Staying Free From Destructive Life Patterns

Okay, episode 189 of Self Talk, I'm Dr. Ray Self, your host here. No more corny jokes, they were pretty bad last episode. I'll give you a break. I don’t want to punish you with my puns. So this show is sponsored by, you know it, The International College of Ministry, a Holy Spirit-filled, accredited seminary, enrolling now, affordable, anointed. Fulfill your call at icmcollege.org/enroll. Thank you for listening, be sure and share this with as many people as possible. Go to our website, give us a review, we appreciate you very much. God bless you, thanks again for listening to me at Self Talk with Dr. Ray Self, God bless you.

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Okay, this is Dr. Ray, episode 189. Heavenly Father, I thank you again for everyone listening to this show. I praise you, Father, that you have given us authority. Authority over all the power of the enemy. Father, I pray that this show will be a time that we will learn and appreciate the authority you have given us and use that authority to stay free from all these assignments and these attacks against us and our family, even our nation, Father. I thank you for everyone listening to the show. Let your anointing fall on them as they hear this voice, they hear this episode, in Jesus’ name, amen, amen. So last episode I talked about destructive patterns and I talked about, you know, why they happen. And we kind of came to several conclusions there. Destructive patterns, repeat things, repeated frustrations in our life come because of…and, and there's other reasons too but the primary reasons in, in my mind. Unfinished business: trying to complete the business of childhood in our adulthood, that can do it. Identity issues, beginning to let the problems of life shape our identity. We become the problem, we start identifying, you know, with the problem. Filters…that we put that, that, because of trauma and abuse that these filters develop over our ears and, and it causes us to hear things that are not being said and perceive things that are not the truth, but it feels very real. And there's the Spirit of Leviathan. I talked about Leviathan which is a twisting spirit that, that twists the words that are being said so you literally hear something completely different. I see that in marriages a lot and you know, these are some causes of these destructive patterns. Of course, demonic schemes, schemes of the enemy. Remember, in Corinthians we are not ignorant of Satan's schemes, these schemes, and there can be curses that need– generational curses that need to be broken. 

But I want to focus tonight, not so much on the problem, but getting free. The Bible tells us that, that the Lord Jesus has given us authority, and the Gospel of Luke, it says He's given us authority over snakes and scorpions and all the power of the enemy. The Book of James says submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. The Bible tells us in the Book of Revelation that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow. There's tremendous authority that we have as children of God, as joint heirs with Jesus Christ, never forget that. You have the Holy Spirit of God living in you. The Holy Spirit of God. The ruler of the universe, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, His Spirit lives in you. That is power, folks. The problem with authority and power, unless you understand it, know that you have it, believe that you have it, and act on it in a godly way, it doesn't do you any good. I mean, somebody could give you a million dollars and put it in your check– checking account but if you’d never checked your balance, you’d never know that it was there. It's there, but you never had the advantage of having a million dollars because you never looked at the account, never believed it was there. So without faith, it's impossible to please God. Everything with God centers on faith, so to believe something that– a promise, requires faith. 

Now, faith to me is like working out. Faith has to be exercised. How do we build our faith? Well, one way to build your faith is the Bible talks repeatedly about meditating on the word of God. Meditate kind of comes from the word mutter which means to constantly repeat. So, when you look at a promise of God and you start to repeat it over and over and over in your mind, it starts to become your reality. Uh, it begins to soak in so to speak. So think about these things, think about the truth of the word of God. Mark 16, “These signs shall follow those that believe. In My name they will cast out demons, they lay hands on the sick and they shall recover,” these signs will follow those that believe. Lord, I believe your word says these signs will follow me. I will cast out demons…and I have to think about this. Now, it's not good enough just to read it once every six months. When you meditate on something you continually think about that scripture. Uh, in Luke where it says, “I've given you authority over snakes and scorpions and all the power of the enemy and nothing shall hurt you.” So you think about this. You know, look at this scripture, read it over and over and over and over again. Think about it, repeat it. You know, I like to work out and I go to the gym and I've learned that unless I repeat an exercise over and over again and do it multiple times a week, I do not grow any muscle. I cannot go to the gym one time and to have a really good workout and expect to grow anything any, any muscle for my body to change. We can't go to church one day a week, hear the word of God, reflect on what was said, and expect there to be spiritual growth. It needs to be something that's done multiple times a week, every single day. When you– Psal– the– David, in Psalms said the word of God never leaves his heart, he will meditate on it all the time. God expects us to do this. 

Repeatedly in scripture, we see Jesus giving authority, let's, let's look at a few of those, okay? Um, the key one I'm focusing on right now is Luke 10:19, the words of Christ. “Behold, I've given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions and all the power of the enemy and nothing will injure you,” okay? And then we can go up and you can see again in His– where He gave them uh, Mark uh, 3:15 and to have authority– “I give you authority to cast out demons,” okay. Um…let's look at another one here, okay? Uh, all right, and He goes uh…let's see here…in Mark 6:7, you'll see this commandment right here. In Mark um, 6:7, “He summoned the 12 and began to send them out in pairs and gave them authority over unclean spirits.” What's it have to do with us? Well, these are disciples. I'm a disciple, you're a disciple. Jesus was teaching us something here. You, you say, “Well, that was for then not for now.” No, my savior's the same yesterday, today, and forever. He gave His disciples authority over unclean spirits, okay? And you see it in Mark and you see it in Luke and you see it again in Mark, okay? And so this is so critical, you know, I– “Behold, I give you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions,” this principle, this truth has not changed, it has not changed, you have authority. Now, why is that? Because so much of these destructive patterns in our life are caused by demons. Well– and let me– I'm going to rephrase that just a little bit. So many of these destructive patterns in our life are caused by our emotional issues and wounds, and greatly enhanced and aggravated by demons. Greatly enhanced and aggravated by demons. So there's two things we need to do. We need to get rid of the demonic influence in our life. Take authority over and say, “I will not accept this demonic influence in my life,” and it goes simply like this, “In the name of Jesus Christ, I rebuke every demon trying to talk to me or my family. In the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to be quiet. I break your assignment against me and this family. I am bought by the blood of Jesus Christ. I am a child of the most high God and by the authority of the name above all names, Jesus Christ, I command this assignment broken now, in the name of Jesus Christ.” And, you hit him.

Now, what the enemy does is he'll come back and try to test you again. It reminds me of a child. You know, you, you set a limit on a child, what do they do? They come back and test your limits, they test your boundaries. Well, the enemy will come back and test your boundaries. What do you do? You rebuke him again. And he comes back again, you rebuke him again. What do I mean by coming back? Well, the pattern– starts to raise his ugly head again and the pattern starts to repeat itself again. And then when you see that, you start rebuking the demons again. Say, “No, no, you will not come back, I will not accept this destructive ugly pattern in my life anymore.” 

Now, that's the spiritual part of it. You still have to deal with your flesh. What is your part? Have you cooperated and come into agreement with the devil? And that happens to a lot of people. You know, we hear this message, this destructive pattern, we experience it so much we absorb it as part of our life. We come into agreement with it and even in our actions and our beliefs and our thought processes, agree with the terrible pattern. This is who I am. This is what happens to me. I say, “No, I am not going to accept it.” Now, you, you must understand: it is not God's will for you to be in poverty, it's not God's will for you to be sick, it's not God's will for you to feel rejected, it's not God's will for you to live in fear, anxiety or abandonment, it's not God's will for you to experience any of this. Do you want this for your children? And He loves us more than we love our own children. It's not God's will for us but He's given us a weapon. He's given us a weapon to defeat these patterns, but it's up to us to use the weapon, okay? The armor of God is a weapon, the sword of the Spirit is a weapon, our faith is a weapon, the name of Jesus Christ is a weapon, the anointing of the Holy Spirit is a weapon. 

And so, I'm encouraging you, if you see a destructive pattern - we can call it a scheme, we can call it uh, Murphy's Law, whatever you want to call it…continued bad luck, I don't believe in that. I believe that, you know, these things that um…these demonic assignments– and sometimes again, it's just our flesh. And you know, there are people that walk around and they just, they look like rejection looking for a place to be rejected, there are people that look like fear looking for something to be afraid of, there's people that look, you know, that have a spirit of unworthiness and they're going to feel unworthy wherever they go. Well, some of that's personal problems that we need to grow up, get some counseling, take responsibility for our part of the problem, repent, ask forgiveness, and ask the help of the Holy Spirit for our part of the issue; and then also fight in the spirit realm for Satan's part of the issue, rebuke him for his part, take responsibility for your part, and continually do that and you will stay free. Stay free. Isn't there a, a laundry product called Stay Free or Static Free? Something like that…anyway, a little random thought there. But it's important for us to stay free. God gets the glory for that. God is pleased when we stay free. I do not– and I've seen this so many times, people repeating the same old thing. You know, like uh, we used to call it a broken record, over and over and over again. Whatever it is, look back at your life. Is there some type of issue that keeps repeating itself? Is it failed relationships, is it poverty, is it infirmity, is it rejection, is it fear, is it depression? You know, what is– is it failure? You know, what is the, the issue that repeats itself? These are schemes, destructive patterns that the enemy loves because what he's doing is he's harassing you. Not because he's worried about you - he's not worried about you - he is worried, however, about this plan of God, that God has placed in your life, that God has a plan for you, a purpose for you, something He's called you to do, and if the enemy can keep this destructive pattern in place it's going to greatly inhibit God's plan working through you. And so, God– and I've never fully understood this, but God works His plan on earth so many times through ordinary people. 

So these attacks, these destructive patterns, these schemes, this unfinished business, these filters, these um, feelings of rejection, fear, abandonment, unworthiness, all these horrible things have one common goal and that's to stop you from the fullness of God, from completing your journey, from getting to your promised land, fulfilling your call, fulfilling your– fulfilling your purpose…that's the, the plan of this. He's after God. But he won't fight God directly, he's not stupid, he fights God indirectly by fighting God's people. Now, God has given us a weapon: the authority of Christ. It's the– it's, it's more powerful than a nuclear bomb. He's given us a powerful weapon. It's up to you to know that you know that you know and believe that you believe that you believe that you have this authority, it is your legal right. Stand up for what is legally yours, stand up for what rightfully belongs to you. You rightfully belong as a joint heir with Jesus Christ. And are you– do you sin, do you mess up? Absolutely. Do you goof up? Absolutely. Do you think– do you have thoughts you shouldn't have? Absolutely. Does God forgive? Absolutely. Does it change the fact that you're a child of God with his authority? 

You know um, Deuteronomy 28 tells you all the blessings for obedience. Well, this is something I've explained to people so many times because a lot of people do not get Deuteronomy 28. This has a lot to do– now hang, hang with me, this has a lot to do with what we're talking about, uh, right now. I want, I want to look at– real quickly, Deuteronomy 28, very, very famous, you know, very famous scripture, and it says in verse one, “Now it shall be if you diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all His commandments which I command you today, the Lord your God will set you on high above all nations of the earth and all these blessings will come upon you and overtake you if you obey the Lord your God.” Now, they list all these incredible blessings. Well, the key is if you diligently and carefully do all of His commandments…well, you didn't do it! I didn't do it either! Nobody's done it, except one person. One person in history has ever been able to do all the commandments of God, fulfill the law, and that is Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has fulfilled all of God's commandments and by faith in Him, His righteousness, His fulfillment His grade on this test is imparted to you, okay? So, did I diligently obey God, carefully do all his commandments? No, nobody's been able to do it - there's 630 laws by the way. But Jesus fulfilled the law and He who knew no sin became sin that we might be made righteous. He imparted that righteousness, that right standing, from completely fulfilling the law. That right standing as a Son of God has been given to you as a gift by faith so therefore, logically, practically, all these blessings in Deuteronomy 28 belong to you. Read them. But you have…like everything with God comes with a condition. The condition for everything I'm telling you today is faith. You have to believe it, you must believe it. If you believe Jesus Christ the Son of God, He died and rose from the grave and He is your savior and He's forgiven you of your sins, He died, took your sins to the cross, you believe that you're saved. Well, these other promises of God do not work unless you believe. You do not have authority over the devil unless you believe it. You have authority, but let me– it's not going to work for you unless you believe it. The promise of eternal life and salvation's been there, it's available to everyone, but only works for those who have faith and believe it. So yes, you do not ever, ever, ever, ever have to accept these destructive, awful patterns anymore. 

To stay free is: repent of your part. If you're not, you– “I don't know what I did, I'm not sure,” well, if you're asking that question, ask the Holy Spirit to show you your part. Then, then repent, ask forgiveness, okay? And then take authority. Use the name of Jesus Christ, rebuke and renounce and command the assignment, the pattern, the attack upon your life to cease. And if it comes back, rebuke it again. If it comes back, rebuke it again. Eventually, the devil will get the idea that he can't mess with you because you're going to keep rebuking him, you're going to keep taking authority. He's just testing you to see if you, if you, if you know the authority you have. And he hopes you don't. If you do this, not only will you get free, but you'll stay free from all this destructive mess, amen. 

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I thank you again for your word, for your truth. I pray, Father, anything I've said that uh, is not of you, let it fall to the ground. But Lord, we receive your word, we receive your truth. And Father, I pray for everyone listening to me that's in some type– that's experiencing some type of destructive, awful pattern in their life. Father, we ask you that you would show them what it is. Show us our part. And Father, in the name of Jesus Christ we stand against these patterns, we stand against this scheme, we stand against this, this repeated awful thing that keeps happening to me and my family and we rebuke it; we renounce the, the cause of it, we renounce Satan, his demons, his forces, any curse, anything spoken against us, any spirit of witchcraft, any spirit of divination that's trying to cause this. We rebuke that, we renounce this, we command it broken by the blood and the authority of Jesus Christ. Amen, amen, amen.

Folks, do your warfare, do your due diligence, meditate on the word of God, take His promises, and read them over and over and over again till they get in your spirit where you believe them beyond any shadow of a doubt, amen. Hope this show has been a blessing to you. Thank you so much for listening to Self Talk with me, Dr. Ray Self.

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