The Palace

Luke 11:20-26
20 But if I with the finger of God cast out devils, no doubt the kingdom of God is come upon you. 21 When a strong man armed keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace: 22 But when a stronger than he shall come upon him, and overcome him, he taketh from him all his armour wherein he trusted, and divideth his spoils. 23 He that is not with me is against me: and he that gathereth not with me scattereth. 24 When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he saith, I will return unto my house whence I came out.
25 And when he cometh, he findeth it swept and garnished.
26 Then goeth he, and taketh to him seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and they enter in, and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first.

Who delivers - Matthew 12:28
But if I cast out devils by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is come unto you. Devils are cast out by the spirit and not by power.
When you use the term strongman, it is a term that is to indicate a control or rulership on authority over us. For example, a strongman or burglar taking control of a store and robbing it. A stronghold has been made.

What is a stronghold?
vs. 21 - it is the control by the ruling principality (evil spirit) over a person's life. God created you with a soverenty it doesn't man the rulership of any principality over you. You have been created to be spiritually free.

When these evil spirits come into your life then the rule over your life and you submit to them and their authority. You submit to their design and intent. You become under their authority and control. The strongman armed would be an evil spirit, principality, taking your house (your palace) over. It is controlling you. His goods would be the armor that is in peace. For example: Bitterness is ruling principality for the devil. When bitterness is armed keepeth your palace his good (or underlings) are at peace (unforgiveness, resentment, retaliation, anger/wrath, hatred, violence and murder in action or with the tongue). These are now in peace under his authority. That is not your peace that is the strongman's peace. When the evil spirit is within you, he is at peace and you are in torment. When he is gone, he is in torment and you are in peace.

Vs. 24-26 it means when the evil spirit is cast out, it goes into torment, that dry place of the second heaven, invisible where evil spirits are when they don't inhabit a human being is a dry place. Why is it a place of torment for them, it's a place of torment because they have all these feelings. They have all these urges. They have all the manifestations of their nature roaring through their consciousness. Evil spirits are disembodied beings. They are as real as you or I except they don't have a physical body and are bound to the spirit dimension of spirit. They are not either in the earth visible nor are they in heaven spiritually. Jesus said this, I saw Satan fall like lightening from heaven.

When the evil spirit is in you, it wants to manifest himself by its nature. If it is bitterness, it wants to use you as a medium of expression and when you allow it that becomes your sin. You need to repent for allowing it to become part of your life. You need to repent to God for allowing an evil spirit or principality or spiritual wickedness in high places and not be controlled by the Holy Spirit in your life otherwise you cannot be used as an oracle for God. You become an oracle for the devil through his kingdom. Example, has anyone ever rejected you and you lashed out in anger at them? Then you just participated in their sin. It was not love and you were not in the spirit but in the flesh manifesting anger at the other person.

When you start spouting off in anger or wrath (because of bitterness/unforgiveness), that is not even you. That is an evil spirit that has taken you over, you go down, it comes up and it uses your faculties as a medium of expression and it fulfills its nature. It is very much happy to do so. You are very unhappy and you have become the victim of an evil spirit in your heart. How do you get it out of your life, through repentance and then casting it out of your life? If you want to punish an evil spirit, cast it out so that it has to go to dry places and manifest all of its personality then it will be in torment. Not you!

That is why the bible says to resist the devil and he shall flee and that we not to give no place to the devil. That's why the bible says to keep ourselves pure from the works of evil. That is why we are supposed to have discernment. It also says to put things under our feet.
What does it mean to be pure spiritually? It means you are acting out of according to the nature of God as he created you from the beginning of the foundation of the world. That is spiritual purity.

What is spiritual impurity?
You are allowing the mentality and mind of the kingdom of Satan to operate through you influencing you, speak through you, act through you and do drastically deeds through you. That is spiritual impurity. You can deal with your emotions all you want, but if you don't deal with the spirit behind it, it will be a long life struggle to overcome it with your inner man.

Jesus said in Mark 7:20-23 20And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man.

21 For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders,

22 Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness:

23 All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.

What is verses 20-23 saying? What is in the heart of man (your heart is the human spirit), expresses itself out of a man in a thought, a word or an action. That is in the spiritual dynamics of a man that manifests and comes up and out through thought, word or deed.

Now when someone stronger than the strongman shall come upon him and overcome him and take away from him all his armor wherein he trusted and divided his spoils.

What is spoils? It is a term of war. When you go in and overcome an enemy, you get all of his goods. The spoils of bitterness, has seven areas that are important to him (unforgiveness, resentment, retaliation, anger/wrath, murder - they are the underlings to bitterness) it his purpose for being. He's trusting that when you deal with the root of bitterness he trusting with all of his might sitting in your house that resentment is as far as you are going to go. Then anger/wrath will want to pump it up and get it back in its life. These are the things he is trusting in that he can keep his position in ruler ship because he is sitting on his throne in your castle (your house). It is trusting it can control you with its armor and its armor is what other spirits lesser than itself.

Luke 11 the strongman armed is the principality or evil spirit that lives in your palace and his goods are in peace. What are his goods? Means every bit of his kingdom (underlings or other spirits) that he's banking on to control you is in place and operating very well. If you are dealing with a root of bitterness, all 7 of these are working somewhere in you (unforgiveness, resentment, retaliation, anger/wrath, murder). Murder can be murder of the tongue or physical murder. All seven of these are the goods that are in peace. For example, when the principality of the unloving spirit there are good which are for example are self-hatred, self-pity, self-rejection, self-idolatry, selfishness, self-accusation, etc.

When one of the goods or underlings is manifesting such as self-pity, then the kingdom of self is being promoted and not the kingdom of God. You are introspecting. Self-pity is a feeling of sorrow (often self-indulgent) over your own sufferings in the past or in the present. It is self exalting your problems.

How can you get past your past pain when in self-pity? You cannot when you are manifesting self-pity. It is people who habitually indulge in self-pity--it's "injustice collector." These are the folks who are constantly dwelling on their hurts and hardships--whether real or imagined--and they enjoy thinking about them and talking about them. That is why it is the kingdom of self. A person in self-pity is keeping a record of wrong. God's way instructs us to walk in the God kind of love, which is "not self-seeking," and which "keeps no record of wrongs."

That is why it is very important to repent, pull down the thought that is not of love or have it cast out otherwise, if it stays and becomes habitual, then it is a stronghold. That person is in habitual self-pity and cannot seem to get free.

So, when you act out in anger then you are in sin. When you feel rejected it is a sin. When you are in fear it is a sin and sin is a being. When you look at 2 Timothy 1:7 it says For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. So, we see that fear is a spirit. A spirit that is opposite of God are demons that influence us.

Any sin will lead to a stronghold (spiritual bondage) if not dealt with. That is what Jesus did on the cross for us was give us a way to deal with our sin. In the old testament, they had to wait an entire year, do sacrifices on animals for blood to cover sin. It was not forgotten like what Jesus did for us on the cross when we repent and it is forgiven and forgotten.

Once a stronghold is established, the enemy influences us in our attitudes and actions, and also distorts our perception of God, other people and situations, causing us to misperceive situations to the detriment of relationships.

Jeseus gave us the authority to cast down thought and strongholds.