Allen Jackson - Spiritual Oppression - Part 1
I sat down recently with my friend Dr. Neil Anderson, and we did a podcast discussing spiritual conflict. Some of the challenges in our world, I don't think can be understood simply by watching the news and trying to understand what's happening between nations or politics. I think it truly requires a spiritual awareness, and I don't know anybody better to help us unpack some of that than Dr. Neil Anderson. I think the discussion will be meaningful to you and helpful to you in learning how to stand in the freedom that's ours in Christ. Enjoy the program.
Allen Jackson: Hey, welcome to "Culture and Christianity". If you're a regular listener, you know the goal. We want to take our faith outside the walls of the church. We wanna learn to live our lives as Christians, not just when we're in a Sunday school class or a small group or a Bible study, but we wanna take it into our homes, into the marketplace, into our schools. I believe that our Christianity has to impact our culture or we are salt that has lost its saltiness, so that's our objective. Today's a little different. My setting is a little different. We're actually on the set where we tape some broadcasts, but we have a live audience today. We got the staff from the church. Y'all make some noise so they'll know I'm not making this up. See, they're really here. Those are all the smart people that make this possible, so I am very much a turtle on a fence post. When you see me show up in these various formats, you should know that a lot of smart people are working hard to help me hold that space, but I am really excited about our guest today. Dr. Neil Anderson has had a tremendous impact in my life and my thought and my spiritual formation. I got to know him through his books, and then I followed him around, listening to his seminars for a while, and to have him on set and in Tennessee today is a great honor. Dr. Anderson, welcome.
Dr. Neil Anderson: Thank you. Good to be here.
Allen Jackson: We are excited about you being here. You have written extensively and taught thoroughly on a general topic of spiritual freedom. Is that a fair assessment?
Dr. Neil Anderson: It is, and that freedom, of course, you know, is in Christ. I mean, so I remember, a doctor asked if I would see his daughter, was going to Biola University, and she said, "Oh, you mean the demon man"? I said, "No, I'm the Christ man, I'm not the demon man"! But that one turned out to be a good story by the way, but anyway.
Allen Jackson: You know, I think that's a fallacy. Having spent a few years in the arena, we get focused on the wrong side of the equation. It's who we are in Christ where the celebration is. It's not to be focused on the darkness and the frailty or even the unclean spirits, and you've written that so beautifully, who we are in Christ and... is that my imagination or do we tend to migrate to the wrong side of that?
Dr. Neil Anderson: No, no, you're absolutely right, and it isn't just in that. It's like trying to stop thinking bad thoughts. I said, "You never told to do that". You think the truth, and so it's like one person after a conference he said, "Well, what should I do"? I said, "Well, live a righteous life". "Is that it"? "Well, that's it". It really honestly is. I said we get confused in the sense of looking around. I said, you know, "You got to focus on the truth". I said, "You aren't trying to dispel the darkness. You're called to turn on the light," and the difference is really profound when you think about it. I said, "You see all the chaos in our society and let's take on the chaos". No, you just, you know, all the darkness in the world can't withstand the light of one candle, and so you just keep lighting that candle wherever you go, and the more people that you see God set free, the more the influence, you know. I learned years ago, if you can win one person to Christ in your community, they have ten contacts. You win one or two of those, they each got ten contacts, and that's how it's supposed to be. I said it's like, "Oh, we gotta do something dramatic," and so, opened up a stadium event. I said, "No, that's not the way it works". You win one to Christ and then in six months they can win two more, and you keep doing that. You multiply it. We know that, we know it scripturally, but we don't do it, and it's just kind of sad in a way.
Allen Jackson: What I appreciate so much about that perspective is it takes most of the fear out of the discussion, 'cause we're not focused on the darkness. We just wanna turn on lights.
Dr. Neil Anderson: I'm not trying to save the world. You do it one person at a time, you just, you know. I remember when Munich America came out and it finally concluded, you know, kind of ended in the year 2000 unfortunately, but the idea at that time was, was that you got five people on either side of you, ten across the street, and their whole mantra was pray, share, and care, and I said, "Who'd be against that"? Well, you'd be surprised, and so sometimes we see the pictures and it's just overwhelming. Where do you start? It's like when I went to India the first time, I said, "Oh my God, where do you start," and the answer is still the same. I mean it was so dark and litter littered everywhere, people just litter, just threw things on the side of the road, and I said, "Let's start by cleaning up the road. That would help me a lot". It does take the pressure off of you. You say, "I've got this big task out there," and your first task is just to be the person God created you to be and that's God's will for your life, and everything flows out of that, everything. What God has planned for your life, you know, the people that you meet, and it's just one person at a time kind of a situation, and I look back at my own personal life, and I'm, you know, I started out teaching at the the seminary. Saw a few students change. Now you start meeting those students around the world, and the people, that impact that they've had, and that's kind of fun to be honest with you. It's exciting for somebody at my age is to be invited by one of your former students, and he's doing a great job someplace, and gosh, that's encouraging. It's fun to be honest with you.
Allen Jackson: Absolutely, to see the fruit of your life, but I don't wanna say you reintroduced, but you have reminded the church of our heritage. It's a spiritual story, and somehow in the 21st century, particularly in seminary or theology schools, we've made our faith almost entirely rational, and it's been a logical exercise, and I like logic, I like both sides of the equation to balance, that doesn't offend me, but there is a spiritual component of our faith.
Dr. Neil Anderson: Well, the journey here is amazing. The very fact that I'm sitting here talking to you about this right now. We'd been so far off the grid when I was young. I was an aerospace engineer. I was so left brain, my head tilted at one side. You know, there was a time in my life, I believe there was a natural answer for everything and a natural explanation, and then out of the mystery, I mean, I was a religious boy too. I got a little pin, says I didn't miss Sunday school for nine years, and if they shared the gospel I didn't hear it. If you asked me then if I was a Christian, I would have said yes. In fact, even in the military, you know, I was kind of like the Christian aboard the ship. Truth of the matter is I wasn't. It was just part of my culture growing up, you know. You go to church on Sunday, and you get the golden rule, and you try to live that way, and, you know, even in that I'm thankful. I look back, you know, I was a relatively moral person. Probably because of that. I was also disappointed when I heard the gospel and received Christ. It was, like, why didn't you share that with me a long time ago? And I don't know, maybe that's part of God's economy for my life is that, "I want you to go through that experience," and it's an interesting thing to me, you know, you look at the book of Acts and God called him to go over here, and then he gave me a mid-course correction, now go over here, and forbid him from speaking in Asia, and I said, "Why was that"? You don't know. I mean, you know, God's guiding you through the maze of life and steering you away from obstacles, but if I wanted to be the person I am today, why don't you just call me out of high school into seminary, and go out and preach? I said, "No, I want you to do a little period in the navy. I want you to go to the athletic regimen. I wanted you", you know, when Paul talks about he's a good farmer, he's worthy of his wages, and a soldier knows how to restrict himself. I've had all those experiences, and look back and I'm thankful for that. You know, I said, "Engineering taught me how to think". I was good at math, to be honest with you, that was my easiest class, but, you know, it taught me how to think. It taught me logic, but when I look back over my life, God gave me A. W. Tozer early on in my life. I don't know if you've ever read anything by him, Christian Missionary Alliance guy, and I looked up something about his life, and he said, "I'm an evangelical mystic," and I said, "What in the world is that"? you know, and then he explained it, and I said, "That's what I am". He wrote an article about Spirit taught or Word taught, challenging to say the least, but in my estimation, he nailed it. I mean, look at John and Paul and Mark and Luke. Were they Word-taught? No, it was all new. They was all Spirit-taught. It's not either-or, it's both-and, but truth of the matter is, I had learned early on that you can go through a good seminary and graduate purely on the basis that you answered most, not even all the questions right, and you could do that and be a nonbeliever. You can know Scripture, recite it, passages, and not know God. I mean, you know, frankly the greatest problem with Christian education is we make knowledge an end in itself, and Paul says, "Knowledge makes arrogance".
Allen Jackson: Say that again, the biggest problem in Christian education.
Dr. Neil Anderson: We make knowledge an end in itself. I know the Bible, but do you know God? And he said, "Knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies". The goal of instruction is love. Having been in higher education, having taught seminary and that kind of thing, you look at the Word of God as profitable for reproof, correction, training, and righteousness. By and large that's not happening. Functionally, it's the Word of God is profitable for teaching, training, and competence, so we're gonna teach you the truth, and so we're gonna give you classes on preaching and teaching and counseling, whatever else, so that you could be competent. Now I'm not against competence, but that wasn't the goal. Profitable for reproof, correction, training, and righteousness, you know? You should be holy as God is holy, so if we're functioning properly as a church and as a culture, as the children of God, every year we should be able to say, "I'm more patient than I was a year ago. I'm more loving. I'm more kind". If you can't say that, you're not growing.
Allen Jackson: I think we have misunderstood the meaning of love. You know, we think of it as a group hug and constant affirmation, and I mean, you mentioned reproof and rebuke and discipline. All of that is a part of love as well.
Dr. Neil Anderson: Well, absolutely. I don't know of anything our society has distorted the concept of love unfortunately. If I could take a minute just to explain something with... churches oftentime puzzle between agape and in logos, and I said the difference is really profound. God loves me because God is love. It's his nature to love me. The love of God is not dependent upon the object, and if you love me, you know, love others because they love you back. When I wrote my little book about my experience with my wife, "The Power of Presence," when she was dying of dementia. I started one chapter by saying, "I love my wife now more than I loved her when I first saw her". When I first met Joanne, you know, I was attracted to her, classy lady, you know. It's what she did for me. I enjoyed being with her. It was what and now, at this time in life, she couldn't do anything for me, and by anybody's stretch of the imagination she was not attractive. When you're dying from dementia it's really tragic, but now I loved her not because of who she was; I loved her, thank God, because of who I am. That's the goal of our instruction. If we're becoming more like Christ, the love of God is not dependent upon the object. So when you say, "I don't love you," you said more about yourself than you have about the other person, and you really, in one sense, can't overstate that, because that is truly the goal of our instruction, and it's, like, the world doesn't care how much we know until they know how much we care so it's been an amazing journey for me, personally, to move from that left brained orientation. Never was involved in any of the occult type experiences in my life. I don't know my astrological sign to this day. The lure of knowledge and power has never been a major issue with me, but the transformations that I had to go through were profound. I mean, I just, my whole world view just kept changing, you know, as I grew and understand, benefited by the fact that I start traveling around the world and realized there were people out there that see this world very differently than I did growing up, and on top of all of that, not just learning, but what began Freedom in Christ Ministries was brokenness. My poor wife went through a period, for 15 months I didn't know whether she was gonna live or die, and we lost everything we had, and, I mean, God stripped us down to absolutely nothing. We were living in a little rental house, meanwhile my ministry's taken off. I'm seeing God, you know, have an effect on people's lives, and my family is going down, and that went on for 15 months. I mean, God just stripped me down to absolutely nothing, and I had a day of prayer on campus, had nothing to do with that other than emphasize prayer, and I got delayed on campus, helping a man, and undergraduate students were taking Communion on the gym floor and I went down there, just sat there. The loneliest period of my life. My family's suffering, I'm dead broke, and I'm sitting on this floor. Maybe it was the context of Communion, I don't know, but if I've ever heard God I heard him there and "Neil, there's a price to pay for freedom. Are you willing to pay the price"? I said, "God, I'm willing, but if it's some stupid thing I'm doing, please tell me," and I left there and I knew it was over, and the major issue of Joanne's struggling is she could not sleep, and within a week she woke up and said, "I slept last night," and never looked back. Now why would I have to go through an experience like that? Well, I think I was kind of a caring person before, but not like you are afterwards, but the big issue was, God brought Neil Anderson to the end of his resources so I could discover his. I can't set a captive free. I can't heal the wounds of the brokenhearted, but God can, and my resources would make a pretty good list, you know, I had five degrees, two doctorates, you know, chairman of the practical theology department. The devil could care less, but out of that brokenness, every book I wrote was after that. Every video series I did, all after that. Didn't know anymore. Brokenness is the key to ministry. It's that you get to that point in your life where everywhere you go, you know, is God in this? And Freedom in Christ ministers around the world today, and I said, "We've never advertised. We've never had a marketing agent. We've never, I've never gone where God hasn't called me". For a guy who had never wanted to write a book, which I didn't up to that period, I mean, had no clue, didn't desire it, but then after that I would go, for about 20 years, I would start the year, there'd be like, two books in my head, and then it stopped. Stopped right there.
Allen Jackson: Is this your last one?
Dr. Neil Anderson: Last book.
Allen Jackson: Oh, don't say that. You never know; one may show up in your head.
Dr. Neil Anderson: I know, my staff says, "Yeah, right," but, no, it is. You know why? Cause I watched Biden, and I said, "I am not going to end my ministry like that".
Allen Jackson: I agree, but I also know you well enough, you don't make fear-based decisions, so don't let that one in. You keep whatever the Lord puts in you.
Dr. Neil Anderson: Well, I'm available to God...
Allen Jackson: When you watch somebody walk through what your wife walked through, it puts something in you.
Dr. Neil Anderson: It does.
Allen Jackson: But I wouldn't accept that. This is the pupil talking to the teacher. But there God has too much in you to pick up that mindset. What has fas... what I think is so intriguing, and you gave us a beautiful presentation, as you walk towards, you invite people to Freedom and show them a pathway, but I have never felt like it was about you, and that's very unique in the ministry world. Selfish ambition is not a part of your portfolio, and that brokenness, I think, makes you very aware that you can't afford to get that out of place, and the people listening to us, this is not about getting a bigger platform, 'cause on our best day we can't heal a gnat's wing. On the other hand, if the Lord shows you his truth, you wanna share it with as many people as you can, but you wanna stand on this, you wanna stand as far out of the light as you can, and you have done that so beautifully. I thank you for it.
Dr. Neil Anderson: Well, thank you. Well, truth of the matter is, I said, "When you know that your ministry is in good hands", our international director now is actually in England. He lives in Reading, in England, and that's what you try to do, is to leave somebody behind that you have confidence and trust in, and our U.S. president right now, he's a godly man, you know, and I'm just thankful for that. You know, I feel I could let it go, and I've been around enough to say, "Let it go". "Don't hang around as the," you know, "the founder and be a pain in the neck to other people," I said. So I'm confident in that, and that gives me a real peace today too, and so don't get me wrong, I'm talking to people, I'm sharing in the Sunday school class here and there I said, but I also realized I've seen Brett Favre stay one year too long in football. I've seen that kind of a thing, and I've seen founders hang around when they should have let it go, and so that comes out of experience, and I'm comfortable with that because there has to be that kind of godly transition where you get out of the founder's trap, if you know what that means, and I'm out of it. It's not dependent upon me anymore, and officially I should be on the international board for the rest of my life and I just withdrew from that. I said, "When you get to an issue, I don't want you to all look down, 'What does Neil think?' I want you to look up, 'What does God think"?' You know, that's has to be the source of your inspiration, and so I'm comfortable with that. I don't need it anymore, if you know what I mean. Yeah, I don't need the affirmation. I don't need the, you know, "This is mine". It's not mine. If it was mine, we would never have had the ministry, it's God's, and I can't sit here and say, "Why don't you charge for counseling"? I said, "I didn't set 'em free. I'm not gonna charge for what God did," you know? But God has honored that. I'm comfortable financially, books have done well, and so not to be a burden on the ministry, and, you know, I haven't had a salary for, probably almost 30 years now, and feels good.
Allen Jackson: You mentioned our nation. How do you describe what's going on these days?
Dr. Neil Anderson: Oh, man, I tell you what, that's why I wrote that last book. The way our country was going, I just think of the last election. What if it had gone the other direction? My goodness. Having a laughing hyena for a president for four years, I mean, it's just scary actually, so what's gonna happen now? I don't know. I mean, you can turn culture around to a certain extent, but I said, "We are in a cultural war". Thank you for what you're doing. I mean, it's a battle between the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of God, and it has been, you know, from the beginning, but it just looked like we were overwhelmingly losing.
Allen Jackson: But it seems to me it's going to take a change from the church that is as substantive as the change we're seeing in the political arena.
Dr. Neil Anderson: Well, that's why I wrote the book, because I just was really concerned for the church. I've seen churches cave in and, you know, we gotta, you know, incorporate people and we should accept everybody. I said "Yeah, accept everybody, sure". Everybody's welcome to come to church, but you're not gonna be on our boards, you're not gonna teach our Sunday School classes, you know what I mean? My concern was, you know, really born out of the fact, I said, "This is not a time right now for us to cave in to woke, and that kind of issue". I said, "It's the time to stand strong".
Allen Jackson: I wanna pray before we go. Heavenly Father, I pray that, by your Spirit, you'll give us insight and understanding how we might walk in the freedom that is ours through the redemptive work of Jesus. Thank you for your great love for us. In Jesus's name, amen. God bless you.