Session 4 - First Assembly of God

“Closing Open Doors (Part 1)”

Main Point: Deny Access to the Enemy

Identify, confess, and close any demonic access into our lives

Introduction:
Jesus has set you free because of the power of the cross. And how do you feel? Do you feel lighter? Like a weight has been lifted off of your shoulders? How many of you want to keep this feeling?

In order to do that we need to understand how the enemy works. Because when we understand his schemes we will come up with ways to defend ourselves against it.

How many of you would like to know how the enemy does it? In fact, this session is the most eye opening session because it exposes the plans and strategies of the devil. So pay attention as we talk about how Satan has access into our lives.

How does Satan have access into our lives?

Intrusion
Legal Ground
1. 8 Be [c]sober, be [d]vigilant; [e]because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. 9 Resist him, steadfast in the faith (1 Peter 5:9-9a)
So first we are going to talk about intrusion

Intrusion

Definition: the act of pushing or thrusting in; the act of putting or coming in without being asked or wanted
1. It is like when a thief breaks into your house. He has no legal right to be there
Intrusion is an attack from the outside
1. Satan has no legal right to be there
2. Satan wants to intrude into our lives and get our attention off of God and onto us in order to stop our communion with Him
What do we do when intrusion comes into our lives?
1. Continue to focus on God and commune with Him
2. Praise God continually
3. 7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. (James 4:7,8 NKJV)

Legal ground

Instead of having a thief break into your house, imagine a police officer at your door with a warrant. That piece of paper gives him every right to be there. It doesn’t matter how upset you may be, he can have legal access into your house
1. In the same way, the devil may have legal access into your life and you may not even know it. So many times we open the door to the enemy because of decisions that we make. And today we are going to expose it!
Definition: places where Satan has the right to be because I or someone has given him that place
1. 7 Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse yourhands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. (2 Peter 2:19 NIV)
2. Five Doors
  1. Emotional Trauma
  2. Unforgiveness
  3. Innervows and Judgements
  4. Disobedience
  5. Curses

Emotional trauma

Definition: a wound caused by a sudden injury or an emotional shock or deep hurt that causes lasting damage to the psychological, emotional, or spiritual development of a person
1. Truama comes from the Greek word meaning wound
2. Part of Jesus’ ministry was to heal the broken – hearted
3. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me [a]to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are [b]oppressed (Luke 4:18 NKJV)
Here are some examples of emotional trauma
1. Abuse (Mental, Physical, Sexual Abuse)
2. Violence
3. Mugging
4. Abandonment
5. Accidents
6. Rape
7. Rejection
8. Fearful Experiences
9. Domination/Control
10. Molestation
11. Divorce
12. Death of Close Family Members
13. Near Death Experience
Supernatural healing by the power of God is absolutely essential to take away ground from the enemy
We have all been victimized, however it’s our choice to remain the victim
1. We are not responsible for the wrong someone does to us, we are responsible for our response to it
Introduce The Kid video
1. Days away from turning 40, Russ Duritz works as a successful but abrasive image consultant in Los Angeles and has a strained relationship with his father.
2. When Russ returns home to find a toy plane on his porch, he assumes it is a gift from his father. However, inside he finds a strange boy, and chases him through the streets. After seeing the boy enter Skyway Diner, Russ runs in and finds no sign of him. Believing the experience to be a hallucination, Russ frantically sees a psychiatrist for medication the next day, but finds the same boy on his couch eating popcorn when he returns home. The boy says his name is Rusty, that he was just searching for his toy plane,
3. Rusty has been asking about what happens next, how he became Russ. Russ tells him about his achievements that he had excellent grades and won a scholarship to UCLA, working to get a master’s degree for six years and changed himself to who he is. Rusty understands about Russ’s job as an image consultant, that he changes people and pretends to be somebody they are not.
4. Russ cancels his appointments the following day, and spends the time walking with Rusty, and driving around the city trying to figure out why Rusty is there, and what from the past needs to be fixed to get Rusty back home.
5. Watch what happens next
Do you see the emotional trauma Russ went through as a boy. He blamed himself for his mom’s death. He realized why he never cried since his eighth birthday and where his twitch came from
1. Emotional trauma shapes who we are today
2. “So I will restore to you the years that the swarming [a]locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust, and the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you. (Joel 2:25 NKJV)
Turn in your spiritual profiles to page 2 and #6
1. It says: Were there major sins committed against you in your childhood by a family member or by any other person?
  1. Sexual abuse
  2. Verbal abuse
  3. Physical abuse
  4. Abandonment
  5. Rejection
2. Pray and ask the Holy Spirit if there is anything other trauma you have experienced
Ask the men to stand and lead in prayer

Unforgiveness

We cope with emotional trauma in several ways. One way is to hold on to unforgiveness
Definition: the refusal to let go or to excuse the debt owed by another or to lift it away; to hold on to an offense
1. Unforgiveness is like drinking deadly poison hoping that the other person is going to die
But God says that forgiveness is a command
1. 14 “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. (Matthew 6:14,15 NKJV)
Unforgiveness brings prison, torment and bondage
1. 35 “So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother [a]his trespasses.” (Matthew 18:35 NKJV)
Forgiveness is humanly impossible
1. “For without me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5 NKJV)
Forgive just as God forgave us
1. 13 bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. (Colossians 3:13 NKJV)
How do we forgive?
1. Forgive from the heart and not from the head only
2. There must be a complete release by the will and from the emotions
3. Bless and pray for the person who has wronged us until the forgiveness cycle is complete
4. 44 [a]But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, (Matthew 5:44 NKJV)
5. “When you release the wrongdoer from his wrong you cut out a malignant tumor out of your inner life. You set a prisoner free, but you realize the real prisoner was yourself.” – Lewis B. Smedes, author of “Forgive and Forget.”
Turn in your profiles to page 3 at the bottom where it says:
1. Hatred of someone. Who?
2. Unforgiveness towards whom?
Now let’s stand and pray that the Holy Spirit will reveal who we need to forgive

Inner vows and judgements

Definition: an inner vow is a deep determination set with the mind and heart into all a person’s being in early life in response to a person, experience, or desire. It is a vow to one’s self Not to God or another person
Like unforgiveness, inner vows are always in response to a traumatic event that happened in our lives
1. In order to protect ourselves from more pain, we develop inner vows
The best way to explain an inner vow is to first look at examples of an inner vow
1. “I will never treat my children like that!”
2. “No one is ever going to get close enough to me to hurt me like that!”
3. “I will never be poor like my parents!”
4. “I’m never going to trust anyone again!”
5. “I will never love again!”
6. “My wife will never treat me like that!”
How many people have said these things and have become the very thing that they detested?
1. You become an alcoholic even though you promised yourself that you would never be like your alcoholic father
2. You get a divorced even though you promised yourself you would never be like your parents
3. We become what we behold
The reason why inner vows are so powerful is because it takes the focus off of God and puts us in control
1. Imagine putting your fist in front of your face. Can you see in front of you? You can see what’s in front of you through your peripheral vision. But the main thing you are focusing on is your fist.
2. And if all you are looking at is your pain then that is what you will become
Inner vows are almost always based on judgements we make about another person
1. “Judge[a] not, that you be not judged. 2 For with what[b]judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. (Matthew 7:1,2 NKJV)
The distinctive mark of an inner vow is that it resists the normal maturing process
1. These vows tie us to the past in an unhealthy way
2. They prevent our emotional and spiritual development
3. They bind us to mindset or course of action that is fleshly
4. We have taken the control of our life from God and predetermined the way it will or will not be
Turn in your profiles to the last page and look at #11 on the bottom of the page. Have you made any inner vows? At this time pray and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal when you have taken the control out God’s hands and placed them squarely in yours

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