How to Deal With Evil Spirits - Swedenborg and Life

Are there negative spiritual influences at work in our lives? How do they operate, and what can we do about them?

Join us as we discuss Swedenborg's accounts of his spiritual experiences and what he learned through them.

Listen to an audio-only podcast version of this episode - https://swedenborgandlife.simplecast....

Visit Richard Smoley's website here: http://www.innerchristianity.com/

The video we mention in the episode is here:    • How to Stop Unwanted Thoughts -- Spiritual...  


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"This is so that we can be reformed and saved, for without freedom there can be no reformation or salvation…. The reason we cannot be reformed unless we have some freedom is that we are born into evils of all kinds, evils which need to be taken away if we are to be saved. They cannot be taken away unless we see them within ourselves, admit that they are there, then refuse them and ultimately turn away from them. Only then are they taken away. This cannot happen unless we are exposed to both good and evil, since it is from good that we can see evils, though we cannot see what is good from evil….” Heaven and Hell 597-598

“...all in hell, how many soever they may be, when viewed in the ordinary light of heaven, appear like each other, and also speak alike, so that you would believe them to be one and the same person, when yet they are innumerable…”
Spiritual Experiences 4584

“When [evil spirits] are applied, then they induce agony of the spirit, by means of tedium, which they increase and inspire continually, and thus they add impatience, which begets the greatest suffering and induces such weakness of body that [the man] can scarce raise himself from bed. This was shown me by this means: when they were present, such a weakness took possession of [me], and when they were removed, it ceased, in proportion as they were removed. They also employ many arts, so as to infuse weariness and thence weakness." -Spiritual Experiences 4587

“Evil spirits stir up our falsities and evil, as mentioned. From our memory they stir up everything we have ever considered or committed since childhood. Evil spirits are able to do this with such consummate skill and malice that words cannot describe it.” Secrets of Heaven 751

"While I was going to bed the evil spirits overhead attacked with a plan to destroy me, deliberating to call forth against me all of hell, and all evil and treacherous spirits whatsoever…. It also seemed as if I were being let down among them—for otherwise they were overhead, in fantasy lifting me up into their midst, so that I was now surrounded by them…. When they had clung for some time to these fantasies, perpetrating whatever they were able, while I lay in safety, fearing nothing, only reflecting on the things they were up to, finally upon realizing the fruitlessness of their effort, they withdrew, admitting that it was of no use." -Spiritual Experiences 3851

"Spirits complained that they could no longer be present. Because I was abiding in the higher knowledge of faith, it was not permitted to entertain objections. They said that then they have nothing by which they can lead—saying also, by which they can mislead—for by their objections they very much mislead mankind." -Spiritual Experiences 3614

“These combats are carried on by means of truths of faith which are from the Word. We must fight against evils and falsities from these; if we fight from anything else, we do not conquer, because the Lord is not in anything else.” -Secrets of Heaven 8962