In 1991 Cindy Jacobs published a book titled Possessing the Gates of the Enemy (PGE), published by Chosen Books, Grand Rapids, MI, where she put forth a teaching that is now commonly referred to as identificational repentance (IR). No doubt many reading this article are familiar with the teaching that has become a treasured doctrine in many circles, including a number of denominations and fellowships. I was introduced to this teaching in 1997 while ministering on the campus of a leading Christian university, years after PGE was published. At that time there was a thirst for the Spirit and desire to see a breakthrough on the campus and IR was the focus of a number of leaders, including seminary professors, believing that if the prescribed IR steps were taken, revival would be the result. I was involved in the prayer meetings that included, “how to engage in repenting for the sins that had been committed in that area”, and praying for the Holy Spirit to be released.

The topic of IR is vast because it not only touches on foundational theological doctrines but it has affected the way many in the Church approach missions and evangelism, to say nothing of prayer and intercession. Therefore I have limited this article to the main points Jacobs asserts in PGE.

IR is probably best described as an integral part of intercessory prayer, where normally a group of people praying have identified sins that have been committed in a city or region. It is because of these sins, spiritual ground and/or authority has been given to the Devil; that is, the historical sins of the people became a portal for demonic activity and oppression, a central premise to IR teaching. IR sets forth that until these sins are identified, confessed and repented of, the favor of God cannot be given and the presence of the Holy Spirit is withheld – hence the name, identificational repentance, was born. As Jacobs puts it, “You must also determine the legal entrances that have allowed Satan to establish the [demonic] strongholds in the first place. These would be called the gates of the city” (pg. 235).

However, over the years I have come to understand that the scriptural basis for IR is faulted in a number of key areas. Before addressing these areas, we need to understand the other foundational premises that are at the core of the IR doctrine presented by Cindy Jacobs and others. For the purpose of this article, I am referencing Jacobs’ book exclusively.

1. The focus is high-level warfare, “which occurs on the battlefield in the heavenlies and contributes to the capturing of a city or nation for Christ” (pg. 225). For Jacobs, the spiritual battle is described in 2 Cor 10:3-4 – “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh.  For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God for the pulling down of strongholds”, therefore, the Church is to make known God’s manifold wisdom to the principalities and powers ruling over cities (not the people in them), which Jacobs concludes based upon Eph 3:10, “… to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the Church to the principalities and powers in heavenly places ….” (pg. 225).
2. Jacobs contends that, “…rulers in the Bible were affected by territorial evil spirits over their kingdoms. Nebuchadnezzar was affected by the prince of Persia to the extent that he made a golden image of himself and commanded all to bow down and worship him as god. (pg. 227).  Therefore, contending with territorial spirits is a primary focus of IR activity.
3. With regard to Jesus being tempted by Satan (Mt 4: 1-11), Jacobs states, “I believe that Jesus used spiritual warfare techniques in the wilderness to give us a pattern for tearing down strongholds” (pg. 231).
4. Jacobs concludes that the reason Jesus was victorious over Satan and his temptation was his humility, His knowledge of the Word, fasting, perseverance and command of authority (pg. 233).  It is interesting to note that she says nothing of Jesus’ obedience, love of the Father, or the fact that he was clothed with power from the Holy Spirit.
5. As already discussed, Jacobs claims that the identification of spiritual strongholds in cities is critical to seeing a city taken for Christ (pg. 235). “The gates that open to him (the Devil) do so because of the sin of people in the cities. Once he can legally enter the city through sin or a ‘gate of hell’, he moves in and out freely” (pg. 236).  In addition, “we must discover the sins of the city. Then we must repent of these sins to stop his kingdom from ruling. Sin must be repented of corporately because the sin is corporate” (pg. 236).

These are what I would view as the foundational premises of IR as set forth by Jacobs. As we proceed to uncover what the Bible has to say, I suggest that we begin at the beginning – in the Garden of Eden.

Foundational Truth

The fall of man came when Adam and Eve chose to disobey the command of the Lord not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen 3:2-24).  If there is a source for the Devil’s authority it began in the Garden and if there was a portal for sin and evil to enter the world, this was it.  He was essentially handed the right by Adam and Eve to take possession and move freely in the Earth.  However, through His sacrifice on the Cross, Jesus redeemed us, paying the price for our sin and rebellion, in fact for that of the entire world, and secured eternal life for those who believe in Him (Jn 3:16-17).

Individuals surrender their rights to the Devil when they choose not to worship the Lord or  follow His commandments (Romans 1 &2); but when the Gospel, the message of salvation is proclaimed in word and deed (through demonstrations of power) and is received, the power of the enemy is broken and he loses his grip over people and their real estate.  I am deliberately bringing up the point of “land” because IR proponents focus a great deal on “cleansing the land”.  The goal of the Gospel is not to cleanse the land, but to set the captive free and restore individuals to a relationship with the Father.  Once a person is saved through the blood of Jesus Christ, they have literally and spiritually moved from being a citizen of the kingdom of the Devil to the Kingdom of God (Col 1:13; Acts 26:18).

If we take IR to its logical conclusion, it would be rationale to assume that Jesus, having overcome the Devil’s temptations, would then need to continue the pattern that Jacobs suggests regarding identifying patterns of sin that were in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and Galilee, in fact everywhere He ministered, in order to secure fruit in His ministry that we observe in the Gospels.  But where does He do that?  Where in the Gospels does the Lord tell His disciples to go back in the synagogue’s history books, otherwise known as the Old Testament, and determine the historic sins that have been committed in that region, humble themselves and confess those sins to the Father?  The point is that He never did.  Why?  Because He knew it wasn’t necessary.  The King of Kings is the only one who knows the complete detailed history of the sin of mankind!  Therefore, He dealt with sin for all of eternity – past, present and future (Rom 6:10; Heb 7:27).

When Jesus ministered in and around Jericho (Mt 20:29-34; Mk 10:46-52; Lk 18:35-43, 19:1-27), did He recount the curse Joshua placed on anyone that rebuilt its foundations: ‘“Then Joshua made them take an oath at that time, saying, ‘Cursed before the Lord is the man who rises up and builds this city Jericho; with the loss of his firstborn he shall lay its foundation, and with the loss of his youngest son he shall set up its gates (Joshua 6:26).’”  No, Jesus never mentioned it; furthermore, He didn’t organize a conference around it.  What do we see Jesus doing?  We see him He ministering healing to those in need, preaching the Gospel, modeling the ministry He sent the disciples to do in Mt 10:5-8 &, Lk 10:9, and then would commission his disciples to do in Mt 28:18-20 & Mk 16:15.

So what “portals of Hell” need to be closed? Jesus made it simple when He proclaimed, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (Mk 1:15).  Man now had a choice to make because the kingdom of God was on the march and the Lord was calling people to make decisions at the heart level concerning their own sins and repent – not the sins of others, which IR focuses upon almost entirely.

Why?  Because when we surrender our hearts to Jesus, the enemy’s claim to our lives is cancelled.  It doesn’t mean that we won’t struggle with sin, but we have entered into the battle to secure more and more territory in our own heart as well as secure the hearts of others.  Once the Lord has people’s hearts, He has the land.  When the Spirit of the God is permitted to flow through a believer, the Kingdom of God advances in and through them.  When the believer chooses to obey the Lord by reading the Bible, discovering and being led into all truth, yielding and following the Holy Spirit in obedience, as Jesus told the disciples would happen when the Holy Spirit came, more souls are won – in short, the Kingdom of God advances.

If we start down the road of identifying the sins of a region, then logic demands that we identify all of them, not just some of them. Jacobs recommends that intercessors ask for the Holy Spirit to provide revelation as to where IR prayer activity should be focused.  Depending on the Holy Spirit’s revelation is commendable, but not in an area where the burden is so great that we can never get to the end of it.  Jesus stated clearly, “My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Mk 11:30).  Jesus not only carries the heavy load, He already took the sins of the ENTIRE WORLD upon Himself so we don’t have to play a hyper-spiritual Sherlock Holmes every time we go to prayer.

In fact, all of the spiritual-mapping (which is the looking back at the history of sins in a region) investigations Jacobs and other IR proponents demand must be done are unnecessary.  Paul already gave us the list!

Galatians 5:19-21 (NASB95) – Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

When Christians make a practice of searching out and focusing on the evil that has been committed, thereby exalting those sins and acts of evil, they are unwittingly exalting the Devil and His kingdom.  If a believer goes looking for the most atrocious and abominable sins that they can uncover – what the sin was, who committed the sin and where it was committed, they are exalting the demonic realm.  In other words, if we go looking for evil, we’ll find it. I’ll say it as plainly as I can – that is not the mission of the Christian.

Jacobs asserts that “high-level warfare” involves preaching to the hierarchy of the Devil’s kingdom, i.e. the powers, principalities and wickedness in high places. This is absurd. In the entire New Testament, you will never find this concept. The ministry modeled by Jesus, Peter, John, Phillip and Paul was the preaching of the Gospel message “fully”, which means with signs and wonders following.  Paul made it clear to the Corinthians that the Kingdom of God is not merely words, but power (I Cor 4:20); so the gifts and ministries of the Spirit that are outlined in I Cor 12, Romans 12 and Ephesians 4, ministered in truth and love, are where we will see and can expect His power to flow.

These are the weapons of our warfare that pull down and demolish demonic strongholds that hold the lost captive.  Where?  In their minds and hearts!  We are not called to preach so that the Devil and his horde become educated concerning the Gospel!  We are called to preach to the lost in the Lord’s authority, the message that He has given us, in the power of the Spirit.  The only education the Devil needs to know is where to run in full retreat!

Preaching to demons or territorial spirits was never the focus of Jesus’ ministry or His Gospel; to assume otherwise and attempt to pull Scriptures together by choosing a few verses in the Bible to prove otherwise leads us to absurd and erroneous conclusions.  However, this is exactly what has happened in the case of IR.  C. Peter Wagner, who wrote the forward to PGE, admitted in his book Confrontinq the Powers (Regal, 1996), while upholding to its tenants, stated that IR is nowhere to be found in the New Testament (Confronting the Powers, pg. 79).

So Why Discuss This Today?

The problem with IR doctrine is that it is now promoted by a second generation of believers and leaders.  Unfortunately, bad doctrine doesn’t die because it is fueled by a lack of understanding and/or poor exegesis.  A new generation has now embraced this doctrine of demons, which I believe merits the label.  I’ve witnessed the following firsthand from those who have engaged in the following IR activity-

1. During prayer, a messianic Jew and his wife stated that, “The Lord revealed to us that Indians had worshipped the Sun generations before, at the site where we were praying. As a result, we repented for the sin of idolatry asking the Lord to heal the land.”  They went so far as to bury elements of communion at the site!
2. A minister and his wife, living in an area that the “Trail of Tears” ran through, felt compelled to repent on behalf of the American government, the military, etc. concerning the sin that had been perpetrated against the Indians that had been displaced and sinned against during their forced march West.
3. A well respected leader, who some pastors referred to as “apostolic”, expounded at length to a group regarding the extensive research he and others had done to uncover Satanic rituals and sins that were performed on a specific mountain in the region and other places. He and his staff had compiled a large notebook with facts, figures and dates.

I’ll say it again – if you and I search for sins, atrocities and the ritual places of the heathen, we will undoubtedly find them.  This activity is in direct contradiction to Paul’s command in Philippians 4:8–9 (NASB95), “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.  The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”

If we model anyone’s ministry, let it be that of Jesus, Peter and Paul and those that follow Biblical principles, rather than being taken captive by persuasive arguments that bring us into bondage.

IR is widespread, alive and well in the Church and has been taught in Charismatic seminaries.  It is an established belief system that can be labeled as a demonic stronghold that must be confronted with the truth of the Gospel and the power of the Holy Spirit.  Believers should stop seeking for sins that have been committed by others and search their own hearts.  It is a heart bound with pride that will confess and repent for everyone else’s pride except its own.  Those who witnessed the demonstration of the power of the Holy Spirit and heard Peter’s sermon inquired, “Brethren, what must we do?”  He told them plainly, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:37-38).

I would be remiss if I did not touch on the Scripture from Hebrews chapter 9:24-26 –

For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; nor was it that He would offer Himself often as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.

We must note the emphasis these verses place on what Christ did for us once and for all.  Jacobs would have us believe that we must go back often and atone for all the sins committed from the foundation of the world!  No, IR stands as a contradiction to what Christ has already done.  We now stand as priests and kings of our God, called to administer the New Covenant of the Spirit (2 Cor 3) not the Old Covenant.  The time has come to refute the IR system of dead religion.

Recent Church History

It is instructive to look at the history of the American Church starting in the late 80’s.  At approximately the same time that Cindy Jacobs was beginning to teach IR doctrine, prior to her book being released in 1991, Rodney Howard-Browne testified that the Lord brought a new anointing to his ministry while ministering at a church in upper-state New York that became the launching pad for the revival ministry that he is known for.  Rodney’s ministry moved to a new level when he was invited to the Carpenter’s Home Church (CHC) in Lakeland, FL.  A multi-week revival broke out and continued for a number of weeks. He would ultimately conduct revivals there that were conference-like events attended by upwards of 10,000 ministers and lay leaders from around the world.

As powerful as those meetings were and considering how many churches in the surrounding area and beyond were affected by the Holy Spirit, Rodney shared with me during a private meeting in 2000 that he made the decision to leave CHC because IR teaching was embraced by its leadership.  IR is in direct contradiction to revival because of its focus on the demonic rather than the power of the Holy Spirit and the truth of the Gospel.

Concluding Statements

Jacobs’ conclusions concerning how Jesus overcame temptation, i.e. through humility, His knowledge of the Word, fasting, perseverance and command of authority is the model she “believes” the Lord gave us for conducting IR is faulty at best.  At the foundational level for any believer, church or pastor, the incredible burden that IR presents effectively distracts and re-directs what could be effective, Biblical-based ministry to nothing other than spiritual shadow boxing.  Followed to its logical conclusion, IR is a pseudo-spiritual, burden-filled treadmill that never ends.

It is a fool’s errand to attempt to identify, through what Jacobs calls spiritual-mapping, the sins that have been committed in a region or city, then confess those sins in some ritual similar to that of an Old Testament high priest – as if what Jesus did on the Cross wasn’t good enough!  Jacob’s doctrine is a veiled attempt to resurrect the ministry of the Old Testament priesthood that could never do away with sin.  It is presumptuous pride to believe that we can stand in the place that Jesus holds for all eternity.  We cannot atone for the sins of the world; that role was given to Jesus, the unblemished Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world (Jn 1:29).

There is much more that could be discussed concerning IR.   It is a teaching that should be abandoned and disregarded with all speed; it is not a teaching that should be embraced, let alone be considered as a necessary path to revival which Jacobs and other IR leaders/proponent would lay claim to.

When the Holy Spirit breaks forth in power, He doesn’t need bad teaching to pave the path.  He calls us to preach the Gospel.  If we listen with our heart we can still hear the echo of John the Baptist’s cry in the wilderness, “I am A VOICE OF ONE CRYING IN THE WILDERNESS, ‘MAKE STRAIGHT THE WAY OF THE LORD,’ as Isaiah the prophet said.” (Jn 1:23)

Let us do likewise and make His way straight.

Mark Biteler