Skip to content Reversing Addiction Curses Oct 14 · 42 min ...more
October 14, 2022 · 42 min · Overcoming
...more Show the full description Show less Support this leader Liking this video? Support this ministry.
Support this leader
Liking this video? Support this ministry.
Give
Support this leader Liking this video? Support this ministry.
665K followers
Dr. Tony Evans is the founder and senior pastor of Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas, founder and president of The Urban Alternative and author of over 100 books, booklets and Bible studies.
665K followers
0:01 A POW is a prisoner of war. It is a person who has been captured by the enemy, who is held hostage in the context of a0:13 conflict. It is where the opposition or the enemy now controls the movements, the actions, the reactions of the0:24 person who has been captured. Many Christians are POWs, prisoners of spiritual warfare.0:37 They have been captured by the enemy and there appears to be no way of escape. They feel trapped by situations and circumstances0:50 that the world calls addictions. Whether it's drugs, sex, pornography, alcohol, codependency, gambling, food, or what have you. They feel1:02 trapped and there seems to be no way out. They find themselves in a sort of quicksand where the harder they try to get1:14 out, the deeper they sink in. And there is this feeling of being cursed or if I were to use another word, this doom or gloom1:25 that hovers over them. So today I want to talk about reversing the addiction curse. Paul says1:37 in second Corinthians chapter 10 verse 3, 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, but1:49 divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. The word fortress was used of a walled area2:02 or a fortified place that a person couldn't escape from. In biblical days, a prison was called a fortress. A tomb was called2:14 a fortress where a person was trapped, locked up, or contained with no visible means of2:25 escape. We're told in verse 4 that fortresses must be destroyed. Now,2:37 a biblical word for fortress, the secular world calls it an addiction, is the word stronghold. That's the spiritual synonym2:49 for the worldly world of addiction because somebody is trapped with something they can't overcome. What then is a fortress?3:01 An addiction or, to use a spiritual terminology, a stronghold. It is a negative pattern of thought which has been burned into our minds3:13 creating as a mindset a situation as unchangeable even though it is against the will of God. A3:25 fortress, addiction, a stronghold, is a pattern of thinking that has been burned into our minds that accepts3:37 a situation as unchangeable and unfixable even though our conclusion about it goes against the will of3:49 God. It is the feeling of hopelessness that you have regarding the stronghold that you or someone you know happens4:00 to be trapped in. You can hear a person describe their stronghold because they will always say something4:12 like, I can't help it. I can't stop it. I can't change it. I can't fix it.4:24 What they're saying is, it's got me. I don't have it. And when that stronghold really becomes prolific in the life of the individual, and I'm talking about Christians here4:36 specifically, then what happens is that they begin to identify their personhood by the stronghold. They will say, well, I am a4:48 alcoholic. I am a compulsive gambler. That thing has become so strong that now they don't know how to talk about themselves5:00 without describing themselves as that thing. They begin to believe what they say they are.5:12 In the Bible, a stronghold is more than gambling. It is the spirit of gambling. It is more than pornography. It is the spirit of5:23 immorality. It is a spiritual reality that is infusing, this burning process upon you, and that is5:35 why if you are not able to address the spiritual cause, you're not really fully addressing its manifestation in the life. So a5:46 stronghold is a pattern that has been burned into your thinking so that you view as unchangeable a situation. And you know you're in it because there is5:58 hopelessness about it. Now if we're gonna cure it, whatever it is for you or me or us or others, then we need to understand the cause of6:10 it. If we're gonna cure it, then we've gotta understand the cause of it. And perhaps what I shared with you today about reversing the addiction or stronghold curse, you will be able to6:22 utilize with someone in your family or some friend who has been trapped. They've gone to 12 step everything and have found no release6:34 from their situation. Well, let's look at the cause. He tells us in verse 5, we are destroying6:46 speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God and are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. At the end of verse 4, he says we must destroy6:57 fortresses or strongholds. Beginning of verse 5, he says destroy again, but then he says what you must destroy is not the thing itself. He7:09 says, what you must destroy are speculations, knowledge, and thoughts. In other words, the problem is not in the habit.7:21 The problem is in the mind. The habit is the expression of the thinking. To fix the habit, you've gotta fix the thought.7:32 So simply telling a person you should not do that is not enough. Because unless they've changed their thinking about the it that is controlling7:44 them, the it will keep controlling them. He says, what you must destroy if you wanna get rid of the fortress are the speculations, knowledge,7:56 and thought patterns that are the spiritual impetus behind the fortress being built in the first place. And all of those things,8:08 speculation, knowledge, and thoughts, arrive in the mind or the thinking. How does it get there? He tells you here in a very picturesque word8:20 that can change our lives. He says in verse 5, we are destroying speculations and every lofty thing. There it8:32 is. The cause of fortresses or strongholds is a lofty thing. Now the question is, what is a lofty thing? Well, let me give you8:44 a synonym for the word lofty thing. A synonym for the biblical word lofty thing is the word partition. Partition. A lofty thing was8:55 a partition that had been lifted up. He says, if you're going to overcome the fortress stronghold, or to use the popular word addiction,9:07 you must get rid of the petition. The petition in the mind. When a person is controlled by an addiction, stronghold, or fortress,9:19 it is because a petition has been raised up in their thinking. As long as that petition is up, the fortress will9:31 stand. But when the partition is dismantled, the fortress loses its authority. So rather than getting rid of the9:42 habit, we gotta get rid of the petition. The question is, well, what's the petition? Well, in a number of our rooms in our sanctuary, the classrooms that are in our9:54 sanctuary, they are the size of 2 rooms, but there is a partition that can be brought down in the middle10:07 so the 1 room can be made into 2 rooms because we can slide a lofty thing, a partition. This high rise separation down the10:19 middle of the room blocking the 1 room from being 1 room, but turning the 1 room into 2 rooms. There's only 1 reason we do that. We10:31 do that to decrease the possibility that the information being given on 1 side passes through10:43 to the people sitting on the other side. In other words, we pull a partition because we don't want a disturbance. We don't want the group meeting over here to10:55 infiltrate the group meeting over there. We want them to be 2 separate meetings with 2 see, if it was 1 meeting, we wouldn't need a partition. We only need a partition because there's a double meeting going11:06 on, and we don't want the information flow to be free. We want to block the information. The way Satan creates a fortress, stronghold,11:18 or addiction is by creating in the mind a lofty thing that is a partition. What is the partition designed to11:30 do? It is designed to block the flow of the knowledge of God from entering into the thinking of the saint who is11:42 living in the fortress. It wants to block out the free flow of spiritual truth crossing over into the thinking of the11:53 person in the fortress so that the person in the fortress stronghold or addiction feels like they are trapped. They're on this side of the room. There's a petition. The information can't go12:05 forward, but they're on this side trying to fix the problem. But the information they need is being blocked so that it will not pass through. So that's why there is no12:17 victory to be had. Satan must erect a lofty thing. Many of you on your televisions12:29 have PIP, picture in picture. That means that you can be looking at your show and you can bring up in the corner of the screen12:42 another channel. And you can be watching a movie and looking at a football game. You can have a picture in picture. So you're watching a movie, you listen to the12:53 movie, but you wanna catch whatever's happening in the game or the basketball game or the tennis match. And so up on the side, there is a picture in picture. Usually, the13:05 picture in picture is not the main show. The main show is on most of the screen. The picture in picture is simply another show that you want to13:17 glance at while you're watching the main show on the television. For many of us here this morning, you have come to church this morning for a picture in picture.13:29 You're gonna come and you're gonna hear spiritual information, spiritual truth, spiritual songs, but it's not the main show. And when you leave here today, you will go to the main show.13:42 You will go back to work and family and the life and day to day struggles, day to day, and and you will have spent your 2 hours of you will have had on on the screen a look at spiritual things,13:53 but the spiritual things won't control the show. And so you'll wonder why why there was no carryover to the main screen. And the reason why there was no14:05 carryover is because of a lofty thing. That is a partition in the mind that blocks the flow of the truth taking root14:17 in the life. Now now how does he do this? How does Satan do this? Well, first thing he does is he shares his thoughts with you.14:29 He shares his thoughts. Remember what he did with Eve? He came to Eve and he said, half God said. The first conversation between a human being and the devil was about God. Half God said. He raised14:41 the question, had a discussion, and by the end of verse 6 of Genesis 3, she was believing his story. You know, when when you burn14:53 a CD, what you do is you take the music or the movie and you pass it on so that on the other disc it has precisely what was15:05 on the original disc being burned into it so the copy is precisely the content of the original. What Satan does is burn15:17 into our thinking his thoughts so that we think his thoughts after him until they're burned so deeply, they become our thoughts.15:28 So his thinking, which starts as a suggestion, turns into a way of thinking, which turns into a way of operating because he15:40 has burned his thinking into us creating the actions that result from the thought. Now the Bible has a word for this15:52 partition. James 1 calls it double mindedness. Petition. Petition. Remember, got 2 rooms now. Not 1. Double.16:04 But it's not just double anything, it's double mind. So, speculations, knowledge, thoughts. There is a partition in the mind that produces a double mind.16:17 2 ways of thinking. See, the problem among Christians, most Christians, is not that they reject the divine way. It's16:29 just that's not the only way. There is another way. So they have 2 ways of thinking because they've got a partition. You hear it16:41 in the phrase secular and sacred. That's a partition. Man's way, God's way. That's a partition. God says, but I16:52 think. That's a partition. A partition is simply having 2 views of the same subject.17:04 It is a Berlin Wall. Remember when the Berlin Wall was up, the East couldn't go West, the West couldn't go east. The17:16 2 could never work it out because there was a lofty thing, a wall, a partition that divided the same group of people, Germans,17:28 east from west, so there could never be unification and flow. The people in the east were trapped. They couldn't go west. People in the west were trapped. They couldn't get to their17:40 families back in the east. And you know the reason why? Cause there was a lofty thing, a wall that had been erected. It's double mindedness.17:52 What is double mindedness? Simply double mindedness is having a human view and divine view both operating in the same mind.18:04 Man's way, God's way. You got both of them. And they're trying to work it out. Once you create a double mind, the Bible says in James18:15 chapter 1, let not that man think he will receive anything from the Lord. Once you create a 2 tiered view, you build a18:27 lofty thing, a partition of the mind. There can be no victory to the trap that you're in because God will never18:38 cooperate with a view that compromises him. Never ever ever. So so that means you are now left to your own resources to fix your problem.18:50 I watched a very interesting movie. Some of you may have seen it, and it was the exorcism of Emily Rose. Anybody seen that movie? The exorcism of Emily Rose.19:02 Yeah. It's a very, very interesting movie. If you get a chance to see it, see it, this demon possessed person, and they're trying to get rid of this demon. Okay? This demon is the spirit is19:14 controlling this person, and they're trying to get rid of the demon. And so they're trying everything to get rid of this demon, but they've got to control the girl from having these19:26 violent episodes while they're trying to get rid of the demon. So what they give the girl is a medication called Gamatrol. And they give her this Gamatrol, and when they give her the19:37 Gamatrol, what they said was, The problem is, when we give her this medication, it blocks the ability for us19:49 to get it makes her calm down, but it blocks the ability to us to get to the deeper root because the medication kinda creates a different20:01 mindset so that she is not able to fully function on the exorcism that she ultimately needs. See, a lot of people settle for stuff that makes them feel better, but doesn't get20:13 to the root of the issue that's spiritual that you gotta get to if you're trying to solve the problem long term, so they settle for short term solutions20:25 by creating a double mind. 2 ways of thinking. Paul says in verse 3, we walk in the flesh, but we don't war according to the flesh.20:37 In other words, we live in our human bodies, but that's not how we do battle. That's not how we get victory. That's not how we get deliverance from fortresses. We don't get it that way.20:50 We don't get it by the flesh. The opposite for the flesh in the Bible is the spirit. You can't mix the 2. And the problem is today, fortresses exist because of illegitimate21:01 mixtures. There's been a faulty mixture. Faulty mixture in marriages, a faulty mixture in finances, a faulty mixture in desires, a fault21:13 there's been a faulty mixture. And because there's this faulty mixture, there's this partition. And the partition blocks the flow of God's victory,21:25 freedom, and deliverance from the fortress that holds you hostage. Peter ran into this in Matthew 16. Jesus was telling his disciples he had to go to Jerusalem, he had to die. And Peter21:37 said, oh, God forbid. God forbid that you would go to Jerusalem and die. He says, no. We we can't have that. Guess what Jesus said? Get thee behind me, Satan. He21:49 didn't say, Peter, you're wrong. He said, you're thinking like the devil. In fact, he goes he says, get thee behind me, Satan. He says, because your concern is not the concern of God. Your concern22:01 is the concern of man. But he says, get thee behind me, Satan, because he knew that that comment, which was well intentioned, by the way, don't go to Jerusalem and die. I don't want you to die.22:12 That was a great intention, but it was not in keeping with the will of God, but it was the way he was thinking. And Jesus said, that's the devil talking through you. You ever said to a person you know, you ain't22:24 nothing but the devil? You could be correct. Elijah asked in first Kings chapter 8, how long will you halt between22:36 2 opinions? How long will you operate with this divided mind? Everybody this morning is probably right now fully Christian,22:51 Fully biblical. Fully spiritually oriented. You are 100 percent right now in the spirit realm. But when you leave here and23:03 go back to the other side of the room, a partition will go up, and you will say, well, that was Sunday. That was church. That was religion. Now let me go to the real world.23:15 Once you lift up that partition, you have blocked the spirit's ability to fix whatever is wrong. Once you lift that up, it blocks it23:27 because that man cannot think he will receive anything from the Lord. So now that we know the cause, what's the cure for this curse of addiction23:39 strongholds? What begins to change it? Please notice at the end of verse 4 he says well, let me read verse 4 again. For the weapons of our warfare, the23:51 tools we use, are not of the flesh, that is humanly oriented or conceived, but divinely, God, powerful for24:02 the destruction of fortresses. So the first thing we want you to know is fortresses must be destroyed, not remodeled.24:14 They must be dismantled. In other words, the partition in the room must be removed. You you can't don't don't see, because if you keep the partition in the room, you're gonna be tempted24:26 to use it. You gonna be tempted to pull that thing out again. He says, no. The petition must be destroyed, and in the process of destroying24:38 the petition, we must destroy, verse 5, speculations, every lofty thing raised up against knowledge of Christ, and we are taking every thought captive, thought, thought,24:50 thought, thinking mind, captive to the obedience to Christ. Now, let me tell you a secret. If you're told25:02 you have skin cancer, skin lotion is not your solution. Now, it may seem like a solution because it got skin on it.25:15 But skin lotion is not your solution to skin cancer because it doesn't have the potency to address the problem. If you have a brain tumor,25:27 taking 2 aspirin and lying down, that that's not your solution because it does not have the power to address the problem. It's25:39 obvious whatever solution you've been trying is not the solution because it hadn't solved anything. So maybe the problem is a partition. Now let me tell25:51 you how the devil has to work this. This will help us to understand why this there's gotta be destroying of fortresses. The devil has a kingdom. It's called the kingdom of26:02 darkness because that is the only place where he can function. In other words, he cannot function in this kingdom called light. He26:14 cannot because that is foreign to his nature. So for him to control you and to control me, guess what he's gotta do? He's gotta drag us to his26:26 kingdom. See, he can't come over on this side and make it work, so he's gotta get us on his side. And how does he do that? Well, the Bible says he's a liar and the father of lies.26:38 He's gotta instill a non truth within you, but make you think it's the truth. So he functions, the Bible says, as an angel of light, but he functions as an angel of26:50 light, making him look like the real thing, only to get you to operate in the realm of darkness. And so that is how he tries to control us. There is only 127:02 thing that can beat a lie, and that's the truth. There's only 1 thing that can beat a lie, and that's the truth. And you shall know27:14 the truth, and the truth shall set you up. Now what that means is if you're not free and I'm not free,27:26 either we don't know the truth or are not utilizing the truth that we know, or God is a liar. So if God is not a liar, because by 2 immutable things it is impossible for God to lie,27:37 that means that a fortress or a stronghold for which is holding us hostage, which means we're not free, is either we don't know the truth or we're not utilizing the truth that we know.27:50 Let's try to illustrate it this way. A great biblical illustration. Great biblical illustration. In Joshua chapter 6, the walls of Jericho28:02 come tumbling down. It's a fortress. It's a walled city. It's a stronghold. It is a stronghold that Israel is too weak to capture.28:14 They can't capture it because everybody's protected in the walls. If they storm the walls, they're gonna die. The question is, how do we take down this28:26 stronghold, this fortress called Jericho? God comes up with an incredible idea that sounds, on the face of it, dumb.28:39 He tells them, here's what I want you to do. I want you to walk around the city once a day for 6 days. Then I want you on the seventh day to28:51 walk around at 7 times, the number of completion. Put the Ark of the Covenant out front. Put the priest out front, and that's all I want you to do.29:04 Say what? What kind of military strategy is that? That sounds like somebody who doesn't know how to fight, coming up with an idea like29:15 that. That doesn't make sense. Joshua, who's the military leader, now has a choice. Since what God29:27 just said doesn't make sense, let us lean to our own understanding of how to fight. Because because what God just said is crazy. You29:39 know, nobody fights by walking around a wall exposed to the enemy like that. They all know we're here. There's no surprise there. Nobody fights like that. So since God obviously doesn't know what he's doing,29:51 let's lean to our own understanding. Or as Joshua said, God is God. It doesn't make sense, but let's do it God's way and let's see what happens.30:02 Now, you got all the soldiers walking around Jericho. Okay? Can you imagine if you are a citizen in Jericho or30:14 part of the government of Jericho or part of the military of Jericho looking out at these fools? Because that's what they had to be thinking. These folk are30:26 crazy. These folk are they're walking around the wall. They had to look stupid. Now now now30:37 you laugh, but I'm getting ready to come down with something. K? When you pull out the petition and the knowledge of God has free flow, you're gonna look stupid30:49 too. Because you are not gonna make sense to people. Because many of the things God will request or require you to do will31:01 not be what you think is right, will not make sense, will not be what you would prefer. It certainly wouldn't be what your friends would do, but God is saying, what you gonna do? Are you gonna lean to31:13 your own understanding, or are you gonna let my information flow? Please notice something. Verse 6.31:26 And we are ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is complete. Somebody didn't read that. Let me read it again. And we are ready to punish all disobedience when31:37 your obedience is complete. What do you think the word is I want to 0 in on? Complete. See, the31:49 reason why the fortresses still stand is because we're doing some of what God said. The destruction does not occur. The32:00 victory is not achieved until the obedience has been completed. You can't do 1 third of it. You can't do 2 thirds of it.32:13 You can't do 9 tenths of it. You must complete the instruction before the supernatural is engaged. When they walked around once on the first day, ain't nothing32:24 happened to those walls. When they walked around on second day, third day, fourth day, fifth day, sixth day, walls still standing. They still look like fools. They walk around once on the seventh day, twice on the32:35 seventh day, 3 times on the seventh day, 4 times on the seventh day, 5 times on the seventh, 6 times on the seventh day. Nothing's happening because they weren't finished. Remember, 7 is the number of32:46 completion. It you must finish it. When they walked around the seventh time, he said, now I want you to let out a shout. And the people32:58 began to shout in praise. And when the people began to shout in praise, cracks were walking all through the walls, and the bricks began to shake, and33:11 all of a sudden, the fortress that had been there for years that was strong and vibrant and looked like it was never gonna change came crumbling33:22 down because God's spirit intervened when obedience was finished. Your obedience must be complete.33:35 You can't do a part of it. Part of the problem for most Christians is they, well, I read my bible. I study, I pray, I go to church, and nothing's better. What is unfinished? There's33:47 something unfinished. There's something unfinished whenever you are hostage. There is a something that has not been complete in what God has asked us to do causing us.33:59 You say, but I don't feel like this will work. I suppose the IRS man said, I don't feel like you pay taxes. No, I just don't feel it. I'm looking at your34:11 face, You don't look like a person who's paid taxes. I just don't feel you've done it. You're going to say, Wait a minute now. Wait a minute. Here's my canceled check.34:23 At the point that you give the evidence, it's irrelevant how the opposition feels because you've now got legal record. See oh, there's so much here.34:35 You have to understand, As a believer, if you are a Christian, you possess legal authority in the spiritual realm. But the moment you go to the human approach, you lose your34:47 authority. There's no power there. The devil loves to see you pull the petition cause he knows the power of God won't flow that way. It won't go through it. Cause God will not do that. He will not mix and match34:59 with you. Whenever there's somebody on drugs that I know and and I can get them there, I send them up to a group in New Jersey.35:09 This is the most unique place.35:12 You come in with your drug problem, and they start off just the opposite. You are not a drug addict. If they're a Christian, you are not a drug addict. You are a blood bought child35:23 of the living God who already has been given victory over drugs. That's who you are. Now you know what they have to do now? Every time they run into somebody that day who's35:35 in this drug rehabilitation program, that's how they have to identify themselves. Not as a drug addict, but as a blood borne child of God who already has victory over drugs. All of a sudden,35:47 after a week or 2, they begin to believe that. You know why? Because they have thought it. The Bible calls it meditation. You know what meditation is? It's fantasizing. That's all. Meditation is35:59 fantasy. Just just dreaming it up over and over and over again in your mind. David said, I I I meditate on your word day and night. That's all it is fantasizing. So he would just fantasize about his new state and and,36:11 you know, and his new state, and then they would memorize scripture and then have to quote scripture to each other. They have a 75 percent success rate for drug addicts36:22 within 6 months of the time that they come there, no matter how long they've been on drugs, and all they use is the Bible. That's all they use. Because36:37 they understand that the action is not the problem. It's the mind that's the problem. The action is simply the expression of the problem. But we don't do36:48 that. We don't meditate that way. We don't rehearse what God says. We spend all our time on the telephone rehearsing what people think, And we wonder why37:01 nothing's changing. Because there's no power in human thought when it comes to a stronghold because a stronghold is spiritually based. I was trapped37:13 in an elevator. And that's an uncomfortable feeling in a high rise when you're trapped in an elevator because you're talking about a stronghold,37:26 a small space stronghold. Okay? The immediate reaction when this thing stopped between 2 floors this is a number of years ago, but37:38 when it stopped between 2 floors was panic because we were trapped, stuck, couldn't get out. We were panicking.37:49 There were a couple of reactions. Some people were crying, help, help, help, help. Nobody hearing nothing. Nobody hearing a thing. Now were they sincerely crying out? Yes. Were they begging for help?38:01 Yes. But it wasn't wasn't working. Other folks were banging on the door. Babe, babe, babe, babe, babe, Ain't nobody hearing that. But desperate people are gonna do desperate38:13 things, and they were crying out. There was 1 calm man on the elevator.38:31 I simply walked to the other side, pulled out a latch, picked up38:43 the telephone, waited. A voice said, Is there a problem? I said, We're trapped on the elevator between this floor and this38:55 floor. Can we38:56 get some help? We'll be right there.39:01 See, everybody forgot about the phone. Everybody forgot about the phone. And we were so into being trapped39:13 that we forgot there's a phone linked to the fire station or the security department, and merely by picking up the phone, we were released from our hostage. All the human effortShow more
34:53
The Prison of the Past Tony Evans
Comments No comments yet. Start the conversation.
Comments
Keep it kind. Comments are public.