“My purpose in writing is simply this: that you who believe in God’s Son will know beyond the shadow of a doubt … the reality and not the illusion.” (1 John 5:13, MSG)
Yesterday’s manna made many believers uneasy, especially as people often don’t know that there are other spirits that present themselves as the Holy Spirit. The pattern that I often observe in the deliverance of those with this demonic spirit is that they were usually in a spiritual construct. With this I mean that they live in a religious imaginary world that is very far removed from objective reality. We must remember: “the reality belongs to Christ” (Col 2:17b, ISV)! The warning in Eccl 7:18b (MSG) is of great importance here: “A person who fears God deals responsibly with all of reality, not just a piece of it.”
One such experience with someone who was living in an imaginary world was particularly upsetting for me as a counsellor. He was an ordinary young man, who appeared to not have many problems. Yet he was extremely fearful and I (and he) felt that the Angel of Death had a claim on his life. The Holy Spirit revealed that he was living in an imaginary world. He was small in his own eyes, insecure, and thus he created all kinds of worlds in which he was successful, handsome, rich, popular, etc. The Holy Spirit gave strategy to lead him to one of those worlds and to ask if God was there. When I asked the question, the demons began to manifest. God was not in that imaginary, romanticised world; it was a place where a number of evil beings had made themselves comfortably at home, a “habitation of wilderness”, as Jer 9:10 calls it.
Sometimes there is even a spiritual construct that is built of deep spiritual experiences that keeps us engrossed. Then Rom 1:25 (WNT) is applicable to you: “For they had bartered the reality of God for what is unreal …” Jesus said to the woman at the well that He seeks worshippers who worship Him in spirit and truth (John 4:23-24). One of the core meanings of the word truth is reality! Remember: If it is not real, it is not God. Worship Him in spirit and reality.
- Sela: Try to determine if you live in a spiritual construct. One way that you can determine this is if your spiritual experiences change something of the reality.
- Read: Gen 32 (this Scripture is important i.t.o. today’s teaching); Ps 32; Matt 3
- Memorise: Matt 3:11
