"A Home Blessing"Recently a member of my flock invited me to conduct a blessing ritual at her new apartment. Five of us gathered in her new flat on her first night there.
My form of apartment blessing consisted of four short prayers, each read by one of the hostess's guests, dedicating the rooms of the home to God and invoking the benign "spirits" of hospitality, security, and serenity. We used several symbols - water for purity, a candle for light, bread for hospitality - to illustrate the focus of our prayers. We had a friendship circle, singing "Bless Be the Tie that Binds Our Hearts in Christian Love" and went out for a nice meal.
House blessings, once common, are rare now though they are coming back into practice in Hong Kong which seems to abound with demonic spirits, many of which seem to possess particular addresses. Many naïve Christians pick up on "old wives' stories" that a particular address is haunted by evil spirits and wish to abandon such places and seek a kind of insurance policy through a home blessing that their next abode will be "pure."
I believe that house blessings are for invoking God's Holy Spirit and not for exorcising territorial spirits perceived as having resided in a particular building or address within it. The biblical view is that God has already conquered Satan, though the mopping up action continues. The devil can't have a series of ZIP codes or particular addresses because evil is on the run, finding only temporary abode anywhere. The reason for a house blessing is to evidence and increase our faith in God through Jesus and the Holy Spirit and not to give undue credit or recognition to evil and dark forces.
The Bible opposes trying to "shout down" evil which is the form an abusive house blessing could take. Jude 8-l0 and 2 Peter 2:l-l2 rebuke those who verbally abuse spirits. We do better, Jude warns, simply to turn the demons over to God. Satan is indeed a formidable adversary (l Peter 5:8), yet Jesus has already conquered him on the cross (Col. 2:l5) and will one day confine him in hell (Rev 20:l-l0).
In the meantime we are called to oppose Satan - but not by identifying the names of his subordinates, reconstructing their hierarchy, or mapping their supposed residences to addresses in Hong Kong. Rather, we are called to stand firm through spiritual discipline (Eph 6:10-18), persevere in persecution (Rev 3:21) and cast out demons as they become manifest in people (Acts l6:l6-l8) rather than places.
See you in Church Sunday, and if you want to pursue more on the topic of demons and territorial claims visit my Sunday Adult Seminar at 9:30AM in the Executive Club, Central Plaza, Wanchai. It's one of the most stimulating discussions going on in Hong Kong.
Pastor's Pages
The Rev. Gene R.Preston
14th Floor, Blk 36, Lower Baguio Villa Tel : 25516161 Fax: 25512114E-mail : gpreston@netvigator.com
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