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"God says, 'Keep going. I am with you.'"

I WATCHED a large-scale pig farmer load 1,000 pigs onto two tractor trailers, and the Spirit spoke. “That’s half.” Half of the number of demons who tormented the Gadarene demoniac. I sat up straight. I find the farmer’s work fascinating because they are so knowledgeable of it and dedicated to it. Loading 1,000 pigs, albeit small ones, “feeders” they called them, took quite some time in the wee hours of the morning and was a noisy job. Pigs don’t want to follow orders.

Watch “This’ll Do Farms” load 1,000 pigs.

The Spirit also pointed out to me, the other day, that the demons had to ask permission to go into the pigs. They couldn’t go without being allowed to do so. I have said this before but the purpose of the pigs is so we can see the size of the problem and the strength of the human spirit to live. The lie from the devil is that we can’t make it, we can’t stand this anymore, it’s too much for us. God is never going to say this. God heard a man’s cries for help and sent His Son across the lake to rescue him. The devil tried to impede the way. But no wind, however strong, and waves, however high, will stop God from doing what He has set out to do.

The devil says, “Give up.” God says, “Keep going. I am with you.” He is Emmanuel and came for this purpose, to go with us through life every minute of every hour of every day. Not simply as a backpack we tote around. We are told to lay our burdens down at His feet. But as God in us, God to us, who has all wisdom we need, all power for health and healing, all strength for the journey. And yeah, He can send demons packing into pigs.

The Old Covenant Law’s words against pigs was in effect when Jesus was alive, but it was taken away when Peter dreamed of unclean animals and the Spirit bid him to eat (Acts 10:13). The meaning of the dream was that salvation was not just for the Jews but for all men. The meaning was also that God has declared all things clean. All means all, and this is worth our thought and our trust in God where diet is concerned. When we make dietary laws for ourselves then we have to follow them. But the pigs on that day were so the pig farmers could see the work of an Almighty merciful God who would rescue a man from what the devil had done to him.

Never doubt God’s heart for rescue. Never look at the life of another and decide where the devil worked against them is how he will work against you. Never confess poverty because she is poor or sickness because he has been sick so long or death because that lovely person died. Or that ungodly one. We are not sealed into some “fate” which is chosen for us. Nor are we trying to survive and get ahead of others in the devil’s idea of competition. The list of works of the flesh listed in Galatians 5:19-21 includes sects like the Pharisees and Sadducees, and sadly like Christians. It includes division and hatred as well as unity through drunkenness or sexual misconduct. The word for witchcraft is the word “pharmakeia” meaning specifically drug abuse. My point is, there are many ways to give into our body’s desires and the wrong thinking in our minds. But God has come to us to cleanse us and redirect us.

He sent us His Guide. We are not chaff blown about like the wind unless we are complacent and do nothing to change us. That is the meaning of repentance. It is a change of thought and direction, a turning about, and I’d much rather repent and stop doing what’s destroying me than to be lost in it and, eventually, through delusion, sure that I know what I’m doing when I don’t. Being sure of myself in the power and ability of myself is as much a deception of the enemy as anything else listed. The devil would have us think we can go it alone, when we all need Jesus, as the popular saying goes.

“And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever;” (John 14:16)

Jesus says, “Come to me. Here’s how much I love you.” The devil says, “God has forgotten you,” or it’s opposite, “You’ve got this. You don’t need anyone.” The devil says, “Those [insert denomination] don’t believe correctly.” He would have us take sides against each other rather than love one another as family. Rather than see that person and love them, we grumble and turn away. Jesus never turns His back. There’s no one behind Him. He is at the Father’s side. He is filled completely with the Spirit. The only thing behind Him are the scars men put on Him.

Minister Jesse Duplantis says it this way, “Stop standing in front of the cross, and go behind it and look at the scars.” For there is our healing. There is our health. And the bread of His body which was broken for us, His will that He laid down, is now, our inheritance. He did the Father’s will so that we could have His strength of thought and emotion. So that we can be confident and at peace, whatever we come up against, and know that God will come to our rescue even if we look so far gone every man alive has given up on us. They’d given up on the demoniac, yet they saw him delivered and in his right mind and were afraid of the one who’d come to die to set them free.

“Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered; And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him;” (Hebrews 5:8-9)

“Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.” (1 Peter 2:24)

Man with chalkboard Image by Elias from Pixabay
Chalkboard background Image by Lemoonboots from Pixabay


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Suzanne D. Williams, Author
www.suzannedwilliams.com
www.feelgoodromance.com