Tormented: Eight Years and Back

Excerpt from Tormented:Eight Years and Back

Making Your Demons Behave
Set Free or Coping ???
Deliverance From Oppression

Christians tend to get in the mode of making their demons behave. That is comparable to having a beach ball that you have pushed under the water. With effort you can hold it under, but there are times that the ball will slip out of your hands and come flying out of the water. Demons behave in a similar manner. We can control demons to a certain extent, but there are times that they pop up at just the wrong moment. David soothed Saul’s demons with a harp. That lets us know that there are some things that you can do to soothe a demon; Saul’s servants would call on David whenever Saul’s bout with an evil spirit became unbearable.

Saul would get relief as David played, but he never got free. We’ve all known people who live in homes where they are cast in this harp-playing-demon-soothing role. Perhaps, there is a rage-aholic in the home, much like Saul, and the best music and the best food are given like peace offerings to temporarily satisfy them.

Many young people today are filled with pain, and I believe that some of the loud music is being played to soothe and drown out the memories, the voices, the torment and the painful thoughts—to help them cope. I call certain styles of music coping music. Much of what we do is cope instead of getting set free. Our coping mechanisms may make us better, but they will never make us free.

What is it that is determining the very course of your life? It may be an area where you look good on the surface because you are keeping your demons under cover, but deep down you are struggling to maintain a superficial calm. We need to ask ourselves, "What do I have hidden below the surface that pops up from time to time?"

© 2006, Peggy Joyce Ruth
http://www.peggyjoyceruth.org