release to the captives

Don Williams begins chapter 7, Release to the Captives, of Start Here with this quote from Father Francis MacNutt, "if you want to start a worldwide ministry, just heal a few people." The church today has lost the plot. I'm quite sure the fray between Evangelical, Emergent, Seeker, Charismatic, etc. would not exist if any of these had a real understanding and manifestation of the Kingdom of God. As I read each "side's" argument against the other I see truth because the truth is that many (too many) of us have simply fallen short of living life in the Kingdom. In the absence of that, we have created systems within our personal ability to attain to try to substitute. We create citadels of theology. We become social saviors of the world or even "go green". We reach out to everyone and anyone and "just love them as they are." So on and so forth. All of this seems right and motivated from a desire to live rightly but in the end it simply falls short.

Along the way we somehow lost the ability to proclaim the Gospel of the Kingdom and even to recognize the true fruit thereof. Irenaeus wrote in the second century:

Wherefore, also, those who are in truth, His [Jesus'] disciples, receiving grace from him, do in his name perform [miracles], so as to promote the welfare of other men, according to the gift that each one has received from him. For some do certainly and truly drive out devils, so that those who have thus been cleansed from evil spirits frequently both believe [in Christ], and join themselves to the church.

In a few weeks I lead our weekly outreach to serve some of the poor around us. It is right to do. I'll not not do it. But I will do it with a budget and some humble willing workers who genuinely care. But I wonder how many of us expect God to take that amount of purchased material and multiply it? How many of us expect that as we interact with someone in the community and someone receive a miraculous healing through prayer? How many of us anticipate encountering or even recognizing a demon and by the power of Jesus casting the thing out? Sure, we need not stop but we need in our own way we also have lost a bit of the plot. We have gotten into a routine and it doesn't look like the Kingdom Jesus proclaimed.

Williams again ...

In the first five chapters of Mark's Gospel, there are 22 references to Satan or demons. Jesus said that He had come to bind the strong man (Satan) and plunder his house (Mk 3.27). In Luke 11.20, Jesus says, "But if I drive our demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come to you." In Acts, Peter tells a Roman officer how "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him" (10.38). In Romans, Paul says, "The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet" (16.20). John says, "The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work" (1 Jn 3.8). This is the Kingdom come.

Williams then offers several practical steps to prepare for this battle. Unfortunately he did not go into detail but I think they are easily studied through Scripture.

1. Arm for battle (Eph 6.10-17)
2. Know the Word of God
3. Be wise with your vulnerability to spiritual attack (i.e., take a moral inventory and confess known sins. Keep this confession current. 1 Jn 1.9)
4. Build accountable relationships
5. Renounce all idols
6. Forgive all
7. Pray for protection against the enemy (Eph 6.18-20)
8. Pray for discernment of spirits (1 Co 12.10)
9. Bind evil spirits
10. Submit to spiritual authority
11. Clean up (i.e., clean up your heart, your house and yourself)
12. Seek help

He then emphasizes a keep point in addition to the list above - stay committed to community. A key aspect of the Kingdom of God is that is functions in community. Our call is not as lone rangers or individual stars.

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