Praying With Power By C. Peter Wagner. (Pt.2)

C_HAPTER 3  

STRATEGIC-LEVEL INTERCESSION

L

“I’M THE PRINCE OF PERU”

A young brazilian man named Jesuel was sent out by his local church as a church-planting missionary to neighboring Peru. Soon after his arrival, he discussed with some friends the strategy they would use to plant their first church. Dur- ing this discussion, Jesuel reported, a demon calling him- self “Prince of Peru” appeared to him. the demon said,“Go back to your own land or you will die in Peru!”

Within a week of this confrontation, Jesuel became critically ill. he sought medical care, but the doctors could  give  him  no  hope  of  recovery. they  informed  him that, although he was young, he needed to face the fact that he was on his deathbed.

As he fought for his life, a nearby pastor, who believed in two-way prayer, was suddenly impressed by God to go to the hospital and pray for a certain young man who was there. he had never heard of Jesuel, nor did he know why this brazilian might have come to Peru. he obeyed God, though, prayed for Jesuel, and Jesuel was miraculously healed and released from the hospital.

Jesuel then went to a town in northern Peru where, after four weeks of fruitless evangelistic efforts, he discovered that the Catholic church had not been used for six months. he befriended the church’s caretaker and led him to Christ. the two of them decided they would ring the church bells and call the townspeople together for a “mass.” When the bells rang, people came to the church from all directions, and 100 gave their lives to Christ that day.

Many more were saved and nurtured until nearby Catholic priests heard what was going on and put a stop to it. Jesuel, however, simply moved to another place and planted five more churches in Peru before returning to brazil to be married.1

THE “SPIRITUAL TRIANGLE”

one of my students, who must go unnamed, is the leader of his denomination in a certain restricted country. Citizens of his nation are well aware of the “spiritual triangle” formed by lines drawn on a map from the points deter- mined by the location of three particular cities. the power center of the ancient rulers of the nation was located there. It was the place where the government authorities had formally dedicated their nation to a high-ranking spiritual principality.“It is here,” says my student,“that the nation’s spiritual fate is still decided today.” the human spiritual ruler of the triangle was the abbot of a popular monastery. he was a powerful occult practitioner and a known murderer. Some referred to him as the “killer abbot.”

through the years, the killer abbot and his predecessors had effectively kept any Christian church from being planted in the spiritual triangle. one exception was a roman Catholic church, which was subsequently burned down. recently, however, a group of local Christians had felt led by God to conduct an aggressive, high-intensity prayer initiative in the area.

Soon afterward, a pastor moved in to plant a church where churches had been forbidden. Predictably, the abbot confronted the Christian pastor and informed him in no uncertain terms that if he continued in his plans to invade the spiritual triangle, he would pay for his foolishness with his life within a week. the church planter, his faith having been lifted to a high level through the powerful prayer ini- tiative, accepted the challenge and boldly engaged in the power encounter.

before the end of the week, a terrorist attack (not un- usual for this nation at the time) swept through the area, and the abbot himself was killed! At this writing, two Chris- tian churches are now located in the spiritual triangle and one more is being planned. My friend is so encouraged with his nation’s new spiritual atmosphere that he believes the 320 churches of his denomination can multiply to 1,000 during the next four years.

SPIRITUAL POWER ON THE HIGHER LEVELS

Case studies involving confrontations with something like a “Prince of Peru” or killer abbots living in triangular spiritual power points take us to levels of spiritual interac- tion that many of us, including me, had not been introduced to until fairly recently.

I will not soon forget the National Day of Prayer in Washington, D.C., May 1989, when my wife, Doris, and I first became acquainted with Cindy Jacobs and her hus- band, Mike. As we were being driven to lunch, I casually asked,“What do you do?”

Cindy responded in a rather matter-of-fact way,“We pray for nations.”

“how do you pray for nations?” I said, never having heard of anything like that before.

“Well,” she said, “we mostly pray for nations just like other people pray for individuals.”

Doris and I, whose lives had been dedicated to reaching the nations of the world for Jesus Christ, were intrigued. We invited the Jacobs to sit with us at lunch, and the conversa- tion became one of those rare occasions in which the direc- tion of a career is molded.  Among other things, Cindy explained that if demonic spirits are preventing an individual from being all that God wants the person to be, the best approach is to confront the spirits themselves as well as any strongholds that might be providing them legal right to molest the person. Doris and I already knew that, but Cindy continued. She explained that the same principle applies for groups of people in cities or nations. through prayer, such as that practiced through the Jacobs’ ministry, Generals of Intercession, and others, spiritual forces on the higher levels can be confronted and weakened or even defeated.

My mind went to 2 Corinthians 4, where Paul expresses his frustration that not enough lost people are being saved through his ministry. he laments that the gospel seems to be “veiled” from those who are lost. Why? because the “god of this age” has blinded their minds (see 2 Corinthians 4:3-4). I had to admit that, as a professional missiologist, I knew all too little about what devices satan ordinarily uses to keep masses of human minds blinded to the gospel.

Later that year, at the historic Lausanne II in Manila congress on evangelism, several workshops were conducted by some who believed they were beginning to understand more about what these satanic devices to block world evangelism  might  be. the  name  frequently  used  at  that time  was “territorial  spirits.” this  was  the  first  time  most of us whohad been rooted in traditional evangelicalism had begun to think about such things, to say nothing of discussing them openly. by that time, I had been learning a bit about how to hear the voice of God, as I explained in the last chapter, and therefore I was ready when he said to me,“I want you to take international leadership in this area of territorial spirits.” It was one of the clearest words I have ever received. the upshot was organizing the International Spiritual Warfare Network, which for years served as a forum in which issues related to the higher levels of spir- itual confrontation were openly discussed. early on, a con- sensus developed that there were, indeed, various levels of spiritual warfare. three distinct levels became highlighted, and names were assigned.

THE THREE LEVELS OF SPIRITUAL WARFARE

ground-level spiritual warfare confronts demonic spirits that molest individuals. this is personal deliverance: casting out demons.

occult-level spiritual warfare exposes organized forces of darkness such as witchcraft, shamanism, satanism, Freema- sonry, eastern religions, New Age, and the like.

strategic-level spiritual warfare involves wrestling with principalities and powers and rulers of the darkness, as Paul defines in ephesians 6:12.

Although all levels are interrelated in the invisible world and therefore all are important areas of confrontation with evil, my chief personal interest lies with strategic-level spir- itual warfare. this seems to me to be the level that promises the greatest payoff for world evangelization. It also demands the greatest risk; therefore, it is not for everyone. Neverthe- less, “high risk, high return” applies as well here as it does to the business world, in my opinion.

Let me explain why I have such a personal interest in strategic-level spiritual warfare, because I am occasionally misunderstood. Most, I think, would agree that as individ- uals serving God, we are primarily responsible for the par- ticular set of gifts, callings, anointings, talents, and life situations he has chosen to give us.

We Are PrIMArILy reSPoNSIbLe For the PArtICuLAr Set oF GIFtS, CALLINGS, ANoINtINGS,

tALeNtS AND LIFe SItuAtIoNS GoD hAS Cho- SeN to GIVe uS. thAt CoNStItuteS our SPIr- ItuAL DNA, So to SPeAK.  that constitutes our spiritual DNA, so to speak, and no one else in the body of Christ may be exactly like us. this is why I do not expect everyone else necessarily to think as I think or act as I act or even agree with my opinions.

VARIOUS KINDS OF PRAYER

those who have read the five books of the prayer Warrior series, for example, may have noticed that I am not equally interested in every kind of prayer. For example, I intercede, but I am not an intercessor who prays two or three or more hours a day. I fast, but I am not a 40-day or even a 7-day faster. I worship, but I do not indulge in a steady diet of worship tapes on my car stereo. I study Scripture, but I am not a bible scholar devoted to exegeting the Greek and the hebrew. I am concerned for the poor and the oppressed, but I am not a social activist.

therefore, when  I  read  a  book  such  as  richard  Foster’s classic, which has the straightforward title prayer (harper SanFrancisco), I find many parts of it boring. Just glancing down the table of contents of what I call, in my lighter mo- ments, the “Cookbook of Prayer,” for example, I find myself skipping  over  “the  Prayer  of  examen,” “the  Prayer  of tears,” “Sacramental  Prayer,” “Meditative  Prayer,” “the Prayer of Suffering,”“Contemplative Prayer” or “the Prayer of  relinquishment,” just  to  name  a  few. they  are  excellent forms of prayer and dear to the hearts of many believers, but they do not seem to fit my particular spiritual DNA.  I believe that my spiritual genetic code came through the new birth. When I was 19 years of age, I was saved, and I was called to be a missionary on the same day, just as the apostle Paul was (see Acts 26:17). I can never remember a day in my Christian life since then when spreading the Gospel around the world was not my highest purpose. therefore, when I began plunging deeply into the prayer movement in the late 1980s, the kinds of prayer that at- tracted me the most for personal research, writing, and teaching were the kinds of prayer that showed the most cause-and-effect promise for evangelization. I found myself working mostly with prayer that could be regarded as a means to the end of evangelization, not with many other kinds of prayer that, good as they may be, tend to be con- sidered as ends in themselves.

No two people have gained higher respect in the prayer movement of our nation than my friends evelyn Christen- son and David bryant. evelyn says,“We must be very care- ful not to substitute the means for the end. our means—our ministry—should become the stepping stones, the open doors, for actual evangelizing….Prayer is a very important means in the salvation process” (italics hers).2

David bryant argues that united prayer efforts such as Concerts of Prayer can be powerful occasions for spiritual warfare, but, he says, “revival praying, biblically under- stood, is the highest form of spiritual warfare, because when God answers, revival leads the church into powerful new ad- vances in fulfilling the Great Commission.3

Many active participants in the prayer movement agree that God’s highest desire is for us to reach the nations so that all the peoples of the earth can have the opportunity to join with us in worshiping, praising, and glorifying him. Certain kinds of prayer can be a big help in moving toward that goal.

PRAYER AND FASTING TO TEAR DOWN STRONGHOLDS

Dick eastman of every home for Christ provides a graphic example of how strategic-level intercession can ac- tually open not only individual hearts, but also an entire re- gion, to effective evangelism. he tells how a pair of every home for Christ workers from the Solomon Islands set out to evangelize an unreached people group, the Kwaio, in a re- mote mountainous area of the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific. the missionaries knew it would not be easy. one government official and at least three other missionar- ies had previously been murdered by the Kwaio as they at- tempted to penetrate their territory. they were told by the coastal people on the same island that if they dared go into those mountains they would certainly lose their lives.  the  workers  were  not  unwilling  to  risk  their  lives, but neither  did  they  want  to  be  foolish. they  clearly  under- stood what many Western missionaries might have ignored; namely, that the spiritual darkness of the region had been perpetrated by demonic forces—powerful territorial spir- its—who had been doing just as they wished to the Kwaio for centuries.they also knew that the only way to break such power  was  through  strategic-level  intercession. their  first step, therefore, was to spend seven days in prayer and fasting.  Dick eastman reports,“As the seven days unfolded, su- pernatural insights flowed into the hearts of the praying workers. Discernment and knowledge came regarding a host of demonic spirits and principalities controlling the region. Strange-sounding names were revealed in prayer, and as each was identified the workers would pray fervently until a sense of victory came. one of the leaders kept count of these confrontations, and before the seven days had passed, eighty-seven ‘strongholds’ had been identified and dealt with in prayer. only then did the workers feel spiritually prepared to move into those treacherous mountains.”4  the missionaries then walked into the forbidden terri- tory and were allowed to enter the Kwaio village unharmed. For several hours they sat and talked to a group of village elders who were protecting their chief. the chief was a pow- erful witch doctor who was too ill to see them, but the work- ers knew that without the chief’s permission nothing would happen. every request to visit the chief was refused, but the Christian workers persisted. Finally the holy Spirit broke the resistance, and the two evangelists were allowed to visit him. Surprisingly enough, the chief listened attentively to the message, and opened his heart to accept Jesus Christ. No sooner did he do this, than he dropped dead!  the  immediate  reaction  of  the  tribe’s  people  was  that these strangers had come and cursed their chief with their strange religion! they began making plans to execute them, but for two hours the holy Spirit postponed their action by orchestrating a vigorous dialogue. Finally, the workers were freed. then, amazingly, some seven hours later, the chief sat up, and called for his family and his friends to come to him.  he explained how what must have been an angel had just taken him to a place where multitudes were worshiping the “Jesus,” whom the missionaries had preached. Although he knew nothing of the bible, he said he had been introduced to a person named “Abraham” and another named “elijah.” After many other remarkable details, he sent to have the missionaries returned to the village and begged his people to  believe  their  message. then  the  next  day, he  lay  back down and calmly went to sleep forever to be with Jesus.

Not surprisingly, every Kwaio present immediately prayed to receive Jesus. by the time eastman filed his re- port, some three years later, the resulting church in the chief’s village had more than 300 converts, and throughout that mountainous region more than 16 other churches were in one stage of development or another. More than 4,000 Kwaio had by then given their lives to Jesus Christ!5

“HOW COULD SUCH A THING HAPPEN?”

Many, moved by this dramatic story, will naturally ask, “how could such a thing happen?” Let’s analyze it a bit.

the workers’ (Pacific Islanders) worldview allowed them to understand that the powers of the invisible world, both powers of darkness and powers of light, greatly influence what happens here in the visible world. they also knew that the invisible God was supreme and that he could and would intervene in human affairs by performing miraculous acts.

they understood that prayer, both two-way prayer (Chap- ter 2) and strategic-level intercession (this chapter) were es- sential for penetrating the powers of darkness over the Kwaio.

they, through prayer, accomplished a form of “spiritual mapping,” which revealed to them even the names of the spirits of darkness that held the Kwaio in bondage. I will explain spiritual mapping in the next chapter.

Acting on the information they had, they “bound the strongmen” and thereby “tore down the strongholds” that had been blocking the Gospel from penetrating their region. these two things should be understood in some more detail.

Not too LoNG AGo, I reLeGAteD the terM I heArD FroM tIMe to tIMe, “bINDING the StroNGMAN,” to the LuNAtIC FrINGe. thoSe Who Were uSING It uNDoubteDLy KNeW SoMethING oF the bIbLe AND oF the WorK   oF  the   hoLy   SPIrIt   IN  the   WorLD toDAy thAt I hAD NeVer beeN tAuGht.

“BINDING THE STRONGMAN”?

I can remember, not too long ago, when I relegated the term I heard from time to time,“binding the strongman,” to the lunatic fringe. I now realize that those who were using it, mostly Pentecostals and Charismatics at that time, undoubtedly knew something of the bible and of the work of the holy Spirit in the world today that I had never been taught.

As a professor of church growth, one of my favorite bible verses has long been Jesus’ words to Peter and the disciples in Matthew: “on this rock I will build My church” (Matt. 16:18). this  is  the  first  time  it  is  recorded  that  Jesus  ever mentioned the words “church” and “building.” It is another way of saying “growing” it. that was the part of the verse I stressed for the years I knew virtually nothing about strategic level spiritual warfare. Jesus went on to say, “and the gates of hades shall not prevail against it.” I should have known he was telling his disciples that building the Church would inevitably involve serious spiritual warfare, but even if I did, I would not have been able to explain what he might have meant.

I had a worse problem with the next verse, “And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven”(Mathew 16:19). here was this “binding” again, something that, in my mind, holy rollers might talk about, but not well-balanced Christians like me. I now see how foolish I had been to miss the crucial point that the “keys of the kingdom” would open the “gates of hades” so that they could no longer obstruct the growth of the Church throughout the world. What are those “keys”? obviously they have something to do with “binding.”

Jesus had already used the word “binding” (which is the Greek deo) in Matthew 12 when he was teaching his disciples spiritual warfare. he said, “how can one enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man?”(Matt.12:29). In the parallel passage found in Luke 11, Luke uses the word “overcome” (which is the Greek  nikao)  the  strongman  (Luke  11:22). the  point  I  am making is that, biblically speaking,“binding” the strongman and “overcoming” the strongman are synonyms.

OVERCOMERS  GET  REWARDS

I wish I had known that sooner because, for some reason, “overcoming” seemed like a more respectable word than “binding” to me. especially in the seven epistles Jesus wrote (through the pen of the apostle John) to the seven churches in Asia Minor in revelation 2 and 3, the word “overcome” is repeated again and again. It is the only command kind of verb to appear in all seven of the epistles (except for the tag line “he who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches”). Furthermore, each time it appears, Jesus of- fers a lavish promise to whoever overcomes, such as,“to him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne” (rev. 3:21). From the first time I read the book of revela- tion, I wanted to be an overcomer!

besides using this word nikao seven times in revelation, Jesus uses it only twice more in the whole bible. once it refers to what he does, and once it refers to what his disci- ples are supposed to do. the first is John 16:33:“be of good cheer, I have overcome [nikao] the world.” Jesus went on to climax this with his death on the cross where, Paul later says, “[he] disarmed principalities and powers, [and] he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them” (Col. 2:15). this  is  what  Jesus  did, laying  the  groundwork for all subsequent spiritual warfare. Is anything left for us to do?

Some like to think that because Jesus “overcame,” we simply rest in Jesus, and he will take care of all the power of evil for us. It is true that God is the only one who has the ultimate power over evil spirits, but he also has chosen to allow us to play a role in releasing that power. Jesus gave the word for believers to “overcome” in revelation, long after his death and resurrection. Jesus’ only further use of the word, besides John 16:33, is in Luke 11:22 where he is teaching his disciples that they must overcome, or bind, the strongman. Let’s look at this passage more closely.

BREAKING THE GRIP OF BEELZEBUB

the Pharisees had accused Jesus of casting out demons by using the power of beelzebub, the healing god of ekron (see 2 Kings 1:2-3,6,16), a demonic spirit still worshiped during Jesus’ time. Jesus, however, said no, he had cast them out by using the “finger of God” (Luke 11:20), who is the holy Spirit. here beelzebub is revealed as a high-ranking demonic principality (see Matt. 12:24,27; Mark 3:22; Luke 11:15,18), just under satan (see Matt. 12:26; Mark 3:23,26; Luke 11:18). he is called “the ruler of demons,” and is like a general in the army who would be a ruler of soldiers, Satan himself being the commander in chief. beelzebub is one of the strongmen of the kingdom of evil. So Jesus says,“When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are in peace” (Luke 11:21). obviously, the most precious goods of a demonic principality are unsaved souls. If his armor remains intact, apparently the unsaved souls he pos- sesses remain unsaved. he gets his way!

the armor of the strongman, though, can be taken away when“a stronger one than he comes upon him and overcomes him” (Luke  11:22). the “stronger  one” is  the  holy  Spirit, the finger of God. Where is the holy Spirit today? he is in  us! Jesus said,“you shall receive power when the holy Spirit has come upon you” (Acts 1:8). Without the holy Spirit, Jesus would not have commanded us to “overcome,” but with the power of the holy Spirit, Jesus said, “the works that I do he will do also” (John 14:12). this is why it is our duty to “bind the strongman.” “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven” (Matt 16:19).

During their seven days of prayer and fasting, the every home For Christ workers in the Solomon Islands were proactively binding the strongmen whose precious goods were the Kwaio people. through strategic-level intercession, they took away their demonic armor and released the cap- tives so that, for the first time, the Kwaio could hear the gospel of Christ.

PULLING DOWN STRONGHOLDS

I like the way Dick eastman comments that through this strategic-level intercession, according to the records they kept, the two missionaries to the Kwaio people, “eighty- seven ‘strongholds’ had been identified and dealt with in prayer.”6   this  is  a  reference  to  2  Corinthians  10:4, where Paul says,“For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds.” Paul goes on to mention that “strongholds” take on two different forms: (1)“arguments”(Greek logismos) and (2)“high things” (Greek hupsoma) (2 Cor. 10:5).

Many are ambiguous or inaccurate in their understand- ing of the nature of strongholds because they fail to recog- nize the two different forms.“Arguments” are strongholds  rooted in human mind-sets or decisions or choices, whether by individuals or by groups such as national governments. When, for example, the united States government chooses to break a solemn treaty it previously signed with the Sioux, it immediately creates a stronghold the enemy can use until it  is  pulled  down. I  elaborate  on  this  in  Chapter  5: “the Power to heal the Past.”

“high things” are spiritual principalities such as, for ex- ample,  territorial  spirits. they  do  not  originate  in  human mindsets, but in the invisible world of darkness. the new international dictionary of new testament theology says,“the New testament use of hupsoma probably reflects astrologi- cal ideas and hence denotes cosmic powers…powers di- rected against God, seeking to intervene between God and [humans].”7  the  every  home  for  Christ  workers  success- fully neutralized 87 “high things” or demonic strongholds in the Solomon Islands through seven days of strategic-level intercession.

SHARING CHRIST IS A MUST

It would be easy to conclude that all we need to do is pray correctly and people will ipso facto get saved. As a mat- ter of fact, this does happen from time to time. We do hear of people being saved through divine intervention, as the apostle Paul was on the Damascus road. It is not the usual way, though. the  bible  says,“how  then  shall  they  call  on him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher?” (rom. 10:14).

Let’s be clear:“binding the strongman” or “pulling down strongholds” never, by themselves, have saved a soul. Lost people are saved only through personal faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Many people in your neighborhood and around the world, however, are not in positions to hear the gospel, no matter how brilliantly it is presented to them, be- cause “the god of this age” has “blinded their minds,” ac- cording to 2 Corinthians 4:4. Strategic-level intercession is simply a means God has entrusted to us to remove the blinders and loose the captives so they can finally hear the gospel. then, they  must  decide  whether  they  will  commit their lives to Jesus Christ.

Many Kwaio were saved, but not all. the rest need con- tinued and persistent aggressive evangelism because God is not willing that any of them should perish. A greater harvest is now a distinct possibility, however, because God’s people engaged in powerful prayer.

86      PRAYING WITH POWER

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

        the  brazilian  missionary  came  up  against  the  alleged “Prince of Peru.” What do you think are the chances of a “Prince of the united States”? or a “Prince of Wyoming”? or a “Prince of houston”?

        Why is it that most Americans scoff at the idea of demonic spirits controlling certain territories, while most Africans agree with it?

REFLECTION QUESTIONS 87

        have you yourself prayed or have you heard others pray to “bind the strongman” or to “bind satan? Discuss what this means.

        review the difference between the two kinds of strong- holds,“arguments” and “high things,” then try to give ex- amples of each.

C_HAPTER 4  

TARGETING OUR PRAYERS: SPIRITUAL MAPPING

I

anything happened to go wrong.

X-RAYS AND SMART BOMBS

harold Caballeros, a Guatemalan pastor, says,“What an X-ray is to a physician, spiritual mapping is to intercessors.”1

I can hardly imagine a more vivid analogy. this chapter will help us understand, first of all, why spiritual mapping is im- portant and second, how to begin doing it the proper way.

I also like the way Pastor bob beckett describes it. he takes us back to the first Persian Gulf War when Saddam hussein launched many Scud missiles, but did minimal dam- age to the Allied forces. Someone satirically suggested that after he shot off his missiles, hussein would tune to CNN television to find out where they had hit! beckett admits this is  the  way  his  church, the  Dwelling  Place, in  hemet, Cali- fornia, prayed for years. he says,“We were striking out at the enemy, but because of our lack of strategic information, we were incapable of isolating or discerning a specific target, aiming at it, and hitting it.”2

beckett contrasts the Scud missiles with the “smart bombs” of the allies.As we saw on our television screens, they would enter right into the smokestack or window or door of the  place  at  which  they  were  aimed. the  reason  they  could do this was that before the air war began, a small number of skillful reconnaissance specialists went behind enemy lines, located the high priority targets, and programmed the tar- geting coordinates into the computers on the smart bombs.

As I have heard bob beckett say many times: “We have had all too much Scud missile praying in our churches. We need more smart bomb praying!”

WHY SOME PRAYERS ARE UNANSWERED

Follow with me in this series of five hypothetical ques- tions, all of which have predictable answers.  Does your church pray? the answer, of course, is yes.

I have yet to find a church that does not pray. Does your church pray for individuals? yes. Does your church pray for families? yes.

Does your church pray for the pastor and the church? yes. Does your church pray for your community? yes.  I would further imagine that if I came to your church on a given Sunday morning and said to the congregation, “Let’s spend the next ten minutes in hearing testimonies of answered prayer for individuals here in the church,” filling the time would be no problem. the same would go for answered prayers for families, and prayers for the pas- tor and the church. If I asked for answered prayers for the community, however, most churches would have a hard time filling even two minutes, never mind ten. Many would have to admit they have been praying for their community for ten years, and it is worse now than it was ten years ago.

Why is this? It is so common that almost anyone read- ing this book can identify with what I have said. the same people are praying. they have the same theology of prayer. they  have  the  same  holy  Spirit. they  are  praying  to  the same heavenly Father. Why, then, do they ordinarily see more specific answers to their prayers for individuals, families, and the church than they see to prayers for the community? I believe the answer is simple. Suppose a person walks up to me, which people frequently do, and says,“Peter, would you please pray for me?”

of course, I agree to pray for the person, but what is the first thing I do? I don’t just start to pray. I say,“What would you like me to pray for?”

Suppose the person says,“I don’t feel well right now.”

I am still not ready to pray. I say,“Can you tell me what’s wrong?” up till this point, I do not know whether I am sup- posed to be praying about a sinus condition or the threat of losing a job or breaking up with a girlfriend, or what. So I keep asking questions until I have enough information. only then do I start to pray for the person. you would do the same thing.

CAN WE TALK TO OUR COMMUNITY?

Why do we go through this routine? obviously, it is be- cause long ago we have learned through experience that the more specifically we pray for an individual the more likely we are to see our prayers answered. our problem is that most of us have never learned how to ask such direct ques- tions of our community. It has hardly ever even occurred to us that we should be doing such a thing.

the  title  of  Chapter  1  is “Prayer  Can  be  Powerful  (or otherwise).” the rest of this book has been written to help all of us pray in the most powerful way possible. Spiritual mapping, or targeting our prayers as accurately as we can, is one of the more important helps we can use to pray power- fully instead of otherwise. Let me give you an example. Just a few days ago, I read a  report  from  Sri  Lanka  in  the  foursquare World advance magazine. It told how a Pastor Kumarawansa and his fam- ily entered an area of Sri Lanka called horona and started a church in a house. they did warfare prayer against the territorial spirits of the area in their customary way. they had been well trained in strategic-level intercession. Still, little happened. they experienced great resistance to the Gospel. Groups of unbelievers came and stoned the house where they were worshiping, disrupting the meetings.

things were looking bleak, until one day a woman from horona came to Mrs. Kumarawansa and gave her the name of the leading spirit over the area. Finally, they had the tar- get  they  needed. they  immediately  switched  from “Scud missile praying” to “smart bomb praying” against the spe- cific ruling demonic principality. In the name of Jesus of Nazareth and by the power of the holy Spirit, they took au- thority  over  demon  so-and-so. the  spiritual  atmosphere cleared, and things began to change rapidly. the report says, “the congregation is growing, and a central church is antic- ipated from which ministry will flow to the entire region.”3

What obviously made the difference in horona was spir- itual mapping. In this case, the intercessors played a passive role except for beseeching God to show them the solution to the problem of evangelistic blockage. God gave them the target coordinates for their prayers through the visit of the woman to the pastor’s wife. God does this from time to time, but he also has given us many tools we can use to move into our communities and engage in more intentional, proactive, and aggressive spiritual mapping. We now know a good bit about how to ask significant questions of our communities so that intercessors can target their prayers more accurately.

DEFINING “SPIRITUAL MAPPING”

the  term  spiritual  mapping  was  coined  by  George  otis Jr., of the  Sentinel  Group, back  in  1990. his  desire  is  to help us “learn to see the world as it really is, not as it ap- pears to be.”4 George otis has become what I like to call “our number one Christian espionage agent.” his books the  Last  of  the  giants  (Chosen  books)  and  the  twilight Labyrinth (Chosen books) and others have revealed many of his findings.

the  implications  of  otis’ statement, simple  as  it  may sound, are vast. For one thing, it presupposes that an invis- ible world exists out there somewhere beyond the visible world to which we relate with our five senses day in and day out. Second, it implies that some things about the invisible world may be more important to understand than some things  in  the  visible  world. this  should  not  surprise  us  if we remember that the apostle Paul says,“We do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor. 4:18).

It is remarkable that up until recently we as the body of Christ have been ignorant of the invisible world. oh, we have known about heaven and hell and God and the devil, and  many  of  us  have  been  casting  out  demons. that, how- ever, is not enough to wage an effective war.

George otis says,“one would think the ways of the spir- itual dimension would be as familiar to the average believer as the sea is to mariners.”5 Such, however, is far from the case. Why?  otis  goes  on  to  say, “the  problem  seems  to  be that many believers—particularly in the Western hemi- sphere—have not taken the time to learn the language, prin- ciples, and protocols of the spiritual dimension.”6 he might have added that we have not had many teachers. In the years I spent in graduate schools of theology and religion, I was not told such knowledge existed. I had no idea it was possi- ble, as otis says, to “[superimpose] our understanding of forces and events in the spiritual domain onto places and circumstances in the material world.”7

WARRIORS VALUE INFORMATION ABOUT THE ENEMY

No one should question whether collecting information about the enemy ahead of time is biblical. God himself said to Moses,“Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the children of Israel” (Num. 13:2). Moses wanted to know how many people lived there, an es- timate of their strength, what their cities were like, how they grew crops, and whether the land included forests (Num. 13:18-20). he knew the value of detailed informa- tion. Joshua, one of the 12 who went to spy, later sent two spies into Jericho to bring him a more specific and up-to- date report before he would cross the Jordan river to take possession of the Promised Land.  our battle today may not be like that of Joshua, who had to fight human beings in the visible world. Paul says,“We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places”(eph. 6:12). the principle, however, is the same whether we are interacting with the visible world or the in- visible world: We gather all the intelligence we can before we move out to engage the enemy.

It is foolish to decide not to plan in advance. Paul writes, “lest Satan should take advantage of us; for we are not ig- norant of his devices” (2 Cor. 2:11). Let’s turn this around for just a moment. Suppose that somehow we are ignorant of satan’s devices. What will happen? Why, of course, he will take advantage of us. I like the way ed Silvoso says it:“In ac- tive warfare, the most critical information is not what you know, but what you don’t know. especially if your enemy knows that you don’t know it.”8

I am afraid that satan has been getting away with far too much these days. We have been woefully ignorant of what he and his hosts of wickedness have been up to in our cities, in our nations, and around the world.

Silvoso agrees,“Generally speaking, the Church today is dangerously ignorant of the schemes of the devil. In fact, some people make it a point of pride not to know much about the devil and his devices. they haughtily declare that they will focus exclusively on Jesus and forget the devil.”9  those  days  are  rapidly  coming  to  a  close, though. People such as George otis Jr., and escalating numbers of equally consecrated and skillful spiritual mappers cause satan, more than ever before, to generate “great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time” (rev. 12:12).

DO WE GLORIFY SATAN?

Does gathering large amounts of information about satan and the demonic world of darkness tend to glorify satan? A few leaders have been waving red flags and saying we should not probe too deeply into what has been happening in the in- visible world.they suggest we should look only to Jesus,“the author and finisher of our faith” (heb. 12:2).

In response, I must say I have never heard a spiritual mapper argue against looking to Jesus. I must also say if looking to Jesus means remaining ignorant of the devices of satan, it is not what the author of hebrews could have had in mind. Joshua did not gather information about the Canaanites in Jericho to glorify the Canaanites, but to de- feat them.

Few would argue that medical research tends to glo- rify  the  disease.  there  was  a  time,  for  example,  when smallpox was killing more people than AIDS is killing today. We applauded scientists who spent years in learning everything they could about smallpox and then breathed a sigh of relief when they finally developed a vaccine. I do not believe that as they were working anyone at all suggested they should do less for fear of glorifying smallpox. We are con- fronting a much worse enemy who has power to steal, to kill, and  to  destroy. the  obvious  purpose  of  spiritual  mapping is not to glorify such things, but rather to destroy them.

SPIRITS CAN BE TERRITORIAL

From time to time I have used the term “territorial spir- its.” this is not to imply that every demon is confined to a limited geographical arena, but it is to imply that some, per- haps many, might well be. the knowledge we have about the mobility patterns of the forces of darkness is admittedly limited. We get certain ideas about them from Frank Peretti’s novels, but Peretti himself will be the first to re- mind us that he is writing fiction, and the degree to which it coincides with fact is a subject for further research. For- tunately, the necessary research is well underway, led, as I have said, by George otis Jr.

otis says,“Nested near the heart of spiritual mapping philosophy is the concept of territorial strongholds  As

anyone who has paid more than a casual visit to places such as India, Navajo land, Cameroon, haiti, Japan, Morocco, Peru, Nepal, New Guinea, and China will attest, elaborate hierarchies of deities and spirits are regarded as common- place. these  incorporeal  beings  are  perceived  to  rule  over homes, villages, cities, valleys, provinces, and nations, and they exercise extraordinary power over the behavior of local peoples.”10

SoMe   hIGh-rANKING   SPIrItS  Are  ASSIGNeD

CertAIN terrItorIeS, AND they hAVe the AbILIty to PoStPoNe the ACCoMPLIShMeNt oF CertAIN thINGS GoD hAS WILLeD.

one of the biblical windows through which God has al- lowed us a glimpse of the invisible world, fleeting as it might  be,  is  Daniel  10. the  chapter  does  not  provide  a method for conducting spiritual warfare, much less for un- dertaking spiritual mapping research. It does, however, pro- vide two pieces of information that help us greatly in understanding what we are facing: (1) some high-ranking spirits are assigned certain territories, and (2) they have the ability to postpone the accomplishment of certain things God has willed. Let’s take a look.

Daniel had received a vision that caused him to begin an extended season of prayer and fasting. on the first day of  his  fast, God  sent  an  angel  to  minister  to  Daniel. the angel, however, could not get straight through to the prophet. Why?  When  he  arrived, he  said  to  Daniel, “the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days; and behold, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me” (Dan.10:13). then, just before he left, he said, “And now I must return to fight with the prince of Persia; and when I have gone forth, indeed the prince of Greece will come” (Dan.10:20).  Many other principles, teachings, and lessons can be derived from this story, but, at a minimum, we learn that some spirits, which have considerable power, bear names such as the “Prince of Persia” and the “Prince of Greece,” clearly territorial designations. It sounds a great deal like the “Prince of Peru” mentioned in Chapter 3 of this book.

this  makes  sense  when  we  begin  to  ask  questions  con- cerning the devil’s modus operandi. one of his chief desires, as we have previously seen, is to blind the minds of unbe- lievers against hearing the gospel (see 2 Cor. 4:3-4). Satan is not God, though, and therefore he does not have the attrib- utes of God. Satan, for example, is not omnipresent, as God is. because he is a creature rather than the Creator, satan can be in only one place at one time. Still, at this writing he has succeeded in blinding the minds of about 3 billion lost souls around the world. how does he accomplish this? he cannot be in 3 billion places at once.

obviously, satan must delegate the responsibility of blinding minds to myriad spiritual beings at his disposition in the invisible kingdom of darkness.the only place he sends these spirits is where there are people, and it would be logi- cal to assume that the more people, the more quantity and quality (in the negative sense) of spirits would be expected.

Wherever human beings group themselves together, such as in neighborhoods, in cities, in regions, or in nations, it could be expected that higher-ranking spirits, who have many others under their command, would be assigned. they are the ones we sometimes refer to as “territorial spir- its.” Where people develop a group affinity such as religious allegiance or vocation or some voluntary associations, how- ever, the spirits over them might not be so confined to a geographical territory. For example, I would not be surprised if certain principalities were assigned to industries such as the meat-packing industry, the gold-mining industry, or the automobile industry--and so on.

NAMING THE SPIRITS?

those  who  regularly  minister  in  ground-level  spiritual warfare know that demons are personalities and that they have names. Sometimes their names are functional, such as “spirit of lust” or “spirit of rejection.” Sometimes they are proper names such as “Legion”(Mark 5:9). In the process of delivering an individual from demons, particularly in some of the more difficult cases, those who are ministering fre- quently experience a major breakthrough almost the mo- ment they discover the name of the demon.

this is not to say that naming the spirits is a prerequi- site for personal deliverance. I have seen success at times through saying,“unclean spirit, whoever you may be, get out!” At other times, however, we ask for the name. For ex- ample, in his excellent book defeating dark angels, Charles Kraft says,“If I don’t have an idea of what the spirit’s name might be, I command it to tell me what it is. Getting them to  admit  their  names  is  often  difficult.” 11   the  reason  for this is that the spirits know they are more vulnerable if their names  are  known. they  then  become  the  bull’s-eye  in  the center of the target.  Let’s go back to Cindy Jacobs’ insight that praying to free nations from the bondage of evil is much like praying to free individuals. I think the principle of knowing the name carries over from ground-level spiritual warfare to strategic- level spiritual warfare. It is not necessary that the name be known, but it can help greatly in certain circumstances.

to  review  briefly  what  we  saw  in  Chapter  1, when  Paul was in Philippi, one of the greatest obstacles to spreading the gospel was a demonic power in a slave girl referred to in our english translations as a “spirit of divination” (Acts 16:16). that would be its functional name, but in this case a literal translation of the original Greek would give us its proper name,“Python.” Paul cast out the spirit, which I think could well have been the major territorial spirit over the city, and as a result he planted a strong, growing church.

earlier in this chapter, I reported the incident in Sri Lanka in which the prayers of the church planters seemed to be ineffective until someone told the pastor’s wife the name of  the  territorial  spirit  over  the  city. that  was  the  key  to breaking its power and allowing the gospel to spread. We will also recall from the first chapter that thomas Muthee of the Kenya Prayer Cave discovered that the name of the principality over Kiambu was “Witchcraft,” and that the spirit’s chief human channel was “Mama Jane.” Knowing this helped greatly in evangelizing the city, according to Pas- tor Muthee.

the  experience  of  harold  Caballeros  of  Guatemala  is similar to that of thomas Muthee in Africa. Caballeros says, “We have learned that it is to our advantage to know who the strongman is in order to bind him and divide his spoils. Spiritual mapping helps us identify the strongman. In some cases, spiritual mapping will give us a series of characteristics that will guide us directly to the territorial prince or power. In other cases, we will find ourselves facing a natural person whom satan is using. In still others, we will find ourselves face-to-face with a corrupt social structure.”12 the confrontation with evil can take shape in a variety of ways.

Although I have received more criticism for bringing to attention this matter of knowing the names of the spirits than I would ordinarily have expected, it should not seem odd. the  prestigious  new  international  dictionary  of  new testament theology  states,“In  the  faith  and  thought  of  vir- tually every nation the name is inextricably bound up with the person, whether of a man, a god, or a demon. anyone who knows the name of a being can exert power over it” (italics mine).13  this seems to be the consensus among scholars and those people, Christians or not, who have a better than av- erage working knowledge of the invisible world.

the More We CAN tArGet our PrAyerS to GoD For PuLLING DoWN StroNGhoLDS, the More PoWerFuL our PrAyerS Are LIKeLy to be.

When we do, we can then bind them specifically, and not just attempt to bind a supposed strongman in some general sense. Not that the latter is totally ineffective, but we are also learning that the more we can target our prayers to God for pulling down strongholds, the more powerful our prayers are likely to be.

THE THREE CRUCIAL QUESTIONS

Spiritual mapping, in some cases, can be a complex and sophisticated procedure. For example, to research the in- formation about the devices satan is currently using to ob- struct spreading the gospel, which are found in his remarkable  book  the twilight  Labyrinth, George  otis  Jr., spent several years and hundreds of thousands of dollars in many nations of the world. Few people in a given genera- tion of Christians would be called upon to do spiritual map- ping on that level, although we are grateful to God for the select few he has chosen to do it.

At the same time, God is calling increasing numbers of ordinary Christians to begin to pray fervently and regularly for  their  own  neighborhoods, towns, or  cities. those  who desire that their prayers be as effective as possible can also launch out in much more simplified spiritual mapping proj- ects. Almost anyone who so desires can do some spiritual mapping. In undertaking any spiritual mapping project, whether large or small, whether complex or simplified, it is

good to keep in mind three crucial questions that will help you maintain the overall focus:

        What is wrong with the community? of course, if nothing is wrong with your community, it is unnec- essary to do either spiritual mapping or aggressive in- tercession. Few people, however, could conclude that nothing  is  wrong. the  list  of  what  is  wrong  at  times is so long that it is difficult to sort out or prioritize which issues to tackle first.

        how did it get that way? It may take some time to find the answers to this second question. Were the problems specified in question one there since the founding of the city? Did they come in later? What was it that allowed them to begin? Many will make the mistake of starting to look for natural means to try to explain what is happening. George otis Jr., warns against this and says,“unfamiliar with the lan- guage, principles, and protocols of the spiritual di- mension, they rely instead on political, economic, and cultural explanations for things. the problem here is a wrong assumption: namely that the material realm is the basement of reality. unfortunately, wrong assump- tions have a way of leading to wrong conclusions.”14

        What can be done about it? At this point, a transi- tion is frequently made from the spiritual mapping researchers   to   the   spiritual   warfare   practitioners. they  are  not  necessarily  the  same. earlier  in  the chapter, we said that X-rays are to the surgeon what spiritual mapping is to the intercessors. As all patients have noticed, when the X-ray technician fin- ishes taking the pictures, no matter how anxious you are to know what the X-rays might have shown about your malady, the technician will not inform you. only the physician ordering the X-rays is allowed to interpret them to the patient and decide on whatever treatment is necessary.

IN the boDy oF ChrISt, the eye NeeDS the eAr, AND the eAr NeeDS the hAND. WheN We teAM uP toGether, We CAN Do WoNDerFuL thINGS For GoD’S KINGDoM thAt We CouLD Not Do by ourSeLVeS.

those  researchers,  however,  frequently  are  not  gifted with the discernment necessary to understand the spiritual implications of all they have found, to say nothing about knowing how to go into the field and begin the spiritual battle. Some people, of course, combine the two, but we should not be surprised if they do not. In the body of Christ, the eye needs the ear, and the ear needs the hand. When we team up together, we can do wonderful things for God’s kingdom that we could not do by ourselves.

THREE MAJOR AREAS FOR MAPPING

Significant pioneering work in spiritual mapping was done some years ago by the el Shaddai Church of Guatemala City under the leadership of Pastor harold Ca- balleros. they  undertook  it, just  as  a  reminder, not  for  the sake of exploring the domain of the devil, but to facilitate evangelizing their geographical area. the model they used is not necessarily a procedure that would be recommended for every person at every time. Many other approaches could work equally well. I do not want to conclude this chapter without at least one specific field example, though, and this approach is a particularly interesting and helpful one.

the  el  Shaddai  Church  divided  its  spiritual  mapping team into three units, and the members of each unit were not allowed to communicate with each other during the process. Again, this is not a general principle; it is simply the way they chose to operate during this particular proj- ect. each unit was assigned the task of researching the three major areas for spiritual mapping:

Historical  factors. this  group, using  mainly  library sources, researched the name of the community, why it got the name, the root meaning of the name, and the possible relationship of the name to the spirit world or to false be- liefs. they then examined the territory itself, exploring the characteristics that distinguish it from surrounding places; the openness to the gospel; the churches, if any; the socioeconomic conditions; the centers of iniquity in the community; and changes that had recently taken place in the area. they also dug into the history of the region and asked questions about why it was founded, who the founders were, their religious roots, traumatic events of the past, the his- tory of the church, and suggestions of the presence of curses or territorial spirits.

Physical factors. Another unit studied material objects in and around the community. Caballeros observes, “It seems that the devil, due to his unlimited pride, frequently leaves a trail behind.”15  the beginning point of this research is studying maps, both old maps and new maps. Some- times the layout of the city will suggest some kind of pat- tern. For example, a city laid out at 45° off true north and south raises suspicions of occult influence on the layout. this is often the case when the city is founded by Freema- sons. Inventories are made of parks; monuments; archae- ological sites; statues; centers of iniquity such as bars, abortion clinics, houses of prostitution or porno shops; centers of worship, both Christian and non-Christian; buildings that house centers of political, economic, judi- cial,  educational, military, or  cultural  power. the  socioe- conomic condition of each subarea of the community is also carefully observed.

Spiritual factors. A third unit checked the spiritual environment. this is a rather special team. Caballeros says, “those  called  to  work  in  this  spiritual  area  are  the  intercessors, people who flow in the gift of discernment of spirits  and  accurately  hear  from  God.”16   they  will  pray  over the churches as well as over the occult and other non- Christian centers of worship, sense whether the heavens are open or closed, draw the internal spiritual boundaries between certain subareas, and seek the identity of the specific principalities and powers who have evil power over the community.

After a period of intense work, the el Shaddai Church teams compared their notes and were amazed. the histori- cal team had focused on a particular occult archaeological site dating back to the Mayan empire. the physical factors team had located a vacant house right in the area that was a center  of  witchcraft. the  spiritual  factors  team  had  dis- cerned that the territorial spirit over the place was using a certain human practitioner of idolatry and witchcraft as the strongman. the  intercessors  mentioned  certain  physical characteristics  this  strongman  had. they  then  began  to  do powerful strategic-level intercession directed toward those particular targets.

Practicing what I am calling “two-way prayer,” they heard clearly from God at one point in one of those “quote- unquote” situations Jack hayford describes (see Chapter 2). the Lord said,“tomorrow I will give you the man’s first and  last  name  in  the  newspaper  on  page  so-and-so.” to  be sure, the next day the man’s picture was on the designated page, and he fit the physical description previously given to the intercessors. he turned out to be the owner of the vacant house right across the street from the Mayan archaeological site!

using that information, a result of painstaking spiritual mapping, the prayers of the members of el Shaddai Church could become more targeted, and therefore more powerful, than they could have been otherwise.they believed their spir- itual mapping project had opened more doors for advancing the gospel in their city than otherwise would be the case.

because spiritual mapping is still in its infancy, we can collectively look forward to much more information and many  more  insights  in  the  days  to  come. the  more  it  pro- gresses, the more powerful our prayers are likely to become.

REFLECTION QUESTIONS 111

REFLECTION QUESTIONS

        If you started to raise spiritually-significant questions about your community,what would two or three of the first ones be?

        If we are in the midst of warfare, how important do you think it is to have accurate information about the enemy?

        how would you respond to someone who says that if you do spiritual mapping you are glorifying satan?

112     PRAYING WITH POWER

        Discuss the differences between historical factors, phys- ical factors, and spiritual factors in spiritually mapping your city.

(Note By Blogger: Due to the length of the book which this content is from I have broken it up into a short series of blog posts.)