The Lion’s Gateway

The Spirit of Control

The spirit of control is one of the most powerful spirits existing in the body of Christ today. Like all evil spirits it disables, deceives, and destroys our life with Christ if it continues to be undetected in our lives. The spirit of control also has a terrible effect on the lives of those around us especially those who we love and care about. This spirit kills freedom and the ability to make choices for ourselves and others. It places heavy bondage on our lives, and causes us to assume responsibilities and make decisions for ourselves and others that we do not need to make. The spirit of control tries to control us so that the spirit of Christ cannot control us.

The spirit of control often finds its foothold in our fears and in our pride. It tries to tell us that God does not care about us and that we need to take care of ourselves. We end up telling God that we can take better care of our lives and the lives of others than He can. It accuses God of not really loving us, and then turns around and accuses us of not being worthy of Gods love. It works to cause us to mistrust God and those around us. We even end up mistrusting ourselves because the outcome of listening to these lies causes more failure, fear, and anger in our lives.

The goal of this spirit is to cause us to be increasingly self centered. It will tend to make us think more and more about ourselves and to worry more and more about what others think about us. Our thoughts and our actions will be more and more consumed protecting ourselves and controlling the lives and affairs of others. We may try to say that we are doing this for the good of others, but we are really doing this for our own good. The end result of these actions and decisions lead us to the idolatry of worshiping ourselves instead of worshiping Jesus.

The spirit of control leads us to judgment and criticism of others rather than to love and mercy. We also will be treating ourselves in much the same way. Those who are dominated by the spirit of control tend to see things in terms of black and white. They are busy protecting themselves, while thinking they are protecting others. It is not easy for them to be flexible because their way is the right way. It is very important for them to be right because it gives an excuse for them to remain in control. Many who have the spirit of control view God as a taskmaster who keeps a ledger balance on our right and wrong actions. This provides a rationalization for the need for everything to be as perfect as possible so that they can tell themselves that they need to maintain control of things and people in their lives. Acts and thoughts of mercy and compassion are viewed as weaknesses that are secondary to the necessity of being in control.

The spirit of control leads us to un-forgiveness so that it can maintain its grip on us. It wants us to concentrate on mistakes and shortcomings of others so that it can maintain more control. The phrase, “they should know better and they should have common sense” are popular ones with this spirit. This spirit causes us to dwell on the weaknesses of people rather than their strengths. In this manner of thinking, we tend to dismiss the strengths of others and embellish our own. Our way is the best way and their way needs correction and advice.

The spirit of control is deceptive because it attempts to remain in the background of peoples’ awareness. When it does reveal itself, it overpowers the person and tries to convince it that they are powerless against it. This is an intimidating spirit that tries to tell the person that being in control is the only way to live. It is a deceptive spirit that appears to try to help you so that it can get its way a then become more powerful. Its goal is to destroy both the person and the people around them. It crushes relationships and increases isolation. It increases pride, arrogance and self-righteousness. This spirit resists correction or change and tries to take advantage of humility and kindness. It wants more and more authority over you and the people around you, and tries to achieve this by convincing you that you are in the right.

The spirit of control also manifests itself in jealousy and envy. After all when other people are successful without our help we cannot be in control of them. It does not rejoice in the successes of other people, but will often seize success at the cost of the happiness and the freedom of others. With this spirit your own happiness is more important than the happiness of others. Happiness seems to come only when things go the way I want them to go and I am in control. We seem to feel that the happiness and success of others is our responsibility. We often already have figured out how others will succeed and be happy without asking God first. God’s plan for the situation is often distant or non¬existent.

The spirit of control is a lying spirit that says its ways of control are the only ways to freedom. It comes against unity and cooperation except when it can control many people at onetime. The spirit of control loves to divide people against each other so that it can conquer others to have its way. This spirit comes against the relationship between the individual and Jesus and the relationships between believers. This spirit prevents and chokes off intimacy between God and his people because issues of control and manipulation arise in the relationship. Both trust and faith are destroyed when there are fears about control and manipulation. Freedom becomes non-existent and bondage becomes more and more evident. The spirit of control comes against friendships by causing the people involved to be offended with each other. This spirit wants to create more isolation and division so that it can have more control. A favorite theme of this spirit is me against the world. It uses hurt and disappointment to make the wounds in our hearts and spirits even deeper. It tries to tell us that loving others is both useless and pointless because it never works anyway. This spirit wants to make us feel used and abused by others. The spirit of control builds walls and not bridges. This spirit wants to possess and control a person completely.

Other signs of the spirits presence are anxiety about the present and future, restlessness, un-peacefulness and exhaustion. Anger and jealousy are often present. We can become God’s assistant because we think He needs our help and input. The truth is however that God did not hire us but invited us to be His sons and daughters, and friends and servants. The right attitude is that we carry out God’s will in loving service to Him. The more we surrender to the sovereignty of God the less we will be under the spirit of control.

There are several things that help us to remain under the spirit of control. The fear of what others will think of us, that is seeking man’s approval is a important factor. When the approval of others is our motive we can easily get caught up in vain imaginations because we are busy trying to determine what other people are thinking about us. The spirit also uses our need to be successful, and to get results, or get a pat on the back. This kind of thinking can lead us to be very hard on ourselves. The devil is always accusing us of our faults and failures. When we get accused we can get defensive and try to control things. When we control things we will try and control others also. When we are under the spirit of control we are not servants of God. We are serving ourselves and the evil one.

I would like to now discuss how to get out from under the spirit of control.

Loving Jesus and each other is the best weapon against the spirit of control

- Make a practice of giving God our emotions daily so
that the devil cannot manipulate us and use them against
us.

- Pray that we will be given hearts to love Jesus and
others more than ourselves.

- Ask people how you can serve them instead of
waiting for people to serve us.

- Do not depend on your own imagination to form your
opinions of what other people think of you. Ask for the
mind of the Holy Spirit instead.

- Avoid the temptation to gossip. Do not allow your
heart to have secret ill thoughts of one another.

- As much as possible, expose your fears about
situations into the light and ask for help in dealing with
them. We need to own our problems and take them to
the Lord.

- Do not be stingy or selfish with your heart or your
possessions. The more we own things, the more we
need control of them. Ask God how you can be a
blessing to others.

- Ask God to help you surrender to Him. Practice this by
giving up little things to Him every day.

- Do not allow room for bitterness or anger in your heart.
This leads to the need to control others

- Confess your need for God’s grace every day.

- Make encouraging others a way of life. Let others be
more important than yourself.

- Do not be silent about your blessings. Learn to boast
about God’s goodness to you.

- Your are not the most important person in the
universe God and His ways have the first place.

- Let God be faithful and take care of you His own way
It will be better than your way.

- Seek and ask for humility and wisdom from the Lord.
Place as many things are you can at His feet every day.

- Do not seek to perform for God and others but
Seek to love and serve them.

The spirit of control seeks to destroy and devour us. To fight our enemy, we need to know their tactics. We need to know the plans of our adversary so that we can have victory over him. The spirit of control has destroyed many people, churches, and families. I hope that this has been helpful to break its hold on many people. Those who are fighting this spirit need to pray and constantly seek the Lord’s favor and grace. Those who humble themselves before the Lord daily in this mailer will find great strength. The practice of asking forgiveness and receiving forgiveness on a regular basis is essential. A person should also consider having a spiritual advisor who they can talk with to discuss about problems with the spirit of control.