How You May Unwittingly Invite a Demonic Stronghold Into Your Life

Do you need deliverance from demonic strongholds or wrong mindsets?

We cannot and must not blame everything on a demon. We have responsibility for the mindsets we take on and the freedom we need to receive.

So often we relate the word deliverance to demonic entities infiltrating our soul. The definition of deliverance from American Dictionary of the English Language, Webster's Dictionary 1828, is, "release from captivity, slavery, oppression or any restraint." We can hold ourselves in captivity by wrong mindsets.

Deliverance is terminology indicating oppression, but oppression is defined as, "overburdened, misery or heaviness." It is not necessarily demonic in nature.

I think we have a tendency to associate deliverance as being demonic because it is often easier to blame our oppression on a demon, something we don't feel like we can control, then taking responsibility where perhaps we played a part and caused some of the strongholds and oppression in our lives.

When we feel as though we caused our oppression, it brings forth shame, self-condemnation and regret. We experience defeat and victim mentalities and we get locked up and shut down. In our minds, we believe we will never change or won't be any good at anything.

I believe a defeat mentality from our past infiltrates our mentality of who we are today. We cannot allow our past to identify us. We cannot get emotional and spiritually paralyzed in our strongholds.

Oppression isn't necessarily our fault, even if it's a wrong mindset. I know that may sound contradictory, but we haven't been taught in general how to release our feelings in a healthy and productive way in order to conquer oppression. We have not been raised in an environment of inner healing and deliverance.

In fact, a lot of people have been taught to stuff their feelings or that their thoughts and words don't matter. When we have been raised not to talk about our feelings and process them outward, we haven't been given the necessary tools in which to fight oppression.

When we don't fight and release the oppression that has attacked our emotions and we keep unproductive and unfruitful emotions bottled up inside our souls, that's when those ill feelings can build up over time and invite a demonic stronghold. Demons enter and infiltrate our souls when we don't process and handle our emotions. They are also given a legal right to attack us when we don't do anything to seek our freedom or we don't take responsibility in our own bondage or freedom.

We need to take a step back and seek the Holy Spirit, allowing Him to convict and correct us. Pray and seek the Scriptures about asking God to "create in me a clean heart" (Ps. 51:10) and "search me" (Ps. 139:23). Inviting the Holy Spirit into all parts of our souls in order to receive deliverance, whether demonic activity or mindsets, will enable us to walk in the fullness and freedom of Christ and receive clarity instead of confusion.