It is a well known fact that God created all things, including the good and evil spirits. He has given both spirits powers to do a lot of supernatural and amazing things like making predictions, revelations and working miracles that often draw people towards them, leading to many people erroneously attributing all such things as coming from God. The good spirits emanate or flow from the spirit of God Himself, referred to as the Holy Spirit, while the evil spirits flow from the spirit of Lucifer or Satan himself referred to as the Devil.
God created human beings and gave us what is referred to as FREE WILL. This is the will or decision to choose between good and evil. That is the will to decide to obey God who is good all the time and follow His will or to decide to obey and follow the will of Satan and do what he likes or what pleases him, which are often against the will and commandments of God. This is why the Bible, aware of the existence of this evil spirit of Satan that is full of deception and lies, says in 1 John 4:1 that we should always TEST THE SPIRIT operating in us, urging us to do one thing or the other or to believe one thing or the other. We are therefore free to follow God or follow the Devil and await God’s judgement at the end. This is why it is very important not to be carried away and believe and follow whoever makes one prediction or revelation or performs one miracle or the other shouting “in the mighty name of Jesus” and conclude that it is the Spirit of God that he or she is working with without testing the spirit. One way the Bible has helped us in this testing of the spirit assignment is by revealing to us that BY THEIR FRUITS WE SHALL KNOW THEM. It must be stressed that this is only one of the ways to test, and not the only way. The fruit being referred to here is the fruit of the holiness of the person, often manifested through the characters of HUMILITY, PURITY, FIDELITY IN MARRIAGE, OBEDIENCE TO LEGAL AUTHORITIES UNDER WHICH THE PERSON IS, TRUTHFULNESS, AND LOVE OF ALL HUMAN BEINGS CREATED BY GOD NOT MINDING THEIR RELIGION, RACE, COLOUR , SEX ,TRIBE OR SITUATION IN LIFE, because of the deep love of God which they have inside them and which propels them to always keep all His commandments and obey them.
MIRACLES:
Miracles are acts or events that do not follow the laws of nature, and are believed to be caused by supernatural powers. They often fill us with wonder and bewilderment as they are often beyond human explanation. However, not many are aware that some miracles are brought about by the evil spirits of Satan. Very often it is not easy for people to decipher or identify which spirit is at work in any particular event or situation – the Holy Spirit from God or the evil spirits from the devil or Satan. The Church which Christ founded and left to guide and feed the world with His doctrine is always able to do this and cannot be deceived by the devil. Here are the words of Jesus Christ: “Peter, feed my sheep” (John 21: 16) “The gates of hell will never prevail against My Church” (Mathew 16: 18). This is why St. John states in the Bible that we must first test the Spirit to find out whether it is coming from God or from the devil (1 John 4: 1). These spirits not only work miracles, but also speak to us. Some people are spoken to by the spirit of Satan and they think it is the Spirit of God. All of them will always say ‘God told me’. None of them will ever say ‘Satan told me’; even though they know that they worship Satan by performing human and animal sacrifices and shed blood which they know our God no longer has anything to do with, other than the Blood of Jesus Christ shed at Calvary over two thousand years ago and re-enacted on the altars during celebrations of Holy Mass. Satan is very intelligent and clever. His Spirit can sometimes lure us away by initially telling us to do certain things which the Holy Spirit of God would normally like us to do.
In its strategy to get us into its fold, it can, not only work miracles in answer to prayers, but also advise us not to commit one sin or the other, and urge us to do certain good things in order to leave us with the impression that it is the Spirit of God that is at work. To obey him in this guise gives him much pleasure and satisfaction, and exposes us to his grip later on.
We are very familiar with the Bible story of Moses and the Egyptian magicians. Working with the Spirit of God, Moses was able to turn a stick into a snake. The Egyptian magicians, working with the spirit of Satan were also able to turn their own sticks into snakes. However to show the superiority of God’s Spirit, the snake from Aaron and Moses had to swallow the snakes from those magicians (Exodus 7: 9 – 13).
Today, in our towns and villages, people with occultic powers from the devil perform such miracles like changing a human being into an animal or making a barren woman pregnant, or having a dead person vomit money, and curing some kinds of diseases, including madness.
God drove Lucifer (Satan) out of heaven, along with all the angels who rebelled with him. But He left them with some of their powers and abilities. He must have done this in order to test us and find out those who would prefer to associate or worship the devil rather than worship Him who is the giver of all powers.
So those who reject God and prefer the agents of the devil for help, may get the help, but will eventually pay very dearly for it, to their regret and sorrow.
ABILITY TO WORK MIRACLES OR RECEIVE MIRACLES IS NO INDICATION OF HOLINESS.
It is possible for a great miracle worker to go to hell on judgement day. The Bible states this very clearly in the response Jesus will give some miracle workers who on judgement day will try to remind Him of their· prowess in performing all sorts of miracles in His name, including casting out demons. Jesus will say to them: “Get away from me, you wicked people” – Matthew 7:23.
Anyone who has strong faith can use the name of Jesus to perform miracles. This faith has nothing to do with the state of a person’s soul. One could be a notorious criminal or a prostitute, but has strong faith. If such a person calls on the name of Jesus, he or she can perform miracles with that name. The person might still end up in hell at the end if he or she fails to repent, in spite of the miracles performed by calling on the powerful name of Jesus.
Cormac Burke states that “without obedience, we are not going to be saved, because salvation does not depend on having humanitarian or pious sentiments, but on fulfilling the will of God”. Our Lord Himself also made this very clear when He said: “Not everyone who says to me ‘Lord Lord’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does, the will of my Father who is in heaven (Matt. 7:21) Burke points out that even when we have strong faith that works miracles, or spend our whole time preaching the word of God, fasting, praying and working wonders with .the name of Jesus but are disobedient to any legitimate authority under which we are, (Like the Church, or our husband or our parents) in matters that are not sinful if obeyed, then we are not doing the will of God, and so will not enter the Kingdom of heaven. Jesus knew how painful it would be to be scourged, crowned with thorns and die on the cross, but because the will of God must be obeyed, He accepted to go through those pains and die.
What a miracle worker does or preaches may not always be correct or true, for he is not infallible or above error. The promise of infallibility was only made to the Church founded by Christ Himself, and not to every other individual or every member of this Church. And it was not promised any other Church founded by any human being, whether living or dead.
St. Paul confirmed this error-free promise made His Church by the Lord when he said in Ephesians 5:27 that the Church is “pure and faultless, without spot or wrinkle or any other imperfection”.
This is why any other Church or a bishop can support or encourage gay-marriages (homosexuality) – the very sin for which God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah with fire, which the Church through her Magisterium teaches to be wrong and unacceptable to God because the Holy Spirit guides and directs her as was promised by Jesus- (John 14:26)
In summary therefore all miracle workers fall into the following categories:
1) Those who have strong faith and are also holy and doing the will of God. They can use the powerful name of Jesus to perform wonders, and have hope of eternal salvation if they remain steadfast in this condition .
2) Those who have strong faith but live a sinful life, or are disobedient to legitimate authority under which they are, can still work miracles with the name of Jesus.
3) Those who worship the devil secretly and use his powers to perform miracles. Faith is not needed here (e.g black magicians, secret cult members, some church preachers).
4) Those who do not have enough faith but to whom the spirit of Satan responds even when they are calling Jesus, Jesus (Matt. 7:23). They may not be aware that they are performing with the power of Satan and not that of Jesus.,
Salvation depends on doing the will of God summarized in Loving God and loving our neighbour. Love of God is shown by obeying His commandments and the commandments of the Church Jesus founded and authorized to look after us (the sheep), feeding us with the truth He taught. “Peter, feed my sheep, feed my lambs” (John 21: 16).
Having been placed on the way to heaven by means of the graces from God which Christ Jesus had appointed his mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary as Treasurer and distributor and which Mary has been releasing to us because we call on her daily, through her Rosary, we now move with joy along this road to heaven.
As we move along, we should expect to encounter not only ‘milk and honey’ but also ‘vinegar and thorns’. This vinegar and thorns represent the unpleasant things or discomfort of life which Jesus described as CROSSES.
He said that we must be prepared to carry our crosses and follow him, if we are truly his disciples or those who love him – Mathew 16:24.
When these crosses come to us, we often see them as suffering.
We believe we are suffering, and often feel like rejecting them without knowing that they are often fore-runners or fore-bearers of our blessings.
ALL PRAISE AND GLORY TO GOD WHO IS GOOD ALL THE TIME