Episode 23

Pastor Paul LeBoutillier Sue: Hey everybody, welcome to our Q&A session together. We are glad to be back and we've got some really great questions and I'm going to start with the first one from John. He says, “Hello Brother Paul and Sister Sue. I believe that a Christian can be oppressed by a demon, but not possessed, and I know you believe this as well. Deliverance ministries seem to be growing, and when I see video clips, I wonder what is happening. Is it trickery? The power of suggestion? Something more sinister? There are some sincere Christians who are caught up in this movement. I am curious about your thoughts on deliverance ministries.

As a Bible teacher, I try to limit myself to just what the Bible says rather than venturing into all kinds of opinions based on this video or that testimony or something like that. And like John says here, the Bible does not support the idea that a born-again believer can be invested with a demonic spirit living within them. That would mean that the Holy Spirit and a demon were literally taking up residence in the same body. And I don't believe that's possible and here's why. The Bible doesn't support it. There is not one single reference in the Bible of a born-again believer having a demonic spirit or having a spirit cast out of them. And in the New Testament letters when the apostles and writers of the New Testament were addressing sinful behavior and they were writing these letters to believers, they never once said, you need to go to a deliverance ministry. They warned people against the temptations of the enemy. They warned believers about the trickery and the schemes of the enemy, but never once suggested that it could be a demonic possession for a believer. So that's what I believe. And my belief trumps all of the videos and all of the testimonies that are out there. I don't know what's going on. I can't really comment on that. As a Bible teacher, I really want to keep my comments centered on the Word of God. I believe the Word of God should be the final answer to every question that we wonder about. So I don't wonder what's going on in that video. If I sit and think about it, I can come up with possible explanations, but what's that do? What's that worth? It's really not worth anything.

All right.

That's my answer.

Angie says,

That's a good question. We get it occasionally. And I think the answer is, it depends. And the reason I say it depends is because you have to ask yourself the question, are you, are you wondering about the severity of sins in God's eyes from an eternal perspective? Or are you wondering about that from a temporal, let's call it this life perspective.

Oh, sure.

Because if you're talking about it from a salvation perspective, then no, it doesn't really matter. The apostle Paul in Romans Chapter 1 argues for the fact that the religionist, the moralist, and the blatant sinner, they're all together under judgment and there's no difference. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. That's the eternal perspective. Now, if we're talking about a temporary perspective, I would say, yeah, there's probably different severities of how God views sin. And you can point to some passages in the Bible, the Hebrew midwives lied to Pharaoh about why the Hebrew baby boys were living after they were born and not thrown in the Nile and God blessed them. Ananias and Sapphira lied about a piece of property that they sold and how much they were giving to the church and they dropped dead on the spot. So I have to think that based on passages such as that, there's probably some varying differences in this life in a temporal sort of an understanding. Now again, sin is sin. All sin doesn't really matter. We're born sinners. We prove it by sinning. And that's why we need a savior. And it doesn't matter how bad you've sinned in terms of needing a savior. We all need a savior because we're sinners, not because we've sinned worse than somebody else or not as much as somebody else. So you have to look at it from those two perspectives.

That's really good insight. I like that a lot. All right. Regina says.

What a fun church to be in. I want to go to that church where that pastor is telling people that if you don't use your gifts to the full extent, you're going to hell. No, that's not true. And the reason it's not true, because if it were, salvation would be by works. And the apostle Paul literally bent over backwards to communicate to us through the Word of God, that salvation is not because of works or anything that we have personally done. We simply put our faith in what Jesus did on the cross and that is how we're saved. There will certainly be less rewards for people who don't use their gifts. But salvation is not based on how we use our gifts.

All right. What passage is it she's talking about here?

Well, she's probably, who knows? I mean, she cites Matthew 7. People usually look at the parables where the talents are given. And the person who didn't use their talents is cast into outer darkness, where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth. So the literal conclusion is, you don't use your gifts, you're going to hell. The problem is that contradicts the Bible. And so whenever we're interpreting the Word of God, we have to use the Word of God. And if there's a problem that is so blatant as there is in this case, we have to back up and say, wait a minute, what's the issue here? Because really there is no contradiction. There's just a misappropriation of our understanding, our interpretation.

All right. Perfect. Cristobal says,

I have a better solution. Job wasn't confused and Job 14:11-12 doesn't even come close to suggesting that we live multiple lives or something of that nature. Let me read the passage for you. Job 14:11-12 says; And Job's probably making reference to the resurrection. But here's the point. The book of Job is full of poetry. And when we start creating potential doctrines out of very vague and difficult to understand poetry that was translated from an ancient language into our modern language, we are skating on thin ice. What we have to do is we have to say, that's interesting. Job 14:11-12 talks about a man who's not going to awake or be roused out of his sleep until the heavens are no more and so forth. What does all that mean? It's hard to say exactly what Job had in his heart and mind. But that's not where we derive doctrine. We go to the New Testament, particularly we look at the writings of the apostles, and we know how these things are going to Job 14:11-12 (ESV) As waters fail from a lake and a river wastes away and dries up, so a man lies down and rises not again; till the heavens are no more he will not awake or be roused out of his sleep. work out. It's very clear. In the New Testament, we learn that it is appointed unto man once to die, and then the judgment. We learn in the New Testament that after we leave these bodies, when our spirit departs these bodies, we are present with the Lord. We know that when Jesus returns, that we will be raised, our bodies rather, will be raised from the dead, beginning with those who have gone before, followed by those who are still alive at the time of the rapture. These things are all abundantly clear. And there's no poetic statement in Job that's going to shake our understanding of these essential pillars of the gospel of Jesus.

I think it's interesting that people are coming to you to fact-check what the pastors are saying, which isn't a terrible thing to do.

So anyway, next question is Babita, “I am grateful to find you both on YouTube for the better study of the Bible. Among the gifts of the Holy Spirit, how would you describe the gift of faith? What does the Bible reveal about the gift of faith as one of the spiritual gifts?” And I think that's a really good question. I don't think it's super obvious as you go through different listings of the gifts of the Spirit. Some are super obvious, like teaching and even gifts of administration, but faith...

Or miracles even. We actually have some examples of it in the Bible. In Acts 14, beginning at verse 8, it says; Acts 14:8-10 (ESV) Now at Lystra there was a man sitting who could not use his feet. He was crippled from birth and had never walked. He listened to Paul speaking. And Paul, looking intently at him and seeing that he had faith to be made well, said in a loud voice,

How would you say the gift of faith works toward other people? Like a lot of times we look through lists of spiritual gifts, and we see that they are something given for the benefit of the body. This example was for his benefit, maybe those that were watching. But how would you say the gift of faith works for toward others?

That's a good question. I'm not really sure. I suppose it could be used in body life for the body of Christ. I'm not really sure though. All I have is the examples that we have here in the word, where the gift of faith was given in such a way. I mean, this was even given to the woman who had the internal hemorrhaging. She knew that she knew that she knew if she just touched the tassel of Jesus's garment, she would be saved. And I suppose the benefit for the body of Christ is that they got to witness it, or something like that.

Our next question comes from Nick. He says,

I can't think of any reason to make that assumption. First of all, the number of demons, or which are angels, that fell with Satan has been established since we don't know when, but very early on, maybe even before man was created.

And they do not procreate and make more.

No, they don't procreate and make more. And they haven't been falling since that time. There was a once for all fall, or rebellion in heaven. And there certainly weren't 8 billion people on the earth at that time. So, no, I wouldn't make that assumption. I wouldn't even begin to make that assumption.

Sure. All right. Joshua says,

In very simple terms, he was saying, stop doing what you're doing. You got caught. And by the grace of God, you've been kept from death. Now stop it. This is probably, I believe that passage in John is one of the most beautiful passages in the Bible from the standpoint that we see not only the mercy and goodness and tenderness of God, but we also recognize His justice and the understanding of the severity of sin. He doesn't just save the woman and send her on her merry sinful way. He saves her, and then her life is transformed. And really, it's a small picture of salvation, how we're all saved from certain death. We are guilty. We are guilty sinners, and we are saved from death. Jesus saves us, but He doesn't just save us. He then begins that work of sanctification in our lives, and He begins to speak to us over periods of time about sin and about issues that we need to clean up and bring to Him and surrender to Him and yield to Him and so forth. So it's a beautiful picture of salvation itself and what it means to walk with the Lord. So He was simply saying to the woman, stop doing what you're doing. In fact, He said that to other people, stop sinning or something worse might happen.

It's as simple as a parent who would rescue their child from something foolish that they did and say, now don't do that again.

Don’t do that ever again.

We won't be back in the spot.

All right. Our next question is from Daniel, “I appreciate your ongoing teachings of the Bible. My question is, how does one deal with intrusive thoughts? Since the moment I gave my life to Christ, intrusive thoughts have become a frustrating part of my life. God bless you both.”

This isn't the first time someone's asked me this question, and to my knowledge, I have to be honest and say, I don't know of a Bible passage that addresses the issue of intrusive thoughts. It certainly talks about our thought life telling us, whatever is good and pure and righteous and da-da-da-da-da, and think about these things. But that might be a small help to someone who's dealing with intrusive thoughts. And that means thoughts that are intruding in their conscious, awake times that they don't want to be there. The only thing I know to say to someone who's dealing with intrusive thoughts is pray about it and don't stop praying about it.

Sure.

And give this thing to the Lord. Fill your heart daily with the Word of God and pray for the Lord to deliver you from intrusive thoughts. Ask the Lord where they come from. He knows. I sure don't know. Obviously, the person who's dealing with them probably doesn't know, but God knows. So my quick response, and I hope it doesn't sound trite or like I'm trying to pass it off, but it's persevere in prayer. Don't give up. Keep pressing in.

I think I would add to that too. A lot of people really struggle with memorizing scripture, but purposefully trying to memorize scriptures and commit them to memory to be able to meditate on that. And when an intrusive thought comes in to try to switch gear, ask the Lord to enable you to switch gear to that which is true. I'm assuming that these intrusive thoughts are unwanted and not useful, not helpful. And Colossians talks about set your mind on things above. So it's kind of hard work. A lot of things in our life are hard work. Healthy living, healthy eating, they're all hard work. And this is another example of something that you can set. It's just like healthy eating. You can fill your refrigerator with some really healthy food. And when you have the temptation to have something well, you can go to that. And the same thing with memorizing scripture, having it available. It's not an easy fix.

No, it is not an easy fix. But I think you're right. When an intrusive thought pops up, begin to just quote the Word of God. Use the sword of the spirit and stand against it.

And give your mind something else to think about.

Something else to consider.

Yeah.

All right. Sharon says,

There's a fairly natural conclusion that people reach when they're thinking about things like this. And essentially, they think if a church is out of order, then God shouldn't bless it in any way or the people in there.

Or look that way.

If the church is out of order, there should be nothing going on in that church that is good. And yet they'll hear about things or they'll attend it themselves and say, when I was there, God met me. So Pastor Paul, explain that. If this church is a problem, then why did God meet me? Well, the reason God met you is because you had faith and you were seeking him. And there's a promise in the Word of God that, God says, when you seek me, you will find me when you seek me with all of your heart. That’s a promise. God's not going to go back on that promise because there's a couple of elders that are whacked out, or there's maybe even a particular doctrine in that church that's a little bit strange or off balance or out of order. When individuals come in, wherever they come in to a church, and they love God and want him with all their hearts, he's not going to refuse them. We forget sometimes that the Bible says that God shines the light of the sun and brings the rain on the evil and the just. We forget that. Matthew 5:45 (ESV) So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. Well, if that's the case, if that's God, if he blesses people who are both evil and people who are just, then what is he going to do in a church where there are people who genuinely long for him and want to know him personally and are calling out, crying out to him with real genuine faith? What's he going to do? I'm sorry, there's a doctrine in your church that's a little sideways.

I've heard you say before that God meets people in imperfect situations because he is good, not because they are good.

And we have to remember, there's no such thing as a perfect church. There's no such thing as probably a perfectly orderly church in every way. I pastored a church for 35 years, and it wasn't perfect. It still isn't perfect, under the next guy. Nothing owing to him. It's just we're imperfect people. God meets imperfect people at the place of faith and moves powerfully and graciously in their lives.

Praise the Lord.

Amen.