Derek Prince - Stop Being Involved In The Occult
This is an excerpt from: Invisible Barriers To Healing
All right, we're going to go on. The next, which is terribly common today... The next barrier is occult involvement: Being in some way or having been involved in the occult. In things like fortune telling or Ouija boards or horoscopes or any of the innumerable different ways in which superstition and satanic cults have invaded our contemporary culture. Those are invariably a barrier to healing. And Ruth and I have experienced this innumerable times. People come for healing but there's some dark shadow of the occult still over their lives and it comes between them and the healing they seek. There are many forms of the occult. A lot of contemporary music hard rock and so on, is really satanic. It has demonic power in it. And if we've exposed ourselves to it we could need deliverance from it. Drugs.
I cannot take time tonight to make a list. I'm going to trust the Holy Spirit to show you. But let me just tell you one story. Ruth and I were in a certain place; we came to the point of ministering to the sick. And a young woman of about, I suppose 18 came up for prayer. And as we looked in her eyes we saw that glazed look which nearly always is the outcome of involvement of the occult. And so we wanted to help her before we prayed for her. I said to her, Have you been involved in the occult? She said no. I felt she was being honest. But I wanted to probe. I said, You haven't been to a fortune teller haven't played with a Ouija board? No, none of those. Have you had your horoscope read? No. And still there was this barrier.
And then God gave Ruth a word of knowledge. And she said rock music. And the girl went flat on her back without her praying for her. That was the barrier, you see. After that she could be healed. So, we are going now to do the next stage, we're going to renounce every contact with the occult. Before we do that let me read to you from Exodus 23. Exodus 23:24 and following. Now these are instructions from Moses to the children of Israel as to how they were to deal with the forms of worship and religion that had been in the land of Canaan before they came there. And Moses warned them they were to have no part whatever in such satanic practices. So, he says in verse 24: You shall not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do according to their works. But you shall utterly overthrow them and completely break down their sacred pillars. In other words there was to be no association with any of those kinds of occult practices.
Now, on the basis of that, Moses gives them these wonderful promises. So, you shall serve the Lord your God, and He will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from the midst of you. No one shall suffer miscarriage or be barren in your land. I will fulfill the number of your days. What wonderful promises. No barrenness, no miscarriages, no female problems, no sickness, a guaranteed full life span. Who wouldn't want that? But brothers and sisters, don't detach it from the context. It's only for those who break totally with the occult in every form.
Let me give you a very simple example. Years back I was in a typical Charismatic house prayer meeting. I found myself next to a young man who was actually from a Catholic background. And I was just talking to him. I said, Are you baptized in the Holy Spirit? And he said, Yes, but... Now, when anybody says yes but to that question you know what that but is, don't you? But I don't speak in tongues. So, I said, Another trunkless elephant! I didn't discuss this with him and I didn't have no plan. I just said, Did you ever go to a fortune teller? Oh, he said, yes, once when I was a boy of about 15. But I just did it as a joke, I didn't believe it. I said, You did go. He said yes. Would you be willing to acknowledge to God that that was a sin and ask Him to forgive you and release you from its consequence?
I don't think he was impressed by my arguments but more or less just to get me off his back he said okay. I led him in a little simple prayer: Lord, I confess that I went to a fortune teller. I should not have done it. I realize it was a sin, I ask you to forgive me and release me from its consequences, in Jesus' name. Then I put my hand on him and prayed for him and he spoke fluently in tongues. See, that was the invisible barrier. It's not just a barrier to the gifts of the Spirit, it's a barrier to healing.
So, tonight if you will cooperate and I can't do anything against your will, not even God can do anything against your will. If you will cooperate we will renounce all occult involvement. All right? Are you ready? I would guess that will cover 50 percent of the people in this auditorium. That would be my estimate, I may be wrong. But this is so subtle today. There are so many different ways. You can go into a souvenir shop and pick up some little idol and take it home as a little ornament. One other story because I'm not sure you're convinced how serious this is. Some years back in the United States I ministered to a lady who was a lady judge. She was a member of the supreme court of the state of Virginia. She had had some kind of intestinal problem for 10 years. She'd had surgery, she was never free from pain.
I was ministering to people in a Methodist church and I was putting people in the chair and praying for them, as I sometimes do. She was standing there and God's power was coming on them. I said to her, Are you ready? She said, No, I don't think so. I said, Well, when you're ready, let me know. About ten minutes later she said, I think I'm ready. I sat her in the chair held her legs; one leg was shorter, it grew out and God's power zapped her. She was out of this world for 45 minutes. She told me this personally. When she came to, for the first time in 10 years she was free of pain. Later she discovered this. When they operated on her surgically on her intestines they put metal clips in to hold things in place. When God healed her He removed the clips. There was no further evidence of clips. After that her lady friend in some competition won a free trip to Mexico for both of them.
So, they went down to Mexico for a vacation came back and the friend phoned my wife and me desperate. She said, This lady has just tried to commit suicide. Come over and help us. So, we went over posthaste and we started to talk to them. Apparently nothing had changed. I said, You've been down to Mexico. They said yes. I said, Did you bring any souvenirs back with you? And this lady said, Yes I brought one circular image. I said what was it an image of? The sun god. I said, That's your problem. You're under a curse because you've brought an accursed thing into your home. The Bible says if you bring that into your home you are accursed like the thing. She was woman of action. She got up went down into the basement, broke it in small pieces and put it in the rubbish can. She never had another problem. But it nearly cost her her life. That's how real this is.
See, God has an intense hatred of idolatry. I don't think we appreciate how the Lord hates idolatry. So, we're going to give you an opportunity. If you have ever been involved in the occult and you've never dealt with it in your life, if you've dealt with it, you're free. That's all right. But if you've never dealt with it we're going to give you this opportunity. We're going to let the Holy Spirit rest upon us for a moment and speak. He's got a very wonderful memory. He can take you back 20 years to something that happened. All right. Now I'm going to help you. I'm going to lead you in a prayer. But it must be on the basis of your own acknowledgment. I want you to say these words:
Lord, if I've ever been involved in the occult even ignorantly whatever it was I confess it as a sin. and I renounce it. I ask you to forgive me and I commit myself now that never again will I be involved in those things. Forgive me, Lord and release me from their influence. Right now, in the name of Jesus.