Rabbi Schneider - Why Don't People Think Demons Exist Today?
The reason I'm taking time with this is because this subject is not often taught on. And this is one of the most important subjects, beloved, in God's Word, especially in the New Testament because everywhere that Jesus went, he did three things. He preached the Gospel. He healed the sick. And he delivered those that were tormented by demons. Beloved, this is the three-fold ministry that Jesus demonstrated on earth. He preached the Gospel. He healed the sick. And he delivered those with demons.
We have to ask ourselves the question, has something changed? Is this still an important subject? In other words, if everywhere that Jesus ministered he was delivering people from demons, have things changed so that this is no longer happening on earth? Has Jesus changed? No, the Bible says he's the same yesterday, today and forever. Did the demons all disappear when Jesus rose to heaven? No, the Bible doesn't teach that anywhere. Has the nature of man and the problems of man changed? No, man is the same as he was 2,000 years ago. Therefore, we can only logically assume that even as men were struggling with forces of darkness 2,000 years ago as King Yeshua HaMashiach walked upon the earth and delivered them, so too today, King Jesus is still delivering those that are being harmed by the devil. The Bible says that Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil and to set free those that have been in bondage to him even their whole lives.
Now I encourage you to get this entire series and the resource available at the end of the broadcast today because this is not just a message that you want to learn about informationally, but this is a series, beloved, that God wants to use to train you. On last week's broadcast I talked about how demons occupy space physically, beloved, even in bodies. They can occupy space in our mind when we're obsessed with thoughts of worry, and fear, anxiety. I talked about that. They can even occupy space in the body, and we saw last week that sometimes people's physical illnesses, diseases, problems are caused by demonic origin.
I want to be very careful. I'm not saying, let me say it again, I am not saying that every sickness is caused directly by a demon, because the fact is, is that bodies ages and things wear down as the body ages. But I am saying that certain sicknesses we see in Scripture were actually being caused from the realm of darkness. There was a spirit that caused the sickness. And I talked about several examples on last week's broadcast; the woman that was bound for eighteen years. Jesus rebuked the demon that was in her, set her free. We saw the same thing with the lunatic. The boy was a lunatic. What did Jesus do? He drove the demon out.
Last week... I want to continue on now with a couple more Scriptures before we continue on through another path today. But hear the Word of God, two more Scriptures just to make the point known. I'm looking in Matthew, chapter number 12 right now, verse number 22 through 28. Hear the Word of God, and may it make entrance into your heart and mind: Then a demon-possessed man, get this now, who was blind and mute. I mean, if we're talking about demons occupying physical space, we see right here how a demon occupied the physical space of this man who was blind and mute, couldn't talk because of a demon spirit.
So listen again: Then a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute was brought to Jesus, and He healed him, so that the mute man spoke and all the crowd saw. Now listen in verse number 28. Jesus said, if I cast out demons, he's talking about the same episode here, he said, if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. So I want you to ask yourself the question, if 2,000 years ago we see plainly in the Word of God that certain sicknesses, and this is not the only one, I took you through several examples last week, that certain sicknesses in the Word of God in certain individuals were caused by a demon.
Is there any reason that we should assume that today certain sicknesses in certain individuals can have a demonic origin? That would make no sense to assume that no sickness today and no disease is being caused by a demon. That would absolutely be refuting the Word of God because we see in the days that Jesus walked upon the earth that he delivered many people that were struggling physically and the root of their physical struggle was a demon.
Now listen, as I said last week, I'm trying to help you today. This is not to scare you. We're not saying again that everyone that's sick has a demon at the origin of it. But I'm simply saying at times demons are at the root of sickness. Let's continue on, the Book of Job, chapter 2, verse 4 through 7: Satan answered the Lord and said, Skin for skin! Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. Let me just kind of put this in perspective here. God was so proud of Job because Job was a righteous man, and Job was walking before the Lord in righteousness and integrity. And Satan says, yeah, of course he's righteous. Of course he loves you. Of course he lives with integrity before you because you protect him on every side, and you've blessed him, and blessed him, and blessed him. Of course he loves you and praises you.
And Satan said to God, but take away his protection and let me put my hand on him and then we'll see what Job does. So the Lord agrees to let Job be tested. Let's look again, Job, 2, 4-7: Satan answered the Lord and said, Skin for skin! Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life. However, put forth Your hand now. Satan is saying to God, put forth Your hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh; he will curse You to Your face. Satan is kind of taunting God. Yeah, put something on him that will hurt him and let's see if he still loves you. So the Lord said to Satan, Behold, he is in your power, only spare his life.
Now get the next verse. Can demons cause physical illness? Listen to the next verse: Then Satan went out from the presence of the Lord and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head. So Job had painful boils all over his skin. And what was the root cause of those boils? It was the devil. And so beloved, we need to start transforming our mind to think like the Word of God says we should think. We just want to attribute everything to the natural. We don't want any type of, of, of theology that teaches the supernatural, some of us. Many believers that call themselves Christians, they reject the notion of demons. They reject the notion that Satan can cause sickness. They reject the notion that anything that's going on in their life could have a satanic origin to it.
To have that kind of a mindset, beloved, is to have an unrenewed mind, because the Scripture says our fight is not against flesh and blood but against principalities and forces of spiritual wickedness. And God is wanting to break through. He's wanting to break in. I know that I'm coming against right now some hardness of heart and some hardness of mind. And I'm coming against some pride. I recently met somebody in my travels and I asked them, what do you think of Jesus? And the individual answered and said to me, well you know, I'm kind of a scientist and I don't really believe in anything that I can't measure and test in a test tube. And I said, that's a big problem because look at those beautiful flowers right there. Where did that beauty come from?
And let me ask you this question. How is it that you have consciousness and the ability to love? Can you see that? Can you measure that in a test tube? And yet that's what's really real above all these other things around us that are fleeting away. No beloved, God wants us to have a supernatural mindset, not to be limited by circumstances and what the world tells us. And to have a renewed mind is to believe in the supernatural and to seize God's Word and not let anything else in. The first thing that Jesus did, beloved, after he came out of the Jordan River when he was baptized by John the Baptist, the first thing that he did was he was led into the wilderness by the Spirit of God, get it now, to be tempted by the devil for forty days and forty nights.
I want to ask you a question. If the devil tempted Jesus for forty days and forty nights, do you think the devil is gonna be inactive in your life? No, we need to put on the full armor of God, Paul says in Ephesians, chapter 6, so that we can stand against the schemes of the evil one. You see the devil is roaming to and fro the earth looking for somebody that's vulnerable, looking for someone that's ignorant, looking for someone that is blind to him, someone that doesn't know how to defend themselves. And what I'm endeavoring to do, beloved one, is to give you the pure Word of God so that you can renew your mind and recognize that you need to accept God's Word that was written 2,000 years ago as applicable and still applicable for your life today, that you're in a fight and I'm trying to help you to grasp this so that you can stand against the devil and break his power, beloved off your life.
Forgive me, but I just want to say it one more time. I'm not saying that a believer can be possessed by the devil, but I'm saying a believer has an enemy that wants to hurt them. And we need to walk in authority and power keeping Satan's power bound under our feet. And we can't do that unless we have spiritual enlightenment and understanding. And that's the point. Well In the Book of Matthew, chapter 8, verse 16 and 17, here is the Word of God. Listen to what we read: When evening came, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed. Notice that word many; not a few but they brought to Jesus many. The same thing is true today. This is a big problem. It's not a little problem. It doesn't just apply to people over on the other side of the world. It's all over the earth. This happened in Israel. The most sacred piece of real estate in the entire world, there were many demons.
So you think there's not many demons in America? Come on, let's believe God's Word. When evening came, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed; and listen now, he cast out the spirits with a word. I'm gonna be teaching you next week how to drive spirits out of your sphere of life, get it now, hear it, with, get it, a word. You see, God spoke the heavens and earth into existence. Why? How? By his word; the Word of God is living and active. And how did Jesus drive out the spirits? Get it now, listen, with a word. I'm gonna teach you in next week's broadcast how to break Satan's power off of your life and off of your sphere of influence with your words. Listen to this again: When evening came, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed; and He cast out the spirits with a word.
Now let's see how this continues on. Mark, 6, beginning in verse number 6 and then 12 and 13, speaking of Jesus: He summoned the twelve and began to send them out in pairs, get this now, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. Then he went out and preached that men should repent. And they were casting out many demons. Two interesting things, the ministry of Jesus continued on with his disciples. Did it stop when these twelve passed away? No, because the next thing he did is he commissioned the seventy. This is the on-going ministry of the church, beloved. He's given us authority over the realm of darkness and unless we realize that we're living in a world that's surrounded by spiritual darkness, we'll never ascend into the light properly. And notice also once again that these disciples, beloved, were casting out many demons.
Now we're gonna continue on, Ephesians, chapter 6. How does this apply to you and me? We see that they cast demons, Jesus and his disciples, off of other people, but does this affect you and I? Do we have a struggle? Again, I know I'm kind of reiterating and repeating but repetition is the motor of learning. Listen, Ephesians, 6:12: For our struggle, I want you to get that word. Whose struggle? Billy Bob's struggle? No. Aunt Martha's struggle? No. Aunt Jane's struggle? No, no. Whose struggle? Our struggle, you and me. He's speaking, beloved to you and I. He's speaking to believers. Hear it. Our struggle; is there a struggle? Yes. He just got done saying, our struggle. Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.
What does he mean by the heavenly places? He means in the realm of the spiritual world, not in the natural, not what we can see. Our struggle is not against what we see. It's at another level. It's in a different dimension. It's in a parallel reality. It's in the unseen world. The Bible says, the things that are seen are temporary, but those things that are unseen, beloved, are much more real. And unless we can renew our mind and understand that our struggle is in this unseen world that's real, here and now of spirit, we'll never walk on water in terms of living in a state of victory.
Let's continue on and see what Paul said in 2 Corinthians, 10, verse 3 through 6. Hear the Word of God: For though we walk in the flesh, Paul said, are you getting this? For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. He continues on: We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.
And so once again, what's Paul saying? That our struggle, our fight is in an unseen world; we're not warring according to the flesh. There's something more. There's something bigger that's going on, and unless we see who the real enemy is and shoot at the right target, we're not gonna be effective, beloved in gaining ground and obtaining victory in our life. We'll never get to the place where we're walking in peace. We'll never arrive at a place where we're walking in stability and we're firmly rooted. This is basic Bible teaching, beloved, but it's rarely being taught today. Now how does the enemy gain access to our minds, because in the Scripture that we just read Paul was talking about taking every thought captive? And so much of the spiritual warfare that you and I are involved in is in the realm of thought.
Listen what Paul said again, 2 Corinthians, 10:3: For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, but the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying speculations of every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God. And then he goes on: And taking, get it now, every thought captive. And so this war that we're in is predominantly in the realm of the mind, in the unseen realm of thought life. In other words, thoughts are things but we can't see thoughts, and yet they're involved in our thinking processes every day.
And so how do these demons gain entrance to our minds? In other words, how do they interject so that they can cause us to worry, and fear, and fret, and have false perceptions of reality, have a false understanding of what's really going on with the people around you, and your environment, and who you are, and who God is? How does this happen? Because when Satan comes in to deceive us, beloved, get it, he disguises himself as an angel of light. And how does he do it? He does it by trying to inject thoughts into our mind that we believe are coming from ourselves. Let me say it again. Satan is often times able to lodge himself into our thought life by introducing a thought to us that we think is our own.
Listen what happened in the Book of 1 Chronicles, chapter 21, verse 1. It says: Then Satan stood up against Israel, get this now, and moved David to number Israel. So David sinned by numbering Israel. But when David thought of that thought to number Israel, he didn't realize that it was Satan that was giving him the thought. He didn't realize it was evil. If he would have known it was coming from the devil, if he would have recognized it was evil, he wouldn't have done it. But he thought it was his own thought. And this is how Satan comes.
And I want to encourage you today that some of the thoughts that you and I think, beloved, they're not our own thoughts. You don't have to feel condemned by them. Recognize that some of the thoughts of fear, worry, violence, hatred, jealousy, these things that can occupy our thinking processes, these are coming, they're being interjected into our mind from the spiritual atmosphere around us. And listen, you're not guilty for having a thought. But there's a difference between a bird flying over your head on the one hand, versus allowing the bird to land in your hair and make a nest there.
Some of the thoughts that enter our mind, beloved, don't take responsibility for those thoughts. In other words, don't own those thoughts and don't feel guilty or condemned or defiled because you thunk those thoughts, because some of the thoughts that enter our mind are being interjected by the enemy. But on the other hand, if you dwell on the thought and put your arm around that thought, then you've allowed that thought to make a nest in your hair. So be very careful to guard your thought life.
On next week's broadcast I'm gonna teach you the secret of speaking a word to the thoughts that try to interject themselves into your mind that are not your own. And I'm gonna show you, beloved, the keys for gaining victory over the devil in your life. You're not gonna want to miss this broadcast, beloved. I take this very, very seriously. I've proven this through experience, and I've helped many others fight the fight into freedom. I love you today. God bless you. Thank you for watching Discovering the Jewish Jesus. God's got great things in store for both you and I. I love you, in Jesus's name. God bless you and Shalom.