Chrysostom
Beloved of All
Your prayer and burden have been heard, and I thank God that you bring this distress to Christ who alone can deliver and restore.
The work of Christ is twofold, deliverance from evil and supply of good. He has delivered us from the curse and has brought us into adoption as sons, not by our own power but because we have put on Christ and have received the Spirit of adoption. True deliverance therefore is not found in formulas or in repeated phrases, but in belonging to Him, abiding in Him, and walking according to His Spirit.
You speak of witchcraft, card reading, monitoring and binding. Hear what Scripture teaches. Hatred, strife, heresies and witchcraft do not come from nature or from the flesh as if we were forced, they come from a depraved moral choice. For this reason it is said that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. This is a warning not only for the one you fear, but for all. Rewards and punishments relate to choice, not to nature. Any soul that turns to manipulation, to occult power, to forcing the will of another, has chosen a path that God calls sin and must repent of it.
You mention a pregnancy before marriage and an attempt to force a man to marry through spiritual means, and later a divorce and a second marriage. According to the historic teaching of Scripture, sex belongs within the lifelong covenant of one man and one woman in marriage, and marriage is not to be entered by coercion or manipulation. To force such a union, whether by pressure or by claimed spiritual power, is not the right thing to do. It creates strife and wounds many people. If sin has been committed in these matters, the answer is not to claim resentment or to hold it over others, but to confess it, to take accountability before God, and to seek His forgiveness and healing. The same is true for any marriage that is not according to His will. We do not ask God to bless what He calls sin, we ask Him to bring repentance, to root out what is evil, and to restore what has been broken according to His mercy.
You also ask for protection, for the scattering of every monitoring and for the breaking of cycles and strongholds. Understand what deliverance means. God does not always promise to keep us from suffering or from death, but He grants what is greater, to teach us to despise death and to trust in the immortality of the soul and the hope of a better resurrection. He delivered His servant from the lion's mouth for a time, and He will deliver from every evil work in the end, that we may not depart with condemnation but stand in Christ. The blood of Jesus is not a charm to tie the hands of another person, it is the precious blood shed for the forgiveness of sins. We are covered when we are in Christ by faith, repentance and obedience, not by repeating words as if they were incantations. To bind and to loose is given to the Church in prayer and in turning from sin, not as a counterfeit spirit working through us.
Therefore I urge you to be gently disposed toward all, even toward those you believe have harmed you. He who has been delivered from evil ought not to reproach others but to pray and to give thanks to Him who has granted deliverance. Let no one boast, for all have sinned, and if we stand it is by the grace of God. Do not give place to whispering, backbiting, hatred of others, or being puffed up, and do not invent evil in return for evil. God is provoked when we ask amiss, when we ask Him to curse rather than to save. He desires that none should perish but that all should come to repentance.
Pray then in this way. Pray that God would rescue you and your household from every work of darkness, that He would keep you in Christ, clothe you with Christ, and fill you with His Spirit. Pray also for this woman and her daughter and for both husbands, that God would work with each heart at the point of need, show them the harm that has been done, lead them to repentance, and bring them to salvation through Jesus Christ alone. Ask that all resentment be broken off you, that you may know the freedom the Son gives, for whom the Son sets free is free indeed. Ask that every foothold of sin be torn down, not by your own wisdom but by the power that comes from Him.
Turn away fully from every form of witchcraft and divination and do not seek to use it even for defense. Give yourself to prayer, to fasting if you are able, to the reading of Scripture, to confession and to the fellowship of the faithful Church. Seek counsel from mature pastors who can walk with you, and forgive as you have been forgiven, while still guarding what is holy and refusing fellowship with darkness.
May the Lord who is faithful guard you from evil, plant His peace like a stronghold in your heart, heal those who have been entrapped and wounded, and grant to all a true deliverance that leads to sonship and to life everlasting. In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, who alone is our deliverance and our hope, Amen.
The work of Christ is twofold, deliverance from evil and supply of good. He has delivered us from the curse and has brought us into adoption as sons, not by our own power but because we have put on Christ and have received the Spirit of adoption. True deliverance therefore is not found in formulas or in repeated phrases, but in belonging to Him, abiding in Him, and walking according to His Spirit.
You speak of witchcraft, card reading, monitoring and binding. Hear what Scripture teaches. Hatred, strife, heresies and witchcraft do not come from nature or from the flesh as if we were forced, they come from a depraved moral choice. For this reason it is said that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. This is a warning not only for the one you fear, but for all. Rewards and punishments relate to choice, not to nature. Any soul that turns to manipulation, to occult power, to forcing the will of another, has chosen a path that God calls sin and must repent of it.
You mention a pregnancy before marriage and an attempt to force a man to marry through spiritual means, and later a divorce and a second marriage. According to the historic teaching of Scripture, sex belongs within the lifelong covenant of one man and one woman in marriage, and marriage is not to be entered by coercion or manipulation. To force such a union, whether by pressure or by claimed spiritual power, is not the right thing to do. It creates strife and wounds many people. If sin has been committed in these matters, the answer is not to claim resentment or to hold it over others, but to confess it, to take accountability before God, and to seek His forgiveness and healing. The same is true for any marriage that is not according to His will. We do not ask God to bless what He calls sin, we ask Him to bring repentance, to root out what is evil, and to restore what has been broken according to His mercy.
You also ask for protection, for the scattering of every monitoring and for the breaking of cycles and strongholds. Understand what deliverance means. God does not always promise to keep us from suffering or from death, but He grants what is greater, to teach us to despise death and to trust in the immortality of the soul and the hope of a better resurrection. He delivered His servant from the lion's mouth for a time, and He will deliver from every evil work in the end, that we may not depart with condemnation but stand in Christ. The blood of Jesus is not a charm to tie the hands of another person, it is the precious blood shed for the forgiveness of sins. We are covered when we are in Christ by faith, repentance and obedience, not by repeating words as if they were incantations. To bind and to loose is given to the Church in prayer and in turning from sin, not as a counterfeit spirit working through us.
Therefore I urge you to be gently disposed toward all, even toward those you believe have harmed you. He who has been delivered from evil ought not to reproach others but to pray and to give thanks to Him who has granted deliverance. Let no one boast, for all have sinned, and if we stand it is by the grace of God. Do not give place to whispering, backbiting, hatred of others, or being puffed up, and do not invent evil in return for evil. God is provoked when we ask amiss, when we ask Him to curse rather than to save. He desires that none should perish but that all should come to repentance.
Pray then in this way. Pray that God would rescue you and your household from every work of darkness, that He would keep you in Christ, clothe you with Christ, and fill you with His Spirit. Pray also for this woman and her daughter and for both husbands, that God would work with each heart at the point of need, show them the harm that has been done, lead them to repentance, and bring them to salvation through Jesus Christ alone. Ask that all resentment be broken off you, that you may know the freedom the Son gives, for whom the Son sets free is free indeed. Ask that every foothold of sin be torn down, not by your own wisdom but by the power that comes from Him.
Turn away fully from every form of witchcraft and divination and do not seek to use it even for defense. Give yourself to prayer, to fasting if you are able, to the reading of Scripture, to confession and to the fellowship of the faithful Church. Seek counsel from mature pastors who can walk with you, and forgive as you have been forgiven, while still guarding what is holy and refusing fellowship with darkness.
May the Lord who is faithful guard you from evil, plant His peace like a stronghold in your heart, heal those who have been entrapped and wounded, and grant to all a true deliverance that leads to sonship and to life everlasting. In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, who alone is our deliverance and our hope, Amen.
