5.2 A Mighty Stronghold

For the weapons of our warfare are not fleshly, but are God-enabled towards the tearing down of fortresses, overthrowing arguments, and every high thing or barrier lifting itself up against the knowledge of God and taking captive every thought into submission to hearing Christ (2 Corinthians 10:4-5).

Paul’s words require this fact of reality, that our God-enabled weapons match overwhelmingly the fortresses-arguments-barriers that oppose the knowledge of God and are well able to strike them down. John’s vision gives us the spirit reality, a heavenly picture of the interlocking arguments and barriers that prevent God’s people from hearing Christ inside of themselves.

The Root Marriage. In the last lesson we looked at each of these seven spirits of anti-Christ individually. In this lesson, we will explore how these things work together to create a seemingly impregnable stronghold in the souls of Christians, casting down the knowledge of God wherever it might try to penetrate.

I plan to include shortly a communication against me on Facebook. It is astonishing to me that this Christian ministry manages to include in his few words everyone of these seven spirits of anti-Christ, clearly visible in his expression. Before we look at that, however, I want to consider the root inside this stronghold. That root is the marriage between contempt in the human, beginning with Adam, and the accusation of the devil against God, beginning with the serpent.

Out from This Union. When Adam and the serpent entered into a contract together to give the other what each lacked, these are the things the two provided. Adam’s authority had become contempt and the serpent’s anointing had become accusation.

A “God” who knows evil will always side with a human who expresses contempt. And to express his contempt, a human will always reach for the argument that “God” is evil, after all. Then, out from the union of these two roots of awfulness, the other five spirits of anti-Christ simply appear to fill in the gaps at the behest of that false union. And the root of both is unthankfulness.

The Fruit of Giving Thanks. I was fifteen years old when God planted in my heart the seed of the knowledge of giving thanks. Thirty-nine years later, when I was fifty-four, that seed had completed its work in removing from me all thought that God might be evil. As I think about the course of my life, I realize that this was truly the issues of God inside of me through all those years, and that every single one of these seven spirits of anti-Christ fell away until that moment when I saw God my Father revealed to me only through Jesus, carrying me all the way through.

I had posted the words of an “Ask and Believe” from The Jesus Secret II on Facebook. A particular minister replied. ~ “Jesus said to pray to the father. One reason your prayers are not heard: in that day you will ask me nothing but pray to the father.” ~

Eliciting even Worse. I responded with – “God my Father always hears me, for I come to Him through Jesus.”

Then the man posted this. ~ “Daniel Yordy, people love to assume that they are heard. An open heavens is when The Father answers all your prayers, and church people get jealous of that. The father does that so they would press in and seek His face as well. God not only hears but bears witness to your life and He brings revival where ever He leads me. People start to weep and are convicted for their sins as the Holy Spirit comes down and moves principalities out of the way. People get a full atonement salvation, deliverance, and healing. God is pouring out His spirit in this hour if pastors would only get out of the way and let God have His way.” ~

Finally, the Very Worst. Later I wrote a general response that God’s ministry will always humble themselves beneath of the least in His House, to lift them up. Here is the man’s response. ~ “God don’t bear witness to fakes. All your religious activity won’t move God.” ~ At that point I blocked him from seeing my stuff.

Now, I do recognize the anointing of God’s Spirit given to this brother, and I honor that anointing. Nonetheless, the Spirit is always under human control. I honor the anointing, but I never trust anyone so anointed, and I judge only his words. Even though he doesn’t know me, this man’s contempt for me drives his words. And the God he presents, who does not hear those who call upon Him in their distress, is an evil “God.”

Never Defend Yourself. The power of evil argument uses many kinds of tricks and pressures to get you to defend yourself. The moment you defend yourself, you have placed yourself under the powers of darkness, and they will rip you apart. NEVER answer these kinds of things directly. Jesus never did. Sometimes He remained silent, as Isaiah said, and other times He said things in response to words designed to trip Him up, that seemed not to be a direct answer, but that were an expression of the Truth unseen by most.

This is how I responded. But then his final answer, human contempt coming out from an evil “God,” was the moment to walk away. NEVER defend yourself. Christ needs no defense.

“My” Stamp of Approval. Now I want to show how the other five spirits of anti-Christ, coming out from these first two always together, can be seen inside this man’s communication. This man’s argument leads into his own ministry of “revival” inside Christian gatherings. And the truth is, Jesus will move through anything by His Spirit to connect with those who want to know Him.

The problem is that along with Jesus for real, the man presents five false ways of “knowing” the salvation of God. When he says, “God bears witness to your life,” what he really means is that your outward show of performance, the appropriate crying and lying, gains MY stamp of approval.

Pleasing the “Man of God.” “If you are not gyrating under the power coming through me, then God doesn’t like you.”

Then he says, ~ “People get a full atonement salvation.” ~ Those very words LIMIT the atonement of Jesus in every conceivable way, again, bringing the evidence that one has “got hold of the real” under this man’s stamp of approval.

And, of course, you can see the dance between the above-you “Christ” and the caterwauling of show, trying to demonstrate to the “man of God” that I must be like this unreachable Christ. People don’t do this to please God, for only believing that God is telling us the truth pleases God. They do this to please the “man of God,” that he would approve of them. I know it well.

All Seven in One Line. Then this line. ~ “If pastors would only get out of the way and let God have His way.” ~ Wow. All seven of these demons are found in this one line.

The predominant one here, however, is that Death is the only way to life. In this case, it’s not physical death to take you to see Jesus, but Constantine’s false death, a death that cannot ever be accomplished, that is, an inadequate atonement. Second, this line is a full expression of the refusal to believe that God has already placed us utterly into the Way, into Jesus, into Himself. You cannot claim that you are inside of God because you have not successfully put yourself to death.

I Despise You. Look at the root words in this man’s argument (my paraphrase).
Daniel Yordy, I DESPISE you. And because I despise you, Daniel, I require a God who despises you as well. Indeed, such a “God” anoints all my thinking.

Because I am superior, way, way above you, Yordy, I place a super-Jesus way above you as well. In conjunction with that super-“Christ,” and because I despise you, I place you entirely outside of a very small atonement, an atonement that certainly does not include you. You might think you’re putting on a show to appease my caricature of Christ, but your performance has not gained my stamp of approval, therefore it cannot have gained God’s.

The Words of the Dragon. So die, loser, die. But I know you haven’t and that you never will, because I despise you, and all pastors of whom I do not approve. But here is your greatest CRIME, Yordy. You dare to assert that you are inside of God, when I have demonstrated with convincing “proofs” that you are NOT.

Now understand this, even though the words of the dragon are in this man’s mouth, he remains anointed of the Spirit. And recognizing the Spirit of God in the past, I lived long years under the horror of imagining these things to be true, frightened out of my wits, wanting to be with God, but believing in my imagination that God was not with me.

This darkness is hades following after.

Our Diagram Again. Consider our diagram again to have a full understanding of the weave of these things. The reality inside this weave of awfulness is a power-hungry preacher who wants to control other Christians. Everything else is spun out from this contempt to maintain that place of control.

Assumed Superiority. I have shared elsewhere of a recent time when I heard preached a most horrific sermon. Everything in this weave of darkness ruled all through what the man, fully anointed of God, preached.

But how did he begin? First he read the words, “As Jesus is, so are you in this present world.” Then he asserted his own superiority, and out from that assumed superiority, he presented the certain reality that God is not telling us the truth. Yet that’s not what he actually said. You see, you cannot be superior if all these thousands of Christians in front of you are not inferior. And if God’s words were true, then he would have to humble himself as beneath the House of God. Thus his whole sermon was – It is evident that YOU have not produced what God says, so you must perform under the control of my approval.

Contempt Is the Cause. Contempt is the cause; contempt is everything hostile against God and everything that seeks to control others. This contempt requires a “God” just like itself, one who also despises others. This contempt, because it despises others, places Jesus far above them, a super-Christ, something you can never really reach. That’s on the one side.

Then, on the other side, in order to undergird the contempt, the atonement of the Lord Jesus cannot reach to you. You don’t have my approval, therefore you are outside a limited atonement.  A super-Jesus, on the one hand, has not actually saved you, on the other hand. Jesus is super, but He’s not very good at His job.

From Failure to Failure. Then, an ineffective atonement leads right into – “Die, brother, die.” You have to perfect what Jesus failed to accomplish before you can ever enter into knowing God. And since we KNOW you will never succeed in putting yourself to death, you will never see Jesus or know God until after you have DIED and “gone to” heaven. Why? – Because you are a loser and I despise you.

I walked in the joy of the anointing and in effective ministry to others three times prior to the present time. Each of those times was when I walked with an elder whom I have named, Abel, Don, and Rick. These men treated me as their equal inside of God and never needed to “control” me.

Hades Followed After. Then, when I consider every time a ministry indicated to me that God was NOT with me, in whatever way, it is clear that they were acting in a manner that would place themselves over me. You cannot see yourself as “above” without, in one way or another, placing your brother or sister beneath. And placing yourself above and your brother beneath has a name, two names, in fact. It’s inward name is CONTEMPT and its outward name is Death.

And every single time some ministry indicated to me that God was not with me, hades followed in the wake of their words inside my consciousness – because I imagined their words must be God speaking to me, just as Eve imagined in the garden.

You Are A Heretic. Next, since you must fail to accomplish the death that Jesus also failed to make effective, then you CANNOT believe that you are inside of God and God inside of you. And if you claim that God has seized you into Himself and into His throne, we know you are a heretic and that God hates you – even though the gospel presents such a reality as the only normal Christian life.

So here’s the deal, loser. Since Jesus has clearly not saved you, and since your efforts to put yourself to death fall so short of my approval, then you cannot be inside of God, Jesus cannot live in union with you. Therefore – pretend to be like my caricature of Christ, like you have never pretended before, and then I might approve, but only if you acknowledge me as superior.

Twisting Gospel Verses. All of this is really sick and really empty.

The problem is this. John Calvin, and others like him through the centuries, took many basic gospel verses, and wove them together into THIS pattern, rather than into God’s patterns of the Tabernacle and the reproduction of Life. Thus all these good verses, wrongly placed and partly miss-defined, reinforce the power-hungry preacher in the minds of his hearers as he or she seeks to bringing them under control. And the big verses of the gospel, the ruling verses, proved to be SO EASY to eliminate. – Since you cannot be inside of God, BECAUSE you are beneath of me, then there is no question that God is not talking about you in the big verses – they are irrelevant.

Without a Cause. And so we see this from our diagram. Contempt looks straight through a “God” just like itself at me, who clearly cannot be inside of God (refusal to believe).

Yet what does contempt actually see? Contempt sees me, utterly inside of God, looking back through a God who sees others as better than Himself. Contempt sees me, humbling myself with such a God beneath of them, sharing with the Lord Jesus that wondrous task of carrying this one so filled with contempt all the way through the darkness and into life.

Then, seeing me in this way spurred inside of contempt his strongest denunciation (my paraphrase). – God does NOT hear you, Yordy, because I do not approve of you. As Jesus said, “They hated Me without a cause.” And even their hatred cannot create a “cause.”

God Loves Me. We could find many more connections in this diagram, how each demon of anti-Christ relates itself directly to those on each side of it. And how every demon looks through a “God” just like itself, to consort with the demon on the opposite side.

Here is God’s answer. – By this we have known love, in that Jesus set forth His soul for us, and we also are committed to setting forth our souls for our brothers and sisters, regardless.

In the next two lessons, we will seek out, not power verses, necessarily, but rather those personal gospel truths so precious to us personally, that destroy every one of these demons all at the same time. But before all of that is this one thing. – Jesus loves me. – God loves me. And darkness does not exist.