TEN STEPS TO RIDDING YOUR HOME OF SPIRITUAL DARKNESS

As you go through these steps, please remember that this might take some time.

Do not try to rush the process. For instance, you may find that you need more time to do personal repentance than you thought or to look through your house for offensive objects.

Allow the Holy Spirit to set the pace for you. Also, remember that you do not have to own your home or property to follow this list.

If you rent a home or apartment, you have the spiritual right to evict Satan’s cohorts.

Step One: Accept Jesus as Your Lord and Savior

Most of you have already taken this step, but for those of you who have not, the very first step to ridding your home of spiritual darkness is to secure your relationship with God by accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior.

It is through Jesus’ Name that we have the authority to expel demonic forces and we cannot avail ourselves of His Name unless we have a relationship with Him.

But there is something much more important at stake, and that is your eternal home. Living with spiritual darkness on earth is one thing, but living in utter and complete darkness with no hope of life for all eternity is another.

Only the blood of Jesus can save you from such an awful fate. If you have not already secured your salvation, please consider turning away from sin, believing in the death and resurrection of Jesus, and receiving Him as Lord and Savior of your life.

To do this you must:

1. Consider your life and then turn away from everything that is contrary to what God wants

(Matt. 3:7-10; Acts 3:19).

2. Acknowledge that Jesus Christ died on the Cross to forgive you of sin and that you take Him as your Savior to cleanse you from sin. Jesus paid the price due for your sin (Rom. 5:9, 10; Titus 2:14).

3. Ask Him to be the Lord of your life, acknowledging openly and verbally that Jesus is not only your Savior, but your Lord (1 John 2:23).

Step Two: Take a Spiritual Inventory of Your Life

In order to remove demonic forces from our homes and keep them out, we must be willing to deal with sin issues in our lives. Demons are like flies and sin is like garbage. “If we get rid of the flies and keep the garbage, the person is in great danger still. But if we get rid of the garbage, what we have done automatically affects the flies. In other words, you must get rid of the garbage in order to get rid of the flies. When we rid our lives of sin, demonic forces do not have the legal right they once had to occupy our lives and our homes.

However, if we go through these steps to rid our homes of demonic forces without making our lives right before God, we may actually be making our situation worse! Jesus taught that if we cast out a demon and it does not find rest elsewhere, the demon then comes back to check out the situation. If the demon finds the house is still suitable for occupation, then it goes and finds seven other demons who are even more wicked than itself and they all set up shop right back where they started. If we expel one demon, but do not remove its legal right, we get eight in return. “And the final condition of the man is worse than the first” (see Matt. 12:43-45).

Ask the Lord to reveal any sin issues in your life that must be dealt with before continuing in this process. Because unforgiveness is a big bag of garbage that demons love to feed on, ask God to show you any places of unforgiveness in your life toward others that need to be cleansed.

Step Three: Dedicate Your Home to the Lord

The next step in ridding your home of spiritual darkness is to dedicate your house to the Lord. Simply pray and invite the presence of the Lord into your home. Ask the Lord to use your home for His purposes. Declare that as for you and your house, you will serve the Lord (Josh. 24:15).

Declare that your home will not be a haven for dark forces, but instead that it will be a beacon of light for your family and to the world. It is best to pray these things in an audible voice, which affirms your intentions not only to God and to yourself, but to any forces of darkness that are about to lose their dwelling place.

Step Four: Prepare for Battle What we are engaged in is spiritual warfare.

We are warring in the heavenlies to establish our homes for the Lord and declare them off limits to the powers of darkness. Here are the preparations we should make as we go into battle:

1. Ask the Lord for the strategy for your war. He may lead you to play praise music throughout your home for a period of time, or He may lead you to read specific Scriptures in each room.

Expect that He will answer your prayer and show you how to proceed.

2. Plead the blood of Jesus over yourself, your family, your animals, and your property.

3. Pray Psalm 91 out loud.

4. In Jesus’ Name, bind any demonic forces from manifesting in your home during this process.

Step Five: Take a Spiritual Inventory of Your Home

Ask the Lord to give you the discernment you will need as you look at what you own. Go through your house, room by room, and let the Holy Spirit show you any objects that should not be in your home.

Step Six: Cleanse Your Home of Ungodly Objects

Whatever needs to go should not be considered an item for your next garage sale! Once you know something must go, be careful to destroy it.

Deuteronomy 7:25 gives us an example to follow, “You shall burn the carved images of their gods with fire; you shall not covet the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it for yourselves, lest you be snared by it; for it is an abomination to the LORD your God.” Take what can be burned and burn it. If it cannot be burned, pass it through the fire (as a symbolic act of obedience) and then destroy it by whatever other means are available to you such as smashing or even flushing. Once you have destroyed the object, renounce any participation you or your family have had with that object (whether knowingly or unknowingly) and ask the Lord to forgive you. If the object is linked with Freemasonry, Eastern Star, Job’s Daughters, Rainbow, or De Molay.. repent for your involvement.

Once the legal right for demonic forces linked with that object has been removed through these acts, you can now command any demonic forces linked with that object to leave in the Name of Jesus. Repeat these steps for every object that needs to go.

Step Seven: Cleanse Each Room and Cleanse the Land

Having cleansed your home of ungodly objects, the next step is to cleanse the spiritual atmosphere of each room. Demonic forces that were not attached to an object, but may be in the home because of sin or trauma which occurred there, need to be dealt with. Go through your house and repent for any known sin that has been committed in each room. If your home was occupied by someone else before you, ask the Lord to show you what needs to be prayed in each room.

Trust the impressions you get during this process. Also, if you have noticed a major change in behavior or circumstances since moving into your home that cannot be explained any other way (e.g., fighting, financial troubles, violence, nightmares, accidents, etc.), this might be a clue as to what happened in your home before you moved in.

Do identification repentance in each room and over the land. Pray that the Lord would heal any trauma caused by the torment of demonic forces in your home. Also, ask the Lord to restore to you and your family whatever blessings were stolen by the enemy through demonic forces in your home.

Step Eight, Part One: Consecrate Your Home

Once you have completed all these steps, then go through your house, room by room, and consecrate each one to the Lord. Speak specific blessings into each room. In the living room you may want to bless the time that your family spends together there and ask the Lord to strengthen those relationships.

In each bedroom, bless the plans and purposes that God has for each one that occupies that room. In the bedroom of a married couple, bless the sexual relationship and the union between husband and wife. Bless the work that goes on in an office or den and declare that all work done there will be done as unto the Lord. Think of why each room was designed, and bless that purpose. You can even bless the cleansing that goes on in the bathroom and ask the Lord to use it as a reminder of the cleansing He has brought in your own life! Many who consecrate their home room by room often use oil to anoint the doors, windows, and furnishings. Oil is used as a symbol of Jesus’ blood and the Holy Spirit– a reminder of both the cleansing and protecting power in His blood. If you feel so led, using oil is certainly appropriate for this type of praying.

Step Eight, Part Two: Consecrate Your Property

Once you have completed the process, you can consecrate the land to the Lord. One way of doing this is to walk the perimeters of your property declaring that the land is consecrated, or set apart, for the Lord. This physical act helps to establish spiritual perimeters.

Another popular way for consecrating land is to stake the land and raise a canopy of praise. This is done by taking wooden stakes and driving one stake in each corner of the property while praying for the Lord’s blessing. Then from the center of the property raising an imaginary canopy of praise to God by worshiping Him, singing songs, and declaring Scriptures.

Neither of these methods (whether used together or by themselves) is a magic formula, but rather a symbolic or “prophetic” act that declares to the Lord, to the powers of darkness, and to yourself that this property is set apart (consecrated) for the Lord.

For example: take four stakes (about 2 inches thick) and with a heavy black marker write Scripture references on each stake, one on each side of each stake, such as Psalm 91, Isaiah 54:2-3, Jeremiah 29:7, Luke 1:37, and Joshua 24:15. Go to each corner of the property, read the Scriptures listed on their stakes, pray a prayer of blessing and consecration, and then drive the stake into the ground with a sledgehammer. Meet back in the house and raise a canopy of praise by worshiping the Lord together. If you choose to drive stakes on your property, ask the Lord what Scriptures you should use to consecrate the property to Him. You may come up with a whole different list. Do whatever is right for you and your situation. You can be as creative as you want in finding ways to consecrate your property!

Step Nine: Fill Your Home with Glory

The next step is to fill your home with objects and activities that bring glory to God.

Jack Hayford offers this list of practices that promote healthy, happy, holy homes:

1. Take Communion with your family at home. Be sure to include the children.

2. Sing at home, both alone and together. Let your home be filled with the song of the Lord.

3. Pray at home. Pray as a family. Make table prayer meaningful, even though it is brief.

Scheduled times of prayer are great, but so is prayer that rises naturally, and it helps the kids enter in as genuine participants instead of being forced.

4. Testify about the good things God has done for you at home. Dinnertime is a great time to talk about what Jesus did to help you today.

5. Speak the Word in your house. Besides your own devotional Bible reading, how about standing in the center of your living room periodically and reading a psalm aloud?

6. Keep your house bright. Cultivate a genuine mood of hope in your home. Refuse whatever influence (moodiness, sharp speech, unworthy music, activities, or videos) would extinguish the brightness of God’s glory light in your home.

Step Ten: Maintain Spiritual Victory Keep on your toes!

The enemy would love to find new and creative ways of infiltrating your home with spiritual darkness.

It is a good idea to periodically go through your home and check for any new objects that should not be in your home, or pray through any new sin issues that have come up. In addition, plan on consecrating the rooms of your house and walking the perimeters of your property at least once a year. You might want to pick a day that will remind you each year that the time has come to do a spiritual checkup and rededicate your house to the Lord.

May the Lord richly bless you as you seek to rid your home of spiritual darkness and live in the glory of His presence!

SAMPLE PRAYERS

Bedroom Blessing

I bless you doorway to this bedroom as the gate of security of this room Bed, I bless you with serenity and peace I bless you as a place of dreams and the Presence of our God I bless you with the blessings of rest and refreshment I bless you bed, as a gentle invitation to slumber and sleep, to regenerate Bedroom, I bless you with quietness I bless you to be a haven that angels watch over I bless you as a private place, leaving all the cares of the day at the gate  I bless you as the place where we awake, fresh and alive to begin each day I bless you as a place of beauty I do this blessing in the Name of Jesus, Who neither slumbers nor sleeps But gives to us, as His beloved even in our sleep.

Prayer to Dedicate a Home to the Lord

Heavenly Father, I dedicate this home and property to You, it shall be a house of prayer, a house of praise and worship to You my Lord. May all that is done within the walls and property of this house be used to Glorify You, Lord. But as for my house , we will serve the Lord according to Joshua 24:15. In the Name of Jesus I pray this Prayer of dedication of our/my home. Amen.

Let the Glory of the Lord Arise

Heavenly Father, I ask that You let the Glory of the Lord rise upon me, according to Isaiah 60 verse 2. I ask You Lord to let Your Glory be seen on me throughout this day and to always show the mind of You Lord today and every day. Heavenly Father I ask that when anyone looks upon me this day, they will see you Lord in and around me. Let every action that I do today proclaim you Lord in every way. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.