Jesus frees believer from spiritual blindness
L grew up with a strong Christian heritage, not knowing that she had conceded to some spiritual deceptions. As she began a journey of deeper intimacy with the Holy Spirit, she started to experience unexplainable hindrances. Here is her story of how God shone His Light into areas of spiritual bondage and set her free. Praise God!
(See Chinese versions: 简体中文 > 耶稣使属灵瞎眼的得看见 | 繁體中文 > 耶穌使屬靈瞎眼的得看見)
I didn’t think I had any major problems – I grew up in a Christian family, went to a Christian school and served at church.
I had no idea what a renewal prayer was until I was sitting in one. A friend had asked me to attend hers and support her in quiet prayer. On that day, I witnessed God’s amazing power and loving gentleness set my friend free from strongholds, and my eyes were opened wide to the reality of spiritual warfare.
Still, it did not occur to me to go through a renewal prayer myself. I thought I was doing fine in my walk and that serving the Lord and seeking spiritual growth was enough.
The truth is I had blindspots and strongholds like anyone else, and I needed to be searched and set free.
God is good, and He set me upon a chain of events that would barrel me towards realising that I wanted to be as clean and pure before Him as possible.
It was during the first night of a study on spiritual warfare that I felt a gripping sensation at the back of my head that I had never felt before. I grew very hot and one of my ears turned bright red. Still not knowing what was going on, I left the meeting optimistic.
Once I got home however, I started to sink into a deep pit of discouragement and sadness.
I couldn’t stop crying and feeling completely hopeless, giving reasons for why I should quit everything I was doing. This feeling of unexplained sadness was familiar to me. In the past, I would wallow in it, but it had been happening less after I read Philippians 4:6-7 and started to pray for God to guard my heart and mind.
As such, it didn’t occur to me how unusual it was until someone else pointed it out to me. That made me realise that this was a spiritual attack.
I felt so weighed down physically and emotionally that I decided that I needed a renewal prayer myself.
Leading up to my renewal prayer session, the gripping sensation at the back of my head and feeling of heaviness persisted. When I prayed, it felt like it was tingling or moving. Friends helped me pray, which minimised but didn’t eliminate it.
Filling out the long renewal prayer inventory form was such a struggle. I forced myself to complete it in one sitting, as my mind progressively became foggier and my head became dizzy. When it came to sending the form to my prayer partners, I was feeling so sick, aggravated by the fact that the internet connection suddenly would not cooperate. The form wouldn’t attach, and then the email wouldn’t send – until I asked someone else to click the send button for me, and at which point it sent immediately!
In the week before the prayer session, the Holy Spirit revealed a few things to us.
One of my prayer partners messaged me after reading my renewal prayer form and praying for me. She asked me about three things that the Holy Spirit had revealed.
Firstly, someone in my family had a gold medallion that was spiritually unclean. Secondly, I needed to do some research on the sorority I joined in college, and thirdly, she asked if a certain name meant anything to me.
I had worn a miniature gold coin as a pendant around my neck every day for many years.
So I took a picture of it and sent it over to her, thinking there couldn’t possibly be anything wrong with it. It was a precious family heirloom. The previous owner was a devout Christian and the coin was so innocuous. Nonetheless, the prayer partner immediately sensed this was the unclean thing and that I should throw it away.
I didn’t understand how or why, but I took it off, put it away and decided to research the coin. I got so consumed by researching this coin that I barely slept. I felt so frustrated about it to the point of near combustion, so I decided to listen to worship music instead. As I did this, I began to feel very dizzy, like I was going to throw up. I immediately texted my prayer partners asking for prayers. At that point, I ran to the bathroom where I promptly gagged and a large amount of saliva plopped out of my mouth. Straight away I felt so much lighter that I silently laughed to myself. I felt amazing!
The dizziness and frustration lifted and I felt a sense of joy that I then realised I hadn’t felt in a while – the power of worship and prayer!
Thereafter, I immediately destroyed the medallion and prayed to cut spiritual ties with it. I didn’t need to know exactly where it came from or what was wrong with it, I knew it had an effect on me and I did not want to be tied to it.
In college, I joined a sorority that felt familiar and safe. It had a Bible verse as its motto and recited Scripture in every meeting. I didn’t feel particularly connected to it, and thus I didn’t think it could be a stronghold for me. It felt strange to go on the website and search for the sorority’s secret resources, having once pledged to never share what happens in our meetings and “rituals”.
However, once I opened up the sorority “ritual manual” (that should have been a red flag in hindsight), I was alarmed to see how spiritually unclean these seemingly silly songs and statutes that we recited in the dark of our basement were (another red flag, I know).
The words included oaths to be bonded and chained to sisterhood loyalty and odes to the “spirit of the sorority”.
Flowery melodies and boring creeds masked the fact that we were binding ourselves to other women and the organisation. Additionally, I read instructions in the manual to change one of the words in a Bible verse that was always recited at meetings. I certainly did not want to be bound to an organisation that instructs members to misuse God’s Word.
During my renewal prayer, I repented of pledging myself to others (other than God), for taking part in secretive rituals and for perverting Scripture.
I cut all ungodly ties to the sorority and everyone in it, and invited the Holy Spirit to cleanse and fill me.
The name my prayer partner mentioned was that of a close relative. After some examination of my family tree, we found out that both this relative and my own family shared a generational curse from earlier generations. I was guided to confess the sins of my family and cut off any generational curses. The curse in my family ends now and will not continue with me into my marriage and my children. Praise the Lord that He is our true heritage. He sets us free from generational curses.
Through the renewal prayer, I learned that for much of my life, I had assumed that anyone who referenced Scripture or called themselves a “Christian” was safe to follow.
The enemy had used Christian falsehoods to deceive me throughout my life, and I’m grateful that my eyes have been opened to this.
For example,
- I attended a “Christian” high school where the daily services were actually interfaith, in order to be “inclusive”. Looking back, it is not surprising that my understanding of God became very confused during that period.
- I thought that because my family is Christian that they did not have curses or strongholds.
- I presumed everything I did with the sorority to be acceptable in God’s eyes, because there was a sorority chaplain, and Scripture was (mis-)referenced in the motto.
I felt lighter after the renewal prayer. I knew I could look back at my past and not be afraid or ashamed, as the Lord has wiped my slate clean and released me from my sins and bondage.
As I continued to pray on my own afterwards, God revealed more and more to me, and gradually the grip on the back of my head dissipated. God is powerful, but He is also gentle.
I have come to realise that godly change and freedom starts with us first submitting to the Lord and repenting of anything that comes in the way of that.
This experience was the beginning of spiritual renewal that continues to this day. It was the beginning of living a life with more awareness – of God, my own spiritual weaknesses, and ways in which I’m prone to attack by the enemy. I now feel equipped to pray with power and assurance of the Lord’s victory, whatever may come my way.
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