TRANSCRIPT

“Hey everybody, I’m Anne-Marie Michaelis, a Christian author and coach. Welcome to the Hidden Battles Podcast. My life was radically transformed during a supernatural encounter with Jesus.

God allowed my eyes to be spiritually opened long enough to see the truth of these hidden battles and to scare the rebellion against him right out of me. This workbook series is called The Truth to Overcoming Hidden Battles, taken from my Christian coaching workbook. I’ll be taking you through the workbook in podcast format.

This workbook series is designed to help you overcome negative thinking, limiting beliefs, irrational emotions, unhealthy behavior patterns, toxic relationship addictions and break spiritual strongholds. This book is a workbook and is available on amazon.com. You’re welcome to use the actual workbook or have a notebook and pen ready for taking notes.

You can always pause the video. Or if you like to have everything included, then pause and order the book first. If you’re jumping in and have missed any episodes, I suggest starting with the first one of this series so it makes more sense.

Hidden Battles, revealing what the enemy does not want you to know. Please take a moment to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and subscribe to my channel on YouTube at GodDesign LLC. Podcasts are available on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcast.

For a free download of my memoir, visit my website at GodDesign.me. GodDesign does not guarantee and is not responsible for your results from the information in this podcast. You need to know that your ultimate outcomes will result from your situation and the innumerable circumstances beyond our knowledge and control.

This podcast is meant as a source of valuable information for the listener. However, it is not meant as a substitute for direct assistance by a licensed medical professional. If such a level of assistance is required, the service of a licensed professional should be sought.

For additional details, visit GodDesign.me. Hello, everyone. This is the third episode of the workbook, The Truth to Overcoming Hidden Battles, Episode 22 from Hidden Battles Podcast, Module 1, Chapter 3, called What We Know About the Demonic.

Before we begin, let’s start with prayer. Heavenly Father, we give thanks and gratitude for this time we have to take this walk with you today. Scripture says, ask and it will be given to you.

Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives and the one who seeks finds and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

As we go into this chapter, we ask that you open our eyes to see your truths through your word clearly. Open our ears as we seek to hear your voice guide us through areas of our lives that may need healing, growth, strengthening, clarity, purpose, and victory. Prepare our hearts to receive fully and to get to know you, Jesus, as our Lord and Savior who brings eternal salvation as we walk in union with you.

In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen. We are in module one. Is this just me or is something else going on?

So is this just me? Module one is focused on awareness of mind, heart, and spirit, bringing awareness of thoughts and where they come from, as the mind and heart are the battleground locations for our hidden battles. I have discovered this principle of life that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong.

I love God’s law with all my heart, but there’s another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. And that’s Romans 7 verse 21 through 23.

This is fundamentally the theme of module 1. So let’s get started in chapter 3. Chapter 3 is called What Do We Know About the Demonic?

So a quick side note for chapter 3. I’ll be breaking this up into two episodes, so we’re not running too long or kind of rushing through. This first part will be laying some foundations, and the second part next week will be examples of manifestations of demonization, as well as deep dives and clues of what spiritual warfare may look like.

So chapter 3. There was no way you would ever have been able to tell me before all the supernatural encounters I experienced that I had demonic oppression or demonization, as it’s also sometimes called. I would have said to you, you’re crazy.

I thought I was being too mentally weak to change and break free from the mess I continued to repeat. It was just me. I didn’t know what I believed and I was blinded into only hearing what the world said.

Satan had strongholds in me and I was entirely unaware for 40 years. And we’ll get into strongholds in a later chapter. Now once my eyes were opened, I understood with a new awareness.

Things quickly became apparent. God led me down some unexplainable paths. I saw the demonic realm.

I saw what was in me. I was then able to fight my battles in a much different way. Now let me read to you 2nd Corinthians 4, verse 3 through 4.

Satan, who is the god of this world, that’s lowercase g, god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe, those who don’t believe in Jesus. They are unable to see the glorious light of the good news, the good news of Jesus. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God.

So we know that Satan blinds the minds of those who are not believing, trusting and surrender to Jesus yet. Just like I was, I was blinded. I didn’t understand any of this before.

It was like that, you know, that Peanuts Charlie Brown episode where, you know, the cartoon, where they’re sitting in a classroom and the teacher’s talking and you can hear the teacher speaking and it kind of sounds like wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. I know that sounds silly, but that’s what it sounds like in the cartoon. But it makes no sense what that teacher in that cartoon is even saying.

And so, okay, maybe it’s not that bad where everything we’re hearing from the gospel sounds like a Charlie Brown teacher. But for me back then, you know, hearing anything about God or God’s word when I was going to Catholic school, it made it made me in my mind would switch to thinking about other things. So like I’d be thinking about baseball practice or a baseball game I was going to have later.

I basically was blinded to understanding. And on top of that, I’d get distracted, like thinking about baseball. And so God’s word about Jesus and salvation, it didn’t penetrate my mind and heart with any true understanding.

The message made no sense to me back then. Why? Because I was blinded by Satan, the God, lowercase g, of this world, just like scripture says.

And I didn’t know it. So if that is where you are at, hang in there. We don’t have to stay in this state of being.

So please just stick with me on this journey. It may be a slow grind, but it’s so incredibly worth it when the blinders or the Bible also calls it the veil. When the blinders of the veil is lifted, it will blow your mind and you will wonder how could you not understand this before and how could you not see this before.

It’s pure awesomeness, like nothing else in this world. So hang in there with me. So it’s time for a reflection question one.

What do you currently know and believe about Satan, demons and spiritual warfare? So pause the video and write down the answer to this question. Kind of think through this, you know, what do you currently know and believe about Satan, demons and spiritual warfare?

Because for me, if you would ask me this, even after eight years of Catholic school, I had no idea. I mean, I would not be able to give you an answer. And that’s okay if that’s where you’re at, but just write that down so that we have that to kind of reflect back on as we go further into all of these different chapters.

So it starts with a thought. And what do we know? Well, we know everything begins with a thought.

We also know that many beliefs are not even based on the truth. And we kind of went over that in Chapter one and two. Proverbs 23 verse seven from the New King James Version says this, For as he thinks in his heart, so he is.

Now, we could be filled with inaccurate information, we could need more knowledge to have a complete and accurate belief or belief system. We could have the correct information and just willingly choose something opposite to the truth, which we’ll discuss in Module two, which is called Open Doors and Windows. And that’s called rebellion.

And many of us have rebelled in one way or another willingly, possibly because whatever we were rebelling against didn’t match what we were desiring in the flesh. And Satan also knows all this. So he goes after our minds and our hearts, feeding us lies and deception.

John 13 verse two in the Amplified Classic Translation says this. It tells us that Satan can put a thought into our heart. It says this, so it was during supper, Satan having already put the thought of betraying Jesus in the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son.

So he put, Satan put a thought in the heart of Judas. So we know that that’s possible. So again, reflecting back on chapter one, we learned that science has also finally come into agreement with the Bible that thoughts exist in the heart, not solely in the mind or brain, which we see in these two passages of God’s word.

And remember also that science has come into agreement with God’s word that a thought can come into the mind or heart from another being, which science calls brain sync or brain coupling, in which we see in John 13 verse two. So go back into chapter one, you know, two episodes ago and review that, because we know that, that’s science is finally coming into agreement with God’s word, which is really cool. So now for a reflection question.

What lies do you believe about yourself that others around you may disagree with? How do these lies cause you to feel about yourself? And I’ll give you an example of how I used to be.

I used to believe I needed to lose weight. Not that I don’t think I need to now, but I am not obsessed with it. It is what it is and I’ll do my workout, but I’m not going to beat myself up over it.

But before, I used to believe that, oh, I need to lose weight, so I would over exercise. Yet everyone around me could not see a weight issue. And because of this, I was extremely self-conscious and hyper focused on exercise to the point that it controlled me.

So take a moment and kind of just reflect on that. What lies do you believe about yourself that others around you may disagree with? And how do these lies cause you to feel about yourself?

How did the demonic realm come to be? Well, let’s talk briefly about who Satan was and is today and his purpose in relation to us. Before Satan became whom we know him to be now, he was called Lucifer, meaning star of the morning, and he was considered an angel of perfection, beauty, and full of wisdom.

Revelation 12 verse 9 says this, And the huge dragon was cast down and out, that age-old serpent who was called the devil and Satan, he who is the seducer, deceiver of all humanity, the world over. He was forced out and down to the earth, and his angels were flung out along with him. Satan did not want to worship God.

Instead, he wanted to be worshiped, and he became filled with unrighteousness, which is he wasn’t in right standing with God. His wisdom had become corrupt because of his beauty and power. Lucifer rebelled against God due to his pride.

He wanted to be God. He became filled with violence and sin, and therefore was cast out of heaven by God, along with one third of the angels, which we now call fallen angels or demons. Lucifer became Satan, meaning accuser, and the demons, one third of his angels, are his followers that do his bidding.

Satan and his demons are enemies of God and God’s children, us. Genesis 3 verse 1 tells us this, Now the serpent, Satan, was more crafty, subtle, skilled in deceit than any living creature of the field which the Lord God had made, including us. So we’re not going to outsmart Satan and his army of fallen angels and demons with our limited human abilities.

We are nothing without Jesus, period. So we’re going to learn how to fight our hidden battles according to God’s word and God’s full armor, the armor of God, which is coming in future modules. But first, we have to get awareness of what is really going on, the hidden battles.

What is the purpose of all this? You may be asking yourself that question. It’s important to know, right?

What are Satan and his network of demons’ purpose and why should we care? The only purpose he has left with his miserable existence is to destroy us and keep us away from God and God’s purpose for us. You know the saying, misery loves company.

Satan and his demons go after our thoughts in our minds and hearts in many different ways, which may or may not be abrupt. They may actually be extremely subtle. As the scripture has described him, he’s full of wisdom.

Satan’s schemes are most successful when they remain hidden from us. This way he can slowly and stealthily worm into our minds and hearts. He is the father of all lies, an illusionist, and a master of deception, a careful and strategic manipulator and twister of the truth.

But you might say something like this, I am a Christian, this doesn’t apply to me. Unfortunately, it applies to all of us. None of us is immune to demonic attacks.

Demons may not possess Christians with the Holy Spirit dwelling inside them, but that does not mean demons cannot oppress us by messing with our minds and hearts, especially when we’re leaving doors and windows open for these demonic rats and rodents to make a home, which we call sin. That’s a deep dive in a future chapter that we’ll get deeper into as we build on this topic. John 10, verse 9 through 10 in the Amplified Translation tells us, tells us this about Jesus, as well as the enemy, you know, the thief or Satan, whichever you like to call him, says this, I, Jesus, am the door.

Anyone who enters through me will be saved and will live forever and will go in and out freely and find pasture, spiritual security. The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life and have it in abundance to the full till it overflows.

So we’re not going out smart Satan and his army of fallen angels and demons with our limited human abilities. We’re nothing without Jesus, period. Jesus is our door, our door for salvation or eternal life united through him with God the Father.

Apart from Jesus, we’ll be contending our eternal lives with Satan, who wants us dead and tormented. So we definitely need to make sure we are building that relationship with Jesus, who wants us to experience an abundant life till it overflows. I mean, think of it this way.

Say there’s two people in your life. You’re currently calling them both friends. One has your best interest in mind, and maybe they don’t tell you what you want to hear.

Maybe they challenge you for betterment, for yourself, right? They know what’s maybe something going on, and they really want you to get better. And then you got another one that drags you into the armpit of hell, possibly doing ungodly things.

Maybe has a habit of lying, cheating, stealing, etc. Whatever the case may be. Are they both people you would call friends?

Who do you want to align yourself with? Jesus is the best friend that wants the best for you. He may stretch you, challenge you, convict you at times to help you achieve spiritual maturity, abundance of life till it overflows as you grow through him.

Or do you want that person or that entity to be Satan, who wants to secretly kill, steal and destroy you? Realize it or not, you’re either aligning with Jesus or you’re aligning with Satan, the god of this world. So I’m going to stop preaching and end with your reflections.

All right, here’s your reflection question. What is coming up for you as you learn about the purpose of Satan, his fallen angels and our thoughts? If you’re confused, possibly fearful at this entire revelation of knowledge around spiritual warfare, after you reflect on this question and jot down your answer, pray this prayer with me.

So again, pause the video, answer this reflection question, and then restart the video, and I’m going to say a prayer with you. All right, you ready? This is the prayer we’re going to say together.

Jesus, as we go deeper into this study, we know we’ll be uncovering Satan’s agenda in our lives. We ask for your protection. We ask for you to guard our hearts and minds.

We ask for you to expose the cracks and crevices in our lives that have given the enemy a foothold and that need to be sealed up and refilled with your word and your goodness. We ask for the courage and endurance to take this deep dive so that we may know you more fully and remove anything that may be preventing a deep relationship with you, Jesus. In Jesus’ name, we pray.

Amen.

Hey friends, that’s a wrap of today’s Hidden Battles Podcast. A transcript for this week’s podcast and my memoir are available for a free download on my website at GodDesign.me or check out some of my other books that you may find helpful. If you liked this episode, please share it with others.

Hidden Battles, revealing what the enemy does not want you to know. Never stop praying, never give up and I’ll see you next week.”