Let’s Talk about Spiritual Warfare: My Deliverance Story Part 2

HEY, HI, HELLO FAMILY AND FRIENDS!!!! I hope you are coming from my previous blog post: Let’s Talk About Spiritual Warfare: My Deliverance Story Part 1 and if you have not read that blog post yet, please go read it!!! It’s important you have all the background info before jumping into this blog post! Without further ado (never knew that was the saying, thought it was “without further or do”, but hey you learn something new everyday), I am going to get RIGHT into the deliverance story, because I am sure you are all on the edge of your seats!!!

 

OKAY, so I finally decided to sign up for a one-on-one with Joy. I was terrified y’all. Wrestling with myself everyday leading up to the meeting, “Am I going to be completely honest with her? Should I just tell her some of my struggles, but not all? Will she be able to see right through me and see how terrible I really am? Should I just cancel the meeting so I don’t have to do this?” THAT right there folks is the enemy. Pesky turd. The morning of our one-on-one rolls around. I woke up literally feeling sick to my stomach. Again, excuse my language, scr** you satan. My team (LOVE YOU PARA LA GENTE) had our team debrief that same day as well and it essentially backed up to my one-on-one with Joy. I was a ball of nervousness, anxiety, fear and worry walking into that team debrief. 

 

Our team debrief ended up going longer than expected and cut into some of the time I would have had with Joy. Not to mention, we also had a birthday party (LOVE YOU FRAN) to go to right after our one-on-one. I was like “???? I can’t tell this woman all my deep dark secrets and then go to a BIRTHDAY PARTY? Are you kidding me?” In my mind I was like, “…wait. This is GREAT. I have a REASON now, not to get into the nitty gritty with Joy. This is actually a good thing.” SILLY Ryann. NOT a good thing. So… Did I tell Joy all my deep dark secrets in our one-on-one… NOPE. But did we have a really great conversation and talk about some other really critical things I was grappling with and learning about myself, YES. AND did God give me another opportunity to spill my guts to her later that night, YES HE DID. He is just too good y’all. TOO GOOD. 

 

So, Joy and I have our beautiful, yet not gut spilling, one-on-one, we go to the birthday party, have a BALL, come home and then this is when things get REAL Y’ALL. When we all get home from the party, Perry, Joy’s wonderful husband, asks if any of us want to be prayed over. Side note: When I tell you this is a power couple for the Kingdom, I MEAN IT. I mean God just equipped these two with so much knowledge, wisdom, authority, grace and love. I am so blessed to know them! Anyway, Perry had done a wonderful teaching earlier in the day about hearing the voice of God and some of us had expressed struggling to hear the Lord’s voice. So he asked if any of us would like to be prayed over by Joy. About 6 of us asked for prayer, one of them being me. We all kind of stood in a semicircle with the rest of our teammates standing around us, all of them laying hands on us as Joy prayed. Joy prayed for each of us individually. When Joy came to me she spoke some beautiful words over me, one of the most memorable being, “Ryann, you ask God 1 question and before He can even answer it you have asked Him 6 more.” That checks out. The entire prayer session was beautiful. Many tears shed, hearts exposed, love and hope poured out. Just simply beautiful. 

 

After the prayer is over, we’re all just standing around chitter chattering when my sweet friend, Annahbelle, tells me she had a vision during the prayer. Annahbelle was standing behind me during the prayer and held her hands on me. She said that in her vision there was a dark figure behind me. It was behind my head, to where I couldn’t see it. She said that it had long, scaly fingers and each of its fingers were inside of my head. But again, this dark figure is behind me, therefore, I cannot see it and am unaware that it is there. She said this dark figure is feeding my mind things, but I am unaware those things are coming from it because I cannot see it. So she starts praying to God during the vision and trying to remove the fingers from my head herself through prayer. God tells her “no” that she cannot move the fingers. So then she starts praying that I will remove the fingers from my head myself, and again God says no. God tells her that only He can remove the fingers from inside my head. God then starts slowly taking the fingers out one by one. And that was the end of the vision. Are your eyes popping out of your head like mine were when I heard this for the first time? CREEPY right?? 

 

So I can’t quite remember if I then take this vision to Joy to get her insight (she’s hanging out and chitter chattering with us too at this point) or if she overhears Annahbelle and I talking about the vision. But nonetheless, Momma Joy gets involved. Praise Jesus. Joy begins to tell me that this “dark figure” is the spirit of mind control. When I tell you I am speechless. SPEECHLESS. For so many years of my life, I have felt unable to control my thoughts. Crazy things popping into my mind and causing me to spiral. I mean this was like an answer, an answer I didn’t even know I was really searching for. So I look at Joy probably with a look of desperation and fear and tell her I need to talk to her about some things… THIS IS THE MOMENT. I pretty much start sobbing and word vomiting my entire life story to Joy, including things I have literally never talked about with anyone. She of course met me with SO much love and grace and empathy. She’s simply the best. Then after I spilled my entire life story, she asked me if I wanted to be delivered from the spirit of fear and the spirit of mind control. Oftentimes, when you are oppressed by the enemy and have come into an agreement with a certain lie, it can manifest itself in a variety of different ways. Therefore, in order to experience true deliverance you must find the root of the lie you are believing and when you came into agreement with that lie. 

 

Joy then began to walk me through a deliverance prayer, inviting the Holy Spirit in to help me recall some memories and thoughts. This helped me to find my root and the lie I was believing. This is where things get pretty personal and intimate for me, and since this blog is public, I don’t feel comfortable going into full detail. But if the Holy Spirit is leading you to ask me to share about the entirety of this story sometime, let me know 🙂 Once I found the root and the lie, Joy instructed me to say aloud that I come out of agreement with the lie and she then spoke truth over me, like what Jesus says about me, to disprove the lie I was believing. As I am going through this prayer I am freezing cold and shaking. Once I finish the prayer, mind you my eyes have been closed this entire time, Joy asks me if I can see all the anxiety I was once in agreement with. I tell her that I can see it, almost through a picture the Lord was giving me. At this point, it is no longer living within me, but outside of my body, it was this huge black pile on the ground to the right of me. (The anxiety was stemming from the spirit of fear.) I remember saying it was really ugly and disgusting. Joy then asked the Lord to bring a new lens to my memories, in case the lie I had been believing had tainted any of them. She asked God to seal my memories up so that the enemy could not attack them anymore. Joy then placed her hand on my head and continued praying for me. She asked me what I was seeing and again my eyes were still closed, but it seemed as if it was noon outside, it was so bright and beautiful. Where Joy’s hand is on my head there were beams of light coming from the top of my head. I opened my eyes and just hugged Joy. I don’t remember a time where I felt so much peace and true freedom! Paul writes in Romans 7:25, “Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

 

After this I was just truly FILLED with SO MUCH energy! My mind felt so clear and I felt so much FREEDOM. I proceeded to RUN laps around our hostel because I was just so filled with the Spirit! I told my teammates that I didn’t realize how small my mind actually was now that it was empty… I like to describe my mind as (picture below) before the deliverance:

It has been over a month since my deliverance and I just cannot believe the amount of freedom and peace I have been walking in. I mean truly my life utterly changed from that experience. All praise, glory and honor to God for giving me this freedom and this peace. Psalm 116:8-9 “For you, Lord, have delivered me from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before the Lord in the land of the living”. 

 

I want this to encourage you to ask God if there are any strongholds you are currently struggling with. Maybe some very specific things come right to the forefront of your mind. Maybe you need to sit with the Lord and ask Him to reveal things to you, in His timing and in His ways. Either way, I want you to be able to share in this freedom and peace I have been experiencing over the past few weeks. I, as a Christian, was under the naive belief that because I was walking with the Lord “no darkness could touch me” and while we are ultimately filled with the Holy Spirit and we are on the winning side of the war, there is still a battle being fought here on Earth. A battle where the enemy wants so badly for us to lose and be held captive by his lies and tricks. I am just truly overwhelmed by God’s love for us and how badly He wants us to experience true and utter freedom. He is such an incredible and loving Father. 

 

OHHHHHHHHH and to add some icing to this already delectable cake, while I was in Guatemala, during the road closures (if you’re unsure what I am talking about, go read my Road Closures, Hard Goodbyes and Debrief blog silly) I was making some watercolor art. Some may even call it prophetic art…After finishing one watercolor, I was thinking about adding a quote to it. I was looking on Pinterest for some inspo and then was also asking the Lord what I should write on this watercolor. I landed on the saying, “delivered, healed and set free”. LIKE WHATTTTTTTT. Come on God!!!!! How cool. So I remembered this art a few days after my deliverance and it just solidified God’s faithfulness, provision and care for me. He’s so cool like that. I found this entire experience SO special that I decided to get that exact quote tattooed on my body (I’m sorry Heidi Loughran). 

Okay so I know that was A LOT but the details are important people!! I would seriously LOVE to hear from y’all regarding your thoughts, feelings, reaction, literally anything! This was such a life changing experience and entailed so many things that are new to me and to my “faith knowledge” so if you are looking to ask questions, get clarity or just chat, please reach out. 

 

That’s all for now friends🙂

Love always. In all ways.

Ryann