Possession and Exorcism
Dr. Warren Larson delivered a lecture on possession and exorcism in the context of Folk Islam during a CIU course. Here, Larson presents what facilitates and observations of demonic possession, discerning demonic oppression and possession, and how to do an Exorcism.
Here starts the auto-generated transcription of Dr. Warren Larson Lecture: Dr. Warren Larson Lecture: Possession and Exorcism
Alright. This is lecture 23, demonization and, also demonization, in other words, demonic possession and exorcism. We’re moving right along, aren’t we, at in in these, situations having looked at some case studies the last time. What is actually possession? This is the question here.
Some of the characteristics that we have noted are that in, and then we’re thinking particularly now of Muslim settings. The thing that facilitates possession, certain things are happening here. For instance, the rhythm bit. You know, we’re not against rhythm. Rhythm is great.
I’m I’m a toe tapper myself, and so I like rhythm. But, this is one of the things that, is characteristic. In the czar, there was this tambourine and the drums. I’m not against I don’t get the impression that I’m against either because, these are now played in well, they’re played in worship services, certainly in in, where I was in Pakistan, the tambourine and the drum. So, we’re not saying that that that’s, you know, devilish or anything like that.
But there is also the nearness to a an object or something, perhaps a fetish or to people involved in this practice. In other words, thinking back to the czar, there is this, sheikha or somebody or sheikha that is into this stuff, so, that’s also a characteristic. And, sometimes drugs are being used. I’m not saying that this is true all the time, but I do know that Sufi orders have been known to use drugs and, certainly as we we think of the scriptures, Revelation, some of the magical stuff that they’re into, the witchcraft drugs are there, according to my understanding, and then there is this zikr, reciting God’s name, or some oftentimes in the trance of sort of being slain, and then the blood sacrifices. When it’s the czar, there is a sacrifice of the sheep and the karena, there is the sacrifice of a chicken.
Now one question here, it might seem a little bit off the topic, but I don’t think the last part of it is, after participating in czar, how women might then relate to marriage, fertility, relationships. So, we don’t really know, but I think we can say that, Satan is out to destroy people. He’s out to destroy marriages. He’s out to destroy, anything he can. So let’s be aware of his tactics and not his, his evil, his wickedness.
But I I think here’s a better question for us. How might Jesus’ followers avoid the czar? And this is a good question because when, for instance, if you came into an area where czar or something like that, as Zweimer would put it, Samuel Zweimer, then what do you replace it with? I think that we should think of something else that would help women to, feel at home, to have, you know, social contact and good fellowship, maybe something like a sewing club. I’m not into sewing myself, but something like that that would give women a a sense of of fulfillment.
I think this is really the intent of the question so that you don’t just leave them high and dry, and they themselves, of course, would have to see the importance of pulling away from it. People who follow Christ cannot be told what to do by some high handed missionary, but missionaries are often involved in these kinds of discussions if they’re on hand so we can participate in that, not to push, get pushy, but prayerfully work with people, understand them, and speak when called upon. Here’s another question. What are some of the observable phenomena of spirit possession? Well, one thing we can look for is personality changes.
In other words, if we suspect possession, has there been any change in the personality? In other words, we’re talking intelligence, morals, demeanor, and appearance. Sometimes these things are noticeable in people who are having trouble with demonic stuff. What about physical changes? Does this person have supernatural strength?
This is a good question. In other words, and and, sometimes it looks like epileptic, or I should say epileptic convulsions look like a demon possession. Foaming at the mouth, catatonic symptoms, sort of a schizophrenia, alternating excitement and voice changes and falling and feeling no pain. These are some of the physical changes that we can be aware of, and continuing on with observable phenomena of spirit possession. What about mental changes?
There is sometimes greater knowledge than is normal. In other words, pre pre pre return actual knowledge that could be demonic. Satan is doesn’t know everything, but he is smart. And, also, in spirit possession outside of Christianity, glossolalia is known to to exist. Psychic or occultic powers and even predictions.
We should not have anything to do with, those kind of, of predictions, in other words, future predictions, whatever they are. You can see the signs even on our own country in this very, very religious city that we live in here in the south of Columbia, South Carolina. Even here, where there are so many churches, you do some signs, psychic readers. What about spiritual changes? One medical doctor who works overseas among Muslims and has had a lot of experience here and some there in the Middle East says that his in his eye in his, his understanding is this terrifying fear in the eyes of the afflicted, either reaction to or fear of Christ, and then, having blasphemed or said something against Christ, says that there is this, regret.
In other words, regret of blasphemy, sort of this instability. He says that there is not he, doesn’t say, but also there is this affected by prayer. In other words, when prayer is offered in these situations, there is bound to be an effect, but let’s keep in mind that deliverance is possible through the power of Christ and through his blood. That we, we never want to to forget, that his power will also change. But I think the important thing is, discernment.
We need discernment and I think that, you know, we’ve been talking about some of these things, about demons that Muslims were specifically thinking now, of course, of demons in in Muslim context. Are they for real? You always wonder about this. You know, the Afrit, the czar, the karena, etcetera. There might be, but it’s also true that there is a lot of superstition and and, fear and people, what they don’t know, they imagine.
So that we have to we have to be aware of. In other words, we can’t be either, you know, total skeptics or, in other words, gullible, but I think it’s possible to be to be fair minded about it, to consider the fact that demonic activity does occur and, and demons do exist. But I I think there’s also one question here and that is does the lack of demonic activity, in other words, as observed among most Muslims, is it proof that they’re not involved? And I think the answer is no. It’s no because of the unseen part of it.
In other words, Muslims themselves try to cover it up and so you don’t always often you don’t see and people don’t talk about it. They don’t either they’re embarrassed, and often they will laugh about the very when the topic comes up about the jinn, I’ve seen this, I’ve seen it among Christians too, as if it was a joke, but it’s not really a joke. People sometimes laugh about the things that they’re embarrassed to talk about or afraid of. One other question is can demons inhabit stones or trees? And I think I think no, I think not.
I think that scripturally, biblically, I think all of the possession cases that we know of have to do with either animals and sometimes demons in the case of Jesus driving the demons into the swine, but I think that we have to be aware of the fact that, you know, we can’t be afraid of every little object, for instance, you know, maybe stone or something like that, that was picked up in, in a Muslim country and said, well, this, you know, is dangerous stuff. I’ve had people react like that in my in my class as if, they’re almost Christian animists. I don’t think that we need to be terrified of things like this. One question that is always asked, and I’m sure you’ve wondered yourself, can believers be possessed? My own personal view here is no because of the Holy Spirit, but you know, it’s not really worth arguing about because, possession and oppression oftentimes look very much the same.
In other words, Satan is like this Russian girl that we were talking about. He is, very active in the oppression of this, poor young lady, but but I think whatever it is, we have to deal with it and deal with the the the what we see, and not get tied up or tied down over the theological end of it. You know? Is this possession? Is it oppression?
I don’t think that matters so much as, the the facts. In other words, that that that, Satan is is working hard here. Demonic activity could be going on, so that’s my own sense. Does possession mean ownership and control? In some cases, I think it does.
A book that we’ve referred to before is Arnold, crucial questions about spiritual warfare. Satan certainly wants to control. This is what he is very anxious to do. So he and and, of course, the Holy Spirit is, is the one that we’re supposed to be yielding to. Again again and again, we talk about discernment.
I’m not gonna say much about these sources here because they’re pretty old. You know, Wagner, Wimmer, Kraft, and Otis, or Otis, I guess it is. This is, to me, sort of out of date, so we’ll skip over that and we’ll go quickly on to, start with, just the diagnosis here. And I think that we should think, first of all, of simple solutions. By that, nothing is that simple, but I think what the intent here is that we should, first of all, look for physical stuff.
Is there anything physically wrong with this person? In other words, a good doctor’s checkup to make sure that there’s nothing physically wrong, because physical stuff is is important. In other words, it’s quite easy, I think, compared to the other stuff. But then we can go on to deal with other issues, mental and spiritual. It’s not so easy sometimes to divide these things either, is it?
But but, those are some of the things that we need to think about, but here are some questions, possible questions for a diagnosis. Is what is happening, does it glorify God? Is it scriptural? Does it further the gospel? Maybe these questions seem sort of simple and elementary to you and you can maybe think of other questions yourself to ask people about, but the stuff that that they’re involved in, in other words, because we will look at case stories case stories later on.
I think I have case stories case studies where the action is questionable in reference to the first one, glorify, does it glorify God? In other words, and then also is it scriptural? Does this really how can we look at scripture and figure out whether this should be done or not? There is some discussion in the past. I don’t know that it’s still going on, but, you know, being Craft Charles Craft, for example, one of my old professors at Fuller Seminary was quite into this, and he talks about having dealt with 100 and 100 of hundreds of quest cases, and he says that his opponents, those who are against it, are not familiar with the spirit world.
They’re rationalists. But, Patrick Johnstone, is more cautious and, wants to make sure that we don’t think that everything is demonic. But I sometimes have thought about Paul in Acts 16 and how he acted or or reacted rather slowly, I think, with that girl who was pestering him and who was obviously demon possessed. I’ve wondered sometimes why he didn’t, just as quick as a flash, cast out that demon. The woman the the girl followed him and and his associate for days, it says.
Finally, Paul had had enough, and he cast her out and, of course, then all hell broke loose. I think the reason why he didn’t jump into it was that he knew that it would stop him and his associate from preaching the gospel. Of course the gospel is unstoppable because he got thrown in jail and then they had the earthquake and the jailer gets saved and his family and they baptized him in the middle of the night. I mean, it’s an amazing story, and then Paul lays claim to Roman citizenship who before he leaves town, but it’s interesting that he doesn’t, you know, he just doesn’t jump at this exorcism too quickly. He thoughtfully approaches it and he does cast, the demon out after all, but definitely some things we should think about here, in in the exorcism is that the team methods are to be used.
Don’t try this single handedly like the lone ranger with your cowboy boots on. I wear cowboy boots so, I would be most guilty of all. But, don’t go in there like a cowboy and try to handle this on your own with your guns blazing. No. Team method so that you can talk about it and pray about it and spend time in prayer and that, any sin is confessed, that is known.
Not that you jump to conclusions and say, well, obviously, this person, has been into sin and and and this, wicked stuff, but, it’s it needs to be found out. And, again, discretion, men with men, women with women, so that, you take all precautions. And possibly fasting. Remember that Jesus said in Mark 929, this kind, he said, doesn’t go out but by prayer and fasting. So there are, there are resist there is resistance sometimes more than others, and we should not give up.
We should stick with this to the end, not the bitter end, the the glorious end so that, there is deliverance. We should command the spirit in the name of the Lord Jesus and the power of the Bible, power of the word. For example, Colossians 2:15 and some of these great verses that we know about, and that we should use the armor of God. I was just thinking yesterday, about the armor of God and Ephesians 6 12-13, one particular armor, part of that armor was impressed I was impressed on, and it had to do with the, what do you call, the shield of faith to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. The fact that we need faith in the view of these terrible things at the moment that are going on in the Muslim world, as a result of an anti Islam, anti Muhammad film that was made.
And you know, this can be very discouraging and we need faith to believe, I was thinking, that God is at work. This we need the shield of faith to believe that God is going to bring good out of this for the furtherance of the gospel. And then we need, we need to seek balance, don’t we? Balance in spiritual warfare, meaning that we are open to it, but we don’t, you know, go into a gung ho as if as if this was the only thing that goes on in ministry. So these are kind of some of the things that we need to think about.