Bewitched, Baffled, and Bewildered

A while ago I had the chance to work with a young man who was a PK (preacher’s kid), who had been saved at age seven, and who had never broken ranks with either Jesus or the church. After spending several hours working through a whole series of issues and demonic strongholds we finally concluded. He was, to use his words, “euphoric”. He had never experienced the freedom that he felt that night.

As we were leaving he turned to me and said. “I have been a Christian almost my whole life. I was raised in the church. I know the Bible inside and out. Yet, in spite of all of that, I never heard anything about deliverance. Why didn’t anyone tell me about deliverance? Why didn’t anyone tell me that I could be free? Where was the church?”

That question has been asked of me many times. I think that answer is that we’ve simply been bewitched, baffled, and bewildered.

• Bewitched – “to affect by witchcraft or magic; cast a spell over.”
• Baffled – “to confuse, bewilder, or perplex.”
• Bewildered – “completely puzzled or confused; perplexed.”

Does that sound like the Church to you?

The Enemy has cast a spell over us; telling us that something that is clearly present is not really there. One of my friends said that his pastor was preaching through a book of the Bible that addressed the issue of demons and deliverance. When the pastor got to that passage he simply skipped it like it wasn’t there. Most of our churches and pastors have unknowingly chosen to be blind. Because of this, we are baffled and bewildered.

We try to believe what the Bible teaches. Some of us even believe that counseling and psychology can provide insight into our lives. We know that physical influences can influence our thinking. However, we get stuck when what we believe the Bible teaches doesn’t work like it says it should and neither psychology nor medicine can help us. We are then baffled and bewildered because the Spirit of God whispers to us that it shouldn’t be this way.

After I did a deliverance presentation at a church a few years ago the pastor came up and said to me, “My denomination doesn’t believe any of this stuff, but now it all fits together; deliverance was the missing piece! You’ve changed my world!” Actually, I didn’t do anything. The answer was there all the time.