When The Devil Meets You | Pastor Shane Idleman

Shane Idleman: I'll run to somebody, "Why don't you come?" "I want to hear a message." Why do you want to hear a message when you can grab the heart of God? You're going to listen to a man? You can listen to a man for the next 50 years, but five minutes in the presence of God will change you. That's what you need. My job is to point you to the man. My job is to build that hunger, build that desire, build that thirst so you get home and you're desiring more of God. That's what he has called me to do. That's the mandate on this church. It's a little bit different than other churches. I got it. I'm not worried about other churches.
Guest (Male): Thank you for joining us here at Westside Christian Fellowship, located in Leona Valley, California, one hour north of Los Angeles. Today on Regaining Lost Ground, we hear part one of this grounding message titled, "When the Devil Meets You." Leonard Ravenhill once said, "The self-sufficient does not pray. The self-satisfied will not pray. The self-righteous cannot pray. No man is greater than his prayer life." Today, Pastor Shane brings the truth with all power and authority against the enemy of our soul, encouraging us to be actionable in this: "Greater is He that is in us than he who is in the world." Walk this today right here on Regaining Lost Ground. You can hear the whole message at Pastor Shane's YouTube and Rumble channels. Make sure to subscribe today. For more information, visit us online at westsidechristianfellowship.com. We also encourage you to hear more truth from Pastor Shane with the Idleman Unplugged weekly podcast. And now from Westside Christian Fellowship in Leona Valley, California, here's Pastor Shane Idleman.
Shane Idleman: The title is "When the Devil Meets You." When you want to do business with God and pray and go in deep and fast, maybe you are going to teach on the demonic realm. Does any demonic opposition happen during that time? You can time it. One of the worst times in our marriage ever was when we were getting ready to plant the church. Our kids came down with every disease known to mankind. Hand, foot, and mouth disease, strep throat—this happens, attacks and all kinds of things. It was just somehow. The enemy can't read our mind or know the future, but he can kind of see what's going on. When I decided to prepare this message, I knew it was going to be a little challenging week, but it's such an important topic: when the devil meets you. In the Book of Acts, there is an incredible story. We are in Acts 16. So if you have your Bibles, you can turn to Acts 16. We always encourage you to bring your Bible, a good translation, a good study Bible, and go through it and even highlight it. If God highlights scriptures—he has in my life. He has encouraged me in deep storms through the verses that really jump out or that others have shared. I don't have this whole section, but it basically says the Lord opened Lydia's heart to heed the things spoken by Paul and her household was saved, and then they were baptized. So, it is a reminder because I still get this question a lot. It's funny how we word things: "Do you have to be baptized to be saved?" I would throw it back like, "Why don't you want to be baptized?" Let's throw this back at you. Technically speaking, a believer believes, receives the Holy Spirit—they've got the Holy Spirit—and as a step of obedience to show publicly that now they love the Lord, they are baptized. Dead with the old man, up with the new. No, that didn't save you, but it's a reflection of God saving you. I would encourage you to do it as soon as possible. Maybe you've been running from it. That's why we always have this full and we use it quite often—lots of baptisms. I'll gladly change and baptize you, even if it's been years. Maybe when you were like me, I was sprinkled. I just actually read in my mom's old Catholic Bible at St. Mary's. I think I was four months old or something. Not communion, but confirmation this and I had all this—yeah, that too, lots of things. But then I finally did it as a believer—a believer's baptism—because that's what the Bible says. The Bible doesn't say anything about baptizing babies who can't make a profession of faith. So this whole household was saved. It's interesting when a parent, especially when the dad comes to know the Lord, it dramatically changes the whole landscape of the house. Now, some of you dads, you might know the Lord, but you've been quenching and grieving the Spirit for a long time. The best way to set your house on fire with the Spirit of God is you yourself catch on fire. You put on worship, you call prayer meetings, you do what you need to do. It's going to be tough. Welcome to life. Following God is tough, but it's worth it. Then we pick up in Acts 16:16-24. "Now it happened as we went to prayer..." I don't know if the slides are off. I might have sent the wrong... the Lord opened... I guess I just keep reading then, maybe. She put it all together. That's good. How about I read, you listen, we'll see if we can find it? So Acts 16, I believe it's verse 16. "Now it happened as we went to prayer that a certain slave girl possessed..." Is that up there? All right. It just looks different than my notes. "Now it happened as we went..." It's interesting, they're going to prayer. I've heard this so many times: "Pastor, I was coming to the prayer meeting, but you'll never guess what happened." I was coming to church—oh yeah, no car ever breaks down on your way to Cinemark and watching the new Spider-Man. I'm not encouraging that; I'm just saying Disneyland, everything gets there fine, but you try to get to church or a prayer meeting, all hell breaks loose. So as they were going to prayer—it says that—they were going to prayer that a certain slave girl possessed with a spirit of divination met us. Here we see a certain slave girl was possessed with the spirit of divination. Now, is that word "possessed" interesting? Especially in the Christian community. Normally in the New Testament, they would use a word, *daimonizomai*, possessed. Jesus, *daimonizomai*, it means "has a spirit." It actually doesn't mean possessed like we think, like a robot, you can't control anything, you're just going to go kill somebody and there's nothing you can do about it. The New Testament says "has a demon." A demon has latched on, and as an unbeliever, that's a very scary spot to be because there's nothing you can do. Now as a believer, we all, elders believe, we teach here, that a Christian cannot be possessed, but they can be oppressed. Just go open the wrong door and you'll find out how quickly you can be oppressed. Actually, don't do that. Just please trust me. These are times when a believer, like normally you struggle with the flesh, right? But these are times like, "Pastor, I just... I fought it all week long. I did okay, but I just... I don't know what's happened. I had to go to the liquor store every day or I had to buy this marijuana and I couldn't stop, or these pills. I did okay, but what is happening? I can't..." That could be the oppression. "I just wanted to go to my computer so bad and open the door. This is so... this is uncontrollable. What am I supposed to do?" As a believer, that's different than normal lust of the flesh. These are when the demonic attack—all hell breaks loose and they're trying to take you out and take you down. So a Christian, we don't believe can be possessed, but they can be oppressed. They can be harassed. But this girl was actually... it's *pneuma pythona* or *pythonos*. It's the spirit—*pneuma*, pneumatology—the spirit of Python is what this word means. It's very interesting. So they're on their way to pray, here comes the slave girl possessed with the spirit of divination. She met them and she was used to bringing her masters much profit from fortune-telling. Here is how the demonic realm works in this area. Just so you all know, we're all clear. I thought most people would know this, but many people don't quite understand. Although the devil, I don't believe can read our mind, see into the future, they know the past. So for a spirit to tell you something, to tell somebody, they're like, "Oh, they knew this happened!" Yeah, there's a spiritual realm that's real. That's why you see all these people on Oprah or different places, or be careful on 50th West. The palm reader—"But they knew!" Of course, yeah, spirits are eternal. Demonic spirits might reveal if a person has opened up themselves to that. That's how the demonic realm works. They never—they rarely—they might guess, but they don't predict the future. They usually go off the past, don't they? "Do you have an aunt? Do you have an aunt that died, Cheryl?" Oh, the demon showed this person with that spirit this, and that's how she made her masters money. People go and they would pay. It hasn't changed. People still look for the craziest information through fortune-telling and things like that. So what happened, though, this girl was following Paul and us and she cried out, saying, "These men are the servants of the Most High God. These men are the servants of the Most High God, who proclaim to us the way of salvation." Very interesting, is it not? That's exactly what she was doing. Oh, there's the words, by the way, for you. So she is following them. I wonder at first you think, "Oh, she knows, yeah, okay, she knows that we're called of the Most High God." But she kept bothering them, and that's when you know it's harassment or annoying. They're poking fun at you. But it's interesting, I want to talk about this spirit of divination for a minute. In Greek paganism, Python was said to be a serpent that has the power of divination. A spirit of Python is likely to have been what the locals called the demon in this slave girl. That's where that comes from. So again, as we went to pray... as we went to pray. I want to just pause for a minute. Why was prayer such a priority for the early church? That was the engine, not the caboose. That's what drove the church. Because the church, I mean, we don't know how many months or years earlier—well, Paul's converted now, so years probably—the church was born in an upper room in a prayer meeting. They would choose their elders by prayer and fasting. They would get direction. We set aside time for prayer and fasting and the Holy Spirit said... It was part—it's who they were. We've really lost that in our culture, haven't we? Because in the early church, the veil was ripped and the Shekinah glory just flooded their hearts. They lived in a time where they knew the temple. Just like 40 days before that prayer meeting, that temple, that veil was ripped in half and it showed we have access to the Father. Can you imagine? To us, we take it for granted, but the early church said, "Now we have access to Almighty God! We can go to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords through His Son." This is a game changer. I'm certain that's where that word came from. That's why prayer was so important. You are grabbing the heart of God. You are hearing from Him. You are asking, petitioning. The more you get in His word, the more you pray, the more He begins to align your heart with His. That's why answered prayer is not difficult. "Lord, what do You want to do? How do You want to use this church? What ministry? What do You want us to do?" Commit your works to the Lord; your thoughts will be established. What kind of business do You want me to do, Lord? Who do You want me to marry? Who do You want me to work with? As you begin to commit these works to the Lord, you're getting in His word, your prayers begin to line up with His will. That's how you get answered prayers. You don't think God wants to answer what He already wants to do and He's putting on your heart? So that's why prayer was so important. I think it's a good encouragement for us this morning to get back to the power of prayer. But always remember this: prayer will often be challenged by the enemy—constant harassment. There's no other place in all of Christian discipline—I mean, fasting, probably because they go together—but that is so difficult sometimes, isn't it? To me, praying for an hour, reading the word is a lot easier than praying for an hour. Putting on worship, driving up in the mountains for an hour—you're praying during that time, you're thinking, but to really go in. The old-timers used to call it "prevailing prayer" where they would lay hold of God. There was a laborious process of getting prepared to pray. They would go in and they would starve the flesh and they would say, "Be quiet, we are petitioning God and I'm going to sit here if it takes an hour or two," and they would prevail in prayer. And that's what kept the things going, and that's why the enemy wants to stop it. It's the only thing that really stops him, if you think about it. The word stops him, right? But I can read it but not apply it. There's a lot of Christians hearing the word today, millions and millions and millions, and the enemy's like, "Go for it, it's not changing you. In one ear, out the next." Where's the power come from? The application. But when you pray, that's I believe what makes Satan tremble. When you really pray, when "I'm setting aside tomorrow for prayer and fasting, watch out." That's how you bring the prodigal son home. That's how you get a breakthrough in your own life. That's the only thing that dismantles his kingdom. I believe it was the Queen of Scotland—the only thing she feared more than the armies of England was the prayers of John Knox, the man who would cry, "Give me Scotland for the cause of Christ, or I shall die!" Who's crying for America now? "Give me America for the cause of Christ, or I shall die!" And that is born in the prayer closet; it is birthed in the furnace of affliction. From that comes out prevailing prayer. The enemy knows that that prayer is going to bring your prodigal home. That prayer might even heal you. That prayer might set you free. That prayer might break that stronghold. There's the power of the praying Christian. That's why he goes after it. I'm tempted to try this, I don't know, but one of these Sundays, I want to just promote it for a while and say, "I'm not going to preach; all we're going to do is pray and worship." I want to see the attendance. Don't shout; you don't know the attendance yet. Should we try that sometime just to prove a point? Okay. I'm guessing half. I'll run to somebody, "Why didn't you come?" "I want to hear a message." Why do you want to hear a message when you can grab the heart of God? You're going to listen to a man? You can listen to a man for the next 50 years, but five minutes in the presence of God will change you. That's what you need. My job is to point you to the man. My job is to build that hunger, build that desire, build that thirst so you get home and you're desiring more of God. That's what He has called me to do. That's the mandate on this church. It's a little bit different than other churches. I got it. I'm not worried about other churches. People say, "Why do you guys do it this way?" I don't know. The Bible doesn't say exactly how to do church. But Paul—oh goodness, it's not just me—but Paul, greatly annoyed... Paul was greatly annoyed. This girl, "These are the servants of the Most High God. These are the servants of the Most High God," just following around. "These are the servants of the Most High God." He said, "You know what? I'm done with you." I mean, I would love to... listen. "I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to be out of her!" And at that moment, she was delivered and set free. What a picture! What a picture! "God doesn't do that anymore," they say. Oh, really? Could it be our lack of faith that limits God? "I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her!" I just wish we could get that power back in many churches where we could tell people, "If you need help, go in the prayer room. Let us pray for you." But it's got to come from vessels who are clean. Prayer team members who are broken, humble, have dealt with God. They're not holding on to besetting sin. They believe in the power of prayer. I have a note to do that at the end and have our prayer team members pray with you if you do need that. If you need that, I just got to... "I've got to get this off of me. I need a breakthrough in this area." Let us pray with you. And that spirit came out that very hour. What's interesting is we don't know—it appears that it was immediate, but we have seen sessions where it's taken a couple hours to really deal with people in the demonic realm. The Bible doesn't give us clear instructions on exactly how to do it, but we know people can be set free. I've—there's... I wanted to maybe sometime just give a lot of testimonies. But there was one time I remember over on—we had a little office on 50th West where we keep our radio equipment and offices. A lady was in there by the name of Eva Marie, some of you remember. I went in there and they're in there, you know, and I'm doing some things. I'm like, "Oh my goodness, wow. I think I'll come back later." Right? It's because she's just like—this lady is just crying and heaving. I texted her later and she goes, "Oh, Pastor, it took about three hours." Three what? Why? Shouldn't it just be like this? So I don't quite understand all that. But then I talked to the lady and she's like, "I threw up in the trash can and I've been set free!" I think she's been at the altar; this was years ago. "I'm just feeling so incredible!" And then you see other things that have been happening and you talk to people. Right, it's not common every single Sunday, for sure. Could it be? Possibly. We're open to whatever God wants to do. But it's a beautiful thing when He sets people free. It's a beautiful thing. And sometimes there's no major event. Sometimes you pray for somebody and they come back and they're glowing like, "I've been set free from that prayer last week! I cannot believe it. I haven't touched whiskey in a week and I've been hooked on it for 20 years." I heard that a few years ago. Same-sex attraction, marijuana—we've heard those things where "I have no desire anymore." And other people are struggling. I don't understand how it all works. Some people are set free, other people there's a struggle to fight through sometimes. We trust in God's sovereignty. But the spirit came out. And when her masters saw that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to the authorities. Isn't that interesting? "What did you guys do to my spirit of Python?" By the way, you guys, you don't have to try and name all these demons. Just spirit of Python, Leviathan, this, that, monitoring spirits—just you can just take authority over what God has given you. But here's a couple keys I want to talk about. Before Paul casts this demon out, I believe he had some time to be prayed up and to use discernment. Like maybe at first he thought it was legitimate—like she recognized who we are. But maybe over time, following them around, he realized, "Okay, this is not good, this is not of God," and he used discernment. And so that's a key for praying with people, especially in this area. If you're going to cast out a demon where there's no demon...
Guest (Male): You've been listening to Regaining Lost Ground with Pastor Shane Idleman. You can find more information at westsidechristianfellowship.com. That's westsidechristianfellowship.org. And for all the latest on what God is doing with His ministry here, please be sure to follow us on most social media platforms. Westside Christian Fellowship is located 60 miles north of Los Angeles in Leona Valley, California. Thank you again for listening to today's message of Regaining Lost Ground, where we are reminded daily: times change, truth does not.