and mode of operation that is nearly the same as what we saw in Madras. These strongmen are grinding out misery, vice, corruption and oppression of all kinds -- and the Spirit of God is raising up a standard against them.
You guys should make a trip down to the Bitterrot Valley. I came back for just a few days from Oregon and it's just a big black hole here. The churchs here are as bright as the weakest candle. Nothing shines bright here. It really needs some help.
ReplyDeleteYes, there are a lot of very dark places in Montana. A couple of months ago I wrote to all the churches in Stevensville offering to teach a seminar on spiritual warfare, but so far no takers. Personally, I think Butte is the key to freeing Montana. If we take down the strongmen here I believe it will begin the release of the whole state.
ReplyDeleteJordan, where in Oregon are you located? We were pastoring in Central Oregon before we moved back here to Butte.