AUTHORITY OF CHRISTIANS BY DAVID CRISSMAN
WHERE IN GODS WORD IS THE AUTHORITY OF EVERY
CHRISTIAN OVER SATAN & DEMONS?
Do believers have the authority over Satan and
demons? The answer is unequivocally, YES! Through the
shed blood of Jesus, we have victory over all the powers of
darkness.
The Assemblies of God has a great article on their
website that helps us understand much about spiritual
warfare:
http://ag.org/top/Beliefs/topics/
sptlissues_spiritual_warfare.cfm
Here is a list of Scriptures that I found that relate
directly to this issue: Matthew 10:1, Matthew 10:8, Luke
10:19, Mark 16:17-18, Ephesians 6:10-18, 2 Corinthians
10:3-5, Revelation 12:11, James 4:7, Matthew 4:1-11, 1
Peter 5:8-9, Luke 9:1, Matthew 18:18, Ephesians 4:27
As you may have read from the AG article, there are
many people who take spiritual warfare to an extreme and
create fear in people about Satan's works. There is no need
for a believer to fear the powers of darkness. We are
already victorious over Satan and all the powers of
darkness. We have to educate our minds to what the Word
of God says, and then live our lives in the authority that the
Word provides us. I firmly believe that the only power that
Satan has over us is the power we give him by not living
according to the truth of God's Word. The Word tells us to
STAND against the powers of darkness (Eph. 6:11, 13, 14).
This is what we are commanded to do when we feel
attacked by the enemy. When we stand on the Word of
God, God fights for us!
This passage in Ephesians talks about praying also, but
we pray to God, not to Satan. Our prayers are to be
directed toward God. We can speak truth to Satan and his
demons and they will flee, but we don't need to let our lives
be consumed by speaking to demons. Paul spoke to a
demon (Acts 16:18) in the name of Jesus. He told the
demon to come out of a girl and the demon left her at that
moment. Demons cannot possess Christians so we don't
need to speak to Satan or demons in our personal Christian
walk because they have no power or authority over us. The
only thing we would need to say to them is, "The Word of
God says, [quote a passage of Scripture]." There is nothing
else that we are commanded to say in Scripture other than
this. Jesus modeled this for us in Matthew 4:1-11. He did
exactly what the Bible says to do in James 4:7, "Submit
yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil and he will flee
from you."
We have complete spiritual authority because of our
position as Christians. We have been bought by God with
the blood of Jesus. We are His and He will protect us.