It’s just allergies — right?
A relevant question at this, the pollen time of year.
And the answer is mostly, yes: immune responses and what’s in our environment often dictate whether or not one sneezes (with every morning breeze). There are physical circumstances and explanations.
That’s true of just about any illness. Yet, it’s also true that in many, if not most, cases, psychological, emotional, and spiritual factors may play a role, and if not just exacerbating factors, behind problems to begin with.
As author Frank Hammond (you may remember his hallmark book of demonology, Pigs in the Parlor) pointed out (in a short work, Physical Healings and Deliverance, a good one-third of healings performed by the Lord Jesus involved the casting out of devils and spirits.
Who knows if other healings also possessed that etiology but simply weren’t recorded in such a fashion. As it says, “You know of Jesus of Nazareth, how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him” (Acts 10:38).
And emotional illness? Psychological problems? Think: the man at the tombs of Gadarenes (Mark 5:3-5).
But let’s stay with the physical: if the New Testament, in its reports of Christ’s healing, was meant as a template of percentage (the ratio of those whose illnesses were caused by oppressive spirits), Hammond points out that a third of current physiological problems — of your illnesses — are caused by demons. (One might add: or “unclean” spirits.)
“We have been engaged in the ministry of deliverance for many years now, and we have seen remarkable physical healings that came when people were delivered from evil spirits,” wrote Hammond (an evangelical Christian who died in 2005). “I am the first to come to mind. I am terribly oppressed with allergies; I had hay fever and asthma and I was allergic to all kinds of pollens and dust. I lived a miserable life. Sometimes I couldn’t even preach or minister because these allergies were so bad.
“Then I learned that Jesus is the same today, yesterday, and forever; He has not changed. His healing power is still available as much today as it was during those days when He walked on earth.
“So I asked the Lord about that, and He gave me conditions I had to meet. I asked the Lord if there was anything I needed to do to release the flow of His healing power in my life. and three things in my possession I had to part with. I was reluctant to give up things that were idolatrous in my life, things that had become more important to me than the Word of God and the life of Jesus. I asked Him about any blocks in my life, and I began to release some things I had collected over the years, things I had in my possession (artifacts and such). I don’t know what thing might have turned the key, but through obedience, in combination with deliverance, I was set free from the spiritual root of tormenting allergies. That was thirty years ago, and I haven’t had any semblance of allergies since. Hallelujah! This is a powerful message for today.”
Indeed it is, and so we’ll leave it right there for your prayerful consideration.
[resources : Physical Healing and Deliverance]
