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Mental Illness and the Demonic, what is the connection?

Updated on September 21, 2018

In our sophisticated world many believe that any talk of demons is superstitious and foolish. These people believe the only place things of this nature belong is in the realms of mythology and Hollywood moves. Even within the Christian church, there seems to be a reluctance to perceive mental illness in the realm of the supernatural.

Even though in Jesus time demonic influence appeared to be a very real problem that Jesus faced head on! Did Jesus every go to some one whom he was about to cast a demon out of and say. “I need a list of the Psychiatric medication you are using and I also need to confer with your Psychiatrist before I can heal you”? Not according to scripture, so why do many Christians feel it is necessary go this rout? If Jesus was “in the flesh” in modern times do you think his healing methods would be any different than they were back when he walked the earth? Personally I feel that He would focus on the spiritual aspect first and foremost.

I believe the Christian church in these modern times is approaching the problem of mental illness backwards! They look at mental and psychological answers first and then deal with the possibility of demonic involvement after all else fells! The scriptures say that as Christians we do not belong to this world! We are fighting a spiritual battle against a spiritual enemy!

To stress my point, let us look at the methods used in twelve step programs with the problem of addiction. These “spiritually based” programs tell us that the addict is powerless over his addiction! It is all focused on the concept of a Higher Power doing for the addict or alcoholic that he or she cannot do for himself or herself. When Bill Wilson first started Alcoholic Anonymous it was before the time that drugs were developed to help cure the addiction of alcohol as it is being approached today. Back in the 1930’s Psychiatrist were at odds with the problem of addiction. The whole concept of AA was revolutionary for its time! Before then, alcoholics and addicts often took their addictions to the grave!

Addiction has been called “Cunning, Baffling and Powerful” as if the addiction its self had its own reality or presence. In my opinion, there is something else that has the same attributes as addiction and that is the very source of addiction, Satan himself! To me the reality is that mental illness and substance dependency often go hand in hand! Yes there are mentally ill people who do not have a substance abuse problem just like you can have substance abuse problem with out mental illness. Even so, there are many times the two are connected. In fact many x-addicts and Mental Health professionals will tell you repeatedly that people with mental or emotional problems will self-medicate on drugs or alcohol to try to deal with their problem.

It seems strange to me that we live in a time in which Pharmaceutical companies are slinging their drugs as fast as the law allows. The problem is that the side effects are sometimes even worse than the problem they are said to cure! This, by the way is during an age in which we have declared a “war on drugs!” Yes it is the age of double messages, when Pharmaceutical companies can go “full tilt boogie” on designing new medications for depression and other mental conditions that many times have the potential of bringing on such things as “suicidal tendencies” in some patients!

Another dark situation has transpired with the development of painkillers that have become even more addictive than some of the street drugs! This has created a slippery slope with no clear solutions in sight. For on a personal level, I have seen many of my friends destroy their lives with these chemicals. On the other hand, I also have seen deliverance from addiction and mental illness though this “higher power” that I chose to recognize as Jesus Christ! I have seen other lives transformed and has had my own life transformed though the power of Christ! For I have had problems with drug dependency and severe depression that almost lead me to suicide!

As I have admitted in many other hubs that I lived much of my life in the realm of complete darkness that I did not even have the ability to perceive as darkness! This was because I was blinded or better yet, brain washed into denying the truth! I have now been on the path of recovery not just from controlled substances, but also from insanity its self! For insanity has often been described as doing those things that we know to be wrong but to expect a different result each time we do them!

When I first returned to Christianity I was still strongly influenced by the effects of my long association with Satanism. It took much prayer to break free from these ties even though I had not been directly involved in any form of witchcraft or “magical practices” for many years. I had been though many sessions of psychological therapy, which had been quite useful and effective and yet, did not supply the transformation that an increased relationship with God allowed me to enjoy! I have come to believe, that any form of Psychotic medication or Psychotherapy does not address the whole problem of emotional or mental dysfunction.

I know that there are those within the Christian community who frown on my focus on the mannerisms of Satanic forces and yet, I am strongly convicted of the importance of doing so.The reason for this is that I am painfully aware of the naïveté on the subject of the Powers of Darkness and how they operate.For to defeat any enemy we must have some understanding on its agenda or intent that “it” desires to accomplish. First, we must try to comprehend why demons desire to possess an individual. What is the purpose of them doing so? My observation is that first and foremost, Satan is the ultimate “control freak”! One-way of understanding this is as a form of “spiritual capture the flag” for the human soul can be looked at as “spiritual real-estate”! Satan wants to “own” and control as many souls as he can!

Remember that Satan’s purpose is to “kill steal and destroy,” This is his main objective that he intends to obtain! Keeping this in mind, let us take a look at the destructive characteristics of mental illness and how it relates to the descriptions of those who are possessed by demons. Self-destructive attitudes are often a trait demonstrated by those with mental illness and is frequently connected to drug abuse. To me, the fact that self-destructive behavior has also been associated with demonic possession needs not be brushed off as just a coincidence!

I have a good friend who has an adopted son who has suffered with Schizophrenia for many years. He is quite aware of the fact that Schizophrenia is a chemical imbalance of the brain and for that reason alone, he knows that it not just a spiritual issue. The other side of the coin though, is that his son has been helped tremendously though the power of prayer. The struggle is to understand why this young Christian man has not been fully healed or does his condition have a spiritual aspect to it at all?

When a person is being told by voices in his head to harm himself or others, it is easy to jump to the conclusion that this person is being affected on some level by demonic forces. Even though, a Doctor of Psychiatry can now prove the physical effects of this condition tough the use of a CAT scan or PET scan.

There is another concept that I feel should be considered when we are trying to understand a circumstance like the one I presented in the paragraphs above. This is the possibility of “generational curses.” The bible speaks of this, and some within the Christian faith have received much training in this filed. In fact, the Christian community that I belong to is strongly affiliated with an organisation that is quite familiar with this subject. This is Christian Healing Ministries (http://www.christianhealingmin,org). This is a world renowned organization that has had devoted its self to every form of Christian healing and teaching others techniques to become better equipped in all characteristics of healing as it is presented in the Holy Scriptures.

I feel it is vital to understand as much history as possible about a person afflicted with mental illness be it spiritual or organic in nature. The reason why I am convinced of this, is that Jesus Christ, being the Son of God understood completely every detail about the people who he had chosen to heal! Faith is a wonderful thing and it needs to be fully empowered by wisdom! This wisdom of course comes from God and yet, it can be acquired many different ways. Direct revelation from the Holy Spirit is quite real however, its message should never be accepted unless it corresponds with the truths presented within scripture. It has been my experience when God reveals something it is usually presented to more than one person. As I have stated several times in my pass writings, Satan is a cleaver counterfeiter and so any spiritual significance needs to be scrutinized!

When we discuss such subjects as deliverance from mental illness we must take a hard look at the life style that a person chooses, for I have found in my own life that to experience true healing I had be willing to surrender to God and allow his will to be done in my life. It is my testimony that the more I allowed the Holy Spirit to interact in my life; the more I was delivered from my pass.

A person, who hangs on to the things of their past that had control over them, will find it more difficult to break free from negative spiritual influences . An example of this was a woman I got to know quite well who ended up in a comma from a drug overdose and almost died. Besides recovering from addiction she also suffers from Paranoid Schizophrenia and had savvier illusions that made her life a living hell. If there was ever a person that seemed to be demon possessed it was this young woman.

She had a strong interest in witchcraft and during the time that she seriously studied the Occult her mental condition greatly deteriorated to the point she was having conversation with people that were not there, some of these people she believed to be ghost, Slowly but surely she started to loose interest in witchcraft and started going to church. She became a regular at the Bible study I was helping to conduct in the half-way house she was living in and soon recovered to the point she could live in her own apartment! You can ask any one who knew her and I am sure they would tell you the change was dramatic!

Even in book and the movie “The Exorcist” the young victim of the Satanic Possession (for in the movie it claimed that Satan himself possessed the girl) produced the words “help me” on her body. This to me showed how important it is for someone to ask for help to receive deliverance. The person must admit and then ask for the liberation from slavery of the presence of evil. Personally, I feel that demonic possession is much more common than people realist but they are unwilling or unaware of what really is taking place.

In fact, the book the “The Exorcist” was inspired by an actual possession that may had not been as dramatic as the account in the novel, and yet was very real and has been documented as such. It interesting to note, that the young man who was given the name Robbie Mannheim to protect his identity, was said that he became possessed after he attempt to contact his dead Aunt with a Ouija board. Though the years, many people have asked me if I felt the Ouija board has any special power and I always told them that this board has no power whatsoever . The Ouija board was created as a child's game back in 1890, and its name comes from the French (oui) and the German word (ja) for the word "yes" It is the fact that someone allows themselves to be "open" that gives the spirit freedom to what it wants! This, by the way, is somewhat rare, and most of the time it ones own subconscious mind that is making the disk move.

Now I am convinced that some of the hideous crimes that have been committed though out time, are examples of Satanic influences. Especially those murderers who admitted a connection with Satanism as being to blame for there actions in the first place. For those of you who are sceptical of this, you should take in consideration that every thing must have a source, as I state in my conclusion to my Luciferian Doctrine series. Just as a plant must have a root, evil its self has a root! After all, if you believe any of the Biblical description and explanation for creation of the world, “the Spirit of God” existed before anything that was physical!

My line of reasoning is that the true reality behind everything that exist, is the spiritual. Is this a far cry from the evolutionist who believes that every thing began from the act of anti-matter crashing into mater? After all, anti-matter was only recently proven to exist! To me I have just as much proof that the spirituality is a reality because I have witnessed it within my life, both good and evil! I have witnessed it in many others lives as well. This was NOT imagination or any other excuses you may claim is the actual reality, for I feel the spirit just as strongly as I can feel the wind blow!

When the subject of multiple personalities is addressed, I can easily see how that can be considered as a form of demonic possession. And yet, many professionals within the filed of Psychiatry would probably tell me I am wrong! The main theory I have read presented is that a person will develop many personalities to protect their main personality from having to deal with a certain problem or memory. I must say that I can accept that option as being believable in many cases but not all!

To explore this a little further I would like to return to the New Testament and explore the incident of the man who had a “legion” of demons controlling him. This event was written about in three of the four gospels and speaks of a man (or two men according to Matthew). I can not even imagine what it would like to have such a large amount of demons in control of your life, and the Bible states that this man had super strength to be able to break chains.

To me it seems similar to the power that some experience while under drugs like PCP that increases the adrenaline within the body so the person can accomplish amazing feats of strength. To wrap this up, I would like to declare that God in his divine wisdom has now supplied us with more knowledge on how to combine medical and spiritual solutions for the effects of sin, and the more we connect our will with the will of God the Father, the more healing we can expect, or the grace to endure! Without him there is no hope!



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