Tag: discernment

Closing Doors In Our Home

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Let’s talk about opening & closing doors in the home. Something pretty incredible happened this week that was quite the learning experience. I knew better. Long but worth it post.

A few years ago my daughter’s friends were telling her to watch a TV series called Once Upon a Time. It takes Disney stories and brings them to life and has them trapped in the real world. When my daughter was younger I told her she could not watch it because I had heard there was some dark aspects of it.


Forward to the last couple weeks where I told her that I would watch it with her (she is almost 15). We both knew it was showing things on there I typically wouldn’t have in our house in regards to magic. But the storyline was good and intriguing so we kept watching it.
There were times where I asked her if it was too heavy and we would take a break. But then this week when we watched a few episodes, during one of the episodes my 18 yr old son came in for lunch and he heard one phrase that was spoken where Rumplestilskin was evoking a dark spirit. He said he had chills go through his body. That night I was up late reading my Bible. My daughter stood in my doorway at 12:30AM with a startled look on her face. She said that she left her room to go to the bathroom and when she came back her desk chair was turned towards the wall. She said it wasn’t like that when she left and it made her scared. I went in her room and prayed for her and prayed for peace for her room.


Then the next morning when my son was eating breakfast he did not look right. He looked heavy and down, not just tired. I asked him if he was okay and he said he felt like he did something wrong but he didn’t know what he did. He said he just felt weird inside.
That same day my daughter kept on looking at me and asking me what was wrong. She said something in my eyes looked different. I was baffled because to me I was just hot and at the time I was getting my lunch so I was hungry and maybe a little agitated. But she said there was something else.
That afternoon I talked to them about what I think was happening and that we need to spend some time praying over the house when we get home from youth group. I told the kids that I realized what I had done, as the adult allowing a open door in the spirit to have access in our home the last few weeks. When we willingly engage by watching or listening to even very light occultic/demonic activities, by our choice it allows an Open Door in the spirit Realm because we have given it legal access.


But the good news is we have Authority in the name of Jesus to close that door. We stood in the living room and I led the prayer and then they prayed their own prayers. I repented and asked forgiveness for opening the door to the enemy. That I was wrong even after feeling a check in my spirit I shouldn’t have kept going. I asked Jesus to close that door and fill our home with his perfect love that casts out all fear. Declared the blood of Jesus is over our home and all evil spirits must go! After the kids prayed we took oil and anointed every single window, door and electronic equipment and screen, declaring the blood of Jesus over everything.

My son stayed downstairs after we anointed with oil. When I came down to turn off the lights he was walking around playing worship music and praying and declaring every demon needs to flee his home in Jesus name. He was walking in an authority and passion like I had never seen before. I was so proud of him and so comforted at the same time for him to step up in leadership in this way.

The most incredible thing was waking up on Thursday and having peace, joy and freedom. It might be a simple thing or very complicated for some people to understand. All the more I know now, when my kids or I have a check in our Spirit about what was being watched, we need to keep out anything that has a resemblance to the occult.
It’s not worth it. It’s Entertainment masked as light or fun. But the enemy can get in and will stay there if we are not sensitive and tell him to get out. Some shows are darker than others and each of us has to use our own discernment as to what our spirit can allow. But after talking to my daughter, we agreed we’re not watching anymore of that show, even though we are curious what will happen. Guess she can ask her friends and get the cliff notes.

I pray sharing my experience helps you to identify things in your home that could possibly be giving the enemy legal access to bring torment. I have prayed through my home countless times when I felt or knew something was wrong. The biggest step is repentance and renouncing sin or the allowing of something to come into the home. The Authority that Christ is giving us under the blood of Jesus has a power to kick out every evil spirit in your home. It takes us recognizing it even if we don’t know specifically what is causing the torment. We can start with repentance and going around the home and declaring the blood of Jesus over every entryway. Closing our Eye gate, Ear gate and heartgate is so important. For us and our children.

There have been times where someone’s been in my house that I knew in my spirit something was wrong, so I went through and prayed after they left. Another time when our first born was just a toddler we had someone babysit him who we knew wasn’t a Christian and she gave him a hanging mobile. We put it up in his room that night and he woke up screaming bloody murder for no reason. I recognized what had happened with the thing that she had giving him that we put up in his room. It was taken outside and destroyed and we prayed over the house and he had no problems after that with his sleep being disturbed. The kingdom aof light and the kingdom of darkness are constantly at war with each other. But we have the authority as sons and daughters of God, under his blood. There is power in the blood of Jesus to break every chain!

Here are some great teaching resources on Discernment (thanks Mom for the links)

Jane Hamon’s teaching series on Discernment is great. Here is a condensed version.
Discernment: The Essential Guide to Hearing the Voice of God https://a.co/d/38t1EfU

My Dad loves Watchman Nee:
Spiritual Discernment https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00M8E42U0/ref=cm_sw_r_apan_MHH28E5EJG5QHJBHF46E

Why it is important to hear God’s voice for yourself

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Reposted from August 2015

All of my life I have grown up in a prophetic culture where hearing a word from God from somebody else is the norm. I have gone to more conferences at a church than I can count. When you grow up constantly hearing words that God is telling someone else for your church, region, nation or world it is easy to put your own ears in the backseat.

Christians submerged in this culture have a tendancy to become lazy when it comes to activating their own ability to hear the voice of God. We tend to rely on others to give us the new “Heavy Revey“.

This is dangerous and sets you up to be malnourished in your own spiritual walk.

There are times in my life when I go through seasons of constantly listening to different pastors around the world, as well as, listening to online conferences. However, in the last couple years as I have entered in a different season of life with running our business, and I have not exposed myself to as much teaching/prophetic ministry as I have in the past. In one sense, I have missed out growing in certain areas of my spiritual walk. On the other hand, I have had to learn to tune my ears in to Gods voice and ask for discernment to understand what He is telling me and where He is guiding me.

I never want to get to the place in my life where all I am listening to are the revelations that God has given someone else. Because when that happens, I cut myself off from the life flow of the Spirit of God that He wants to pour in and through me.

Now you might say I don’t know how to hear the voice of God. He never speaks to me.

The good news is, that He does all the time we just need to learn to recognize it. This subject has been my heart’s cry since I was 12 years old. I would lay in bed at night crying out to God to hear His voice. I wanted to be like Solomon wanting wisdom and understanding. I wanted to hear his voice so clear.

When I was in Bible college I shared a word with a church in Klamath Falls entitled “Stop, Wait, and Listen.” Boy oh boy, do I wish the computer I used back then didn’t crash because I do not have my notes. The purpose of the message was to teach on how to begin to hear God’s voice.

The first thing we have to do is STOP. Many times when I’m in a church service or praying God will tell me to be quiet. When He says my name first, then tells me to be quiet it really gets my attention! Many times we talk and talk and talk and do not stop to give God a chance to speak to us. He comes to us in a still small voice. Like Elijah in the cave, God did not speak to him in the thunder or in the storm but in a still small voice.

If our voice is only thing we here, we will never hear HIS.

But next we need to WAIT. Now this is the hard part. We have to focus on HIM, our mind, heart, emotions and desires ALL FOCUSED ON HIM. There are a zillion distractions in our life and depending on your present circumstances waiting may feel like an impossibility. But this is where the majority of people who say they cannot hear Gods voice fail. They’re not willing to wait. In this waiting period, many times God begins to speak but we dismiss it on account of not realizing he is speaking.

Not everyone hears an audible voice, that would be a voice that everyone else around you can hear at the same time. Like when John the Baptist was baptizing Jesus and everyone around them heard God speak, “This is my son in whom I am well pleased.” That was an undeniable audible voice.

Some people hear a voice in their head or spirit, some may attribute it to being their conscience. But did you know, your conscience is the Holy Spirit – who is God. We think that our conscience is just “us”. We overlook the fact that God speaks to us all the time, we may not even know it and we don’t give Him the credit. So listen to that voice! He will always give you peace. He also will never contradict His written word.

Another way he speaks is through His Written Word – the Bible. You may be reading the Bible and a verse jumps out at you and you can’t get away from it. You reread it over and over and feel at the same time that a match was just lit in your heart. That is the Holy Spirit speaking through the word. Other times, you may be waiting on God and a verse goes through your mind. That is God speaking to you through his word. I would encourage you when that happens to look at that verse up and research the context of what it is saying.

Something else awesome that happens is when you receive a Bible passage in your mind to look up. You might hear the words Psalms 121. Then when you look up that passage it is exactly what you needed to hear. Sometimes I have heard passages like that and went to look them up and they meant nothing to me. But when I read down further it led me to exactly what I needed. Don’t get discouraged if that happens. Sometimes it will be right on and sometimes it will be off. I heard someone say not to take it too literally if it doesn’t work out correctly. Especially if you open up and read and “Judas went and hanged himself”. And especially if it says, “whatever you are going to do, do quickly”. Haha, be wise and have fun with it.

I have seen signs at a church recently that say “Meeting with God face-to-face, through His Word.” The first time I saw that title I got really excited because my experience of meeting God face-to-face has been with my face down in the carpet weeping while experiencing His intense presence & glory like nothing else, while seeing revelations in the spirit. But my experience is not something that you would typically find at the church I was at. It opened my eyes to the reason why we need every denomination in unity. Because every denomination has a piece of the puzzle that the other does not. The desire inside of me to experience God face-to-face in his word is growing more and more. It is definitely a paradigm shift for me to put those two phrases together, face-to-face – in his word. I long to be encountered by God through his word like I never have before.

It also important to discern when God is giving you a yellow light. A traffic light when yellow means caution. We need to make sure we know when we have a check in our spirit and God is telling us to stop or slow down.

The most important thing to do after he speaks is to LISTEN and put action to his words. Many times when he speaks it requires us to do something with what he says. If we doubt his words and never move forward with his instruction we will find ourselves stuck in a rut frustrated with life. He is always speaking, leading, guiding. If you feel stuck in a rut take some time to wait on the Lord and allow him to stir up the desires he has placed in your heart. But then ask, seek, knock and he will open doors before you that you never even dreamed possible.

I pray this blesses you and you’re able to share this with others who desire to hear Gods voice. – Rachelle Layzell

Here is a powerful song that reflects my hearts cry

I’m Listening by Chris McClarney