Doug Tales 106: Evil Entities, Part Six

Not just injury, but disease and similar physical problems may be caused by evil spirits. Doug Mendenhall talks about such issues in Conquering Spiritual Evil, Volume One (2012), pp. 68-69:

Characteristic #6: Dark entities can cause disease and infirmities through possession.

In a talk at Jedediah Grant’s funeral Brigham Young said this:

“You never felt a pain and ache, or felt disagreeable, or uncomfortable in your bodies and minds, but what an evil spirit was present causing it. Do you realize that the ague, the fever, the chills, the severe pain in the head, the pleurisy, or any pain in the system, from the crown of the head to the soles of the feet, is put there by the devil? You do not realize this, do you?…The spirits that afflict us and plant disease in our bodies, pain in the system, and finally death, have control over us so far as the flesh is concerned.” (Dec. 4, 1856, Journal of Discourses 4:133)

If this is true then what are we to do about our many aches and pains? Many of the miracles the Lord did in the New Testament were proceeded by Him first casting out devils and demons which is an interesting order of healing.

“As they went out, behold, they brought to him a dumb man possessed with a devil. And when the devil was cast out, the dumb spake: and the multitudes marvelled, saying, It was never so seen in Israel.” (Matthew 9:32-33)

Several years ago a young woman who was very allergic to sunflowers seeds accidently ate something with either sunflowers seeds or the residual of sunflower seeds and went into anaphylactic shock and couldn’t breathe. A man placed his hands on her head and immediately after calling her by name, declaring priesthood, he cast out the demons that had been on the food and were causing this problem. He then commanded her muscles to relax.

She immediately relaxed and started to breathe. She got up a few minutes later and resumed her day, none the worse for wear.

Even in the scriptures we find evidence of Satan causing illnesses:

“So went Satan forth from the presence of the Lord, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown.” (Job 2:7)

“And, behold, a man of the company cried out, saying, Master, I beseech thee, look upon my son: for he is mine only child. And, lo, a spirit taketh him, and he suddenly crieth out; and it teareth him that he foameth again, and bruising him hardly departeth from him. And I besought thy disciples to cast him out; and they could not. And Jesus answering said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you, and suffer you? Bring thy son hither. And as he was yet a coming, the devil threw him down, and tare him. And Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, and healed the child, and delivered him again to his father.” (Luke 9:38-42)

Here is a modern day example. When two missionaries in Brazil visited a family, the family informed them that their six-year-old daughter was possessed. They thought she just had some sort of mental disability as she just stood in the room with a bland expression on her face and didn’t speak. What was interesting is when they said a prayer before leaving the home, she started to act up and really created a disturbance. Could she have had a possessing spirit in her causing these things? This is something to consider.