24 Wherefore, O king, let my counsel be acceptable to thee, and redeem thou thy sins with alms, and thy iniquities with works of mercy to the poor: perhaps he will forgive thy offences.
One of the great evils of the charismatic way of "deliverance" has been the confusion about authority, which I wrote about last week, and the ignoring of the life of the virtues.
Too much emphasis has been on "deliverance" prayers and not on repentance. Demons leave those who consistently follow a life of purgation and virtue. If a person who is working on their predominant faults and on venial sin is "oppressed" by demons, it is merely for their further sanctification, or to undermine God's good works. Works is the key word here.
One cannot assume a passive state in spiritual warfare. Too often I have met persons, involved in charismatic ministries, who do not know or believe that repentance is the key to healing.
The confessional can be a place for healing and deliverance. To be prayed over (a bad idea-see my posts last week) for years and years about the same problem may simply be the case of a person not taking reponsibility for detachment from sin.
Detachment for sin is a must for a life of holiness.
Along with detachment, again see last week's posts, is the necessity of almsgiving and works of mercy.
Five people, including one couple, responded to the plea for helping a poor seminarian with blacks requested for use in his EPP year. I have over 2,000 readers per day. In Lent, it seems to me that the ideal of almsgiving, giving without any expectation of receiving anything back, would be foremost in the minds of Catholics. He still does not have all he needs.
"..perhaps he will forgive thy offences." Part of the humiliation of the king involved him realizing that he had to not only repent from pride, but do good works. Perhaps is the key word. None of us can be assured of going to heaven.
Repentance and working in the life of the virtues go together.
There is a great scene in the movie Becket where the Archbishop is giving away the riches he received while working for the king. Becket claiims that he is enjoying his charity too much. What a grace!