Is There a Stronghold in Your Yard?

Growing up in a small beach community in Connecticut with two older brothers provides me with many memories of forts, barrier walls, and weapons of warfare. My brothers were skilled snowball warriors, planning strategies while I was still in diapers. Consequently I was usually set under an apple tree with my dolls while they planned and plotted. 

One of those memories flashed through my mind this morning happened when my eyes fell on the word “stronghold” in scripture. My brother Scott was the “Tom Sawyer” of stronghold building. He had a mind that calculated, strategized, and enticed others to do all the hard work of building things for him.

One winter, Scott sat inside the house looking at all the snow pile up in our yard. I could almost hear his mind clicking. Within hours he had all the neighborhood boys gathered to pack cardboard boxes with snow in order to build a barrier wall. He strategically placed it by the gate in our yard that led to the park. He knew every kid in the neighborhood came in and out of the park through that gate.

Inside the wall my brother’s team built a ledge for elevated bombing. Then they spent hours making snowball bombs to launch over the wall. Timing was everything with my brother. He could wait out even the most patient until their curiosity got the best of them. Then boom! He clobbered them. I always admired my brother’s ingenuity, but it didn’t exempt me from an occasional snowball in my Barbie box.

The Demonic Kingdom Builds Strongholds In Our Soul

It’s a humorous memory for me but isn’t just just how the enemy of our souls, the demonic realm, works in our lives? In our ministry, we define a stronghold as a portion of the territory in a person’s soul that refuses to submit to the ruling authority of Jesus Christ.

That wall or stronghold can be built with blocks of fear, rejection, depression, anger, addiction, bitterness, or pride. The demonic kingdom is skilled at using the bombs of others to harden our heart and build that stronghold that they can dwell or hide in. They wait until we are in a vulnerable or weakened position and from that fortified stronghold can launch his attack on our heart and mind.

In Romans Chapter 7, Paul sums it up by saying that he keeps doing the things he does not want to do because it is the sin living inside of him. This stronghold of sin is clearly in conflict with the Holy Spirit that also indwells us. What walls have been built in your yard, your soul, that are keeping you stumbling in sin? Deliverance may be your key to being like a snow plow that removes that stronghold. Winter in Gods kingdom is over and it’s time to kick out the enemy.