 Habakkuk chapter 3 versus 17 and 18, probably 17, 18 and 19, right? Habakkuk chapter 3. Just one second, let me just close a few things here. So let me read from Habakkuk 3.17. Though the fig tree may not blossom nor fruit be on the vines, though the labour of the olive may fail and the eels yield no food, though the flock may be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength, He will make my feet like deer's feet and He will make me walk on my high hills, not high hills. Anyway, so when we look at verse 17, right? Verse 17 paints a very, very bleak picture, right? It says, though the fig tree may not blossom nor fruit be on the vines, so it's talking about different kinds of fruit, figs, babes, olive and then also about the harvest of the field, there's nothing and the flock also, there's nothing that livestock are yielding, the flock is cut off from the fold and there's no herd, talking about the cattle, there's no herd in the stalls, so it's talking about there's nothing, there's nothing, economically the situation is very tough, very difficult and verse 17 is quite a challenge because it says, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation and that word, yet I will rejoice. Yes, it is about exulting, it's about being joyful, being happy, but that word has, that Hebrew word means that you jump up and down, yet I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. So full of happiness and joy that jump up and down and that other, the second part of the verse, I will joy in the God of my salvation and that also has a physical action attached to that, I will joy meaning I will spin around, like spin around foolishly, spin around because of joy. So he's saying I will rejoice, I will jump up and down and joy, I will spin around and I'm doing this in the Lord, I rejoice in the Lord in the God of my salvation and then in verse 19, the Lord God is my strength, my presence, he is my strength, he will make my feet like deer's feet and he will make me walk on my high hills. So there's a I will because of the fact that he will and this reality, this truth that he will do that was so strong in Habakkuk that he says he will do this, he will make my feet, he will make me walk and the Lord God is my strength and because of which he says I will rejoice, I will joy and it's a very extroverted and expressive kind of emotion, I will rejoice in the Lord, I will jump up and down and joy and I will joy, I will spin around like a child, I will spin around because of this joy in the Lord, God of my salvation. So though the situation is like this, he is the God of my salvation, he will take me through and he will strengthen. So may that be our prayer as well and may that be our decision. When things go wrong, when things go bad, when we are in a season where there is economically, there is no productivity and we see that things are not going fine, that we can say I will because he will. Let's pray. Father, we thank you Lord, thank you for this testimony of Prophet Habakkuk and the truth that we can also agree and say, yes, I will rejoice, I will rejoice, I will jump up and down in praise and thanksgiving, I will jump up and down, I will spin around and joy because of my God, because of who you are Lord. You are our strength, yes Lord, you will make us strong of our God and you will make our feet like there's feet to walk, to be sure-footed and to walk on the high hills of our God. Yes Master, we thank you for doing this for your name's sake in each one of us and I just pray that I pray a release of that Father God, that truth, let it be our experience Father God, if any of us are going through a similar situation Father God, maybe emotionally Lord we are going through something of this sort and Lord I pray that you will strengthen our wills to say I will and because you are the God who will Lord do this for us and take us through that. We thank you, we give you all the praise and glory, in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. We've already come to the very end of our course. So today we're going to look at chapter 11 which is more like miscellaneous things that we are talking about. The main topic you already handled, you've already covered. So we're just coming to some miscellaneous things like questions and so on. So let's look at that and even before we look at that, let's look at some of the things that we've already seen. Psalm 23 verse 3 saw that God is the Restorer of our soul and we saw that wholeness emotionally has been provided for us through the cross. It has already been given for us, the Lord Jesus has bought it for us on the cross. So emotional wholeness is also covered by what he did for us and what he's extending to us and this has been provided for on the cross. Our responsibility is to receive and to walk in it. Our responsibility involves our choice, to receive by faith. And yes, we looked at certain things that we need to do in order to enter into emotional wholeness and also to sustain and walk in emotional health. It requires some things that we need to do. And we can start from a place of where we are, maybe emotionally battered, maybe emotionally weak, but we can progress and we can go down that path of restoration. And when we saw that emotional wholeness and healing, yes, it can happen in a moment. It can also be a series of steps of path to emotional wholeness and to sustain, to continue to walk in emotional wholeness. We need to walk in certain things. We need to make sure that certain things are consistent in our lives. We need to guard against certain things. We looked at that also. So let's look at some of these, some questions. Let me just share the notes. Okay, so some questions here. Just coming up on the screen. Okay, so the first question is, are all the emotional problems caused, does it have a spiritual cause in the sense, is it because of demons? Is it because of demons? Yeah, the different sources or the different causes for which one might have emotional challenges and issues of problems. We see different sources, different causes. It could be our circumstance. It could be our challenge and our response to it. What is happening in our circumstance? What has happened? Maybe some stressful things. Maybe we are going through a season of professionally. We are going through a lot of late nights and early mornings. There's a physical stress. There's an emotional stress of high expectations and meeting those high expectations professionally. Or it could be some loss that we are going through. It could be maybe some bereavement that we are going through, some sorrow that we are going through because of a loss of a loved one or some relatives and somebody in the family. It could even be the marriage relationship that is, that is, you know, there are challenges to it. There's just this unraveling. Maybe there could be some parenting challenges because of that. Or in behaving a certain way and wayward behavior and lifestyle of children and that's causing stress and so on. So, stress and emotional challenges that arise out of it could be because of that. It could be physical as well, physical conditions. There could be some illnesses. There could be some. I looked at how certain levels of chemicals in our physical brain also affect our moods and can also cause certain illnesses. It could be a physical thing purely. Maybe serotonin levels and there are other hormones, the imbalance of which causes some conditions. It could be because of depression, your anxiety, you know, arising because of physical conditions because of certain things and the physical, because of the brain and then these things persist because we are not addressing them in a proper way and it could be because of that. It could be even because of unhealthy habits. There could be abuse of substance like alcohol or drugs or even prescription medicines like cough syrups and something like anti-allergic things and which may be sleep inducing and so some of these things, anti-depressants and so on. So, we take those things and become addicted to it. So, there's an abuse of these medicines and because of which there could be problems or there could be other things like pornography and even lack of exercise, lack of exercise which affect our body. Well, gluttony is listed as something that is off the flesh and a work of the flesh in that list and we see that that causes things as well. We just keep overeating and that overeating also has a source as a root in emotional, maybe because of stress, maybe because we want to feel good because the whole act of eating and food releases a certain pleasure, a pleasure center. So, we feel a certain pleasure, we feel good, the body feel good and so eating also overeating and overindulgence. Every time someone feels stressed out, preaches, just order something or reach out, look in the refrigerator, look for that snack box and eat something and so that also causes emotional challenges. Then, definitely, there are spiritual sources. It could be because of demonic spirits. It could be because of various spirits that we see listed, spirit of heaviness, spirit of fear and spirit that causes we see in the work of God in in March, chapter 9. This spirit forcing or causing this boy to fall into water, into fire and so on. The father comes and it's helpless and he's saying, God, please pray. I mean, please cast, I need help, cast out demons causing him to do all this and suicidal actions basically. Causing harm to oneself and so on. So, definitely there is the spiritual source of powers of darkness and so on. But to say that everything is caused by demons is wrong. So, emotional challenges or problems, not everything is caused by demons. Having said that, when you look at the fall of man and what caused the fall of man, yes, the original sin or the fall of man, that's the cause of everything, the breakdown of everything. We know that, we understand that. But when we look at each of these causes, we see that. Yes, it's some things are physical, some things are purely emotional in the psychological realm. Some things are abuse of things that are good, things that are meant to be helpful and nutritious. But the abuse of that also leads to these kind of challenges. So another question, is it okay for a believer, somebody is going through these challenges? Is it okay for someone to consult a psychologist or a psychiatrist for maybe counselling or maybe sessions, which are therapeutic for therapy? Well, the answer is this. Well, God, he has given us the knowledge, he has given us the understanding and the capacity to understand these natural processes. To understand what is causing this. And also the know-how or the knowledge to change that. So when we read through scripture, we see that God's knowledge and understanding that he imparts to human beings is more than just the revelation of the Word of God or revelation or understanding of himself. It is also understanding of the natural processes. I think we read in Exodus and we... In fact, when we studied the Holy Spirit, we see that he's the one who actually gives the ability and the knowledge for Bezalel and others like him to the skill and the ability to do these creative things, to come up with these creative things. He's the one who gives the skill and ability. And we also see that the knowledge of the whole aspect of growing things and how the different things need to be different crops need to be harvested and so on. It comes from him. So also about the human brain, the mind and the functioning, well, he's the one who created it. So he's well able to give us the know-how about the body, two doctors, psychologists and psychiatrists to give an understanding of what it does and how it can be treated. So there's no harm in going for counseling or therapeutic sessions. As long as the one who is counseling... Now, we know not all are believers, not all have the knowledge of God, not all follow Jesus. So as long as the methods do not contradict or violate God's word and God's instructions, it's fine. I remember, you know, when I was interact with some university students, now I was a post-graduate student and there were some who were actually doing some doctorate studies in... I forget if it was psychiatry or I think to psychiatry. So now they were indulging in some methods which were clearly contradicting God's word. So they, for example, this was something to do with the person's... I think it was addressing a person's lust or something of that sort and they were clearly doing something because they were actually engaging someone, a prostitute, engaging her to meet with this person and they were doing something and it was completely off. So I was just talking to them and they said, yeah, sometimes with these methods, we employed. It was clearly a red flag. So it's the psychiatrist or a psychologist is going to employ some method or means that are in the name of providing treatment or therapy. If it's going to contradict Violet God's word, then clearly we should stay away or not recommend such kind of methods for people. But if people were to ask, is it okay for counseling, the answer is yes. The answer is yes, but with this disclaimer, with this clause and so also for medicines and so on, the same thing. If they prescribe certain medicines, if they prescribe certain medications, well, that's absolutely fine. And well, sometimes this is what happens when people get prayed for or they want to take a stand based on faith in God's word or maybe they've been coming to church and you've been ministering to them and then they say, I think I want to stop. And that happened so many times. I think I want to stop this medication because I have faith that God will heal me or God has healed me. So I'm stopping it. It could be a physical condition. It could be for a critical functioning, for them to function normally. They need to take that medication, but then they say, I think I've had enough. I don't want to take it anymore. So what do we do in such cases? What do we recommend? Do we affirm their decision to say, okay, by all means stop the medication? We need to be careful because simply because as believers we are in different levels of faith. In the previous chapter before the one before mental health we looked at how in the process of renewing of the mind it is possible for us to step into presumption. So presumption is not faith. To presume something to be true, to assume that yes, this is true when clearly it is not faith. So as believers we have people or we are in different stages of growth in maturity and also different levels of faith. So well, people can, some may just say, some may be at a level of faith where they know that they know that they know that God has healed them and they don't need anything. They're just standing on faith. They're saying, okay, I know God has healed them and it is faith, it is genuine faith. We can't doubt it. There could be some who could be just presumed it's faith. That's the other end and it's not faith at all. It's just based on that emotion or based on their frustration of having to take medication and coming to that place. Or it could be that some people have been using medication for some time and then they just want to taper down and stop but it's on their own. All these things, as ministers of God, as people maybe who are counseling or interacting with such people, the recommendation is that you don't recommend, if you are a medical person, if you are a trained psychologist or psychiatrist, and you are sure that this person to whom you are counseling, to whom you are in touch with, if you recommend that they're not going to harm themselves, that they will be able to, if you recommend not taking the medication. If you tell them, yes, we have prayed, we believe in. And also, you have the knowledge that taking that or not taking that medication is going to enable them to function normally and then probably you could take a call. But if you're not a trained, technical, medical person, do not advise. So the advice we can give is you get checked. Check with your whoever's prescribing, medical person, the psychiatrist or the doctor, whoever's prescribing, you check. Let them come to the conclusion that yes, you are indeed healed, that you do not need these medications further for your normal functioning. Let them be satisfied. And even if you go and tell them with confidence that yes, I'm fine, let them be satisfied and let them make that decision. So it's always to, and sometimes when we are ministering, when we are praying, we know for sure that God has touched them, God has healed them. And in such cases as well, and even in such cases, it is recommended that they check and then stop. I remember once just going to a place, going to a traveling tour and then I just received a call. I've been meeting with this boy for some time and he was heavily, like having a problem for a long time and it was unaddressed and it just compounded and heavily, heavily depressed in the sense he would sleep during the day. He would like and keep awake at night. He was unable. His whole thing was completely switched and very sad. So he suddenly, you know, I just received a call and saying, first I've decided to stop on medication. I've decided to stop and he was so, so set on it. But I knew that, you know, he was, it would spiral down even if he missed it for a day. Like he was not in that place at all. I tried helping him. I mean, I tried telling him that, you know, you need to, you know, why did you come to this position? He said, no, I was just, I just felt that I should just stop. I just felt I should stop. I've been reading the Bible and you've been praying and the eyes just felt so that I just said, you know, yeah, that's fine. Absolutely fine. That's great. You're feeling this way and you're building yourself in your faith. But just one best, you know, when is your next checkup? The doctor said, okay, just next week. Fine. Continue with the medication till next week. You know, you stay on the word. You build yourself in your faith. You continue on the medications. Just taking that is not a sign of lack of faith in God. Right. You continue with it. And then you get checked by the doctor. And if he says that you need to let go, you can stop or you can taper. If he reduces the dosage, just go with it till such time. I just, this is my request is that you continue with it. Thankfully, he said, okay. And then he got checked and then I think the doctor recommended a reduced dosage and so on. So the thing is this, you know, in our zeal, or maybe even in our presumption, let's not do that to others. And even if it's for our own cells, let's let the medical person check and then give a clean diagnosis. Okay. So what about, you know, hypnosis or other things which involve hypnosis where there is a release of control of our minds. We are just completely giving up the control of our minds to another human being and opening up. And that, you know, as we see that that opens up. That's an open door for so many things, manipulation. That's an open door for spirits to come and inhabit and influence it so on. So hypnosis and anything else where we are permitting others to control our mind and will. You know, there's so much of, there's so much of a challenge of abuse and manipulation as well. So it is recommended that we as believers, we don't recommend this hypnosis or other therapy or that we don't enter into it ourselves. So this would come as one of those things that, you know, if even if that's maybe a psychiatrist or I don't know if they actively recommend this, but even if they do that we don't, you know, we don't step into that. So it is because this kind of manipulation is all forms of manipulation we see is actually has its roots in witchcraft and rebellion as well. So any questions, any questions that you might have, we looked at about three questions, any questions that it's on your mind when it comes to, you know, emotional health or particularly of this nature. We can ask now. Or maybe any questions that people have asked, asked you regarding mental health or something that you've always had questions. Okay. Let's look at, you know, some of these, look at the spiritual or some of these spirits which cause different things or different, the influence and oppress, you know, we see, and you have learned in healing and deliverance as well that we have different spirits that are listed in scripture and they're given different names because of what they actually carry out or the assignment that is on them. So lying spirit or foul spirit or unclean spirit, it does exactly that. Spirit of heaviness, spirit of harlotry, spirit of lust, it does that, it promotes that or goes about suggesting that the person, you know, does that or gets into that area. So these are, when the spirits manifest themselves and they cause these things, they cause these problems or bring about these problems in an individual, right? And so we see this, right? So as a person who's a minister of God, as God uses to minister healing and wholeness to others, one thing is to be aware of the fact that, okay, there are these spirits and they have these assignments and they bring these conditions, you know, they cause these conditions in people, right? So to be for us to be aware of that. So when God, when we encounter people maybe being influenced by, maybe being oppressed by these kind of things, then what are we to do, right? We, God in practice, looking at us, he's commissioned us to go ahead and minister freedom, right? Minister wholeness to others. So first and foremost, as believers, we need to be ready in season and out of season. Being ready, which means being ready in all seasons, right? To be in a state of readiness. So for that, that we keep ourselves healthy, right? So we keep ourselves emotionally, physically, spiritually healthy, right? So we get into a good rhythm of ministering, of working, ministering, maybe if it's in a necessary season that we are studying, a good rhythm of carrying out our responsibilities and spending time refreshing or renewing ourselves in the inner man, right? And some of these rhythms are like continuous, right? We're praying in the spirit throughout. We are, you know, talking to God throughout. We are ensuring that guarding ourselves from all kinds of things that might drain us off of our emotions or, you know, we're guarding ourselves, right? And guarding our heart from all kinds of things, from the things of the flesh, from bitterness and rage and all that. We're just guarding our hearts because out of our heart close the issues of life. So we are guarding ourselves, right? So we need to keep ourselves and this is a continuous thing, right? Just like how we cannot just, you know, expect to eat a bad meal, you know, that it's rotten and not expect to have consequences. We can't just eat something in there, you know, not expect to have consequences on our bodies, right? We know that it's not good. Why indulge in it, right? So also keep ourselves spiritually, keep ourselves physically, emotionally healthy, right? So when it comes to ministering healing, we need to understand that certain things that, well, it need not this encounter. It need not always be a power encounter, right? Where there's a manifestation of the spirit and it tries to intimidate and do all sorts of things to, you know, to manifest itself and put everything that it can do on display. And then, you know, as a minister of God, we are doing certain things. So we are, you know, we don't need to shout or scream and, you know, we don't need to do that, right? So it can be a truth encounter, an encounter of truth. An encounter of truth is a power encounter. So there's an encounter of truth then, which means there's, we are presenting truth in authority. We are standing on the authority of God's Word. We are reassured, we are confident, we are calm, we are in Christ, right? We are based on that authority. We are reassured of the authority that God has given us, that Christ has given us, that Jesus has extended to us. Luke 10, verse 19 talks about the authority that he gave his disciples. As the Lord says, we hold, I give you the authority to travel on serpents, scorpions, and all the power of the enemy. So which means he's vested that authority upon us. And as the church, all authority has been given to him and he has given us the authority as the church, as the people of God. So we walk in, we don't have to, you know, just go around and flaunt that authority by shouting, screaming, et cetera. So we can be quiet, we can be authoritative and authority flows from that revelation in our hearts. We being fully convinced, fully convinced. And not having a shred of doubt, fully convinced that well, he has given us the authority. And when we issue that command, that thing has to go, that thing has to leave. The demons have to leave. So we speak and we evict the demons that are taking residence or troubling someone with the authority that God has given us, with the authority that he's given us and by using the word of God. By using the word of God, by declaring what he has already finished on the cross. By declaring what he has done because of the shaped blood. So we declare that and we command the spirits to come out in the mighty name of Jesus. So we do that. Well, do we engage in a conversation with the demons? Some people, you've seen some people do that, have a conversation where you come from, how long have you been there, et cetera, et cetera. Well, it helps to know what kind of a demon it is. It helps to know so that we can be specific and we can address that area. And we can counsel that person, after the whole deliverance, you can counsel the person to shut the door, to not indulge in those areas. It helps. In that sense, it helps to know that, okay, this kind of a demon, it came in, maybe it was a demon of lust, which came in through the open door of maybe that person was in pornography or something and then continued to walk in it and the demon energised that area and causing the person to go and go further into that and entangled it there and so on. So it helps to address that area and say, okay, you need to be careful, you need to be watchful in this. Don't relax, don't let down your guard when it comes to these things. Because that's the open door that caused the problem, that caused the enemy to come in. So be careful now. And so in that area, in that sense, it helps. So it helps to know. But we don't need to have a chat with the father of darkness, engage in conversations and so on. All we need to do, like the Lord Jesus did, is to cast out to the authority. Okay, so we keep in mind that the enemy is not something that we're going to negotiate with. We're not going to negotiate with the enemy. These spirits are vicious. They come with one agenda that to steal, kill and destroy. Steal and kill and destroy. And there's a hierarchy and they want to create problems and want to keep a person in bondage and so on. So nothing good comes out of these spirits. It's just bondage and entanglement and sin. And for some time, it could be, this feels like this is pointless. I'm doing this for the sake of good health and some practices, new age thing, like meditation and yoga and all those things. But it's a path which the enemy takes further and further away from Jesus, away from life itself. So nothing good comes out of it. They are the author of the source of lies and deception. Okay, so for us to understand that and also to be aggressive, maybe assertive, maybe aggressive, not the word assertive and so on. So the Lord Jesus very clearly, Mark 16 says, these signs will follow those who believe. In my name, they will cast out. In my name, they will cast out. So in the Lord's mind, in his heart, this is what the believers will do. They will cast out. They're not going to compromise. They're not going to entertain. They will cast out the demons which are causing these problems, which have infiltrated and taken a wrong place. Maybe residence or maybe a place of influence and maybe a photo. The believers in the Lord's heart, it's this they will ask. In my name, which means the authority and they are doing this in my place. And with the delegated authority, they will cast out. So also, we do the same thing. So in terms to the adults or children or anything, we do it. Okay, so that we come to the end of the notes and also of the subject of emotional health and so if there are any any doubts, any questions you could ask and we'll see if we have some additional thoughts in our next session. We'll have one more session next week and maybe we could have something to be reiterated in whatever we have learned so far. But with that, we could bring things to a close. So if there are any questions, if there are anything that you would want to share, maybe we could take some time to do that. Otherwise, we can close. Okay, so we'll close this session and we'll have one more next week and we can talk about some additional things. Okay, thank you. God bless you. We'll meet up again. Have a great weekend. We'll catch up next week. Bye-bye. Thank you, Pastor. Thank you. Bye. God bless.