Mike Bickle emphasizes the New Testament model for spiritual warfare, focusing on the importance of prayer in pulling down spiritual strongholds in both personal lives and cultural contexts. He identifies three types of strongholds: personal, cultural, and cosmic, explaining how demonic powers influence societal beliefs and laws. Bickle highlights that spiritual warfare is not about confronting demons directly but rather about agreeing with God through prayer, worship, and proclaiming truth. He encourages believers to engage in identificational repentance and to act in the opposite spirit of the prevailing darkness in their communities. Ultimately, he asserts that the power of prayer and worship is essential for driving back demonic influences and fostering spiritual revival.

Well, last week in our first session, we talked about strongholds of the mind. Pulling down spiritual strongholds related to our personal lives, our heart and our mind and our own behavior. Tonight we're going to continue on the same theme, but go on to the next part. We're talking about pulling down spiritual strongholds in the culture and affecting the spiritual strongholds in the heavenly places. Paragraph one, I want to talk about the three types of spiritual strongholds. I just mentioned them, but I'll say them again, just so we have it, one, two, three. One expression of prayer, because we're talking, this is a course on prayer that's often referred to as spiritual warfare prayer. That's not the actual biblical name for it, but it's used commonly and it's important to understand what most people mean by it. The reason it's called spiritual warfare prayer, because it's contending with the demonic strongholds, the high level demons that are affecting the culture. But particularly, they're affecting the governmental leaders that affect the culture. These high level, high ranking demonic powers, their target, they're on the men and the women who make the laws, because the laws help set the culture in a major way. The culture of a city or of a nation or of a geographic region. Paragraph B, the verse we looked at last week, we're going to apply it at a different level this week. Paul exhorted us to pull down spiritual strongholds. Again, last week, we looked at strongholds of the mind. This week, we'll look at the other two that are commonly identified. There are three spiritual strongholds, categories that are commonly referred to by people who teach on prayer all around the nation. These are, again, not technical terms, but they give you an idea and some understanding so you can communicate with other folks that are talking about the same subjects. 2 Corinthians chapter 4, Paul said, The weapons of our warfare, they're not carnal, meaning they are not limited to human power. Carnal in this sense just means limited to human power. But they're mighty. They have a supernatural dimension to them. The weapons we're talking about, they're more than human power. More than what a governmental leader can do just by virtue of their office. Like, there's a lot of emphasis on praying for the elections, which is an important thing to do. Let's get the right men and women in office. And that's important. But the right men and women in office is not quite enough because the laws themselves won't change the culture. But the laws with the release of the supernatural power and the driving back of demonic powers, that combination, that will affect change, a spirit of revival in the church. Verse 4, For the weapons of our warfare, they're not carnal, they're not limited to human power, but they're mighty in God. There's a supernatural dimension to them. And Paul uses this phrase again that's good to get familiar with if you're not. The pulling down of strongholds. That's the phrase. The pulling down of strongholds. And he elaborates on that idea by identifying the key activity in pulling down strongholds. It's not the only activity, but it's a key one. It's casting down or exposing and denouncing the lies, the arguments against the truth about God. So we pull down strongholds by casting down or exposing, renouncing the lies by proclaiming the truth. And we pull down strongholds by casting down arguments and every high thing that speaks to all, that includes demonic powers, every high thing that exalts itself against the true knowledge of God. So Paul, again this is reviewed from last week, is using the analogy of a stronghold. A stronghold is a fort or fortress. It's a common idea in the ancient world. He's teaching the believers how to pull down strongholds in their personal life and how to address strongholds in the culture. Again from last week, a stronghold in the ancient world. It was a fort or fortified city. It was like a city with stone wall built around it to protect it. Now the purpose of a fortress or fort, the purpose of a stronghold built around a city was to keep the invading army out. Well Paul was using this in kind of a, he's saying the invading army, Satan wants to have strongholds to keep the army of the blessing of the presence of God from invading his territory. So he's creating lies and seducing people with lies to protect these people from the blessing of God to keep them under his dominion. Not protect, but I mean to secure them being under his own dominion. So Paul's using the pulling down strongholds, he goes, the bad guys making the strongholds in this case. Because in the ancient culture it was the city that made strongholds to keep the bad guys out. And Paul just uses it in a reverse way. Paragraph C, very simple principle, but it's important to grasp. Spiritual demonic strongholds, they're established in a city or a region when people open the door to Satan. They do it by embracing ungodly belief systems, ungodly values, ungodly actions, and you could put the word here, laws. When ungodly belief systems are embraced by a vast majority of the people in a geographic area, that is an invitation for a certain kind of demonic activity corresponding to that belief system or that law or that value or that practice. Because human beings open the door to greater satanic activity by agreeing with demons. We do it individually in our own lives, but people can do it collectively in a city or a region. Satan has to get the permission of the human beings. He's got to, they've got to open a door using their own free will to agree with him. If he can seduce them and lie to them so they have wrong belief systems, wrong laws, wrong actions, it really matters. It affects the spirit world because demons are then, they have legal access given by the human beings who live in that geographic territory or as we looked at last week, given by the person who just, when you, when somebody agrees with darkness, I don't want to put this on you, that's why things like pornography, it's not innocent or harmless. It's absolute disaster. It is an invitation to demonic spirits, it's like giving the key to a demon and saying, here, come, disturb me now. The demon says, I needed you to give me that key, that's why some, you know, I've talked to folks, they go, well, I just look at it and think it's kind of innocent, I go, no, no, no, absolutely not. And there's many, many actions and activities, that's just one that's so prevalent in our society. Okay, the first of the three types of strongholds, last week's personal strongholds or strongholds of the mind. Today, cultural strongholds, strongholds in our culture, where a, not all the people, but a large number, a large, a vast majority of the people, they are in agreement with beliefs and values and actions and laws that are in agreement with Satan, that are against God's righteousness. That's why it matters what laws go forth, it matters what we do with the issue of abortion, it matters what we do with certain economic issues, it matters what we do with human rights, it matters what happens with gay marriage, it matters what happens, how we proclaim the grace of God according to the biblical definition of the grace of God and not twisted, deceptive ideas, using the terminology, but ridding the meaning of that terminology from its biblical intention. It really matters, these things do not just in individual lives and families, but in cities and regions and nations. Cultural strongholds, those are demonic, it's demonic activities and similar patterns of demonic activities seen in a city or an area, a region might be bigger than a city or a region might be smaller than a city. And then paragraph F, the third type of strongholds is the cosmic strongholds. Again, these are just terms that people use, are they supernatural, demonic, well it's all demonic, but meaning these are powers that are in the heavenly places. This is the spiritual demonic power source behind the cultural strongholds. There's demons, there's a hierarchy of demons over every city and over every nation. And those are the highest ranking demonic powers and they're actively involved in bringing that city or that region into darkness. But they need the cooperation of people in that city to do it. These strongholds in the spirit realm are caused by demonic principalities in the air, that's how Paul described them. Principalities is the term he uses, that's the highest ranking demonic power from the best that we can understand in the scripture. They assault cities and nations, but I believe they focus their attack upon the governmental leaders because the governmental leaders, whether it's a leader like a president or a king or a prime minister with great authority over a nation or a local leader, the very small sphere, those leaders they open the door to the legislation. They open the door to what is sanctioned and what is promoted in that region. And when a demonic, seductive, false behavior is promoted by a law, people in the society think, well, I mean, it's the law, it must be okay. And a tremendous door opens when demonic powers get leaders to vindicate, validate, promote these demonic doctrines and behaviors by establishing laws that promote them. Paragraph 1, Ephesians 6, Paul called them principalities of powers. He goes, we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. He goes, we're just weak and broken people minus the grace of God. By the grace of God, we have power. But in our own flesh and blood, he says, we're not really fighting against the bad law or just a person that's causing trouble in our life. There's demonic powers inspiring that activity, energizing that activity, bringing a supernatural dimension and complexity to the attack against a city or a nation or a person. He goes, it looks like you're wrestling against a governor or a governmental leader or an authority at the office. But he goes, behind every authority, there is a spiritual power, good and bad, that is wanting, vying for the attention and the influence of that leader, I mean, to use that leader to promote their influence. So he goes, we're wrestling. It's more than the person that's bothering us. There's a power behind it. And he gives five titles, names, he goes, they're principalities. That's the first category mentioned. That's why we assume that's the highest ranking demonic power, a demonic principality. Then the next category is its powers. And the assumption is, and many hold it, I think it's a reasonable assumption, that's a title, that's a name of a ranking of a demonic power, the second ranking. Then there's the rulers of darkness. Then there's the spiritual host of wickedness. There's the four that Paul mentions here. And he's describing them, and those are the titles that are often used to describe the different ranking of demonic powers over cities and nations. Paragraph two, these high ranking demons, they are different than demons that are dwelling in people on the earth. These demons, Paul called them, called Satan the prince of the power of the air, meaning they're in heavenly places, they're in the spirit realm, they're above. They're not on the earth. They're not earthbound in a person where, you know, a person's demonized, you cast the demon out. These demons are in the air and they're orchestrating their influence on people and societies and all the demons under them from a lofty position of power in the heavenly places or in the air. And when it says heavenly places, the Bible talks about three heavens. There's three different heavens described in the Bible. There's the heavens above us, the sky. You look up and the Bible says, and the heavens declare the glory of God. Talk about the sky, the stars. And Paul talks about paradise being in the third heavens. So the first heavens is the sky above us. The third heavens we know is paradise. But then demons and principalities and powers are in heavenly places, and that's often referred to as the mid-heavens or the second heavens. That term, second heavens, is not in the Bible. The first heavens is obvious, the sky above us. The heavens declare the glory of God. The third heavens is designated by name, Paul calls it that. And so when the demonic powers are described as being in heavenly places, the common understanding is that there's a second heavens, a mid-heavens of which demonic powers, that's the power base. And they have a place of greater influence from that position. Paragraph G, just as there's a human hierarchy in human government over nations, there's a demonic hierarchy over the governments of the nations. But there's also an angelic hierarchy over the government of the nations as well. So there's a human king, there's a demonic king called a principality or a prince, and there's an angelic high-ranking angel assigned to that geographic area as well. Now sometimes these demonic spirits over a city or region are referred to, I have paragraph G here, as territorial spirits because they influence a particular territory in the supreme way. From the demonic point of view, they have the strongest power. Some people, you hear it commonly, it's not a term I use very often, but just so you're understanding what people are talking about, they're talking about the demonic power over an area and they refer to it as a territorial spirit. Top of page 2, paragraph A, whole cities, nations, geographic areas, sometimes bigger than a city, smaller than a city, part of a nation or the whole nation, they can be affected by the same lies. They can be assaulted by the same demonic activity. Like different regions of the earth have, you know, real similar demonic deceptions that are different than other regions of the earth. You know, in India you have Hinduism, very different than Buddhism and a number of Chinese speaking nations, not all of them, but which is different than the western humanistic secular values of western Europe and America. I mean, everybody is catering to the flesh, but there's different manifestations in different parts of the earth that are very, very recognizable. One way we recognize what spirit, I mean the high ranking demonic spirits, because you can recognize it by a large number of people in that geographic area are participating in the same deception and the same dark behavior. Same patterns of darkness in their beliefs, their values, laws, actions, and so therefore you can ascertain what type of demonic power, I mean the focus of that demonic power. Some people like to name them all, I steer away from that kind of stuff. They name it this, they name it that, and their names are conjectured and I think most are trying to be helpful by trying to give you a little bit of idea as to what, you know, the pattern of darkness happening in that geographic area. Paul said we're to bring down, we're to cast down every high thing, paragraph B, that exalts itself against God. When we cast down every high thing, that involves demons and their activities and their ideas. Because a demon's activity begins by the demonic idea getting lodged in the mind. Satan cannot, can torment somebody and hold them in bondage in far greater effectiveness by getting them to agree with his ideas. That's the way that he brings people or cities into bondage. He seduces them to believe wrong things. Paragraph C, I'm identifying three ways in which we cast down the high things. And the surprising part of these is how simple they are. Well they have to be simple. They were not simple, we couldn't do them. I mean the body of Christ throughout history, both the literate and the illiterate, the rich and the poor, the gifted, the non-gifted, everyone's got to be able to do these. So that already gives you the tip off that it's not complicated. Some people try to make this very, very complicated. I've seen books and they've got all these high level of information about demonic names and how they all work. And I'm wondering, where do they get that information at? And maybe it sells books or something, I don't know, but it's got to be simple or the body of Christ throughout the nations and throughout history couldn't do it. It's got to work for folk, people like us, it's got to work for us. Or it's not, that's the way the gospel works in the kingdom. We cast down these high things, again demonic ideas, high meaning high in power, high in importance, high in the source is the principality in the air. So the word high has probably got several different implications to it. It's high in importance, it's high in power, the very location of the demons, you know, I guess you could say geographically, I don't know what the term would be, it's high, it's up there somewhere in the air, in the mid heavens. Well we cast down these high things, number one, by proclaiming the truth. As simple as that is, everybody can do it, but it's amazing, or not amazing, it's something else, I don't know what the word is, but many people don't proclaim the truth and even many believers don't. It's unfortunate, tragic even, the proclaiming of the truth, a lot of folks aren't that clear about the truth, they're just too busy doing other things. This is key, to have foundational, strong, bold convictions about the truth, truth about Jesus, the truth about God's victory. Many believers are swallowed up in oppression and pessimism and cynicism and they don't have beliefs about God's victory in their life or about where the kingdom is going, they're stuck in a negative mindset and some think, well that's just how I am, you know, my mom was negative and my dad was negative too, and this is really important that we break our unity with things that are not the truth. We need to proclaim the truth publicly, I don't mean on a microphone, that a little bit, but I mean one-on-one, in family settings, in social settings, I don't mean you interrupt the social setting, get a bullhorn out and do that kind of thing, I mean just in your conversations, not every conversation, but when opportunity presents itself, we speak the truth. You get, you know, tens of thousands of believers in a major city all speaking the truth, things are going to shift, even that, many believers are silent about the truth, they're private about it, they believe it in the church service, but when they get outside the church service, you know, the other 166 hours a week, they don't do much with the truth with verbalizing it. We proclaim the truth about Jesus' supremacy, His victory, His promises, His leadership, we expose lies. Number two, that's, proclaiming is important, number two, we do the works of the kingdom, and then connected to doing the works of the kingdom, we confess the works that are against the kingdom, that's called sin, we confess sin. And there's a place where we confess the sin of our culture, happening, it's called identificational repentance. We have a number of examples of it in the Old Testament, where the leader would confess the sin that was happening in the culture, like Daniel would say, Lord, we sinned against you, and he meant that he had sinned in his life, meaning all through the years he had weakness and brokenness, but he didn't do the things that he was confessing, but he's saying I'm identifying with my city and my culture and my people. Ezra did that, Nehemiah did that, several of those in spiritual leadership would do that, it's called identificational repentance, where you're identifying with the sin of a city or a region. We act in the opposite spirit of the evil that's permeating that area, that is absolute spiritual warfare. We call the people of that city, that region, the lawmakers, they embrace lies, we call them tenderly, with humility, not obnoxious, I mean there's a way to proclaim, expose lies with tenderness and humility and in a right spirit, but it's critical that we speak these things and we call the truth and we call repentance in the church and outside the church. Number three, very simple, we pray. The Lord says I want your partnership, I want you to say what I say before me. I want you to say what I say before people, that's number one. I want you to do my values, that's number two, the act that works in the kingdom, and I want you to say what I say before me and I'll release more. I'll release greater angelic power and I'll drive back demonic power. We pray the prayers of the Bible, we declare the supremacy of Jesus, we remind God of His promises, we make prophetic decrees. Prophetic decree means we're just agreeing with what the Bible says. Jesus will be esteemed as Lord over all the nations, that's a prophetic decree. I mean it's just a word that's going to come to pass for sure, openly before all, we're declaring it ahead of time, the fullness of it. That's what I mean by a prophetic decree. Let's go to Roman numeral three. This is so simple, the principle of agreeing with God, but it deserves emphasis because it's so simple, but we can, it can be so simple we can skip it and not really lock into it. It deserves, it requires emphasis and repetition. Now what I'm really doing is demystifying spiritual warfare. Meaning it's so, it's not complex and spiritual and I don't, I mean so complicated. I don't get how it works. No, yeah you do, you really do get it. It's just you agree with God. Well I agree, do, do, I can do that. Well that's spiritual warfare, there you have it. Like really? Well I can do that. Paragraph A, I'm just repeating it all again. Engaging in spiritual warfare is essentially agreeing with God, disagreeing with God. Agreeing with the enemy. Involves reminding God of His character. You're holy, you're good, you're loving, you're wise. His covenant promises. Break through in power, exalt your son. Declaring the supremacy of Jesus. It involves confessing sin, rejecting the works of darkness, acting in the opposite spirit. Everything I've just said, it's just, I'm just wanting to make it so clear and so easy. It's so doable for, for individuals, for family units, for ministries, for cities. That's why it's important those times where a whole bunch of city leaders, like the days, you know, the National Day of Prayer. There's different events where one or two or three hundred pastors and leadership teams gather together. I mean you, you wish, you know, three or four thousand would, but even two, three hundred is really significant. And they agree together to declare the things on God's heart. That really matters that we do that in, in together with other believers and other ministries. We're in the same city. We're in the same region. We're being, the same demonic powers are resisting us. We do it as individuals. We do it as family units. We do it as church families. We do it as geographic areas with other ministries. We do it all, all these different ways. The primary method of spiritual warfare emphasized in the scripture. Not the only, but the one that really has a lot of emphasis is prayer and worship. It's what we do. It's not the only thing that is involved in spiritual warfare. I, I just gave you three. Proclaiming the truth, doing the works and the prayer and worship. Paragraph C, worship is agreeing with who God is. The Lord is good. You are holy. His mercy endures forever. You are worthy. That's, that's worship. We're agreeing with who He is. Paragraph D, intercessions agreeing with what He promises to do. Release the activity of the Holy Spirit in a greater measure. Don't, don't pray, release the activity of the Holy Spirit, leave it there. Because the activity of the Spirit is operating right now, everywhere around the world. I mean, all throughout the nations. We don't want to, we don't want to disregard that or minimize that. We want a greater measure. We want to honor the measure that is operating. If the activity of the Holy Spirit wasn't happening in your life, in this city, this meeting wouldn't be taking place, and a whole lot of things in your life would be completely opposite. Say, well, I know, but I mean, I want a greater measure. No, no, don't say I know and write it off. It is critical. Not the activity of the Holy Spirit. Your inward life would be in a whole different position. Well, I'm not doing that great now. You'd really be in a mess if the grace of God was in touch with you. So it's real. So I, when people say, Lord, send the Holy Spirit, I go, oh yeah, I know what you mean. The Lord knows what you mean better than I do. But ask for a greater measure. Thank Him for the measure that's happening in your life. But just ask for a greater measure of experience. Top of page three. When we agree with who God is, we call it worship. When we agree with what He promised to do, we call it intercession. It's one flow. It's one river. Both are critical. I talk to different leaders of prayer ministries, and it's, I've heard this over the years. One group says, man, we're really into intercession, and we got these folks that joined us, they just want to worship all day. Come on, let's get with it. They just want to go, oh, I love you, I love you, I love you. I mean, come on, where's the Rambos at, you know? Devil, come out, or I'm coming in after you. I mean, they want to go after it. And I love the seal. Then I got the other folks. Oh man, we got some people in our prayer ministry back home. They just want to yell at the devil all day. It's so annoying. Just what about Jesus? Why don't we just worship Him? And sometimes I get the same question, and I do Q&As at different times with leaders, the same question in the same room. I go, you know what? Whether you agree with who God is, or you agree with what He promised to do, whether it's worshiping or intercession, agreement is the point. I said, I don't think the Lord is real energizer. Maybe He has a bigger opinion than I do, but I go, if we agree with God, we spend all day, you are worthy, you are holy, you're agreeing with God, or we spend the whole day yelling, Lord, release more, release more, release more. I mean, I like a whole lot of I love you, I love you, I love you, release more. I love you, I love you. Oh, you're amazing, release more. That's how I'm built. But when I started off, I was a Rambo intercessor. I said, I love you. And every now and then that would eke out, but I was really into the other. And I think both approaches, God says, you agree with me. That's the point. So my point being we can have grace and we can really value somebody if they have the other position on that than what you might have as your primary one. We go, hey, it's happening. That's good. It's happening. Let's let it go. And then in paragraph F, in addition to agreeing with God and worship intercession, there's lives of holiness. There's godly activities, healing. Paragraph one, holiness. We're agreeing with God's heart, not just who he is. We want to reflect who he is. That's how much we agree with him. We love his love. We love his purity. We love his bright righteousness in our lives. Paragraph two, or we want to do deeds of healing that heal people, their body, their lives, their hearts, their families, the city, restoration, healing, doing good works. All of that, we're agreeing with the God who restores. So we want to put the whole thing together. Roman numeral four. Well, there's different models of spiritual warfare that people talk about, different views. Some focus more on God. Others focus more on the demonic attack. There's kind of two polar views of the body of Christ. So when we pray and do, it's like somebody says, well, we can worship, but let's do warfare prayer. What they normally mean is, let's talk to the demon spirit over the city. That's normally what they mean. Not everybody. It's not what I mean when I say it, but that's what I understand when I'm at a meeting out and about. If someone says that, typically they mean, let's identify the demon over the spirit and let's, you know, really let him have it. You know, let's proclaim the word of God to that demon. Now, the New Testament model of spiritual warfare, right here in 2 Corinthians, the passage we're looking at is to direct our prayers to the Father, not to the demonic powers. We actually wrestle with demons. We wrestle with powers and principalities by talking to God, agreeing with God. We're actually releasing angels and the power of the Holy Spirit, because I mean, the angels can't do anything without the power of the Holy Spirit. I mean, it's the power of the Holy Spirit we're talking about. But the power of the Holy Spirit uses angels and uses believers as the vessels. But when we talk to God, the power of the Spirit moves in a greater way, whether through the angelic host or whether through believers. Daniel, we'll look at, I got a little bit on the back pages here, the back page or two, but most of you know the story and we won't spend a lot of time on it. We'll look at it more in the book of Daniel class. But he prevailed over the demonic principality of Persia by talking to God. In Daniel 9, he talked to God. And Daniel 10, we see demons moved. He didn't talk to the demon, at least not recorded in the Bible, he talked to God. But when he talked to God, angels came in and they moved back demons. And that is part of the conflict in the spiritual battle. And angels are loosed in greater activity, released in greater activity. Demons are driven back. The power of the Holy Spirit annoys the church at all. I don't know how it all works together, but those are kind of the main activities that are happening. We pray to God, the Holy Spirit uses believers more. The Holy Spirit is poured out just sovereignly on touching unbelievers directly. Angels have greater activity. Demonic powers are driven back. Those are the kind that's, you don't wanna be too scientific about it, but it's that kind of components in the ingredients in the soup, so to speak. And I don't like to break it down too much because I don't know how to. And I just wanna keep it general like the Bible does. Paragraph B, having said that the New Testament model of wrestling with demonic principalities is actually by talking to God. Paragraph B, but I believe there's exceptions to that. I believe there are exceptions where the Holy Spirit leads in a rare occasions to where the people are to address the power and principality. That's a bigger subject. I don't know that it happens that often, but there's been a few times where I have heard the testimonies of it and I've seen a little bit of the Lord's activity in that. So I believe that that does exist. I don't wanna rule that out and say, can't do it. No, that's not the rule, but it can happen. Paragraph B in the middle. Now it is important to know that Jesus did, and the apostles talked to demons, but demons that were living in a person's body or dwelling in a body or they're demonized is the better way to say. They were spirits associated with the body. They're commanding the demon to come out. That's different than talking to a disembodied principality in the heavens. That's a different subject. So it is. It is true. They did talk to demons. When I am talking to a person, I'm praying for a person, they're in torment. I address the demon because that's the pattern of scripture. An embodied demon, that's a horrible term. I like embodied. What a horrible concept, but it's the opposite of a disembodied spirit that's up in the heavenly places. We talk to the father to drive back, to release angels, to drive back that power from the biblical point of view. Paragraph C, all the prayers of Jesus in the Bible, the ones that are recorded are directed to the father. All the prayers that he taught the disciples are directed to the father. Paragraph D, all the apostles prayers about the 20, approximately 25 in the New Testament, they're addressing the father. I mean, even what is called the warfare epistle, you know, epistle meaning a letter, a letter of one of the apostles. The warfare letter of Paul to the Ephesians, that's the one we're talking about where he's talking about powers in the heavenly places. All three of the prayers are addressed to the father in the great warfare epistle. Paragraph E, the apostolic prayers, they're positive prayers. They're asking God to impart positive things. They're not talking to the devil to remove negative things. Like in the New Testament, Paul prayed for love to abound. He didn't pray, father, I ask you to remove hatred. You don't find any prayer for the removal of hatred. You only find a prayer for the release of love. And you don't find Paul saying, I take authority over the spirit of hatred. He asked for love to abound. Same thing with unity. Paul never in the New Testament, nobody in the New Testament addresses, Lord, remove division. There's not a negative prayer like that. It's Lord release unity. And there's not a, I bind the spirit of division. Now, if somebody prays that way, I, God gets it. It's not like the Lord says, oh, I'm confused. You said it wrong. I think it still works. I think it works. But I think that we want to obey. We want to embrace the biblical pattern because, well, in session eight of our first course, I spent a whole session on why biblical prayers. Top of page four. Just the next five minutes. We'll just end in the next five minutes. Most of you know, this passage a little bit. Daniel chapter 10. Some of you know this passage quite a bit, actually. Daniel 10 gives us a snapshot of what happens in the paragraph. And what happens in the realm of the spirit when we pray? It's a favorite chapter of many intercessors. Lou Engle, I've heard him say, that's my favorite chapter. If it's your favorite chapter in the Bible, you are an intercessor. I promise you. Because the veil is drawn back and we see what's happening in the angelic demonic realm. We see how our prayers affect angels and how our prayers affect demons. It reveals the intense conflict between high ranking angels and high ranking demons. Paragraph C, if we could see in the spirit, I think we would be amazed how many demons and angels are actually involved in this room, in this city, in the nation. I mean, God's passion is to fill the earth with his glory. There's angels dispatched and Satan's rage is to stop it. I mean, the host of darkness is to stop it. And God's desire is, I mean, is to see the glory of Jesus fill the earth. And the angels are on assignment all over the earth. It's not like they're so busy up in heaven and say, oh yeah, what about the glory of Jesus on the earth? Oh yeah, we can get... No, this is plan number one. This is focus number one in terms of God's earthly intervention of his power. Is that the glory of God, the worth and the beauty and supremacy of Jesus would be made known across the earth. And it is happening in an increasing way. Paragraph D, there's a dynamic correlation between what we do on the earth and the measure of demonic activity that happens in that region. We've already covered all that. Let's go to, let me see, top of page six, probably, nope, bottom of page five. Because in this page, the notes were skipping. I'm just saying the same thing, adding a few different points to it. For those of you who want to study a little bit more. Roman numeral six, paragraph A, Daniel's on a three week fast. That's what it says in Daniel 10, verse two and three. He's on a three week fast. We'll look a lot more at that on the, in the Daniel course. Paragraph B, verse 12. Here's this mighty angel comes to Daniel. Verse 12, paragraph B, bottom of page five. The angel says to Daniel, he's on the 21st day of a fast. The angel says, Daniel says, don't be afraid because Daniel was just, I mean, this, because it describes the angel verse six and five and six, a mighty angel with great power and glory of God being manifest through him. So Daniel was afraid and the angel says, don't be afraid. I want you to listen carefully from the first day, 21 days ago. You set your heart to understand. You set your heart to humble yourself. God heard your words. And when it says your words were heard, it means by God. And it means your words were approved of. When the Bible talks about God hears you, it means he approves. That's the implication clearly. He goes, I've come because of your words. He goes, when you spoke on day one, the father said, yes. I agree with that prophet's words. They're in agreement with me. I mean, this is the way to say it. I've come because you said things to me. I mean, you said things to the father that were in agreement with his will, verse 13, but the demonic prince, it's talking about a demonic prince here, not the human prince of Persia, which is modern day Iran, withstood me. Here's a mighty angel. When you read the whole chapter, it's a powerful high ranking angel. He says, but this high ranking demonic principalities resisting me. I can't get through, but you kept praying. You kept praying. You kept praying and behold on day 21, the father sent Michael, the archangel. He came to help me. He goes, because up until this time, I had been left alone. And what he meant is I didn't have the aid of another high ranking angel to assist me, because there really are different measures of authority and power. And I don't understand all that stuff. You don't want to get too detailed. We want to stay general on those subjects. But the principle is pretty clear. He goes, but when you prayed, the father sent Michael and Michael came and drove back this demon. And I, here I am. If you would have quit praying earlier, the implication is the angel would not have come. He was being resisted in the spirit realm. Paragraph H, go top of page six. I just want to say this one thing that's important. Go to towards the bottom and we'll end with this. Paragraph H, Daniel's experience proves there's a dynamic relationship between our prayers and not just our personal life and our family, but how God touches a city and a nation. That's the point. It's not about us earning. Some people think, well, you're praying fast, you're earning. No, it's about agreeing. We labor to come into agreement, to stay in the, we're contending for the place of agreement because the place of agreement is what releases the activity of the Holy Spirit for increased angelic activity or just increased power through the church. Agreement is what does it. That simple principle. And it's because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, the power of the cross, the power of the gospel. That's why our weak words in agreement with God have power. Amen and amen. Now, remember, we're going to take five minutes.