How to Exercise Spiritual Authority (3 of 6)

Mike Connell

Now if you were to think of your past life, and think every thing that you had ever done wrong, and the things that were right that you should have done and failed to do, to know what to do and not do it, to know to do good and not do it is sin; so if you took a list of that, that is going to be one big list. If we put it on the computer we'd probably fill up the memory, have to stick in another card and put more in. [Laughter] Okay, now imagine all of that, and then take that all the way through the rest of your life, so we've got the whole of your life from when you're born right through to when you die, we've got the lot. Those are all your sins - that's the list that is contrary to you. That is what the devil manipulates to give legal right to your life. So for example, in a person's background if there's been idolatry or freemasonry in the background, there is now a legal right established for demonic spirits to use that as an entrance point to the successive generations.

So in order to deal with the demonic realm, the legal rights issue has to be resolved, and so when Jesus died on the cross He literally paid full price to cancel everything against us. It's the most amazing truth. Now what that means very simply is this: the word redeem means to pay the full price, to get back the person who's in prison and can't free themselves. It's to go to the kidnapper and to pay the price and to get the person kidnapped free, so what Jesus accomplished at the cross was to deal with the legal right. So when He rose from the dead, He was able to say all authority in heaven in earth is now given to Me. Now get this - when He came from heaven, He left all authority behind. He now gained all authority because of this act of obedience in His life, even to the point of death, so legally everything belongs to Jesus. Nothing belongs to the devil.

The nations belong to Him, the earth belongs to Him, all of creation belongs to Him. He has redeemed it, paid the full price to now legally be entitled to rule it. So the Bible tells us one day He'll come back, and He'll assert that with great power. In the meantime we are delegated as representatives of Him, and whenever the devil has a legal right to something, we can go to the cross and say that's the place it was cancelled. So every sin that you bring to the cross, its power to hold you in bondage and create a legal right for demons is broken, so the issue of legal rights is an incredibly important one in the spirit world. That is how the whole thing operates, under law. If we walk in the laws of God, the devil can't touch us. If we break the laws of God, he has legal rights to access us. It's as simple as that, so there's a remedy for the broken law, and that is to bring sin to the cross. That's why you cannot operate successfully in the spirit world without a revelation of the cross, and the blood, and the authority given to us as a believer, to represent the Lord. Okay, so there we are.

So at the cross Jesus legally broke the power of a number of things; the power of sin, the power of curses. Galatians 3:13, He has redeemed us from the curse of the law, becoming a curse for us, that the blessing of Abraham might come upon us. Redeemed, paid the full price. Griefs and trauma, Isaiah 53 and Verse 4, He carried our sorrows, He carried our griefs. In Isaiah 53, Verse 5, by His stripes we are healed, so sicknesses He dealt with; Isaiah 53, Verse 5 and He took away our our iniquities - so everything the devil could use as a weapon, at the cross Jesus legally broke its power. However it's one thing to have something legally done, it's another thing to have the reality of it in your life, and so we need to understand what Jesus has done, so we can bring it into reality here. So this issue of the law, and of sin, and dealing with sin is a crucial one in addressing the spirit world. That's why any person who works in the realm of deliverance has a great awareness of what sin does in terms of establishing legal rights for demons to operate, and it is incredibly difficult to get any person free, or any demonic spirit to shift, if you don't address the legal rights it has to be there.

In fact many times a demon will actually argue with you that it owns this place; I've been here a long time, I have a right to be here. So they'll actually argue with you. When Jesus taught about deliverance, He said that the demon, after it's cast out, will go back, and says: I will return to my house. See, it claims legal right to live in the person's life, so demons look for every legal ground. They are great manipulators to try and use any legal ground to access your life, so removing legal rights is a crucial part of freedom, and we need to understand that if I have broken the law, I don't have much authority, because I'm a transgressor, to be able to set others free. I need to actually bring my own life into alignment.