How Deceiving Spirits Work

December 6, 2014

Ezekiel: Welcome to Heaven Talk. Dream, visions, comment and discussion on all things Heaven. I'm Ezekiel.

Clare: And I'm Clare.

Ezekiel: Here in the foothills of Taos, New Mexico, the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Good Evening!

Clare: Well, YouTube family, we've really had a heart for people who've been sorely disappointed because the Rapture didn't happen around Thanksgiving as we had mentioned before. And in fact, I have a letter from one lady, I'll read you a segment from it.

She said, "Part of the reason we were both so fooled by these 'end dates' for the Rapture (as we thought of them) was it gave so much hope that the abuse and hardness of this world would finally be ending. The Lord told us a few days ago that He allowed us to hear these dates because we wanted to hear them so much (we were too attached to the answer, so the demons were able to step in.) That He's been here with us all along and He loves us. So, we're praying that our words are clean and that our discernment is good, but I don't feel like I have any discernment at all.

Clare: I think a lot of us felt that way in this last week or two weeks.

Ezekiel: Yeah, it's been kind of foggy, off and on.

Clare: Yes, like some kind of static storm, or something like that, very static-y and stormy.

Ezekiel: Yeah, some definite oppression interference.

Clare: It's so subtle, you know. This oppression is so subtle that we don't really realize that it's an oppression. And I think that there's an art form to that that the demons use. They make it subtle, so that you don't notice it, it just kinda of creeps in on you.

Ezekiel: Yeah, yeah. Well you wake up some days and you feel like "Where am I? What? Lord you just spoke to me, or I thought you did?" Or you flip back to your journal and see what the word was He gave you or what your Scriptures were, but you don't feel it. And I think sometimes there's a - we can't really trust our feelings can we?

Clare: No, and the demons definitely toy with our feelings. And I have already put out just a Youtube with a very simple message from the Lord. But I think it would be good to read it again tonight just for you, just to kind of spark our conversation here. I have it on my computer, so forgive me for looking to the side.

The Lord began:

"My heart is deeply grieved by the many deceptions My Bride has fallen into during these last days. Did I not warn you that many would come in My Name?

"Nonetheless it is not your fault, as much as it is the fault of the shepherds. So let Me begin by saying, 'No one knows the day nor the hour.' Not even I. You do know the season, and yes, this is the season."

Clare: We all know that! Real strong feeling of that!

Ezekiel: Close. Right at hand!

"My Bride you must be more clever than the demons assigned to you. These vile creatures know you better than you know yourself. And that's why knowing yourself has become so important."

Clare: And He gave a list of the things, the way that the different doors open so easily. And I'll go through that real quickly.

"Pride, Flattery, Self-seeking, is the number one open door for their entrance...they tell you, you are so special, and so different than the others, you are specially chosen to receive secret knowledge."

Clare: So they play on your pride and your vanity.

"And may I say, all of you, each and every one, all of you are unique and special in your own way. Period. So don't let them tempt you by putting you on some kind of pedestal. And as far as secret knowledge goes, now you are taking on the New Age mentality that capitalizes on the esoteric."

Clare: You definitely don't want to go there. And you know that I wanted to make a point about that. Any time in the Christian community that there's a sense that someone has 'secret knowledge,' that they have a special relationship with God that is so special and that he confides all of his secrets - I mean, the Scriptures do talk about confiding things to your prophets - but when it becomes a thing, when it becomes like a movement, when people get drawn into the idea of the mysterious, and the esoteric, and the 'highly advanced' and so on and so forth - this is NOT the Lord. That is definitely the devil's trap.

Be careful about saying that it's a move of God because it's producing some exclusivity and bitterness and that's taking the Lord's name - Yeshua, Yahweh, and using Father God, and using the name Jesus, and some people are highly offended that you use the name Jesus and I want to tell you, the demons know what the name Jesus means. We've been in deliverance situations where we use the name of Jesus and it works perfectly. There's not one issue with that name. The issue is I think more with people who kind of get puffed up and proud and say "Well, this is the right name and this is the way you should say it." And it causes scandal and division in the body.

Ezekiel: Confusion.

Clare: Yeah, confusion. It's like, people are used to calling the Lord, you know, especially older people, by the name of Jesus and the Father and so on. And we . . .

Ezekiel: Cuts a whole heck of a lot of nice praise songs, doesn't it.

Clare: Oh yeah, there's all kinds of praise songs we can't sing (if this were true), and because some people are so adamant about this, it's really pride that causes them to rise up and condemn other people who don't use the "proper name" for the Lord. And I don't think this is a good thing. I think we need to be really careful. I think it's beautiful that people use the Hebrew names and feel comfortable with it.

But for the ones that don't feel comfortable with it, we need to cut them some slack.

Ezekiel: Yeah I mean we're swallowing camels, right, and straining out gnats. You know, we're warned not to take part in foolish arguments, aren't we.

Clare: Exactly and that's another good point. I mean, I don't want to argue over these things. It's ridiculous.

Ezekiel: Divide and conquer. Divide and conquer.

Clare: And I think that we are probably in the not too distant future going to do a segment on the suffering of the Lord, and maybe we can bring some of that up tonight. The visions that you've had of the Lord's suffering because people are ripping and tearing at the body. Could you share that?

Ezekiel: We're just crucifying Him all over again. In fact, the meeting I mentioned earlier - I got to a point that I went to the hardware store and I bought three railroad spikes and before this man passed away (the way he did, it was unfortunate and tragic) - at the next meeting I was going to come and just lay those spikes on the table and walk away. You know? Try to kind of let him get the message. How many nails are you going to continue to drive into the body? How do we assassinate? We've got to remember, that lady at the church we just talked about, or that sister or brother, the preacher or pastor, that's Jesus that we're taking a bite of!

Ezekiel: We can't do that - that's like a cancer eating the body. You know, eating itself.

Clare: Right - right. And like you've said so many times before, is that if you have a child who's challenged or disabled or someone does, you don't point at the child and say "Look they can't even walk!" or whatever. You don't say that to the parents.

Ezekiel: That would be very hurtful.

Clare: You're very compassionate, and you pray for them. You pray for the healing of that child. I hate that bumper sticker "Christians Kill Their Wounded" - but you know what? There's substance to that. And a lot of us, (and I notice even on Youtube,) we get some rather harsh remarks. (laughs)

And you know, God love 'em, I think some people think they are doing the Lord a favor by bludgeoning other Christians into knowledge. "You WILL know the truth! I am going to tell you the truth now!"

And it's just sad, even amongst the denominations, I mean we've experienced the Lord in the Orthodox Church, you know the one with all the ceremonies. We've experienced the Lord in the Evangelical Church, in the Pentecostal Church, in the Methodist Church. We've experienced Him in the Catholic Church. It grieves my heart when people speak against a denomination and speak against things and oftentimes there's no substance to what they're saying. They don't know.

Ezekiel: Parroting. Just parroting what someone said, and someone said, and someone said. I have a friend who was in Northern Africa for some time. He told me, "Even though I'm an Evangelical Christian, I hadn't seen a Christian forever. I was in these Muslim nations and states and provinces. And I was like a hungry, tired, thirsty man looking for water. I came upon a group of monks in a Coptic (which is Egyptian) Christian church. And the priests and the monks came out - I didn't care who they were, what they were, what their name was. I saw that Cross. I knew that they were Christian. I saw the Scriptures, I didn't care - I was so glad to see another Christian! It had been a year!

Clare: Yeah, and you can really feel the presence of the Lord in another Christian.

Ezekiel: You may need to know each other by the Spirit.

Clare: Absolutely. I mean, these are the same people right now who are being beheaded for their faith. You know, while we are at our shopping malls and our daily jobs.

Ezekiel: Even their children. Even their children!

Clare: Children are dying for their witness to the Lord. And they're in these Coptic churches.

Ezekiel: Not just Coptic, you know -- Palestinian Christians, others - the Christians of the East or Middle East, or whatever.

Clare: Right, right. Not just evangelicals, but these are people who are in the churches that have liturgies, and they are dying for the witness. They won't renounce the name of Jesus, and that's why they're beheading them.

Ezekiel: Yeah, so you know, I'm not here to argue somebody's rite or ritual or history or as many would say, man's precepts or such. I don't care - we all have the traditions we have in our families. In our cultures. I don't care. When they love Jesus and they're willing to lay their life down on the line? Man, it put me to shame.

Clare: Yeah, well we all have traditions. And some of the traditions are Holy Spirit inspired, and some of them aren't. I think the ones that aren't - we need to get rid of.

Ezekiel: You know the argument these days is "Oh, we don't have religion. We don't have religion, we just have faith." What IS that good religion - you use the word religion? To feed the widow and the orphan. You know, give it a break guys. We are just, we get on these little - we're fundamentalists as well, aren't we, over here in this country. Fundamentalism, whether Shiite or Christian, is dangerous. Let's be careful that we're not putting Him back on the Cross and bludgeoning Him with the whips and driving the nails.

Clare: Well, you know, moving back to this whole thing on discernment, and you know, even though that is a little bit off the topic of discernment, it's a very good point, because when we criticize other people, we open ourselves up to demonic manifestation.

Ezekiel: Deception, deception big time.

Clare: Oh my gosh. In our marriage, I mean, we found out early in our marriage that if we come out of a place - let's say we're wounded, you know how it is when you're wounded in a church. If you come out of that church wounded, and you go home and you talk about it and you start to cop an attitude about the people and what they said and what they did. And then I noticed we'd start fighting between ourselves. And we noticed this pattern for a few years before we finally 'got it', DUH!

Ezekiel: We started to say, "What opened the door?"

Clare: We got it. What opened the door? We opened the door by criticizing other people.

Ezekiel: I think that's the quickest way the Lord will bring any of us down, is the minute we open our mouth -- our heart. We might not even say it, but a heart judgment. He's going deep to the things that matter. The judgments of our heart and our mind. We're all wounded and we all need healing. He has been so firm with us, I mean to the point of breaking us into fine powder over the years, to stamp out any judgment - we just can't have it.

Clare: Yeah. And it will affect your discernment, and the Lord will allow you to fall. And of course, as we judge others, we'll be judged. That's another facet of that the Lord warns us about.

So, I think I mentioned the first one was Pride, Flattery, Self-Seeking was the number one open door.

And then number two, Loneliness is the second open door. We're talking here about how mistakes in discernment happen, how we allow the enemy in. So, Loneliness is the second open door. Failed marriages, feeling of being isolated, bitter failures in business or in church, rejection and wounds from others in the Christian body -- these are all things that can leave us -- what's the word -- wounded and debilitated and open to an attack from the enemy. Because he looks for you when you're weak. He wants to hurt you when you're down and you're weak.

Ezekiel: Wounded fish syndrome.

Clare: Yeah. He sends - he waits, he watches, he sets up situations so that you'll get injured. Then he comes in on the heels of that and starts pounding you. And then you start pounding the other people and then that opens the door wider and it just gets worse. So, Loneliness and failed marriages and isolation, that also is an open door.

The third one is attachment to anything you want. Along with it goes self-well, disobedience, thinking you know better. Oh boy, have I been guilty of that.

Ezekiel: How many times have you gone to the Lord and it's like: "Oh, please say yes, oh please say yes." Or "Oh please say no, Oh please say no! I don't want to have to go over there, tell me this in this order . . . " You know. And He's given you Scriptures on brotherly love and everything, but we're actually trying to get some Scripture to justify us not going to see the sick sister or brother because we're lazy and we don't want to go! You know - attachments like that - attachment to the outcome of whatever it is you are trying to discern. "Oh I need this to be the Lord, I want this to be the Lord, because I want this vision so much" or this 'whatever' so much.

Clare: Remember, just not so long ago, I had an opportunity to buy a label maker and a CD burner, and I thought "we really need this" and the Lord put His foot down. And I was just, oh, I was just so upset about that.

Ezekiel: You were crestfallen.

Clare: Oh, I was terribly crestfallen. Here I loved to work with graphics and Photoshop and we need labels on our DVDs... and He said "no". And I had to go with that, you know, but not without a little bit of an interior fight. That's for sure. (laughter)

Ezekiel: Poor Jesus! (laughter)

Clare: That's right!

Ezekiel: She told me one day, "You better pray for me, the Lord and I are having a fight." I said, "I am going to pray for Him!" (laughter) Just kidding!

Clare: Oh Lord.... OK. So that's the open door - Attachment. If you really want something the demons will oblige you. And they'll say you can have it, just to get you off track.

And then self-hatred came up as a fourth. The survival instinct kicks in to counteract the terrible self-image we have of ourselves, whether real or imagined, to keep yourself from giving up on life. We tend to construct a fantasyland of being special, to protect the projected ugliness that we're so afraid to see. So, we create this fantasy world and the demons are only too happy to oblige us in that.

Ezekiel: Oh, you have all kinds of neat visions and dreams and words and everything. But you know, are we willing, as you said, to be made willing to just be honest and look at the truth of who we really are and who we're really not? The Lord's trying to get the false stuff out of the way so He CAN give us the good stuff!

He's not trying to hurt us or take away our life...

Clare: And we're not half as bad as we think we are on one level.

Ezekiel: No, no.

Clare: But the other thing that the Lord was very careful to speak to me, and I am going to share that to you -

He said:

"Now I am going to advocate two way communication with the use of Rhemas."

Clare: That's an illuminated word from the Lord, which you can get from a Bible, or a book or a bumper sticker or a billboard.

Ezekiel: When something just stands out to you on a page.

Clare: Yeah, yeah, and there's a flutter in your soul, in your heart. You can feel the Holy Spirit has arranged that --whatever you saw. We have a special way that we do that and I'll be showing that to you in just a second. So, you may be familiar with the little daily bread boxes that people put on their tables. Well, it's a system very much like that except it's using a book. And the book that we use is called The Bible Promises (which I have a different cover on it now).

Ezekiel: People will give it to you for Christmas gifts - Precious Bible Promises, or whatever.

Clare: Things like "Repentance", and different readings will come up.

Ezekiel: Don't just stop at the title, like "Oh I got Repentance", or "Oh I got God's Love, so I can do this." Actually read the Scriptures and see what He's trying to say. In fact, what He's had me doing lately, when a Scripture stands out to me in a little book like this or a devotional -- go look up the Scripture so that I can read into the chapter and see what He might be trying to say and more narrow it down or flesh it out more fully. Right?

Clare: Right. Well, the reason I'm bringing this up is because this has saved us from many false words. We'll open this little book and it will open up to "Lying", and "Lust in the Flesh", and "Jealousy", and "Lying" and we'll know that we've got a Lying spirit.

Ezekiel: Yeah, and this is not "Dip for Script" or some kind of Ouija or crystal ball or that.

Clare: So the Lord, He's actually verifying that He wants us to use this. Because you know, if the people who thought that the Rapture was going to be before Thanksgiving had done that, they would have gotten "Lying" and they would have realized they had a Lying Spirit telling them all sorts of things that weren't true.

Now, this is what He said. He said:

"I don't care what the devil has planted in other people's minds about this being divination or childish. They are wrong. And unless the motives turn to divination, there's nothing wrong with it."

"I will explain: If you are seeking Me for the sake of obedience, and you pray to the Holy Spirit and ask for what He wants, the Lord will protect you. But, if you are seeking answers out of insecurity, or wanting to foretell the future, have secret knowledge, or impressing others, you are bordering on divination"

Clare: Watch out! Then you are into borderline divination, and the devil has a counterfeit for everything. So it's legitimate to have a Rhema or a word from the Lord, and of course the devil copycats that with something evil or he puts in people's minds that it's wrong.

Ezekiel: Well, I'd like to also say that many of us, when we first came to the Lord, we didn't know how to do a Bible study, or do this or do that. We just, by the Holy Spirit, began to read the Scriptures at some point. And it was amazing how He would lead a lot of us as new believers exactly to what He wanted.

Some of us just closed our eyes and stuck our finger on a page. (You gotta be careful doing that, you might get something like "God has utterly rejected you.") Ahhhh!! (laughter). But what we do when we get Rhemas, whether from our Scriptures or the little Bible Promise or devotional book, something - we make a card, a file card, like a little recipe card. And we keep them. Man, we've got boxes of cards from years back. And every now and then, when I need a confirmation outside of myself, I'll ask my wife or someone else to pray and see if they can get a word from the Lord. I probably won't even tell 'em what it's about. But I'll go to one of those little daily bread boxes - homemade daily bread boxes . . .

Clare: Yeah, that we put together, with index cards.

Ezekiel: And I don't like to go to hers, because they've got some tough, disciplinary, fasting hard words! But when I really need to know, I go to the hard boxes! (laughter). And sure enough, He'll give me something real loving and tender and good. But, a tripod stands on three legs, right, and testimony is verified on two or three witnesses. So we really believe in a second and third witness from the Scriptures.

Clare: Navigation. You know, like you're out in the ocean and you get one reading but you need another one to intersect that so that you know exactly where you are. Well, I never did quite finish reading what the Lord had given me after He said that that's borderline divination, when you're trying to foretell the future. You know, that's not what this is about.

He said:

"Your motives have to be pure and detached from your own personal agenda. My priests and prophets used this form of acquiring discernment with Me far before your culture made it popular. So, I endorse the use of the Bible Promises or the Scriptures to receive understanding from Me when other means aren't working. Ideally, you should feel the truth deep within your soul, a place no demon can enter or imitate."

"Remember, the devils look for your weak point, they know your history, they capitalize on that. It's easy to tailor the deception or should I say the bait, to hook you. So if you know yourself and understand My ways, you will be less likely to grab the bait and run with it. 

"Doing anything to impress, influence, or please others makes you vulnerable and easily manipulated. Any kind of selfish ambition, what so ever, makes you an attractive target for the demons. 

"Even your desire to be used to help others, if it's not moderated and strictly mandated by Me, can also make you a target. In short, any impurity in your motives can make you vulnerable; wanting a title, to do or be someone different or important, to control, influence, manipulate others, it opens the door wide to demonic manifestation.

"So your safest posture is pure love and devotion to Me and Me alone, and to love your brother as you love yourself."

Clare: And these are just guidelines that He's given me because there are so much pain right now. Discernment is so difficult. There's such a proliferation of evil and demons are constantly finding new ways to deceive us.

And if there's sin in your life, if there's unconfessed sin, He will let you fall. Whether you use a Bible or you don't use a Bible to verify it, He will let you fall if there's sin.

So your motives not only have to be pure but your life has to be pure. So many times, we don't know that we're sinning against the Lord. Like He's brought up pride to me in an area that I never even imaged I was prideful.

Ezekiel: We've come so far in this protective shell within the church and the killing of the wounded, that we certainly don't let anyone know about anything. We're not vulnerable and we're not going to confess our sins one to another, so even good friends won't share their weaknesses. Why? Because all of a sudden that friend gets on the Internet and types a bashing letter about whatever. It might not even hit you, but they're talking about your situation. And if you're not comfortable with that and they didn't ask your permission, it makes you feel terrible. We have got to be able to be transparent and real with each other without the fear of "they're going to use it against me" - you know? Backlash. And we think, people are terrible for confessing their sins to a priest or something. Wow. You know, same kind of fear. If we can't share our burdens . . . safely - we've got to be safe.

Clare: Yeah. Well, I think that pretty well wraps it up. We wanted to share the Lord's heart with you on discernment, and encourage you. And give you some guidelines that He's used with us for many, many years to verify when He is indeed speaking with us or when we've let a familiar spirit in.

Ezekiel: And don't be afraid to ask for help with discernment. I mean, no person is an island. Notice I was inclusive - male or female (laughter). Ask others to pray for you and for situations - and you don't have to give them all the details. It's even better if you don't sometimes.

Clare: So I thought it might be a good idea just to take a moment and show you some of the different things that we use for discernment.

First of all, first and foremost, the Scriptures. Any really good Bible will work. But something that speaks to you for sure, something that has a real meaning to you that you can understand easily.

Sometimes I'll take a reading from The Ways of the Desert Fathers, which is some ancient wisdom, ancient Christian wisdom. Praying with the early Christians.

Another person I like to use just for encouragement is Laurie Beth Jones. She has a number of books that are Christian motivational. She takes examples from the life of Jesus and applies them to worldly situations that we might find ourselves in.

I also like Rick Joyner and I'll get a Rhema from one of his books sometimes. It's nice to have a little bit to choose from sometimes and to have a little color in your reading sometimes. You don't always want it to be just black and white Scripture. Sometimes you can use someone else's viewpoint. It's very useful to help you see something in a new light.

And then, here's The Bible Promise Book that I was talking about. It's just straight Scripture and it's organized by topics like: Fruitfulness, God's Love, Brotherly Love, Lying, Jealousy, Lust, Eternal Life. It's really, really useful because it is pure Scripture and it is broken down into different subjects and topics.

Here's one of our card files. (shows box with index cards in it.) It's a big'un! It's a double sized one. But we'll make a card and sometimes we'll color it and do different things with it, depending . . . it's just Scripture written down, or a word that we received in prayer, or prophecy that someone gave us. We'll write it down on a card and we'll keep it in here. And then on those gray, gloomy, foggy, misty days when you just don't feel like you can quite connect with the Lord and you don't know the reason why, I'll go to this little box and I'll pick three cards out to get my bearings. And it's just amazing how the Holy Spirit is reading your mail. I mean, He's right there with you.

You're trying to please the Lord. You're trying to be obedient. You're trying to love Him and give Him your life more fully. He's not going to give you a snake when you ask for a fish.

The problem with a lot of these people who claim they've heard from the Lord is that they don't have any external backing. They don't have verification. There's a few that do and they talk about their back-up and their pastor and so on. And of course, my husband and the words that we use here.

But if you don't have a husband and if you can't really trust people at church, use the Scriptures and The Bible Promises or homemade Bible promises like your own little book. These are my own little homemade books that I've done and they have different little readings in here. Just a little reading like that, it says: I will cut a road through all my mountains and make my highways level (Isaiah 49:11).

You know, something like that at a time when you're facing monumental challenges can really, really, really encourage you and give you hope. It confirms that you're on the right path; that you're going in the right direction.

I think that a lot of people, if they had recourse to this method of discernment, they wouldn't get off into trouble as much. The Lord would be able to rein them back a little more easily by giving them a word that they could meditate on and that would apply to their situation. And that's what's so wonderful about using confirmations is that they are so on target, that there's times when you say "Wow, I don't think I could have said it any better myself! Thank you, Lord!" And "From all those pages in the book, You gave me this reading. It's just what I needed to hear."

So, I want to encourage you all to press in and do hear from the Lord and do persist with that. Because it's a skill, just like typing is a skill, driving is a skill. It takes time to learn it. Don't give up because you failed - that's the worst thing you can do and that's what the devil wants. He doesn't want people discerning God's clear voice in their lives at all. He wants to sow confusion, so don't give up.

God Bless You!