Am I remembering that every spiritual experience I have down here is a means to an end—my ultimately going to heaven?

17 The seventy-two returned with joy and said, "Lord, even the demons submit to us in your name." 18  He replied, "I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. 19 I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy; nothing will harm you. 20 However, do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven."

INSIGHT:  I went to a deliverance conference once and it felt to me like the man was a showman whose entire ministry, identity, and pleasure was in casting out demons.  As a natural human being, encounters with the supernatural can be terrifying, but they can also be exhilarating.  It can be hard not to get swept up in the fascination of dealing with demons once you have had a few victorious encounters with them. 

For the first 19 years of my professed faith in Christ, I mocked the notion that demons were much of anything to be taken seriously and since Satan doesn’t go after dead horses, they didn’t take me seriously either.  Then, after my full surrender to Christ’s will, the devil came hunting.  During the divorce from my first spouse, demonic activity became my new reality.  They would often hold me down in my bed, give me terrifying dreams of her trying to murder me, or of a demonic dog standing over me in bed, trying to suck my breath away.  One time I woke up with a demon landing on my side and trying to jump inside of me through my stomach and I had to strain to keep him from entering me.  Then, while praying for someone, they kept banging on iron gates each time I began praying again.  Another time, I woke up from a dream where I had just realized, in the dream, that my first spouse was possessed by a demon, and that was why I had been experiencing so much warfare.   The second I realized this in the dream, I woke up sleeping on my stomach, while being held down in my bed, paralyzed, unable to move or speak while the covers were slowly peeled off my head.  Then, while living in India, I started having the worst nightmares.  One night God opened my eyes, while I was in the bathroom, and I saw the black shadowy demon go right through the walls of the bathroom.  Now I knew where the dreams were coming from, with a malevolent purpose, and that they weren’t just my own imagination. 

However, all those demons have been used for my spiritual good.  God, who is rich in wisdom and mercy, used them to teach me many things, like how real the spiritual realm is, how much Satan hates Jesus Christ and his followers, how powerful the name of Jesus Christ is, and how serious the business of God’s redemption and heaven really is.  I now see that although Satan is a powerful destroyer, in the life of a true Spirit filled follower of Christ, the only thing the Thief is allowed by God to steal, kill, and destroy is our sinful nature, our rebellion, our unbelief, our spiritual blindness, our impatience, our worldliness, our disobedience, and our self-life.  Although Satan has attacked, frustrated, and hurt me so much in the last two decades, I would not be who I am in Christ today, without God’s use of Satan in my life!

Many Charismatics don’t realize this, but rather than overpowering our free-will, God uses demons to chastise us, discipline us, strengthen us, and to motivate us to live godly lives.  The worst things demons do is lie to us, but they can do nothing destructive to us that we do not open the door to, or that God does not allow for our good. God used demons in Saul’s life to torment him, but more importantly to shape David into the King he would one day become (1 Sam 16).  God used a demon in Paul’s life to keep him humble (2 Cor 12:7).  A pure heart, and an obedient walk with Christ, allows God to turn all the strikes from evil spirits for your good!  

As you grow in your faith, God may allow these encounters for further shaping you into the image of Christ and preparing you for eternity in heaven, with Him. 

Some people get way too caught up in the excitement of the spiritual here and now, even becoming almost obsessed with demons and spiritual warfare, neglecting other matters of righteous living and eternal life.  Are you remembering that Satan and demons are a means to an end, and not the end?