THE NIGHT RAIDERS || Power Against Dream Criminals By Dr. D.K. Olukoya
There is an important aspect of spiritual warfare which has been neglected by the global company of prayer warriors.
Many prayer warriors have not been able to deal with powers that attack men and women in the night.
People have suffered terrible problems and received greatest attacks at night. A lot of people who were healthy, happy, sound and normal went to bed in the night only to wake up with mysterious sicknesses, mental disorder, business failure, death of a loved one, collapse of marital relationships and other mishaps.
Unless you learn how to deal with night raiders, you will continue to go through some problems in life. The believers who know how to target and deal with these wicked night raiders will recognise that the root or the foundation of the problem will begin to shake. Evil powers will no longer be able to hold sway over your life. Satan’s arrow will no longer penetrate your life. Long-standing problems will vanish and things that appear impossible in your life will become possible.
The average Christian loves peace. Most Christians preoccupy themselves with seeking and pursuing peace. Nobody wants conflicts and hostilities. Most of us would like to go through a whole year without a single attack. That is a dream that will never come to pass. Whether we like it or not the devil has declared war against every one of us.
Every believer is in the battle field. To choose to fold your hands is to
decide to become a casualty on the field. Even if you are not conscious of the fact that you are on the battlefield, that does not exempt you from the warfare. Satan hates every one of us with perfect hatred. He is active every minute, fighting to destroy everyone who has relationship with God. You owe yourself the duty of fighting the battle of life and dealing with every attack that comes your way, either in the day or at night.
The activities of evil night raiders are exposed in four passages in the Scriptures. These passages unravel the mystery, the secrets, the strength and the weaknesses of wicked night raiders.
Matthew 13:25: But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.
Sleep is a very strong friend of the enemy. He has specialised in using sleep as a form of anaesthesia to perform evil operations on innocent men and women. He makes use of the cover of darkness as a cloak for attacking his victims. He attacks people where they are weak, vulnerable and unprotected. He is conscious of the fact that the moment a person goes to bed he becomes unconscious and unable to resist attacks. That is why 90 per cent of the attacks which people go. through occur in the night.
Have respect unto the covenant: for the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty (Psalm 74:20).
This second passage is quite revealing. Here, reference. is made to a realm that is hidden from human view, the dark places of the earth. This hidden realm is the habitation of wicked forces which operate in the night. The Bible makes it very clear that members of that evil society are cruel. Everything they do has a tincture of cruelty. Anything they do against individuals in the night is cruel and wicked.
There are regions of the universe which cannot be seen with our naked eyes. In parts of that invisible realm, lots of activities are carried out with the intent of unleashing cruelty upon men and women.
The dark places of the earth are found in every community. The community in which you live is filled with invisible powers whose task is to wait for the hour of darkness and attack men, women and children. For someone to become a member of that society, he or she must be a wicked person.
The Bible gives a vivid picture of some of the activities that take place in dark places in Job 4:12-14:
Now a thing was secretly brought to me, and mine ear received a little thereof. In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falleth on men, Fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones to shake. Then a spirit passed before my face; the hair of my flesh stood up:
Job was attacked by a night visitor. Job did not bargain for what happened to him. All he wanted was sleep but he woke up the next day trembling and fearful. A spirit visited him. This made his hair to stand on end. That experience was embarrassing to him. The attack was so vivid that he trembled when he woke up.
We are given further insights into the activities of night raiders in Eph.
5:11:
And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.
In this passage, emphasis is placed on what is done under the cover of darkness. The Bible says that those things are so bad that it is improper to speak about them. What evil powers do in secret s terrible. Only God can open our eyes to the reality of what happens in the spiritual realm.
Satanic night raiders have destroyed so many lives. It is nice when you are able to build walls around your house and put broken bottles or barbed wires on it. That is a very good effort. These satanic raiders do not need the doors of their victims opene to carry out their activities. They can go in and out of walls. They carry out their activities at all times and in all places, even when serious efforts are made to ensure security.
A friend of mine happened to be a senior military officer. In spite of all the efforts I made to share the gospel with him, he decided not to give his life to Christ. However, he was jolted out of his complacent state when he had a strange experience. He was sitting in his office one day, when a strange visitor entered, beating all security efforts put in place by this high ranking military officer. The strange visitor held his shirt and said: “Tell me, don’t you know that I can kill you right now? Where are your body guards?” The military officer was thrown into confusion. The strange visitor spent a minute or two and went out.
The military officer felt that his body guards were careless and decided to charge them for dereliction of duty. He summoned all of them and the personal security staff and queried:
“Why did you allow that man to pass through the security post my office?”
They wondered what the officer was saying. They told him that no human being passed through the security department. Again, he told them:
“But the man left my office right now. Didn’t you see him’ when he was coming out?”
They answered him:
“Sir, we are always standing at attention. It is impossible for any man to beat our security check point and come into your office. Nobody passed through this place.”
He could not believe them.
He told them again:
“But the man came inside and spoke face to face with me.”
All the soldiers stood their ground saying:
“Sir, that can never happen. Nobody can ever pass through this check point It is impossible.”
It then dawned on the senior military officer that he had received a different kind of visitor. From that day, he gave his life to Christ and committed himself unto the only One who neither slumbers nor sleeps.
You have lots of invisible enemies who do not need to take permission from you before attempting to attack you. They operate under the cover of darkness. Unfortunately, you cannot see them, neither can you detect their activities. That is why I want you to close your eyes right now and take this prayer point:
Oh Lord, open my spiritual eyes, in the name of Jesus.
There is a testimony in one of our booklets, Power Must Change Hands, concerning a woman. The woman had a friend whom she thought was a true friend. The woman dreamt of a cow coming to attack her in her dream and decided to share that dream with the close friend, who opted to take her to a particular man of God. The woman was surprised by what the man of God said. Instead of saying anything to the woman who had the dreams, the pastor faced the friend who brought her and said:
“Let me warn you, you must stop your evil work. If you attack her again, God will deal with you.”
Her friend simply said:
“Yes sir, I have noted what you said, I will comply.”
The woman kept on praying asking God to intervene in her situation. One night, the cow came as usual to attack her. However, the woman had learnt to pray fervently. Her prayer point before she slept that night was: “Let the Rock of ages smash my opposition.”
Just as the cow was about to hit the woman, a mighty rock came between her and the cow. And the cow crashed on the rock, fell down and died instantly. Early the next morning, neighbours came knocking at her door to tell her that her friend died that night. They also told her that there was a very big wound on the head of her friend, as if someone had hit her with a big stone. That was how God gave the woman victory over her unfriendly friend.
Once again I want you to close your eyes and take this prayer point:
Oh Lord, open my spiritual eyes, in the name of Jesus.
A friend of mine had a very strange experience when he imported some goods. One of the items disappeared; mysteriously. He ransacked everywhere but could not find the item. But God gave him a revelation after he had prayed. As he slept, God took him to one of the warehouses at the seaport. God told him: “Go to the left, to the right and to the left’ again and look under a particular table.”
He did and to his surprise, he found the missing item there. When he woke up, he went to the’9ffice of the clearing agents and boldly asked them: “Where is the missing item?” They told him that they had tried their best but could not find it. He told the agents that the good was in one of the warehouses and that he knew the particular spot where it was.
They laughed at him saying:
“What are you trying to say? We have not found the missing item. We have tried our best. The item is nowhere to be found.”
He insisted that if they would allow him, he would fetch the item from where it was hidden. The clearing agents flared up saying,
“Are you trying to say that we have stolen your item? We have told you that the item is nowhere to be found. Now, we are going to allow you to search for it but if you cannot find it, we are going to prosecute you for libel.”
The man told them that they should prosecute him if he failed to bring the item from where it was hidden. The man was so bold because God had given him a clear revelation.
The brother asked the clearing agents to follow him as he followed exactly the same direction given to him in the dream. He turned to the left, to the right and to the left again and behold, there was a table. He bent down and brought out his item. It was hidden there by someone who stole it and wanted to take it away when nobody would be around. All the clearing agents were embarrassed.
Another friend of mine also had a strange experience when he decided to hire new staff. Twelve people turned up for the interview. My friend had soaked himself in prayer before the day of the interview and God opened his eyes to see beyond the physical realm. To his surprise, he saw the applicants in very strange postures. Some of them were sitting on their heads, others were hanging in the air while some were hiding under the table.
Out of the twelve people, only one was free spiritually. He quickly decided to cancel the interview. “Gentlemen, this interview has been cancelled due to certain reasons beyond our control. You are free to go back home. Just leave your addresses behind and we shall get in touch with you if necessary.”
As people were going out one by one, he pulled the coat of the only one who was spiritually free and told him to wait behind for a brief chat. He later
interviewed him and decided to employ him. That was how God saved him from employing wizards who would have ruined his new company.
Several years ago, when I was a young Christian, I had an unusual experience. A creature that looked like a gorilla appeared beside my window. I thought I was dreaming, opened my eyes and the gorilla was there. I closed my eyes and it was still there. Then it became clear to me that a night raider had come to visit me.
The creature opened his mouth to announce where it came from. Then I went into an aggressive prayer session and the evil creature disappeared.
That was how I dealt with that evil night raider.
You must close your eyes at this moment and take this prayer point:
Every night raider, he disgraced, in the name of Jesus.
Did you take that prayer point? I want you to repeat it now with some slight variation:
Every night raider, he disgraced right now, in the name of Jesus.
WHY NIGHT RAIDERS OPERATE IN THE NIGHT
Night raiders carry out all their activities in the night because darkness provides a good cover for their evil activities. It is clear that the night is characterised by darkness. Here are the characteristics of darkness.
Darkness is the absence of light.
Darkness is not a positive creation. It is the consequence of the absence of the sun.
Darkness is the result of obscuring light. It comes up when light is
hindered from penetrating into a particular place.
People find darkness uncomfortable because of the uncertainty of the environment where it is.
Darkness can cause a person to lose his way:
Darkness can, make a person to expose himself unconsciously to danger. For example, if there is a snake in a dark room which you cannot see, you will expose yourself to danger.
Darkness causes a person to wander about.
Darkness causes an individual to stumble. Men easily stumble when they find themselves in darkness. That is why the Bible says: “Give glory to the Lord your God, before he calls darkness and before your feet stumble’ upon the dark mountains, and while you look for light he turned it to the shadow of death and made it gross darkness” (Jeremiah 13:16).
There are degrees of darkness – We have partial darkness, medium darkness and gross darkness. For example, if you decide to illuminate a large building with one candle, you will have partial darkness, but if there is no light there at all you will have total darkness.
Darkness is silent – There is a lot of silence in dark places.
Darkness has a binding power – It binds people and limits their activities. Whenever there is darkness, you are confused. You do not know where or how far you can go.
Darkness has separating power – The introduction of darkness causes division.
Sleep takes place mostly at night. At that time, every evil takes place. Your best friend may turn around to harm you under the cover of darkness. The devil has released an army of night raiders upon the sons of men. The night is the most conducive time for evil powers to carry out their evil activities. A lot of evil
things take place at night.
Sacrifices, robbery, witchcraft attacks, demonic meetings, disco parties and other evil things take place at night. If you have observed properly, you would have observed that most of the things which people find difficult to do during the day are done in the night. If you survey all the evil activities that are done in your community, you will observe that most of them are carried out in the night.
This shows that the night is meant for works of darkness. Most drinking places, drug joints, disco houses and other places where men and women carry out nefarious activities are generally active in the night. I hope there is no true believer who., runs a beer parlour. Anyone who does that and calls himself or herself a believer is living in self deceit. Any believer who sells alcoholic drinks is also joking with hell fire.
Most criminals go about in the dark hours of the night. Most witchcraft meetings are held at night. Generally speaking, iniquity flourishes in the night.
WHO THE NIGHT RAIDERS ARE
Marine powers – They carry out their activities in the night. Many of them are found in the streets at night. They roam the streets as ladies looking for men who will give them lift. Unfortunately, some foolish men enter their traps, not knowing that they are carrying strange entities to their homes.
When a single lady who is below 25 decides to stand alone under a dark bridge at about 1:00 a.m., looking for a lift, she cannot be an ordinary person. An intelligent man should know that a lady must have some extra powers for her to stand there alone without fear at that time of the night. She must be a creature of the night herself.
Something usually happens during some night parties. The moment it is midnight, some extremely and unnaturally beautiful ladies appear at such parties. It is often difficult to identify them. They come in without being invited. Some
men quickly rush to them not knowing that they are delegates from the marine world. They are part of the company of the evil night raiders.
Familiar spirits – These forces go about confusing men and women, causing disasters, initiating people, distorting people’s lives, causing demotion and fuelling the power of household wickedness. The strength of these powers lies in the fact that they are thoroughly familiar with their victims. They are able to carry out their evil activities because the secrets of their victims are known to them.
Witchcraft powers – These powers are well-known to Africans. Although withes and wizards are somehow active during the day, they carry out most of their activities during the night. The hours of toe night are their finest moment. As men and women lay down their weary bodies, witchcraft powers settle down to work by destroying lives and property.
Forest demons – These powers sometimes move out of their domain and mix up with men and women. Those who find themselves in the forest in their dreams are part of the victims of the night raiders.
Wandering spirits. These spirits wander about looking for people to possess.
Evil angels – These powers go about like normal human beings, only to disappear whenever their identity is about to be known. Just as there are good angels, there are also bad or evil angels. The good thing about good angels that a single angel can destroy thousands of Satan’s angels. For example, one angel of God destroyed 185,000 Assyrians in the Bible.
Satanic angels – These are fallen angels. They are wicked angels who double as men and angels and deal with human beings.
Wicked personalities – These wicked personalities carry out wicked assignments. Recently, a strange woman was caught in a posh area in Lagos, Nigeria. She was upturning people’s dust bins in the neighbourhood searching for something. Once she realised that she could not find what she was looking for, she would turn the contents back to the dust bin. Then she would go to the next dust bin. Unknown to her, somebody was watching her from a distance.
The person watching her suddenly realised that she was excited whenever she found a used menstrual pad in a dust bin. The observer saw she put the pad in her handbag and resumed her search. The observer recognised that she was looking for nothing but used menstrual pads. She was gathering as many used pads as possible. No doubt, she was carrying out an evil assignment. It was clear that she wanted to use peoples’ sanitary pads to do something against them.
Occult powers – Lodge members, Freemasons and other occult groups hold their meetings at night.
Spirit wives and spirit husbands – These forces go about at night raiding innocent men and women.
Ancestral strongmen – These spirits arrest people in the night.
Recruitment agents – These powers recruit or initiate men and women into all kinds of evil societies.
Spirits impersonating the dead – Some spirits impersonate dead people. It is because of these that there are reports of dead people who are seen in real life.
Satanic spies – These spies work like spiritual intelligence officers. Their task is to gather information concerning people which they take back to the Satanic kingdom.
Counterfeit angels – These forces pretend as if they are angels of God while they are not.
Dream manipulators – They manipulate people’s dreams.
The Eater’s of flesh and drinkers of blood – Their task is to destroy and cause all kinds of health problems.
Spirits from the second heavens – The second heaven is the place where darkness reigns. Spirits from that realm go about destroying peoples’ lives.
Night caterers – They feed people with evil meals in their dreams at night.
The demon of pestilence – The Bible has stated that pestilence moves about in the night.
Local masquerades – They are part of the company of the evil night raiders.
Demon idols – These idols are sent to pursue and attack men and women.
Household pursuers – These powers operate within the household and attack members of the family.
Spirits of death and hell – These spirits also operate in the night. They are killer spirits.
Can you imagine what happens when these 24 powers decide to attack human beings? Unfortunately, there are people who are attacked by forces from more than 15 groups.
Now close your eyes and take this prayer point? Every activity of satanic
night raiders, be frustrated, in the name of Jesus.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE NIGHT RAIDERS
They are persistent – They have great determination and zeal. They are always at their duty posts. They avoid offending Satan, their task master is very cruel. They have compiled a fist of all our weaknesses and use them as points of persistent attacks.
They are persuasive – They persuade people to carry out ungodly assignments. They push men and women to do what will make it easy for evil powers to attack them.
They are punctual and committed – They are always on time. If demons visit a particular person at 1.00 a.m. they will never be late. They do not miss their hour.
They are liars and deceivers – They show you all kinds of things in order to deceive you.
They are very productive – They always achieve maximum success. If these powers are not succeeding there will be no need to have deliverance ministers. Every night raider is a specialist. It knows how to do the right thing at the right time.
They are powerful in their own right – The Bible says: “When I was with you daily in the temple, ye stretched forth no hand against me but this is your hour and the power of darkness'” (Luke 22:53). Here, Jesus admitted that powers of darkness have their own kind of power. However, although they are powerful, their own power is inferior to ours.
Today, a lot of people experience night visitations. Some are tired of these visitations but do not know what to do. Others keep the experience to
themselves. These powers try to visit everyone. They do not want to give people breathing space. Their purpose is to kill, steal and destroy.
You may not be able to prevent, evil powers from attempting to visit you, but you must not allow their weapons to prosper in your life. These powers visited Jesus but failed. Unfortunately, today, the weapons of the evil night raiders are prospering in the lives of so many people. Very few people are victorious over these night raiders.
Some people are helpless whenever they are attacked by raiders at night. Some are so weak that they cannot call the name of Jesus when they are attacked. Some people would fight battles until they wake up in the morning. They become tired as if they had fought a real battle.
I do not know how many blows you have received from such night raiders. It is possible to experience victory at the end of a night raid only to wake up the next day with a swollen face. I am sure you know that there are some boxers who win in a boxing tournament only to be hospitalised for one week after the fight. That is why you must not joke with any encounter with night raiders. Therefore, I want you to take this prayer point.
Every satanic visitation at night assigned against my life, fall down and die, in the name of Jesus.
I have heard stories of people who go to bed hale and hearty only to experience a cold chill suddenly. Unless you know how to pray, the cold chill may continue for some time before it stops. You may then conclude that everything is over. You may not know they have planted something in your life. If you wake up the next day and rush to see a doctor, the doctor may prescribe some drugs for you but nothing will be able to take away the sickness because it is a spiritual attack.
There are those who are healthy only to, suddenly, receive an attack of paralysis all over their bodies. That is not an ordinary sickness. Others experience a swelling without knowing why. Sometimes some people observe
that their heads become larger than usual. It is an evidence of an evil attack. Others are pressed down by some unseen forces when they are asleep. Some people would almost pass out because some unseen forces choked their throat. Others experience attacks from masquerades. Some are shot by uniformed soldiers in the dream.
If you have ever had a dream, in which you were shot by soldiers take this prayer point: I fire back every satanic bullet, in the name of Jesus.
A lot of people suffer from attacks of night raiders by receiving evil visitations from demon idols. Demon idols are short or small in stature. They are harsh and stone-faced. They go straight for their victims and attack them.
Sometimes when they attack, there is no physical evidence of their presence. It may be in form of a wind. Their victims would only feel a sharp pain in their bodies.
Recently, a lady shared a testimony with me. She was invited to a meeting and strangely the only vacant seat was given to her. She sat down not knowing that some powers had planned evil against her. She sat down not suspecting any foul play.
Suddenly, something was fired from the seat into her body. She was afraid. Fortunately for her, she heard the voice of the Holy Spirit “Don’t let that arrow get to the region of your head.” She promptly obeyed the instruction. What saved her is the fact that she was a prayer addict who always went about with her anointing oil. She stood up from her seat and rushed into the toilet, opened her bag, brought out the anointing oil and anointed her head. That was how God delivered her from that evil arrow. If she had not obeyed the voice of the Holy Spirit, she would have died on the chair and passed to eternity.
Victims of night raiders have all kinds of experiences. Some of them hear strange voices without seeing any human being. Others find themselves arraigned in a court in their dreams. Others dream and find themselves among a company of people in black uniform. If you do not pray about that kind of
dream, you might be initiated forcefully into the demonic society.
Some of these night raiders are so effective that they do not have to touch their victims before planting evil objects in their lives. I wonder if there is anyone who has never had a visit from these night raiders at one time or the other.
If you have noticed that you are stagnant instead of breaking new grounds, then you can be sure that night raiders are at work.
If you have noticed that your dream life is a war front, night raiders are at work.
If you have noticed that you always have one funny dream or the other whenever you are about doing something that is very important, then you must be aware of the fact that night raiders are fighting against you.
If your being attacked in the dream makes you to experience automatic failure in real life, you do not need anyone to tell you that night raiders are carrying out some wicked activities in your life.
WHY NIGHT RAIDERS PROSPER
The power of God has not changed. It has never failed and will never fail. The problem is not with God but with us. You may ask: Why should night raiders prosper in the life of a child of God? The reasons are obvious.
Sin – Night raiders have legal rights over those who are living in sin, to trespass and attack them. So, if you are living in sin, you are exposing yourself to attacks from night raiders. If you have sex outside marriage, you are destroying yourself and throwing an invitation to night raiders.
Curses in place – Night raiders carry out their activities wherever they find unbroken curses in people’s lives.
Evil covenants – Evil covenants are fertile ground for operation by evil night raiders.
Evil properties – Evil properties may include stolen goods, demonised objects which could be your earrings or your shoes, cursed art works and other materials. Such goods attract night raiders.
Lack of deliverance – Whenever there is incomplete deliverance or lack of deliverance in your life, evil powers will attack you.
Bad spiritual environment – If you happen to live in an environment that is spiritually contaminated, you are likely to experience evil visitations from night raiders. Or if you live in a place where sin abound, you will be open to attacks.
Backsliding- When you talk about backsliding, some people think about those who have turned their backs at God. That is not true. A backslider is anyone who fails to follow the Lord wholeheartedly. Those who refuse to obey the word of God, or allow sins in their lives, those who are crooked in their dealings with others, those who turn back to the devil, those who forget God and those who have left their first love and are now lukewarm.
If you deny Jesus as Peter did, look back like Lot’s wife, or remain stagnant in your spiritual life, you are a backslider. You must settle your account with God today.
The only way you can be free from evil night raiders is to totally surrender your life unto God. If you allow evil night raiders to gain access into any department of your life, you will be. attacked. Get rid of everything that invites evil powers into your life today. Pray until you are free from every attack of
night raiders.
