Okay then, now let's have a look what words begin to flow, because the words reveal what is actually festering, and is in the heart. If I find having come to church and felt good and praised the Lord, had a wonderful time, then 10 minutes later I'm putting someone down, there's something in my heart, something in my heart - there's bitterness. There's something not right in my heart, because when you put people down, you actually release a spirit of murder against them. To murder someone is to unlawfully take away their life. When you put people down, you take away their life. They don't feel better afterwards, they feel worse. Oh yeah, you haven't thrown them on the ground and physically cut their head off or stabbed them to death. What you've done is, put words into them that actually wound and hurt them, then they struggle to cope with the feelings that all go with that, and we take away people's life.
That's one of the most common ways that people have their life taken away, is by words which put them down, words which put them down. Remember, death and life in the power of the tongue. So there are three common sources of it that I want to identify for you. The first one as I mentioned, is family put downs, family dynamics and some families are filled with put downs. There are some families, the whole family get in that environment. Everyone is putting people down. It's like the whole culture of the family is filled with put downs and so you know then that demon powers are at work. The family is unhealthy. It's not an environment people can grow in and so people grow bitter. Why does it happen? How does it work? Well, name calling is one way you put people down, call them names. Another way is nicknames. Most nicknames are derogatory, or many nicknames are derogatory. Sometimes you find in families, abusive words are being spoken, that people speak abusive words. Abusive words don't just talk about behaviour, they actually attack the person. Oh you're stupid, you're a dummy, you're an idiot, you're a fool. That is a put down, because it ridicules, or it attacks the person's identity, and shames them. It releases a spirit of murder against them, and then the person's got to cope with what's happened.
Of course, if a father speaks words like that, the results are devastating through the whole family. Some cultures are like that, and I think there's a lot of it in New Zealand culture. My observation in teaching, and I've got no issue here, but I notice among a lot of the Maori kids, the words, the way they spoke to one another, I have never heard such vicious put downs in my life. What happens is, it's trying to bring everyone down to the same level, or at least put someone down lower than you, so you look better, and it's got a spirit of murder in it. It's violent murder. It releases violence against a person. I was astonished teaching, to find how much put down goes on in classes, how much put down goes on in schools, and in some families that's the whole family's riddled with put downs, so people are not speaking words to encourage, bring forth dreams, bring forth destinies, identify gifts, lift up and bless. Instead it's critical, negative, fault finding, putting down, and when you put down, you actually attack the person and push them down, so they don't stand up the way they ought to.
So one area that's most common is in families. Some families are riddled with it. Now of course there's Biblical examples for all of these things, so one example is Genesis 37, 4 to 5. Joseph's brothers put him down all the time. Often the youngest one is picked on by everyone. Sometimes there's a black sheep in the family, and they're picked on by everyone, and that put down is actually attack of the spirit of murder, rooted in hatred and bitterness and envy. So Joseph's brothers put him down all the time. It says they couldn't speak peaceably to him. In other words there was war continued, their words hurt him, and we're going to look at what it does to you, if you don't deal with this thing, or don't know what to do with it, and I'm going to minister on it tonight, and give an opportunity for people to be set free.