D
It's in the Bible.
How do you know that the person is 1. Saved 2. Demon possessed?
Many people just repeat what demons whisper to them without using discernment. Others believe that their dreams are true when the demons take the image of someone they know.
I wouldn't call either of those demonic possession. It is demonic oppression but there is a difference.
Possession means the demon takes total control of their body and the person's personality is not there at all.
I will find the Bible verses after i catch up on my reading,and yes I realize the best solution is for everyone to read the Bible themselves.
However I read the Bible all the way through 3 times before accepting Jesus as my savior and during that time the spiritual war around me was fierce.
I heard voices telling me what it meant and lots of lies and false doctrine and then people coming up to me and repeating the lies and doctrines.
I might not know everything, but I know the basics.
1. God's grace is free, you can't earn it or work for it.
2. We are all sinners in need of a savior
3. Jesus died on the cross for MY sins because He loves me (took me a while to believe this one because I felt unloveable)
There is more but it's basic.
So I know that the Holy Spirit protects people from demonic possession because God revealed this truth to me through scripture and affirming it within my own heart and life.
How do you know that the person is 1. Saved 2. Demon possessed?
Many people just repeat what demons whisper to them without using discernment. Others believe that their dreams are true when the demons take the image of someone they know.
I wouldn't call either of those demonic possession. It is demonic oppression but there is a difference.
Possession means the demon takes total control of their body and the person's personality is not there at all.
I will find the Bible verses after i catch up on my reading,and yes I realize the best solution is for everyone to read the Bible themselves.
However I read the Bible all the way through 3 times before accepting Jesus as my savior and during that time the spiritual war around me was fierce.
I heard voices telling me what it meant and lots of lies and false doctrine and then people coming up to me and repeating the lies and doctrines.
I might not know everything, but I know the basics.
1. God's grace is free, you can't earn it or work for it.
2. We are all sinners in need of a savior
3. Jesus died on the cross for MY sins because He loves me (took me a while to believe this one because I felt unloveable)
There is more but it's basic.
So I know that the Holy Spirit protects people from demonic possession because God revealed this truth to me through scripture and affirming it within my own heart and life.
At least we agree on what possession means, so far.
And, yeah, that's what I'm talking about. How do I know? Well, I'm not able to discern it all that often. (Once in 60 years, and I've worked with people with mental illness in one way or another much of my life. Not to be confused with treating them, just worked with them in a variety of ways.) It really is a change of personality -- from an everyday person to a much darker, scarier kind of person.
One was hubby's ex. She was saved right after he was saved, so somewhere around 1970. She was a believer, like we are all after being regenerated. She changed to the good. But she still had the mental illness (at least bipolar. Don't know the rest, since she was obviously mostly out of his life, except for the kids, by the time he and I met. And we really have no need, nor desire, to hang with her -- ever -- so we don't know how she's doing now.) But about 6 months to 18 months after they were transformed by God, she was in church service and a demon came out of her.
Again, hubby was there, I wasn't. But he's no more the type of guy who believes in praying over any little issue to cast out demons than I am. (And I am so NOT one of those kinds of people, so neither is he.) It was palpable. She changed again, instantly. Like something dark and creepy left her. It was like any other church in that everyone there was shocked by it. They could almost see it, but they instantly saw a change in her. This no more happens in most churches than it happened in that church, so it was very much a shocker.
And she did change. It was as if the bipolar part had shrunk quite a bit. She still got the maniac, but it was a less stressful maniac. It no longer unraveled her. And the depressive side was just that -- depressed. Not like what it used to be. She was very down, but not out to destroy everything in her way anymore.
And she stayed like that for a while too, but then it got worse than before. Before she would guilt her hubby (now my hubby) every time they enjoyed "bedtime" together. (Sex was an evil to her, yet she was very sexual. She did grow up in one hugely messed up house. Her father was schizophrenic and in his 40s when he married her mother. Her mother was 14 and given to him in that marriage. He was a pedophile, so it was bad for her growing up too.) When the demon returned, it got worse.
Then hubby came home, and never knew who he was coming home to. She could have just canned a bunch of veggies or she could come at him with a knife. His saving grace was he was a foot bigger than her and over 100 pounds heavier, so he was able to hold her wrist with the knife, until she dropped it. But she meant to kill him.
He woke up one morning with her next to him. She had a single-sided razor blade dipped in gold for a necklace, and she had the sweetest smile while she fiddled with that necklace, and then asked him, "Isn't it nice to wake up this morning?"
He got it! Before he woke up, she was considering whether to slit his throat in his sleep.
That kind of change when the demons came back. Palpable evil, but she was born again.
The other one? Nice conservative Presbyterian church where Teaching Elders, (kind of like pastors except they only teach), don't believe in the gifts. A crazy guy came for a couple of weeks and was screaming obscenities during the sermon. (Kind of like Paul in Acts when a woman was screaming prophecies when they were preaching.) Finally, the Ruling Elders (kind of like pastors when they aren't teaching) took him out front and prayed for him. Something came out of him, and he settled down. They took him out front to pray for him before telling him never to return. Ends up they prayed out a demon, and the guy stayed. (He said he used to be a Christian but something evil seemed to take over him, and he had spent the last few years homeless and crazy.)
Those are the two I know for sure were demon possessed.
You got another way of seeing it? I really am asking, because I don't know what that is if it isn't possession. (And I do get you know this from the Bible. I just never noticed anything in the Bible that differentiated between believer and nonbeliever. So, I can't find what I haven't noticed. I'm good with you finding your evidence, whenever you have the time to look for it. If it takes a while, free free to PM it to me. I really am just asking, not arguing.)