Who Has the Right to Guide Your Life?

Another common experience is that people are in a meeting where God is being worshipped in spirit and in truth. They're reaching out in worship, and somehow just when they seem near to touching God, some barrier seems to come down between them. I've heard many people tell me that. And I have almost always found that they've been to a fortune teller, almost invariably.

I remember a man of Catholic background who had come into the charismatic movement. He's a friend of mine today. A quite well-educated, intelligent man. And I was with him in some meetings and I said, “Are you baptized in the Holy Spirit?” And he said, “Yes, but…” And when people say, “Yes, but,” you know what that ‘but’ is, don't you? A trunkless elephant. “Yes, but I don't speak in tongues.”

I said, “Wouldn't you like to?” He said, “Yes.” But he said, “Somehow I just can't do it.”

I said, “Did you ever go to a fortune teller?” He said, “Yes, when I was a boy of 15, but it was just a joke. I didn't mean anything by it.” But I said, “You did go.” He said, “Yes.” I said, “Have you ever renounced it?” “Well,” he said, “not openly.” I said, “If I'll lead you in a statement of renunciation publicly now, will you follow me?” He said, “Yes.”

I led him to confess that as a sin and renounce it and release himself from it, put my hand on him, and he spoke fluently and effortlessly in an unknown tongue. The barrier had been removed.

Here is the unseen barriers that are binding and hindering the people of God: their ministries, their prayer life, their Bible study, their homes, everything. Dark, unseen barriers that have to be removed.

Alright, Elymas stood between the preachers of the gospel and the man in position of a political authority who needed to hear. And then, oh glory to God, this is a beautiful passage.

“Then Saul, who also is called Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost…”

Notice the faithfulness of the Holy Spirit. At this moment of conflict, the Holy Spirit refilled Paul so that he could deal with the situation.

And he said to this sorcerer, magician, practitioner of the occult, false prophet—listen to the language that the word of God uses—

“O full of all subtilty and all mischief, thou child of the devil, thou enemy of all righteousness.”

That is strong language. And it is true of every person in that category. They are full of subtilty and mischief, they are the children of the devil, and the enemies of all righteousness.

Now, I wouldn't want to be in that category.

After that, Paul told this man, he said,

“Now the hand of the Lord is upon you, a darkness and a mist shall come upon you, and you shall be blind for a season.”

And the man walked out of Paul's presence looking for somebody to lead him by the hand. And it says the deputy, the consul, believed, being astonished at the teaching. And I would have believed too, if I'd seen that, believe me. And I tell you, we need more teaching like that.

Alright, Acts 16, verses 16 through 18. In Philippi, Paul and Silas have been there, they've contacted the ladies’ prayer group in the city, they're going every day to the prayer group, and then Satan gets on their tail. Don has got a beautiful message on this. I wish I could give it to you, but it'd take too long.

“And it came to pass, as we went to prayer…”

Luke was included in this,

“a certain damsel, a slave girl, possessed with a spirit of divination.”

Now that's not a good translation. What the Greek says is this: having a spirit, a python. That's the word used in Greek. In fact, the word python comes from Greek. Now, the python is the snake that does not kill its victims by biting and poisoning, but by coiling itself around their body and crushing them to death. This slave girl had a spirit, a python.

It says in, in, in English, divination, a fortune-telling demon. She brought her masters much gain. When people lost things, they went to her, she told them where to find them. And I tell you, it did work. Satan has supernatural knowledge, and he makes it available. Things that a fortune teller will tell you do sometimes come true.

Let me tell you this story while I'm about it. I'm trying to get through, and God helping me, I'll be through by midnight, but… this is an example. You see, when you go to a fortune teller, you may not realize it, but you are going to a servant of Satan for help which you should seek only from God. And in doing that, you are really making Satan your god in the person of the fortune teller. And if you go and hear what the fortune teller says and believe it, you are really submitting to Satan's decree for your life. And that's when Satan gets power over you.

Now, I was in a service in Chicago, and a woman came forward and asked me to pray for her for deliverance. And I looked at her and said, “No, I won't pray for you because I believe you're a medium, and I won't pray for you.” So she went away, and about six weeks later, she came back and said, “I've repented. Pray for me.” Well, I was far from convinced that she had repented, but I thought, I can't refuse on that basis. I began to pray for her, and I prayed and several spirits apparently left her.

And I was getting somewhat tired, so I just leaned against the altar, the woman standing by me, and while I was leaning there, she looked at me and she said, “I see you in a car, and it's wrecked against a tree.” And praise God, I was on the alert. That was Satan's decree for me. I said, “You divining spirit, I reject that. I do not receive it. I don't intend to be in any car that's wrecked against any tree, in the name of Jesus.”

But had I said, “Oh, I'm going to be in a car that's going to be wrecked against a tree,” I would have submitted to Satan's decree for my life.