The following is a rough transcript of a testimony by Jackie DePalmo and the effect that deliverance has had upon her life immediately and now six months later.

John Torell speaking:

You know there are things that we call divine appointments. Last Friday as I was preparing for the weekend, I knew that Jackie DePalmo would be here and the Lord laid it upon my heart to ask her to share her testimony. She is back with us as part of the deliverance team. She testified after her deliverance, but I want her to share what has happened since that time.

The apostle Paul had a couple named Pricilla and Aquila who were powerful co-workers. Jackie has a husband named Peter, and he is a powerful man. He is built like a street fighter and was in fact one earlier in his life, so he is a good person to have to do deliverance with. So that is what you need, aggressive people to do deliverance, you don’t want them to be docile, it doesn’t work.

Jackie and Peter were part of the Jesus Revolution; both of them came out of a hippie drug culture in the late sixties. Peter went to Vietnam and came back with long hair and drugs and all kinds of things, and God supernaturally touched him and saved him. God also supernaturally saved Jackie. They did not know each other and met in a commune outside of Ukiah. I remember these times because I was in California and we had hippies here in the hills and all over the place; they were in Volkswagen buses and it was always “peace brother.”

So they were in California, and we were in California, but we never meet until God put us together some forty years later. It took place because a lady got demonized and came to San Diego. The problem was that Jackie and her team couldn’t handle it, so they started looking on the internet how to handle demonic problems. They contacted one ministry who was only too happy to pray and minister at a cost of $100 per hour. They continued looking and found this ministry. We don’t charge for deliverance because God always meets our needs.

So anyways with that introduction, I am very happy to introduce Jackie and she blesses us with her testimony.

Jackie DePalmo speaking:

Six months ago, just a few days after my deliverance, I stood behind this pulpit sharing what it felt like to be free of mental torment, fear, shame, and disappointment. I was a believer in Jesus Christ but I had mental torment, I suffered from fear, I had shame and many disappointments but I hid from these things for so long that they were just pushed aside to do what I called the work of the Lord. But those issues were there, and it wasn’t until that time that Pastor spoke to a friend and there being an assignment on her life by Satan to take her out. As I sat and listened, I realized that I was so busy doing things for Jesus that I neglected what was going on in my life. When we become so busy in ministry, we can’t hear the small voice of the Lord saying, “Jackie, come aside, let me speak to you. There are things that I want to heal in your life.”

I became sick and bedridden for two months. The gift of that was that I was still and quiet again so I could hear the Lord. There is a scripture which says, “Hear I am, Lord, speak to me.”

Do you know deliverance is a gift? Can you image deliverance as a gift from the Lord? It is. Years prior, it was the scariest thing I could ever think of, but now it was the gentle shepherd, Jesus Christ, calling me to come aside. He wanted to deliver me from all this torment and shame that I have carried for over 40 years as a Christian.

The shepherd, Jesus Christ said, “Come” and He used this precious team that I hope you might one day meet. They worked with me for many hours. No laid hands on me, no one screamed at me, no one condemned me. I was called away by the Shepherd of the Lord to hear His voice through the Word of God and truth that was spoken into my life. That was just six months ago. And here I stand today, behind the same pulpit.

Right after that deliverance took place, I kept thinking of what a new born baby feels like because I was trying to identify the feeling I had immediately after deliverance. I was able to reflect back to the time that our three sons were born. And in the hospital they would bring them wrapped in a warm receiving blanket. I put those sons close to my breast, to my heart, and it was just a feeling of such peace, of such serenity, of bonding with them. And when I have went through deliverance six months ago that was the feeling. I was being bonded with my Heavenly Father for the first time even though I have walked with Jesus Christ for over forty years at the time of my deliverance. It is difficult to describe deliverance. Everyone has a different journey.

Upon returning back to the hotel after my deliverance where I was staying and saying goodbye to Pastor John and Aina, I received a phone call from my husband as I was just five minutes down the road that my brother, Steve, had just been killed. Shock and trauma, immediately hit my stomach and I needed to find a bathroom because I felt sick. I had just walked through deliverance, forgiving my brother and released the bitterness and hate that I harbored toward him. I had just released it, the Lord took it, and five minutes later down the road, I suddenly get word that he had been killed. So I returned to the ministry and sat under a beautiful plum tree with Pastor John and Aina. They began ministering truth to me from the Word of God that restored me immediately. Would I go back and allow what I now knew was a demonic force that wanted to take this peace that passes all understanding. Would I yield to that or stand in truth that was just given to me. They helped me to stand in that truth.

I wanted to share that after I went back to the hotel the Lord gave me a dream and showed me that my brother was with the Lord and had received Jesus Christ. So now my brother was with the rest of our family that has gone to be with the Lord. And it was such a wonderful gift to receive a dream like that from the Lord.

There’s a scripture in Proverbs 3:5-6, that says trust, and I took this for me.

“Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” (Proverbs 3:5-6)

I took that and stood on that and it was time now to return home to San Diego. There’s a scripture that says in 1 Peter 5:8. “Be sober, Jackie, be clear headed, be serious, be watchful, on your guard, alert, attentive, because your adversary the devil, walks about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.

“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:” (1 Peter 5:8)

I was one he was seeking to devour, but it was time for me to return home, as a mother, as a wife, as a grandmother, and as a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ. There seemed to be no obstacles or hindrance in the way now for me to walk on this path. Jesus Christ has purchased my freedom and I have received it to walk in it. I made that choice. Things were wonderful and I wondered what changed? The Holy Spirit told me that I had changed. The circumstances were still there but I had changed. So I began to receive that and allow that to settle into my life.

I want to share a portion of scripture that has helped me, because when I went home, as a mother, as a wife, as a grandmother, and as a minister of Jesus Christ, I said “Lord, I want to remain in this victory. I don’t want to fall back into the lies of the enemy.” And the Lord began to speak to me as an overcomer. He said, “You are an overcomer Jackie, in Christ Jesus.” I accepted that truth and I want to share what I wrote. Overcomer: to be an overcomer in Christ Jesus, requires from me, complete dependency on God for daily direction, for the purpose for my life, for the fulfillment that He has given to me to walk in, and the daily strength to follow His plan for my life. When situations get difficult, because it happens, I do not give up any more and walk away. There are solutions in the Word of God in truth that I now apply to my life. Before deliverance I would just shove the problems away and walk away from them. Now I can face it because there are solutions in the Word of God, and with the tangible relationship with the Lord, by keeping my vessel clean, His presence is beautiful, and it lets me know that He is there. I cling to Jesus Christ, no matter what the cost is. I am not sinless, yet I know where to find forgiveness. That is the difference.

I want to go over a few verses in Psalms 51.

“Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me.” (Psalms 51:1-3)

I want to stop there for a moment and share that scripture in relation to deliverance changed my life. I was able to identify my sins through deliverance. In going over the biblical curse list with the ministry team, there were times I did not think I had sinned. I had been walking with Jesus for over forty years but there were hidden sins because I knew to appear to be a virtuous woman of God. The beauty of deliverance is that the Lord allowed me to see my sins, identify them and see them for what they were. He cleansed me and that’s where the beautiful feeling of being newborn baby came.

So how do I use it now six months later? I stop and repent from my sin, from my wrong doing, right there and then. I don’t shove it to the side any more. I identify with it. Do you know how beautiful and how free that is, to identify with your wrong doing. What a gift repentance is! What a gift of deliverance! To identify when I am in the wrong, to be able to say, “Here I am.” Forgive me and wash me clean, and He does! It’s not over; I’m on the journey to my last breath, but I know where to go, when the enemy is lying to me, and the demonic activity wants to hit and trip me up. I know where to run to, and it’s to God. There’s no more hiding.

“Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest.” (Psalms 51:4)

I pulled in for several months to just sit quietly before the Lord after deliverance. It was the best choice I could have ever made. As I been traveling in ministry again in the last month or so, ministering to other leaders, I want to stand here not as a woman, I want to stand right here now as a son of God, as the bride of the Lord Jesus Christ. I want to share with you that the days of hiding only harm yourself. Jesus Christ has come to set us free.

As we travel and speak with leaders and pastors. I don’t know why people don’t see the gift in repentance and the gift of deliverance to be set free. Because as we’re traveling, there’s so many that are hiding behind their pornography, they’re hiding behind their adulterous affairs, they’re hiding behind their drinking and drug substances that they are doing. As ministers, that’s where we’re going these days. This is where the Lord is sending us. We pray before we go, and as we’re there, we’re just waiting for the Holy Spirit to please help someone to come forward and be honest, not to be afraid. The gentle shepherd is there and He’s here now with open arms to receive our sins. He died for that! He bore our sins so we can be forgiven. All you have to do is ask.

As I stated earlier, it is six months later from deliverance, and my prayer is that you will find the gentle shepherd, Jesus Christ, waiting there not with a battle axe, but with open arms through His love and His Word, and His precious blood, to receive and wash you clean just like me so you can continue life’s journey to fulfill everything that we were created to do on this earth. There’s a harvest out there and the labors are few. You are needed pastors, leaders, women and men; mothers and fathers in faith you are needed. Repentance is a gift. Deliverance is a gift. Don’t be afraid. Don’t hide anymore. Come out of hiding.

“Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me.” (Psalms 51:10-11)

I want to share that in our home, I have a place set aside in our living room that is just for me to come away and be with my beloved Jesus. To come away in the secret place as brother Sotiris spoke this morning. There’s quiet place but you must make it; you must provide that place. If it’s a dish towel over your head, so be it. If it’s in your car, if it’s on a walk, so be it. But find a place to come away, not with your wife, not with your husband, not with your children, but alone with the Lord so that He can begin to speak to your heart. The apostle James tells us to draw near to God. It’s a promise, and He will draw near to you.

“Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.” (James 4:8a)

He’s not waiting to beat you up. He’s waiting to embrace you. Deliverance is a gift. Repentance is a gift. Thank you for this time to share.

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