In November 2024, Charisma House Publishing released a book by Isaiah Saldivar concerning deliverance ministry titled, How to Cast Out Demons: Everything You Need to Know About Deliverance. Saldivar is well-known for his online presence, currently boasting of 1.2 million YouTube subscribers with over 195 million views, and for his stance and practices surrounding the modern deliverance movement. According to the back cover of this book, Isaiah received a powerful visitation from the Holy Spirit in 2020, where he alleges that the Holy Spirit said to him, “Isaiah, the church is unprepared and untrained in spiritual warfare; I want you to teach on casting out demons and spiritual warfare.” From there, he proceeded to teach over sixty hours online regarding deliverance practices, and much of what he taught is found in this book.

The reason for reviewing this book is because of the topic of deliverance and its resurging popularity over the past several years. According to Saldivar, the call to cast out demons is for all believers, hinging this on Mark 16:15-18. It is interesting to note that while Saldivar and others will instruct people to cast out demons, they forego taking up serpents and drinking deadly poison while ignoring the context and the audience pertaining to Mark 16:14-20. Keep in mind that according to modern deliverance practitioners, casting out demons is to be done to Christians, as deliverance is said to be the children’s bread. In one section of the book, Saldivar focuses on the seven accounts in the gospels pertaining to demon possession, creating doctrines from these accounts that deliverance from demons is to be practiced today on Christians, including children.

According to Salvidar, the use of the words possessed and oppressed are deliberately avoided, as he states that these terms have been misinterpreted, stating that demonized is a more accurate term. He claims that this mistranslation occurred in the King James Version and that “there is massive difference between being possessed (owned by a demon) and being demonized (under the power of a demon). However, what Saldivar fails to note is that BDAG, a reputable Greek lexicon, defines this very Greek word (daimonizomai) used thirteen times in the Gospels as “being possessed by a hostile spirit”. Though he says that Christians cannot be possessed by demons in the sense of ownership, he utilizes word semantics to teach that Christians can have a demon or be under the power of an indwelling demon.

We must remember that the core teaching of the modern deliverance movement is that Christians need indwelling demons cast out due to various reasons, such as legal rights, generational curses, soul ties, cursed objects, and sin. He discusses these elements in other chapters, providing seven reasons for the entrance of demons, eight signs that you may have a demon, and seven steps to casting out demons.

Much of this is also based in the teaching of the tripart being. Though not exclusive to the Word of Faith doctrine, it is a prominent belief within it. Deliverance practitioners believe that the Holy Spirit dwells within a person’s spirit while demons can indwell the born-again believer’s soul or body due to legal rights, generational curses, etc. Saldivar teaches this in his book, utilizing Matthew 12:43-45 to justify the teaching that demons view the body as their home. However, Scripture affirms that the body of the Christian is the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 3:16-17, 1 Corinthians 6:19-20) and there is no mention of compartmentalization within the regenerated. Furthermore, a born-again believer is not empty.

Saldivar appeals to personal experience in order to inform his belief in deliverance ministry. He provides anecdotal stories in order to form his doctrine pertaining to deliverance. In this one particular account, he claims to have conversed with a demon:

“I was casting a demon out of someone once and it was extremely stubborn and would not leave. In a desperate attempt to get it out and because I tried everything else, I began to preach about the cross to it. I talked about how Jesus carried his cross to Golgotha, died for our sins, and defeated Satan. I was going on and on when the demon spoke out of the person and said don’t tell me about how they crucified him. I was there when they did it. Instantly I said you’re a lying demon. Then I heard the Holy Spirit say Isaiah the demon isn’t lying, it was there. After some time, the demon did finally come out and the person was completely set free. I was shocked and realized that these demons have been around for thousands of years. They’ve seen kings fall, empires collapse and societies come and go.”- page 11

When individuals such as Saldivar claim experiences with demons in order to teach doctrines about deliverance, they are ultimately creating doctrines of demons. Additionally, the particular example cited above seems to undermine the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ in setting the captive free. Paul told the Corinthians, “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved. If you hold fast to the word I preached to you-unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures.” (1 Corinthians 15:1-4) According to Isaiah, this demon was not even phased by the account of Jesus going to the cross and dying for sins. This is deeply concerning because the focus shifted from the gospel to the counsel from an alleged demon being present at the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, it seemed that Isaiah was more convinced by the power of the alleged demon than by the power of the gospel.

Though Saldivar has claimed to not hold to Word of Faith doctrine, he teaches it in this book. On page 138 in chapter 9 (How to Keep Demons out after Deliverance), Saldivar claims that based on his experience, people are demonized after speaking negative confessions. When making a simple statement about one’s parents being a certain way, Isaiah says, “Talking like this is a great way to attract demons. When you’re speaking death over your life, demons listen to that, and they capitalize on it. Negative confessions attract demons, but confessing the Word of God repels demons.” He goes on to say on page 139, “If you speak death and destruction, that’s what you will have, but if you speak the promises of God, that’s what you will have. Your words have incredible power in the spiritual realm.”

My friend, this is classic Word of Faith doctrine. This places the power into your hands by the mere words that you speak. It denies the sovereignty of God at work in the world, and it makes you on par with God in the power of your words. Though we do have ability to encourage or discourage with our words, our words do not create reality. Though we will be held accountable for every idle word that we speak (Matthew 12:36), this would not lead us to fear demonic entrance, but rather, the holiness of God and to live our lives for His glory and in submission to His Word.

Though Saldivar will go on in this same chapter to state that a person should stay in the Word of God, he has presented numerous Scriptures in this book out of context, which leads to confusion and a misrepresentation of God Himself. To be fair, he did say a few things that were true in this book, such as the importance of confessing our sins to God and to others. On page 177, he stated that the conviction of the Holy Spirit brings us closer to God, not further. He also noted that confession means “me agreeing with God, seeing my actions, my sins, and my compromises the way God sees them.” We can agree that confessing our sins before God is agreeing with what God says is rebellion and sin against Him. At the same time, he states in his book that sin can be an open door for demons to enter. How does this stop someone from blaming a demon for their sins instead of taking responsibility for their sins against God? Saldivar also holds to the belief that a person can lose salvation while also saying that deliverance is only for Christians. How, then, does he know that he is casting demons out of a born-again believer if they may have possibly lost their salvation? Teachings such as these lead to many inconsistencies and further bondage to those who hold to such beliefs and practices.

A popular statement was quoted in this book, “A person with an experience is never at the mercy of a person with an argument.” When the argument presented is from the authority of Scripture in its proper context, that could not be further from the truth. The concern with books such as these is that they create doctrines going beyond what is written and essentially, denying the sufficiency of Scripture. The gospel of Jesus Christ is powerful enough to set the captives free. Colossians 1:13,14 affirms for those who are in Christ Jesus that God has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

This does not deny the fact that we engage in spiritual warfare in this world, and it does not deny the fact that the devil is our foe. As Christians, we rejoice in the fact that he is a defeated foe because of Jesus Christ’s finished work on the cross, and we are no longer under his tyrannical power, nor can we be indwelt by demons. We are the temple of the Holy Spirit. We have been sealed for the day of redemption by the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13,14, 4:30). The Word of God does not affirm that Christians need demons cast out of them, and Saldivar’s book attempts to undermine the truth of God’s Word by presenting his book as something that is needed and even inspired by God in order for the church to now operate in truth that we apparently did not have for two thousand years. Either we believe that the Bible is sufficient, or we believe that books such as Isaiah Saldivar’s are necessary. As Christians, we can be certain that the first statement is where our hope rests.

Listen to this two-part podcast regarding this book review: Book Review: How to Cast Out D… – The Lovesick Scribe Podcast – Apple Podcasts

Book Review: How to Cast Out D… – The Lovesick Scribe Podcast – Apple Podcasts