Biblical teaching on the Demonic: With Dr. Sam Storms

hey everybody welcome to remnant radio my name is joshua lewis and today we've got dr sam storms with us in studio but not our studio another space uh and we're gonna be discussing uh the supernatural warfare spiritual warfare uh demonic forces but before we dive into that subject i need to let you know what remnant radio is and what we're all about remnant radio is a theology broadcast we stream every monday night at 8 30 p.m at central standard time uh and tuesdays from four to five we interview pastors and teachers from all over the world many of them we disagree with many of them we we agree with but they're presbyterians anglicans methodists and if you're on the internet trying to figure out uh what the christian faith has to say about any given theological subject remnant radio is the channel for you uh uh there's gonna be guys we disagree with guys you're gonna disagree with but it's gonna kind of that community of ecumenical spirit it's a great channel for you so hit that subscribe button make sure to like this video as we're coming out with content just like this to my left you're right pastor michael roundry hiding sir doing great doing great so excited to have dr storms on the show we've had him quite a few times we've talked about spiritual gifts with dr storms we've talked about amillennialism both of those episodes this year today we're talking about spiritual warfare and we've done a lot on this subject generally this summer we did two episodes one with ken fish called the the courts of heaven we looked at that in depth we've had michael heiser on the show a number of times we've talked about demons yeah we're gonna talk about some more demons today in the studio yeah i hope we don't have those devils in the studio this is the prayer room uh no devil's here no devils in there they all got kicked out dr storms tell us a little about yourself and your ministry before we dive into the subject sam sam every time every episode we we wait for you to tell us yeah it's like so the audience knows you know what sam it is yeah so a little bit about me oh my okay born and raised in oklahoma dallas uh university of oklahoma for undergraduate work dallas theological seminary thm i got my phd at university of texas at dallas pastored in dallas for 12 years in ardmore oklahoma for eight years uh then went to kansas city and joined with mike bickel and was at the metro vineyard fellowship for seven years from there i went to wheaton college taught four years at wheaton college in the theology department um back to kansas city launched and joined god ministries and then in 2008 came here to bridgeway church by the way that the here is where in oklahoma city that's right it's okay to tell them that absolutely yeah we're in the prayer room at the offices of bridgeway church came here in 2008 um and i have been married to my wife it'll be i've got to get my numbers right uh-oh come may of next year it'll be 49 years old uh two daughters four grandchildren and um loving life you got a big 50 year coming up man oh yeah tell me about i don't know what i'm gonna do about that yeah we'll pray about it well we're thrilled to have you back on the show we did the the spiritual gifts episode we've done an episode on tongues uh we've done an episode on all millennialism all with uh doctor uh with sam yeah i almost did yeah almost next so make sure you check out those episodes and uh and make sure you subscribe to our channel because we have content coming out like that all the time so sam we're talking about spiritual warfare i know you have a book coming out this spring probably in april we definitely want to read that book when it comes out but it's not out yet so maybe you can tell us just kind of what's the premise of your book and and just introduce us to this topic of spiritual warfare yes it's really a something of a sequel to my book on spiritual gifts my spiritual guest book is called understanding spiritual gifts a comprehensive guide this one is understanding spiritual warfare a comprehensive guide both of them being published by zondervan both of them about the same length so they're pretty long pretty in-depth um i don't know if i can have anything more to say about it after i've published this book but um it's comprehensive that's what that works well i try to be and not exhaustive but comprehensive let's just put it that way not encyclopedic but i try to address most issues um i think probably the motivation behind it more than anything else was in one respect the same way with the spiritual gifts book i'm grieved by the extreme unbiblical approaches to the issues of spiritual warfare that we so oftentimes run into in the broadly evangelical christian world i see more and more of the activity of the enemy in our day it seems to be proliferating and i i and i'm deeply grieved uh more than anything else by the lack of of confidence and assurance that christian men and women have and the authority that they have in christ and i think one of the things that stirred me to really go into this issue was watching how otherwise mature biblically rooted christians freak out if they're somebody who is manifesting a demonic presence uh and they get they don't know what to do they get scared they run for cover or they come get me said come help us this guy's manifesting um and that's why i think one of the things i address in the book we can probably talk about it here so important is luke chapter 10 where jesus said i've given you authority over all the power of the enemy you know the disciples came back rejoicing even the demons are subject to us in your name and these were 70 average people these were not apostles these were just followers of jesus who are nameless faceless in the in the book of luke and yet demons were subject to them in the name of christ and so at times i i look at that and i say well wait a minute if they exercise this kind of authority over the demonic realm before the cross before the empty grave before pentecost and the outpouring of the spirit how much more um we be able to operate in the power and the authority that we have in the risen christ and i don't think many christians understand that now again i also want to differentiate what i'm talking about when i talk about spiritual authority from the rather presumptuous arrogant claims that that we see oftentimes in the broader charismatic pentecostal world so we're not talking about the kind of authority that is demanding or pompous you know ours i trust is one born of genuine humility and again the key phrase in luke 10 even the the demons are subject to us in your name it's the name of christ it's because of who he is and uh his having been raised and exalted the right hand of the father that we have this authority but we do have it i mean ephesians 2 where paul describes how god has highly exalted christ put all principalities and powers underneath his feet and that same resurrection power is now in us and then he tells us in chapter 2 of ephesians that we have been seated together with christ in the heavenlies so the same principalities and powers that have been placed beneath him have been placed beneath us and so i don't i don't want christians to go around um with a kind of an arrogant um undiscerning attitude where they're seeking out demons just for the sake of a fight but i want to see christians emboldened i want to see them confident in the the reality of christ's defeat of our enemy and that we are participants in that and we don't have anything to fear doesn't mean that we don't stand into in a measure of if i can use the word respect knowing that satan is very powerful and incredibly wily and strategic in his purposes um but fear isn't has no place in in the christian life when it comes to our engagement with in our battle against demonic forces yeah so you talked about uh fear not being this the space for uh for christians to walk in to when combating demonic forces i think of a conversation that i heard jack dear talk about just recently um in houston when he was saying that uh he's talking to the paralytic why do you look at us as if we have made you well right we know holiness or piety in our own uh but jesus christ has made you well right so so in that passage um that jack uses it to say hey there's that little thought in the back of my head that god can't use me to heal this person because you know i got in a fight with my wife on the way to church right i'm not i'm not perfectly holy and god can't use this imperfect vessel i hear that quite frequently when talking about demonic activity you got to be prayed up you gotta you gotta you can't have any sin in your life because that demonic force will just cling on to you what level of of responsibility does the christian have in walking into a situation where they know there's going to be demonic activity oh absolutely i mean the fact of the matter is although obviously we are born again justified by faith people and nothing as paul says in romans 8 neither principalities nor powers nothing's present nor things to come nor angels nor any powers of heaven and earth nor any experience that we can are confronted with can separate us from the love of god in christ we rest in that but paul also says you have to put on the armor of god well what if you don't you know james says in james chapter 4 verses 7 and 8 resist the devil and he will flee from you you know submit yourselves to god what if we don't what if we don't submit ourselves what if we don't resist the enemy um is he does he have to flee when when we kind of presumptuously acquiesce to his presence so there is a responsibility in fact i one of the stories that i tell in my book um i've told many times before the first massive encounter i had with the demonic took place in kansas city i don't know how much detail you want about it but um i'll go ahead and tell the story it was my first conference that i was hosting in kansas city i've been there about two months and somebody came to me they said sam we've got a problem there's a lady who has set up shop as it were behind the sound booth and she's got an altar back there and she's chanting and she's doing incantations what in our church building so i walked over there sure enough there she was and i couldn't tell what she was doing it was really freaky and i thought well do i confront her i thought well she's out of sight no nobody knows she's there so let's just ignore her whoa so about 10 minutes later um she came uh walking toward me and i've always i've grappled with language to account for what i felt and it's hard to describe but she was about as far away as i am from michael right now she got no closer than that and i felt this incredible wave of energy that just engulfed me i've often described it as liquid air that's what it felt like and it was it was just profoundly wicked i'd never i'd never encountered anything like that at all before and i i got profound i thought i was going to throw up i really did i was nauseated i couldn't think my mind was jumbled i couldn't put words together it was it was it was frightening to say the least and i'll never forget mike bickle who was the senior pastor of the church his sister was standing there she felt the same thing she grabbed me by the arm and pulled me away we got back into an office and we started talking about she said did you feel that i said yeah i felt it gradually i began to regain my composure but it was the it was the most bizarre i want to say physiological empirical encounter with spirit that i'd ever felt that i'd ever known about three days later as a monday morning we're at our regular prayer meeting at the office building my wife was the receptionist at the front desk and this lady who had been there shows up she walks in the front door and i'm not i'm not exaggerating it's the most horrid smell i've ever smelled in my life anne was so freaked out she gets up and she runs into the prayer room to alert us there are probably about 50 of us in the prayer room and this lady walks in behind her and i mean the stench just filled and you're talking about body odor folks we're talking about like sulfur or i don't know if demons smell but this was wretched wow and we had a two-story office building we had pastors upstairs coming downstairs wondering what in the world was going on because they could smell it up there we eventually escorted her upstairs and a couple of us sat down with her and began to share the gospel with her prayed for i can't even remember how we endured the smell but it was bad and she got set free came to saving faith and jesus right there turns out she had been in every kind of occultic activity imaginable she got gloriously converted and became very much a part of the ministry of the church in the in the years following but the point of all that is this i i remember asking them i still ask it today lord why i'm i'm you're i'm the son of the most high god i'm justified by faith the holy spirit lives in me why was i affected that way by this demonic presence and i think part of the reason for that was the lord was saying you are you came into that whole conference unprepared you hadn't prayed you hadn't really thought through the armor of god you had just assumed automatically that there was no way any enemy could have any effect on you now again his effect obviously is limited can't separate me from the love of god in christ can't rob me of my salvation but it was like the lord saying wake up sam wake wake up this is a real war against a very real and powerful enemy and you need to be prepared for it and so that was a my first this was september of 1993 a long time ago but it was a truly eye-opening life-changing encounter that alerted me and i'd had uh counseling situations in which i dealt with people who were demonized before but i had never and again i i struggled with language i'd never empirically tangibly felt the that level of oppression that level of demonic dark power yeah uh it was it was eye-opening it was life-changing for a while very instructive so so you talked about at the beginning just our authority in christ i want believers to understand our authority of cri in christ and so we've got matthew 28 all authority on heaven on earth has been given to me and i think you quoted ephesians 1 where he's high above all principalities and authorities and all of this so to what degree do we have all the authority that christ has as his ambassadors walking in authority and to what degree do do i kind of like grow in my authority or maybe even that's the wrong word maybe it's gifting but like is there some degree to which if i do this for a while i get better at casting out demons not because necessarily i learned a new skill or you know tweaks the system or something but because i've actually grown in maturity is there such a thing as growing in authority i think there's such a thing as growing in the knowledge of that authority and being built up in your confidence in acting on the basis of that authority i think the the baby christian who's born again five minutes ago has that authority amen but do they understand what it means do they understand um how they ought to wield it so to speak um you know you read you know the classic passage in acts 16 where uh that that slave girl in philippi was um shouting all these things while paul and barnes were trying to preach and paul finally basically just stopped and commanded the demon to come out i think a lot of christians who have this authority if they are ever confronted that way they would turn tail and run or they'd go find try to find somebody who wears a clerical collar or somebody who's got a seminary degree they think has more authority than they do um so yeah i think and certainly i think there are spiritual giftings that um that facilitate and deepen our capacity to operate in that authority think i think for example the gift of discerning the spirits relates specifically to the spirit-empowered ability to know when the enemy is at work or when the spirit of god is at work or when our human spirit is at work or when it's only a fleshly manifestation i'll give you an example another example happened in kansas city a couple of years after this other incident we used to go on prayer walks we would gather on saturday mornings break up into groups of five or six and just canvas the neighborhood and just pray and we were doing one in our neighborhood where we lived and i'll never forget we we came around the corner and i knew this elementary school was there obviously and we came around the corner and i suddenly felt that same wave that same dark energy that was starting and it was just and i immediately recognized it so now because of the prior experience my discernment had been elevated and i recognized it for what it was in fact it's happened multiple times since then but i stopped and i said i said to the other four or five people and i said there's something profoundly satanic or demonic in this area we need to be alerted and they didn't know what i was talking about we walked around the corner about another 15 feet and sure enough satanic graffiti written all spray painted all over the walls of the elementary school building there was actually a little um a place where obviously some sort of sacrifices into taking place we could see the the coals were still there from the night before 666 scrawled all over the walls uh pentagrams the whole bit but your feeling came before you even saw that absolutely absolutely but would i have would i have known what that feeling was if i hadn't had the prior encounter right and i think the more um we encounter the enemy the more aware the more alert we are to that reality discerning to that discernment and discernment can operate in different ways with some people it might be an impression it might be a vision it might be um some with me it's a physiological reaction i feel physiologically the presence of the enemy and that's how it operates with me because nowhere in the new testament does it tell us how discernive spirits operates right what happened for example when when paul in the book of acts you know singles out elimas the magician he says you know he recognized that he's being used by satan to undermine the gospel being preached to sergius paulus um or um just thinking of other another example maybe maybe ananias and sapphira satan had filled their heart to light of the holy spirit how did peter know that maybe that was a word of knowledge maybe it's just a revelatory disclosure or maybe peter felt or sensed something that was operative in their lives at that time so i don't know how the gift of discerning spirits operates in everybody the new testament doesn't give us a one size fits all so i'm open to i like to hear how others have experienced that and many times i hear people will say very much the same thing i do they said i could feel it i had i had a physiological reaction that alerted me to the fact that there was a profound demonic presence here do you think there's any kind of correlation between the working of miracles and the casting out of demons i know some people have made that kind of connection that some people are just extra gifted in casting out demons and somehow that's connected to or at least potentially to the working of miracles yeah i i um so for example in my book on spiritual gifts i mentioned 21 spiritual gifts and i talk about a couple that i think um may not be mentioned in the new testament i i don't and again i'm not trying to be extra biblical here but i think there are at least three spiritual gifts that i would recognize that aren't explicitly mentioned in the new testament one would be in the interpretation of revelation i don't mean how to interpret what does john 3 16 mean i mean right somebody gets a dream or vision remember daniel said the interpretation is from the lord joseph got the interpretation from the lord so the ability to interpret dreams visions and so on intercession all of us are to intercede we're to be prayer prayer warriors but there are some people who have an energy to stay on their knees and intercede at the throne of grace endlessly could that be a spiritual gift possibly and the other one's deliverance i think all christians have the authority and the power within them of the holy spirit their identity in christ seated with him in the heavenlies to cast out demons and to push back the enemy there are some believers who operate just far more effectively in that than others um i i can think of a particular couple in kansas city that we knew that often in fact this man was one of the individuals who sat down with me and that lady in that room and there was just you could just sense this authority in his voice in his words in his demeanor and in the reaction of those to whom he was ministering i think maybe he just had an extraordinary operation of the spirit in and through him to facilitate what i think is really actually present in every believer so yeah yeah yeah that's good i love that and i love the way you talk about how we all have that authority from the moment that we're born again something that i was thinking about as soon as you start talking ephesians 1 popped into my mind where it says i pray the eyes of your heart may be opened or enlightened and so that like the third in the list is you may you may know that you have uh that the same power that raised jesus from the dead dwells in you and that same power that raised him up above all those authorities and powers and rulers so again it's like paul's stepping into the vein of just what you said which is it's not about like achieving the authority it's about he achieved the authority we just need the eyes of our hearts enlightened to see it now now when we talk about the the power of satan and you talked about just this overwhelming power uh and authority that he has in a sense i mean it's stripped i guess you know he's been disarmed colossians two but uh he is the god of this age okay we can say that second corinthians 4 4. so given his power and his position in the heavenlies one passage i'm thinking of is in the book of jude where it says not even the archangel michael would bring a railing accusation against satan when disputing over the body of moses but rather said the lord rebuke you so you know the way i would tend to understand that is you know we don't need to go around like shouting at the devil and disrespecting like we need to we need we need to have a sense of respect in a sense but but not fear but not fear but i guess the other thing is he said the lord rebuked you and yet it seems like i i feel like jesus and when he casts the i guess there are several occasions when it said he rebuked your spirit yeah so is it okay to rebuke a spirit because i don't want to like violate jude yeah honestly uh i do address that passage in my book let's this may sound odd um you know in in first peter chapter one it says that the angels desire and long to look into our experience of salvation as the as the children of god and whom the spirit dwells i don't think that we should be limited by what is possible for even an angelic being in other words i don't want to overstep my bounds here but i want to i want to be real clear i think we have a greater authority in the realm of the spirit than do the angels no angel has the holy spirit dwelling within amen as far as we know angels haven't been redeemed forgiven justified they haven't been adopted into the you know granted they're they're angels but um and they're supernatural beings undoubtedly so but do i think that uh we as as god's sons and daughters have an authority given to us in christ to rebuke and resist and to cast down the enemy that maybe not even angels have yes i do amen i'd love that wow okay so and this gets into the question of demons and angels because now we get to like like ontological differences is there ontological differences because even what michael was saying is is thus satan and he tells he tells jesus tells the satan right like hey like kick rocks and he does right so so that that definitely happens as well uh but like when when speaking with demonic forces i've been in a couple of situations where uh a demon will flare up and start cussing up a storm and uh the guy that i worked with frequently would be like stop that be silent and it obeys the command um so so uh it does seem as if there is an authority that is present to uh command them to stop convulsing command them to do those kind of things is that the same equivalent of commanding like geographical spirits it's one of the things that that we see creeping into the pentecostal charismatic movement of there is this principality this regional force that's in charge of uh uh different areas and hey i command that spirit of abortion to come down or that spirit of materialism yeah for dfw that's a big topic and i'm happy to address it sure first are there such things as what we call territorial spirits i think the answer is yes and i have uh i have some evidence for that from scripture obviously daniel chapter 10 is very clear talks about the prince of greece the prince of persia against which both gabriel and michael are waging war so yes i think that in all likelihood satan has assigned uh certain demonic spirits to geographical geopolitical realms nations however else you want to describe it um then you have you know i've always been fascinated by the story of the gathering demoniac we all know the story it's got it written down um why did the demons say don't send us out of the country [Music] what was that about could it be that satan had assigned them that territory of operation and they feared reprisal from satan for leaving it and then you have uh the letter to the church in pergamum in revelation where it says pergamum where satan's throne is now that's that's fascinating because it seems to suggest that for whatever reason satan's base of earthly operations was pergamum back in the first second century obviously there was incredible amount of idolatry in pagan temples in pergamum it was a center for emperor worship so it seems as if there is justification for believing that uh you know we know that satan has a hierarchy i mean how there's no reason why he would paul would talk about principalities powers world powers authorities dominions if those are all synonymous terms and they don't differentiate at all what's the point of using them i think he's saying there there are differing levels of of spiritual power and authority jesus himself mark chapter nine this kind does not come out except by prayer he's saying there are some extraordinarily powerful demons and you bumped up against one when when you couldn't cast it out of this this little boy so yes i do think territorial spirits is a biblical concept i do not agree however with the approach that many have taken in so-called strategic level spiritual warfare there you go which basically says as you articulated we can go into a region now let me back up a little bit part of this is also a practice called spiritual mapping i don't think spiritual mapping is inherently wrong i think it can be actually very helpful basically what it is is you go into the history of a let's say of a county in the state of oklahoma and you and you look at um who was um who were the commissioners what is the background were there any satanic temples here what kind of what kind of lifestyle and laws were built into this area that might have opened the door to a demonic presence that might give you insight in how to to minister to people but i don't believe that anywhere in the new testament or old testament for that matter are we given the authority to go out as some have done and they'll go out and god bless them for their intentions they'll pray and fast for two weeks until they hear the name from the spirit of the particular principality that rules over that region and then they go out to some high place in the area and they shout at the demon and pull it down and demand that it cease all of its nefarious activities i don't see any biblical grounds for that so i think we need to be careful there i think the way we respond to territorial demons is the same way we respond to any demonic presence that we would ever encounter in any person or in any place the same way we do it through adorning ourselves with the armor of god of ephesians 6 and if con and if we are confronted directly by a demonic spirit um we we deal with it now the reason why and you mentioned like i call down the spirit of abortion or the spirit of abuse and all these things here's the problem with that as long as the people who are performing abortions and committing abuse and are doing all sorts of other criminal and sinful activity are doing it satan has an open door i mean sometimes demons don't go because the person doesn't want them to leave because the person has granted them moral authority in their life so you know we oftentimes say the the proof of the pudding is in the eating and you have to ask the question after you've called down these demonic principalities is there any change in the community is there any change in the practices of the people oftentimes there's not well that doesn't mean you lack authority and means that they have said sorry i want the demon to be here i have granted them access to my life i want them to be operative in my community so the way you deal with those kinds of demonic powers is you deal with those individual people and you call them to repentance and you lead them to faith in christ that's how the demons that have manifested in that particular region are defeated and brought down and that follow-up question then would be uh you use the term territorial demons and and then like this in person demons that are like manifesting in front of you is there an ontological difference between what would be i think some would call angels like fallen angels that are in heaven in the heavenly places and these lower peon kind of demons that are here in front of us that we have interaction with do you find ontological differences between them ontological a different sort of being a different being yeah i don't see grounds for that i know some do i'm not entirely convinced by the arguments we know that jesus himself referred to satan and his angels when he talked about the lake of fires prepared for them um so we know that the demons that do satan's bidding um are clearly referred to as angels so i i personally think that you know certainly there are there may well be what we might call if i can use this language different species of angelic beings cherubim seraphim sure and some would even say they're not angels they're an entirely different category creation okay they're spirit beings let's just use that spirit beings are there different species or varieties of spirit beings certainly i'm open to that um it seems to me however that when we read about the demonic in the new testament we're reading about fallen angelic spirit beings who were seduced along with satan to rebel against god i don't know that i have enough confidence in the differentiation to say that territorial spirits are a different order of spirit being from from fallen angels um i'm not persuaded by that argument but i'm aware that it is made by some who are a lot smarter than i am so for now okay so we've you've mentioned a little bit about the the fall of satan and then there's we've also talked about principalities and casting down territorial spirits is it an example in the new testament of something at least akin to how you might deal with the territorial spirit what we see in luke chapter 10 where you mentioned earlier we talked about this passage and the disciples are going out in the authority of christ and they're healing the sick and casting out demons and preaching the gospel jesus says in that context luke 10 18 i saw satan fall like lightning i know there's a few different interpretations of that could you walk us through what that means and what it might mean yeah for anything dealing with any kind of territorial spirit there are differing interpretations as you said my own understanding of that is that jesus was using very graphic language in a proleptic way to refer to the defeat that satan was about to experience as a result of the cross and resurrection you know when jesus says in john's gospel the prince of the the god of this age is cast out and colossians chapter 2 where it talks about triumphing over the principalities and powers through the cross i think revelation 12 which i believe is an event that has already happened i believe it happened at the time of the first coming of christ at the time of his resurrection and ascension to the right hand of the father so i think jesus was was speaking in a sense proleptically of what was what as if it had already happened but in fact it would happen as a result of his death dealing with sin his resurrection his exaltation it's just a very graphic visual portrayal like fell from heaven like lightning of you know what this is your defeat over the demons you said in my name uh that bears witness to the fact that the enemy satan himself is due for a demise he's uh there's a book called the demise of the devil on the demonic in the gospel of luke which is a very fascinating book as well it's written by a lady i'm trying to her first name is susan i can't remember her last name um but that's what i think he's talking about there i i don't i don't think he's saying oh because i saw satan fall from heaven like lightning that means that you guys because of what you've just done have pulled down a territorial spirit satan himself and every other christian can do that that's extrapolating from that story far far more than i think that jesus had in mind okay okay so what do we do with uh and these are these are the the questions of categories and where these fallen angels come from what do we do with the the genesis 6 account and the nephilim right those are the the real pop culture questions and then maybe we can get into the the nitty-gritties of how we actually do some of this stuff yeah um that's an interesting question i don't know if you all know this i do a monthly uh call-in show with janet partial on moody radio okay and i've been doing it with her for about three years now and almost every single time somebody raises that question really so you've there's documented evidence on it goodness i get this all the time um it is obviously a very controversial and difficult passage to understand there are many in the evangelical world who are simply embarrassed by it it strikes them it is weird and like unicorns yeah and real quickly just for our viewers because not everyone's really memorized genesis 6 just that's right could you just capture for us you can read it maybe it'd be better if we actually read the bible and see what it is all right genesis 6 began in verse 1 when man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them the sons of god saw that the daughters of man were attractive and they took as their wives any they chose then the lord said my spirit shall not abide in man forever for his flesh his day shall be 120 years the nephilim were on the earth in those days and also afterward when the sons of god came into the daughters of man and they bore children to them these were the mighty men who were of old the men of renown tell us what it means yeah let's just be real clear i do not want to be dogmatic on this there are a number in the evangelical world who i think i hate to be critical or pass judgment on their motivation but seriously i think many of them recoil at the supernatural dimensions of this story because they don't want to incur the disdain of the broader academic world you believe what you know you're obviously not a scholar because you don't have a critical mind and you don't realize there's a naturalistic explanation of what's happening here this is one of the reasons why i do so appreciate michael heiser i know you all have had him on your program because michael is unashamed unabashedly open about the supernatural dimensions of biblical christianity and that's what i most appreciate about his books but some would say that the sons of god here are the godly descendants of seth and the daughters of men or the ungodly descendants of cain i don't see that i think sons of god is used consistently in the old testament for again spirit beings we call them angels or whatever i do think that what we have here now there's so much behind him you know i know that michael would say that this was a second rebellion of spirit beings the first being satan's fall himself i would i'm more inclined to think that they had already fallen in that original rebellion and that these are a selective group of demonic spirits who has an expression of their perversity and their wickedness having observed how human beings reproduce through sexual relations aspired longed for lusted to experience that now of course many immediately push back they say wait just a minute doesn't jesus say that um we'll be like the angels we'll be like the angels who neither given or taken marriage and so on we know that the angels do not reproduce they are not a species like the human race that produces its own kind um as we do and my response to that is what jesus was talking about was the behavior of godly angels in heaven not the demonic ungodly behavior of demons on earth so i don't think that what jesus said there precludes the fact that demons could desire to enter into illicit relationships to as it were across the boundaries of the created order obviously there are there are there are barriers or divisions in in god's created order and here are spirit beings who crossed over that line as it were and desired to enter into these illicit physiological relationships with women that does mean and this is where it gets tricky that for whatever reason god permitted or or satan was able to produce the ability for these demons to assume human form and to engage in sexual relations with women and actually to reproduce according to their kind now i i know that that sounds really freakish to a lot of people and i have to admit it i thought you were a scholar sam yeah but i don't know how to get away from that and i think also in second peter and jude i think this interpretation is reinforced so i do believe that that is what happened if you ask me how is that possible i don't know it's a supernatural phenomenon and now another possibility that i've argued for in the past is that um that the sons of god here it's a reference to demonized humans in other words the sons of god being fallen demons inhabit or take up possession of human beings just like us and engage in these illest relationships and procreate according to their kind um that's a possibility sure um but it's probably not as likely or any of these views likely it depends on what kind of standards of judgment you're applying because i realize it sounds so outside the mainstream of how we think about ultimate reality but again i think that is largely due to the fact we have lost the the perspective of the supernatural dimension at all levels of of this world this universe in which we live um so yeah that now that's that's that's that's a quick survey i mean there are other theories that you know the sons of god were uh kings and they married beneath their uh level of authority and their status why would god flood the whole earth because of of that right and polygamy you know some of them say it's an expression of polygamy well polygamy was permitted although not endorsed throughout the old testament as well all the patriarchs yeah it just doesn't make sense this was something of such profound violation of the boundaries that god had created between the spirit being realm and the human realm that produced these um these offspring that it warranted uh severe judgment yeah love that so you mentioned the flood and this makes me think of first peter 3 which seems like maybe it could be referring to this story and this is the verse a few verses 18 to 18 and 19 maybe through 20. for christ suffered once for sins the righteous for the unrighteous that he might bring us to god being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit in which and here's the key part in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison because they formerly did not obey when god's patience waited in the days of noah while the ark was being prepared in which a few that is eight persons were brought safely through water so is this a reference to those angelic beings somehow i believe it is so they're they were put in prison and then i guess tartarus would that be correct so they were put in this spiritual prison type of place and then jesus went and preached to them can you walk us through the little mechanics there yeah this this is notoriously the most controversial passage in the new testament those are the ones we like to talk about on reddit i wrote a commentary yeah i wrote a commentary on first peter for the esv exposures commentary and so i've done a lot of work in this passage and for example my good friend wayne gruden believes that um that he's talking about jesus having preached to the people in noah's day through noah i don't that's what he thinks it is and he thinks the uh the spirits in prison are those of human beings who have died i i don't think that's it i think that what peter is saying here is precisely what you just suggested or what i suggested in light of genesis 6. i think that those demonic spirits those sons of god who committed to sin in genesis 6 were punished by god confined you know people say is there actual prison with bars and chain no he's using obviously human imagery and language to refer to the fact that god has confined them he has inhibited their activity they cannot do anything where that prison is we don't know i think trying to identify some sort of geopolitical find it with a compass maybe yeah in the in the belly of the earth you know had a lady call into janet parshall the other day and asked me is is tartarus in the middle earth you know or in the center of the earth he's in mordor actually i think i think that what what has been described here is yes those spirits that are in prison are these demonic spirits of genesis 6 that violated the boundaries that entered into illicit relationships with women that produced the nephilim and that what we are reading here is christ's proclamation of their judgment and their their doom at the time of his ascension to the right hand of the father and the reason for that is because let me just look at the passage again verse 19 in which i think is a reference to in his resurrected state in the realm of the spirit he went now some translations render that he descended and proclaimed to the spirits in prison the verb there he went is the same verb that is used down in verse 22 when it says he has gone into heaven so in verse 22 it's not he talking about a descent it's actually talking about an ascent into heaven he's talking about his resurrection and exaltation so i think verse 19 is describing not something that happened between the death and the resurrection of jesus in this disembodied state i think it's talking about what the resurrected christ did at the time of his ascension he went to this this spiritual prison and proclaimed his victory over the demonic forces the same victory we read about in colossians 2 11-15 and i think this was a way of encouraging the people to whom peter is writing say look you do not have to live in fear of the demonic jesus himself has pro has conquered them by his death and resurrection and at the time of his ascension to the right hand of the father he proclaimed his victory and you need to take strength and courage and confidence from that from that truth so i don't think the spirit's in prison here is a reference to all demonic spirits i think it's referring specifically to those who violated the boundaries that god had put in place back in genesis chapter six so he's like jesus is like talking trash on his way up to heaven there's a yeah i like the way you put it that sounds about right yeah uh so so uh we were talking uh we talked about categories and i'm curious um in particular on the names right we talk about names of demons right and in my entire christian life it was like don't ask a demon its name don't talk to the devil like that's a foolish thing to do right my entire christian life um but then you know i hear a couple of guys that i really respect talk about the spirit of jezebel right they named that spirit uh others will talk about the spirit of leviathan which i'm inclined to think is not a thing uh and you know and then i've got other people who come to me and they say hey i've had multiple experiences people i like multiple experiences with incubus and succubus and i'm like okay like that gets into the area of man i'm uncomfortable now i don't like this so what do we do with the naming is is is that that kind of those naming patterns that more like the kind of what they tempt in or their actual name does it matter well there are very few instances in which um in which a demon is named i mean satan has a number of different names obviously um in scripture angels michael and gabriel have names yeah yeah so it's reasonable to assume that all holy angels have names um but you know i'm thinking for example in the story again of the gathering demoniac where um i'm trying to say uh jesus mark 5 9 jesus asked him what is your name he said my name is legion because we are many so some have said we need to ascertain the name of every demonic spirit that may be harassing a particular individual i don't think that's i don't think that means we have to i think it's permissible if you think it helps uh maybe one out of ten times if i'm dealing with somebody who's severely demonically oppressed or even demonized uh i might seek to ascertain the name of that demon i don't think it's necessary in order to exercise full authority and help that person achieve real freedom um so again you know in the ancient world the idea is if you if you named something that that was a reflection of your authority over it and therefore gaining the name might tell you something about the nature of the demonic spirit you know in luke 13 jesus talked about a spirit of infirmity that's right um now i don't know that infirmity was its name right but certainly in that case it was a spear a demonic spirit that had caused that woman's uh problem and we see lying spirits in the old testament yeah yeah uh i don't i don't put a lot of weight on trying to ascertain um the name of a particular spirit uh or a particular demon like i said if you can get it if it helps you fine don't fret don't worry don't think that somehow your your authority is limited if you don't have it um i think that's pr i think that's pressing it too far okay that's good yeah that's good at the beginning of our time you talked about one of the reasons you wanted to write your book was because of the unbiblical approach that people have to dealing with spiritual warfare so we've touched on a few of those one of them was the kind of shouting down principalities in the heavens and one of them is maybe going overkill with the asking of names like you can do it but like this is not like this mandated thing you have to do every single time what what are some of the the unbiblical approaches that give you the most concern when it comes to dealing with the demonic this is a very if we end on this it's a very controversial one that probably you'll get a lot of wonderful a lot of pushback um i think one of the the things that bothers me is obviously i don't think a lot of christians uh give much consideration to the reality of spiritual warfare because they operate on the assumption that a christian cannot be demonized and i believe that a christian can be demonized i don't believe in demon possession by the way just so people know the words demonic possession occur nowhere in the bible it appeared in the king james version it came into christian vocabulary nowhere does it talk about demonic possession or satanic possession it talks about being diamondizimide demonized and in every case of demonization in the new testament and i demonstrate this in my book we're talking about a demon indwelling a person that is then subsequently cast out of the individual i think a lot of christians pay very little attention to this because they say well i'm a christian and you're a christian and therefore we can't be demonized so we don't need to worry about this there is no explicit text in the new testament that says either you can or can't be demonized as a believer uh there are a number of theological arguments people use and i respond to every one of those in detail in my book and none of them in my opinion hold weight i do think there are a couple of suggestions i mean the the luke 13 i mentioned jesus calls her the daughter of abraham does he mean just that she's jewish of jewish descent or is he talking about her spiritual heritage and she obviously was demonized by a spirit of infirmity we also have first corinthians 10 which i think is comes as close as anything in fact it might even be good for me just to real quickly read this first corinthians 10 most people aren't even aware of what this text says but paul's talking about the corinthians who were going to these idol temples these pagan temples and these feasts before they came to the local church and he used some very interesting language he says the cup of blessing that we bless is it not a participation in the blood of christ the word participation it's a greek koinonia a communing with a fellowshipping with the bread that we break is it not a participation in the body of christ then he goes on down a little bit further he says i am what i'm saying is that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to god i do not want you to be participants with demons same greek word so he's saying that communion when we come to the the lord's table we enter into a spiritual communion a fellowship where there's a partnering there's an engagement on a spiritual dimension of the human heart with the spirit of the risen christ through the holy spirit and jesus is saying or paul's saying when you go and you participate in these pagan feasts you're participating with you're communing with those demons in very much the same way that you then think you're going to commune and participate with christ in the holy spirit at the lord's table wow and he's talking to christians here yeah so that's a that's a very fascinating text that i and then of course there's the ephesians four uh when he talks about you know do not let the sun go down in your anger don't give a place to the devil greek word tapas we get our word topography from it it means a place a location he seems to be saying that if you live in unrepentant unforgiven sin you can provide a place in your life for the for the enemy to operate does that mean indwelling and again a lot of christians say ooh that feels too icky and too close maybe he can sit on my shoulder and speak words to me but um except that you can have indwelling sin romans seven right so if you can have indwelling sin why couldn't you have corrupt flesh right uh yeah there are all sorts of bad arguments for why a christian can't be demonized like well the holy spirit and the demonic spirit can inhabit the same body at the same time and i say wait just a minute the holy spirit's omnipresent he's everywhere so if the holy spirit and a demonic spirit can't dwell in the same location demonic experiences can't exist anywhere that's right i mean that's just there's just dumb reasoning people don't think through these arguments well um so i am concerned and i'm not saying that have i encountered people that i absolutely know without question were born again lovers of jesus yes who were demonized yes um it's not all the time it's not necessarily even frequent but it happens and i think sometimes our our resistance to that idea um has led some christians to play not so much fast and loose but basically just to casually dismiss the reality of spiritual warfare so let's let's pretend that we have a hypothetical situation where a couple christians uh have a group of friends that have been involved in cultish activity uh that have openly admitted to having levels of oppression in their life um they're gonna have a meeting okay people are gonna come over they're gonna get prayer pretty confident there's gonna be demonic activity how do we find out if there's demonic activity how do we address it what do we do in preparation for that activity how how give us the how to so you're you suspect that somebody has is demonically oppressed because they said so they've con they've talked about uh oppression they've talked about cultish activity they've talked about um uh dark forces in their life depression first thing i would do is shut up okay let's get quiet let's ask for the spirit's guidance and help okay and really say let's just quiet our hearts let's say spirit of god we need your help we need discernment because we can be easily duped and deceived and the enemy wants to uh to mislead us and so let's just quiet ourselves before you and ask if you would communicate through whatever means you might choose with any one of us here about what we're dealing with i think also one thing that i we will often do is i will immediately then say any demonic spirits that would seek to interrupt or to distract us we we command you in the name of jesus to depart we silence your voice in the name and the power of jesus by the virtue of the holy spirit who's in us so we ask for the spirit to speak and we tell the demons to shut up and then we begin to ask questions of the individual tell me about your experience what is it that you're that you're feeling when these episodes or these problems that you're confronting come upon you and then begin to deal with them and try to discern as best you can is this somebody who's just under oppression are they being harassed are these the you know the flaming darts of the enemy ephesians chapter six that kind of rained down on us or is this a case of somebody who has actually through unrepentant sin idolatry immorality actually in a way given access to the enemy into their life and sometimes you that takes a little bit of time sure and maybe the individual doesn't want to maybe they don't feel safe and they don't want to open up and say yeah man this is what i did i dealt with a young lady once who had uh she'd never had sexual relations before in her life she was a college student and her boyfriend brought her over to his mother's home his mother was a witch she said there's all sorts of occultic paraphernalia all throughout the house and she submitted to his advances and she lost her virginity in his mother's bed she wanted to know why she was having such tormenting dreams and such struggles i said i think you opened the door to the enemy he gave him a place a tapas ephesians 4 in your life and so we dealt with that and we were able to address it so sometimes you need the you need that clear honest vulnerable testimony of the individual to tell you what has been going on in their life what they might have done to have granted satan or the or a demon you know moral ground in their experience and then you address it you deal with it yeah so so if you have a person who's repenting and confessing and bringing the darkness into the light so you have you have that dimension and then you have the dimension that you're walking in your authority in christ when you command a spirit to leave do you find that if you've been given that those two situations that the spirit will leave or is there ever a scenario where it's like man this is really taking some work even though this person's repented they've brought it into the light i i seem to remember and i can't remember which story it is where like the the verb form that it uses to describe jesus casting out a demon it says it imperfect he was casting or he had been i guess it would be he was telling the demon to go which would be just it was over the course of time and which we kind of expect jesus he just goes be gone and it's gone right but like it doesn't seem to communicate which i can't remember which text that was i can't either right now but yeah it says jesus was was commanding the demon to leave and if we pray sometimes we've got to be careful those who are greek scholars watching this will obviously be saying wait a minute sam be sure and you tell warn them we need to be careful not to press greek tenses beyond what they intend at the same time let's not ignore them i think this is a case where it's significant i think it's telling us that jesus repeatedly was telling the demon to go so i tell people it's not so much tell the demon and it will go it's tell the demon until it goes um mark nine's the classic story when uh you know this father came with his son he said your disciples tried to cast out the demon that couldn't do it and that's when jesus basically said you know this kind has not come out by prayer some manuscripts read and fasting this kind you may be bumping up against an extraordinarily powerful demonic spirit some demonic spirits are more powerful more entrenched than others and i've bumped up against a few of those where it took multiple sessions in praying because it does involve also the individual the person who has to want to be set free and sometimes they are so they've become so accustomed to the life that they are living it's not so much that they welcome the presence of the demonic spirit but they have become accustomed to the kind of life that it has thrust them into they're comfortable with it they like the attention they get that's why jesus asked the man do you want to be healed what a dumb question sorry lord no some people don't want to be healed because they like the attention they get because of the affliction that they have um and they get healed and suddenly they have a responsibility to do things that before everybody else did for them the same thing can be true in spiritual warfare there may be somebody who has simply become accustomed i mean i dealt with a a young girl who had an imaginary friend and that friend brought great comfort you know wooed her to sleep at night overcame her bouts of loneliness well she had it was very likely a demonic spirit that had cast itself as an angel of light second corinthians chapter 11 or 10 or 11 10. um so yeah i don't know how i got off on that so yes the point being it's not always tell the demon to go and it leaves sometimes it's tell the demon to go until it leaves persist and persevere and the weakness in that scenario would maybe be would it be us walking in enough faith but but i guess jesus walked in enough faith so it's a very powerful demon so it's just when it's a really powerful demon sometimes it just takes a little longer it does i mean that's that's why jesus said uh to the disciples in mark 9 oh you have little faith i mean or maybe their confidence was in themselves rather than in christ maybe instead of like the 70 who cast out demons in christ's name they were casting out demons in their own name maybe they'd become presumptuous because they are apostles and we're also not told the process of like what was really taking place in that that little short verse where jesus was saying right because you know did the guy have some unrepentant sin and he's talking him through that and then he's casting the spirit out and then there's another spirit you know we don't we don't know the the four we have a story we have summations of what may be very long and complex encounters in the gospels yeah because that's what i find when i'm casting spirits out that you talked a lot about the interview component if we want to use that word that there's there's a finding out and an uncovering of the person's heart and sometimes there's a trauma and sometimes there is a sin that opens a door and there's something that hasn't been repented of there's unforgiveness there's all these things where i find and the same thing with with healing i find sometimes i can command or i can pray and it's done and other times there's this like deep unraveling yeah and i i can't really we don't get to decide i guess when that which is going to be is there ever um i think of the first was it not first corinthians uh it's second grade isn't it when when paul has a thorn in his flesh uh 12. um and in that passage uh there's this this thorn in his flesh which is as a demonic force it seems at least now is it physically afflicting him it's demonic messenger of satan what do we do with that if jesus is like or if the the lord is responding my grace is sufficient is it possible that we're supposed to endure demonic affliction i know we talk about healing as the even now and not yet is it ever god's will not to deliver someone from a demon no i don't believe it it's never never not god's will i always i i think god made use of a demonic spirit to afflict paul with a physical affliction i think it was a physical affliction i don't think god gave him a demon he said paul you know you just have to live with this this demon uh my grace is sufficient for you i don't think i can't imagine god would ever say that to a child of his no um but i think he did make use as he does many times in the scriptures certainly did in the old testament where god made use because satan is god's devil demons are subject to do his bidding and no more so yes god employed a messenger of satan a demonic spirit to afflict paul paul didn't have a demon but he had the some sort of physical affliction that was very painful distressing maybe offensive to the site and and god chose in that particular case and it's one of the only few that you find in the new testament where he basically said you're going to have to i want you to learn to live with this so that my power can be made perfect and made manifest in your weakness do you like the the kind of language of father filtered like when when jesus is speaking with peter hey um satan's come to me wants to wants to sit to you has asked permission and shift you like we and of course peter goes like you told them no right jesus like anyone would like you said you said no right and then he's like no no he's gonna sift you you know um is would you say that even though christians can be afflicted that any affliction that that that is allowed in their life is an affliction that the lord has provided a way of escape the lord is using it to strengthen the brethren that he's going to use this opportunity to bring glory and it's not going to be for the sake of affliction yeah either that or he's allowed it to come into our lives in order that he might be glorified by healing it right certainly also by giving us the strength and the endurance to persevere underneath it to show that in spite of the fact that i'm suffering terribly look at how worthy of my devotion god is that he could sustain faith and commitment uh in the presence of so much discomfort and pain and uh and sorrow so yeah the whole question of did god do it did satan do it you know it's like the the census in the old testament right uh it's like job did god do it or satan do it well satan did it but only because god gave him permission to do it same thing with the sifting of peter in that particular case the same thing with the thorn in the flesh sometimes we sometimes we just don't know whether this is something that's directly inflicted or imposed by god or is a demonic spirit i mean that this we don't have time what about covet 19 people ask me this is demonic this is satanic this is satan disrupting our lives and doing this or that and others say god sent this as an expression of his judgment he's trying to call us to repentance and i think maybe it's a little bit of both maybe they have different intentions for this phenomenon maybe there's a natural maybe it's romans 8 and the creation has been subjected to futility there you go yeah uh so i think we're probably at the part of our interview where we've got to do some closing thoughts what i'll do is i'll toss it over to michael and you kind of think of that that one last thing that golden nugget that you want to think about that you're gonna hey everybody's walking away from this this interview this is that that thing i want to leave you with that'll encourage you and i'll let michael just really drag it on so you have plenty of time yeah i i can't you want me to talk about the nephilim come on bro that's your closing thought nephilim i've got a i've got some closing thoughts man okay okay good uh you know i think it's that we have authority in christ we don't have to be afraid and we also don't have to over complicate this this is not like the 32 steps to casting out demons it's we have authority the like the step is casted out i mean there can be more than that there's help the person come to confession and repentance and and these kind of things but i think sometimes in the charismatic community we we over complicate things with our 92 steps i've now increased it to 92. see i'm a charismatic so but at the end of the day we we have authority and we don't need to be afraid and that authority is is not tied to me or anything i do it's tied to who jesus is and what he's done he's the conquering so we don't have faith in our steps we have faith in jesus there you go i love it so here's what i would leave people with um two verses in john's first epistle first john 5 19 is a is a stunning verse i'm looking at it right now we know that we are from god and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one think tease out the implications of that the whole world business economy politics athletics finance educational institutions the whole world lies in the power of the evil one but john says but we know we are from god and then balance that with ev the text everybody knows first john 4 greater is he who's in you than he is in the world amen so the whole world lies in the power of the evil one don't be terrified by that be alerted but be comforted by the reality greater is he who's in you the spirit of god than he who's in the world so some people take the first john 4 passage and ignore the chapter 5 passage some take the 5 19 passage and ex nor first john 4. i think we have to hold them both we have to embrace the reality of both of them that's awesome so uh for those of you who are out there watching man really encourage you to subscribe to the channel for coming out content just like this we've got episodes of dr heiser a couple of them we've got episodes on courts of heaven uh the very kind of address these kinds of issues and abuses in these areas and healthy areas i also encourage you guys to give on patreon we just had stephen bankers he's actually in the room he's about to tape uh here with uh stephen uh and uh uh uh anyway uh steven's gonna be on our channel doing a special patreon video if you wanna grab that make sure to click the link in the description you can donate as low as five bucks a month uh you can go on the donate there and we're also going to link uh sam's book here in the description so you can pre-order it i'm almost positive it's open for pre-order isn't it on amazon i haven't even looked okay i saw it the other day on amazon it's the most positive it's open for pre-order so i'm gonna drop that link in the description of the video um anyway it was it was an honor to have you as always uh really a lot of fun thanks for having me guys i always enjoyed it blessings guys we'll see you next time

Channel: The Remnant Radio

Views: 22,377

Rating: 4.9109945 out of 5

Keywords: Biblical teaching on the Demonic, biblical teaching on demons, biblical teaching on fallen angels, teaching on the demonic, teaching on demons, biblical teachings on the demonic, biblical understanding of demons, biblical understanding of the demonic, biblical understanding of fallen angels, biblical deliverance ministry, biblical deliverance, sam storms, spiritual warefare with sam storms, dr. sam storms

Id: X9pUfTYa-R0

Length: 73min 14sec (4394 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 19 2020