The most successful strategy ever invented by the Enemy is, in my option, the one that persuades you that an impulse arising from a demonic intruder in the soul, permitted entry because of a legal right granted by willful disobedience to a mitzvah (commandment), or by believing a lie, is actually 'you'. If you believe, for example, that you are too dirty, soiled or sinful to be lovable or loved by Yahweh, then believing that demonic lie will cripple your life, rendering it ineffective, and prevent you from ever being delivered. If you believe that a moral commandment stated in the Tanakh (Old Testament) has been abolished by Messiah on the Cross, and you then go and break it, believing the antinomian lie, then you have opened a door to a demonic entity who will tell yet more lies from within and then persuade you that it is 'you' talking or feeling what you hear and feel.

When a person yields his or her life to Yah'shua (Jesus), surrendering all to Him, repenting of known sin, and promising to adhere to Him always, the Ruach haQodesh (Holy Spirit) enters the lev (heart) and completely transforms the inner man or woman, relandscaping it, rebirthing the soul and making it into a "new creature" in Messiah (2 Cor.5:17; Gal.6:15). Beginning as a spiritual conception at Pesach and resulting in spiritual rebirth at Yom haBikkurim if the conceived soul in Messiah seeks to get sin out of his or her life in the process represented by Chag haMatzah, so the spirit undergoes a complete inner restructuring, rather like the metamorphosis of a caterpillar into a butterfly. A complete 'rearrangement' takes place in the core of the being that is the spirit.

Our spirit, thus regenerated, is structured in a matrix of eternal Torah-Emet, or Torah-Truth. It is reshaped by the Living Torah, Yah'shua the Messiah (Jesus Christ), by means of the Ruach haQodesh (Holy Spirit), once He has been truly admitted to the lev (heart).

Imagine a jelly mould. Before you were born again, your spirit was shaped in the tavnith or pattern of the sinful, carnal, Adamic or fleshy nature. Once you were born again, Yah'shua (Jesus) metaphorically 'reached in', threw out the fleshy mould, and put in its place one shaped like Himself into which your spirit could then fit and be reshaped. This three dimensional mold or matrix is a complex tavnith (pattern) of Torah-mitzvot (commandments). Any principle that contradicts this new matrix is from the Adamic, carnal or fleshy nature.

When such an impulse arises from the flesh that contradicts this new Torah-matrix, a conflict arises requiring a choice for resolution. This impulse - which is demonic, shaped after the tavnith (pattern) which is Satan - is seeking entry to the spirit to change the mould. This fleshy 'voice', 'feeling' or 'sense' will always contradict Torah-Emet and will always present itself as YOU! The flesh never directly presents itself as Satan - obviously - as that would give its identity and source away. Therefore if you, the born-again believer, see something in a shop which you can't afford but would like, two things will happen:

• 1. The real you says: "I can't have that without stealing, stealing is wrong, therefore I can't have that - move on";
• 2. The demonic, fleshy impulse will pretend to be you, and say: "I want that and I will have that, it's OK to take it, it will cost the shop so little, they will never notice it is gone".

So what should you do? First, recognise that that is not you. If you have been born-again, you have been changed by Messiah and have acquired His mind and lev (heart). If you don't, you will start to doubt your salvation, which is the chief goal of the Enemy, because then he can work on you by small or large increments to persuade you to thereafter walk away from your salvation. Remember, if you have been born again, your spirit is already yielded to the opposite of what the demonic flesh nature would have you believe. Consistently refusing to either listen to or yield to that flesh nature is what it means to be crucified with Messiah. It is not some tortuous battle to change yourself into something you aready are. The battle is not to try and do the impossible: turn a demon into a Messiah-centred being vcalled "I".

That's why people often struggle with the same issues again and again. They believe the lie that they are somehow not saved and have to be more saved. Now it is perfectly true that in salvation there is a maturation process. We live in a physical body which has a psychic nature that are by default opposite to the regenerated nature of the spirit. Therefore the flesh has to be "crucified" (silenced) and the psyche transformed into an image of the regenerated spirit and not into the image of the flesh! That is the primary battle.

I repeat, the Great Lie is thinking that the fleshy "I" is the spirit-regenerated "I" when it isn't. When your spirit is already yielded to the opposite of the false "I" (which isn't even an "I" at all but a demomic "it"). Remaining in Messiah after rebirth solely consists of refusing to identity the real "I" with any anti-Torah "I" because that "I" is a LIE. Furthermore, if you never identify with that Lie you will have no disposition to sin, because the regenerated nature will be in control.

Now, of course, the Enemy plays on our ignorance which is why we must know the Scriptures so that we have a second witness to the Ruach (Spirit) witnessing to us. The flesh seeks to imitate the inner voice or sense of the Ruach (Spirit) which is why Yah'shua (Jesus), when He was being tempted by the devil for 40 days in the Judean Wilderness, always countered the voice of Satan with Scripture. This twin witness establishes two poles on the ground of reality with a visible line between them so that we can always know which side of it we are supposed to be on. And then a second believer conforming the same truth allows those two lines to intersect - rather like tracking a phone call or a radio transmission - can clearly identfy the original LIE in order to permanently defeat it. Hence the importance of fellowship with other believers. And a third witness is even better! Once you have exposed that demonic lie for real, you'll never be fooled by it again.

"By the mouth of two or three witnesses every word [of Emet/Truth] may be established" (Matt.18:16, NKJV).

Is it so easy? Yes. Some days ago my wife confessed to me that she did not feel like doing something which she knew was right, and she didn't know what to do about it. "I just don't feel like it," she said. I told her straight out that it wasn't her talking but something else, because I could see the darkness in her countenance. "Just declare in Yah'shua's (Jesus') Name that the "I" is not you, recognise that the feeling of intransigence and coldness and hostility isn't you either, and give the whole lot to Yah'shua (Jesus)". She trusted me, did so, and instantly her eyes and face lit up, and the former disposition and hostility to the truth-principle vapourised. She was amazed!

Now it is true that if we have yielded to a whole series of false "I"'s over a longish period of time that a whole network of lies will have solidified into what Scripture calls a demonic "stronghold" (2 Cor.10:4). Like a concrete wall, it may take time pulling these mental structures down, demonic resistance will be met, and a struggle (like that of Jacob at the River Jabokk) becomes a necessity. A period of spiritual warfare is mandated that could, depending on the depths of sin yielded to, take a while to dismantle, simply because so many lies have been believed and the spirit has been plunged into darkness. When such sins pile high into mounds and then into hills and then into mountains, great emunah (faith) must be exercised, much will- or staying-power is needed (which Messiah can provide), and great surrender is required.

If you are facing such a "mountain", I want you to remember two things:

• 1. Each lie, and the demonic power that strengthens it and makes it seem bigger than it really is, can be exposed and the demonic power dismissed as easily as flicking a light switch - its the demonic that wants you to believe that some Herculean effort is required that will take years and years to figure out; and
• 2. Yah'shua (Jesus) says mountains of lies can be removed en masse if you are really willing to trust Him:

  "So Yah'shua (Jesus) answered and said to them, 'Assuredly, I say to you, if you have emunah (faith) and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, 'Be removed and be cast into the sea,' it will be done. And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive''" (Matt.21:21-22, NKJV).

Mountains of lies that lead to a concrete network of demonic powers putting you in bondage that seem like am inescapable steel prison isn't - it requires simply turning on several switches consecutively and dismanting the structure - or rather, letting Yah'shua (Jesus) dismantle it. Your part is simply being willing to admit the problem exists in black-and-white, agree to see the lie exposed in technicolour, make a choice, declare the Torah-Emet (Truth) that contradicts the lie and that you want the emet (truth), and then let Yah'shua (Jesus) do the rest. Then mountains of lies get thrown into the sea of deliverance.

More tomorrow!

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