Eph 6:11-12(11) Put on the whole armor of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. (12) For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
The scripture tells us that our battle is with devils, spiritual wickedness, and dark rulers. The Church has known this truth but we find ourselves and our culture being seduced by a force that seems worldwide and unstoppable. It is the same old Enemy but now packaged and distributed by the electronic media. The electronic media has thrown off all restrain and now makes the sexual available, worldwide, through images, videos, movies, magazines, and even cartoons. The unbelievable number of people, apparently without spiritual discernment, willing to submit themselves and their families to sexually graphic entertainment is overwhelming.
As a people, we are being demonized, through our eyes, by images which powerfully seduce and change us inwardly. Our culture is being demonized before our eyes, literally. The Internet has made the most graphic sexual images, and graphic sexual videos, available to everybody, regardless of age, worldwide. One does not have to look for it; the pornographers will send it to you, realizing the greater their recruitment, the greater their profits. Pornography is very, very, big business and its dark influence and its profits will only increase as new technologies enhance its availability. The problem with pornography is that we can be emotionally and spiritually bound by it; make no mistake, pornography opens our mind and heart to the seductions of unclean spirits. Once captured, we become enslaved and unable to resist its dark power; only the power of God can free us.
In addition to the Internet, we have TV that sexualizes those who come under its hypnotic and seductive effects. The TV industry understands human nature and is writing to our eyes, not our conscience. TV programming teaches, through unclean content, that unrestrained sexual activity is normal and good. They create sexual scenes that communicate, over the TV channel, the passions, the sounds, and the emotions of passionate sexual activity. This type of programming has only one purpose; it emotionally and sexually arouses those who watch it. If we allow ourselves or our children to be chronically aroused through sexualized images or through sexualized TV programming, then we have introduced the power and strategies of spiritual darkness to ourselves and to our children. Do not assume your children are not spiritually affected by chronic sexual arousal. There is a direct link between the chronic viewing of graphic sexual images and adolescent pregnancy, sexual perversions, sexual violence, physical and mental violence, child abuse, alcoholism, drug use, behavioral problems, and all kinds of emotional dysfunction.
Programmed sexual arousal is spiritually powerful and its long-term effects are unbelievably destructive to ones person and life. As our eyes open the door of our heart to darkness, without knowing it, we become unresponsive to the Spirit of God.
We have an industry that, for profit, is sexualizing an entire generation, and we have an Enemy who sits in every boardroom of this industry, to oppose the Person of Jesus Christ, and to oppose His purchased possession.
It is the chronic emotional and chronic sexual arousal from sexual images, or sexual TV, that sexualizes our thinking. Once our thinking is sexualized we, eventually, will act out the distortions of our new desires. Not necessarily possessed, but our eyes, our emotions, our imaginations, and our memories are co-opted and sexualized; in a word, we have become bewitched through our eyes.
Our nation has a terrible increase in infidelity, divorce, and the sexual abuse of children and there is a direct link to the chronic viewing pornographic images. Adults who give themselves to chronic emotional arousal from sexualized TV and pornography become predatory and often see children as sexual objects; their emotions and their behavior inflamed by demonic exploitation of their sexual pre-occupations.
As Christians, we may have been sexualized previously to our conversion or we may have fallen into sexual sin subsequent to our conversion and now want to change. Either way, we need the power of God to break the demonic strongholds that result from sexualized thinking.
This is not a pleasant topic but I have addressed it because it is a major problem within the Christian community and even though born-again, Christians can be spiritually bound, and not know the cause of their spiritual strongholds, or how to wage an effective battle against them. The Warfare Prayer is a weapon we use to take back our thoughts, our emotions, and our imaginations from demonic strongholds.
To wage an effective war we have to know we have complete victory over all the power, methods, and strategies of our dark enemies. We are a new creation with a new identity and we have been called to put off the old and to put on the new. We are a purchased possession, and we belong to Jesus Christ. Darkness has no right and no authority to bind us with sexual or any other kind of dark thinking. We are joined to Christ in His death, His burial, and His resurrection and we now live our lives to God. The scriptures inform us that we have been given victory over every sin. So, lift up your head, be thankful, for the Lord has set you free. Our challenge is to possess our victory by faith, and then take the necessary steps to walk out the freedoms of the Gospel.
We speak the Word of God over our life to break demonic strongholds in our thinking, our emotions and our imagination. Darkness has been defeated by Jesus Christ and we are enforcing His victories by speaking His Word over our lives. Have faith in the Word of God, it is more powerful than all the lies and deceptions of our Enemy. God has promised you freedom. Use the Warfare Prayer daily or many times per day.
If you sense your thoughts or your emotions to be out of control, read the Warfare Prayer out loud; remind yourself of what God says. The Warfare Prayer contains spiritual power because it is based on the Word of God.
God bless you as you regain your life by regaining your thoughts and your emotions to serve and honor Jesus Christ the Lord.