“The first step on the way to victory is to recognize the enemy.” ~ Corrie Ten Boom
I was saved in July of 1995. By January of 1996, I was fully involved in prolife ministry – namely Operation Rescue (or what came to be known as Operation Save America). My early stories, the ones that need to be told, have to be put in proper context. From my point of view, I never protested anything. I simply had a heart to see people set free. And, I still needed much healing myself.
That is the heart of Father – that people would recognize the strategy of the devil in their lives to rob, kill, and destroy and run into his shelter of salvation. Our propensity toward sin twists the truth in ways that are difficult to recognize. The areas of our lives that are given over to deception cause continual pain and trauma until we allow Father to break the strongholds and replace lies with truth. Just like individuals need this kind of deliverance – so do nations.
Legalized abortion is an open door for Satan to destroy our nation from within. Not only does abortion take the lives of the most innocent among us, it brings physical, spiritual, and emotional trauma to all involved. Father would not be a loving God if he didn’t have a response to the devil’s attempts to destroy people in this way. He responded – he sent out his warriors. Below is a link that shows the spiritual battle for what it is (there are no graphic pictures, just a very demonized group of young women):
The young man in the video is Isaac. You never see him defend himself or raise his voice as the girl shrieks curses over him. He just stands there and prays for her. In the background, you can hear Butch apologizing for any hurt or pain that has taken place in the young ladies’ lives at the hands of fathers/boyfriends, etc… There are reasons these girls have given themselves over to demonic influences. In case you didn’t understand what she is screaming, she says, “Death camps to you all.” Notice the word written on her T-shirt: LOVE.
Listen, I can’t say that we always did everything right – we were in the midst of extreme spiritual warfare. But in this instance, we did. Deliverance doesn’t come about by powering through your struggles. You are not strong enough to save yourself. Nor, are you strong enough to save anyone else. Deliverance comes when we embrace the brutal, splintered cross of Christ. We must be identified in Jesus’ death in order to live in the abundant life of his resurrection.
Revelation 12:11 states, “And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony. And they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death” (ESV).
If you are familiar with Operation Rescue/Operation Save America, you most likely remember people sitting in front of abortion clinic doors, or people being drug off and arrested. Do you know why we did that? Because it was a picture of true intercession – we identified with the cross. Very often, the clinics where we staged “rescues” closed suddenly for no apparent reason. No matter how violently the enemy shakes his fist at God, he has no answer for the Lord’s death and resurrection – or God’s people who understand how to overcome.
The girl shrieking words of death over Isaac was in desperate need of understanding what true LOVE looks like. She needed to be healed of the pain and trauma that drove her. Jesus was often found among those in need of deliverance. He lived out the words he spoke. His words and his actions married perfectly at the cross, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” John 15:13 (NIV).
0 Comments