Gil Rugh ..
“Believers cannot be possessed by demons…The scripture is clear on this matter. …Christ’s work was sufficient. There is no further deliverance that must take place. If there were, salvation in Christ would be incomplete. If the church would stop and think through its theology of scripture we would realize that something is drastically wrong with what is being promoted by those who teach that believers can be demonized.”
(Gil Rugh Demonization and the believer- an unbiblical teaching exposed, pg.26 1994)
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Paul writes of the spiritual army of the devil that he lists in Eph.6: 12 in Col.2:15... “Having disarmed principalities and powers He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.”
The devil and his angels fate is already sealed yet God allows them to continue. But they have no power over a Christian. He works in the sons of disobedience and will continue to do so until he is bound by God, not us. He can lie to us and lead us into sin but its a matter of our will bending to his lies... all one has to do is resist and he is defeated.
As Christians we are Christ’s possession owned by God. (1 Cor.6:20, 1 Jn.4:15)..... We have been bought with a price and are born again of incorruptible seed... 1 Pt.1:23.
1Jn.4:4 ....tells us.... “Greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world.”..... The Holy Spirit is able to keep us separate and clean when we allow him to do so. If we give in we can’t say he is weaker it really is a matter of choice and an exercise of our will. ....
For one to believe in Christian demon possession a number of factors need to be ignored..... Christ is our good shepherd would he let his people get wolfed?...
While we may unwittingly step over the line this does not annul the grace and protection of the Lord. This would mean God deals with us as a ‘legalist’ every time wittingly or not we violate his boundaries we lose his protection and are at the mercy of the enemy.
It is true that certain areas need to be avoided like the plague (the occult, sex outside marriage, homosexuality, and various altered states of conciousness)..... Yet God is greater than these. If not there are no guarantees for anything when do wrong. we would walk in a state of paranoia not victory.
God does not sleep on the job, nor has he put his protection in our hands and strength. We are to be strong in the grace of the Lord not be paranoid of the enemy.
(Let us reason)
I agree that a Christian cannot be demon possessed, but I do believe that they can be oppressed.
When the enemy comes in with temptations, and we give in and sin, we give him ground to work in our lives, letting him build a stronghold in our mind.
It’s not a power battle between God and the enemy; he’s already defeated but it’s a truth battle.
Lies are all he has left and if he can get people to believe them over the Truth of God’s word, he can at the very least, render the believer ineffective in his walk and work for the Lord.
That’s why it’s so critically important to be in Scripture and hide God’s word in our heart. That way we can stand on the truth that we know to be true, instead of buying the lies of the enemy to get us to sin or capitulate.
We are told that we have the mind of Christ, and in Romans 12:2 we are to renew our minds, having our thinking transformed.
When we know who we are in Christ and what we have in Him, we can then be effective in our lives in winning people to Him.