Soul Set Free: Kimberly Larsen's Journey of Deliverance and Healing

Kimberly, can you share a bit of your early life and how events like your parents' divorce and relocation impacted you and your emotional journey? I was born into a Christian home, which provided an excellent upbringing in a small farming community. In my early childhood, I don't have any memories of ever feeling anything but loved, safe, and happy. When I was 9 years old, though, my parents divorced, and my world got a little shaken from that.

We moved off the farm and into town. So, that was a whole new world. And that is when I started to feel anxious and insecure. I knew I was loved, so nothing was terribly wrong, and yet my heart felt bruised—I had a hard time getting started again. And then as soon as I got comfortable in that place, we moved again. And I think it was like a double whammy where that pain I already began to feel was reinforced. And I didn't fully realize at the time that I had a broken heart because of that. I was just trying to keep up with what was happening and do the best I could. And so there wasn't like one big accident or anything like that, but it was just this kind of doubling up of the same type of pain happening twice. Kids are resilient, and so I think that, from a parent's perspective, they're doing pretty well. Even if you asked them, they would likely say, "I'm okay." I think a lot of what was going on was deeper than I understood, and it started to show up later on when I started hanging out with the wrong friends. So as a teenager, I began to walk away from my faith kind of—I never completely left my faith, as I always continued to believe in God, but I was looking for attention and friendship and love, and, you know, I didn't have a lot of parent supervision because my mom was a single mom working and my dad wasn't in the picture. We did a lot of things to keep ourselves entertained, and none of it seemed all that bad at the time. However, it eventually got worse. 

You experienced an abusive relationship in your teen years that led to the beginning of spiritual battles. What were some of the doors that opened that may have caused demonic influence and oppression, and how did that affect your life? For a long time, I thought that it was because of the abusive relationship as a young teen that the demonic oppression came, and that was the door that I had opened. Still, then, the Lord brought me back to some other memories and showed me that I started having these demonic nightmares right before the relationship began. And so that helped me to understand that it was probably a generational door that had been opened even before me. There was similar abuse in my mom's and grandmother's lives, so what happened is I started having attacks in my dreams, but then I would wake up, and I would still feel the attack. So I would feel choking happening, and this extreme, intense fear in the room. It happened over and over, almost nightly, where I was having terrifying dreams, and it went on for years and years. There were times when I woke up, and in the dream I was dreaming that somebody was banging my head, and I woke up and it was actually happening, and then I would have a headache the next day. So it was a dream, yet it was also becoming a reality. They were spiritual attacks in my sleep that are known as sleep paralysis.   

Were you able to talk to your mom about what was happening?

I kept a lot of this a secret because when I talked about it at all with people, I could sense right away that they were kind of like, What? And I just was afraid to talk about it. I didn't discuss it much. I would say to people that I was having nightmares, but I wouldn't explain to what extent. Sometimes I would have wild animals in my dreams that were chasing me. Those I would talk about. So, everybody knew that I had bad nightmares, but the actual experiences with the spirits—that part I wasn't sure how to talk about. It wasn't until later in my life, after I got married, that I started speaking up about it. And even then, people did not know what to say to me. And so, I thought it was just spiritual warfare and that this was one thing that Christians had to deal with. I learned that if I said the name of Jesus, it would stop, so I thought, 'Okay, this happens to people.' You speak Jesus' name, and then it stops. But I did not realize that I could get free of the nightmares. If you speak the name of Jesus, in that very moment, the evil one needs to flee from you. There’s a Bible verse that says… “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” James 4:7. I always thought it was resist the devil and he will flee from you. And it was later that I realized I truly understood the beginning of the verse: 'Submit to the Lord.' And so your life needs to be submitted right to Him. And when you submit to Him in your everyday life, you will not receive the same attacks as if you're only using His name to ward off a nightmare. As I walked daily with Him, I learned that I was more in authority and dominion. I had to overcome a spirit of fear because I was terrified of these evil spirits, and I'm not afraid of them anymore. If I have even the smallest experience with them now, I'm ready to fight them, and I know my authority, and I know they have to flee in Jesus’ name, but it took years of building myself up to understanding my authority, and there was a lot that I didn't understand about Christianity—there were a lot of missing pieces for me, and as those pieces came together, the stronger I became. Now, I'm not just fighting my own battles. I'm helping other people fight theirs. And we can think we know who we are, but we need to study who God says we are in Him and truly know and understand it. And in fact, I realized that it was wrong of me to believe anything less than who God says I am. And I was pretty insecure, and God doesn’t want us to have a spirit of fear. He wants us to have a spirit of power, love, and a sound mind. So if you’re somebody who is walking in timidity, you need to actually repent of that and then ask the Lord to help you grow into boldness and to be who you're called to be as a son or daughter in Christ. 

What was the turning point for you—when did you realize you needed to surrender to God fully, and what did that surrender look like? There were a couple of turning points. One was that I got lost in addiction. I was drinking and partying all the time with my friends. I was smoking. I was even, I would say, even addicted to my friends because I felt I needed to be with them. I think I was looking for attention and love, and that's why I loved my friends so much - because I just felt like I was part of something. You know I could not stop on my own, and I got afraid and then rededicated my life to the Lord, and I was delivered from those addictions overnight. I'm so grateful that the Lord pulled me out of that. 

What was the turning point for you—when did you realize you needed to surrender to God fully, and what did that surrender look like? There were a couple of turning points. One was that I got lost in addiction. I was drinking and partying all the time with my friends. I was smoking. I was even, I would say, even addicted to my friends because I felt I needed to be with them. I think I was looking for attention and love, and that's why I loved my friends so much - because I just felt like I was part of something. You know I could not stop on my own, and I got afraid and then rededicated my life to the Lord, and I was delivered from those addictions overnight. I'm so grateful that the Lord pulled me out of that. 

Secondly, when I was diagnosed with cancer for the second time—the first time was hard enough, and I prayed my way through that and survived. And then two years later, it had returned in a different area, and I kind of just gave up. And I just said, “I give up, Lord. If you want my life, take it.” I was tired of hoping and trying to stand on my faith, only to feel like it was when I received bad news. In that moment, I said to Him, "But if this is an evil attack on my life, I refuse to die early before my time." And that is when I started to experience deliverance, without even knowing what it was, because I began to cough and almost dry-heave. Then, I felt a beautiful presence come into my room. I couldn't see anything, but it was as if I were enveloped in a cloud of peace and joy. I had a beautiful experience, and the spirit of fear left me; I was no longer afraid of my situation. Even though it was still a terrifying diagnosis, I felt a presence from heaven. I just knew God was doing something, and that I needed to trust Him. So, I Googled… “Can Christians need deliverance?” Or something like that, and this YouTube channel came up that said how to be self-delivered. And as I followed through with that and prayed for renunciation, asking God to deliver me, I experienced even more deliverance. 

And for a week after that, I felt like I was walking on clouds. I was so excited—it was the most wonderful feeling, like nothing you could experience on earth, that is for sure, and so I had this self-deliverance. Then I became curious: I needed to understand what had happened to me more, and I wondered why nobody had told me about this before. I searched through the scriptures, and it's all in the Bible; Jesus performed many deliverances. Then I embarked on a longer journey, and I experienced many more significant and minor deliverances. After that, it set me on a path of inner healing because a lot of the places I needed deliverance were tied to emotional pain. And when I had that emotional pain healed, then that was when I no longer needed deliverance anymore. 

Is there anything else you can encourage others about if they need deliverance, based on your experience? Yes. Deliverance is truth chasing away lies, just as it is when Jesus says, 'I came to set the captives free.' Much of our captivity lies within our minds, and even a tear rolling down someone's cheek who has just realized that when they thought they weren't loved, they are loved. I see that as deliverance. Some people are stuck in addiction like I was, and they can't get out, and when they truly ask God for help, and He makes a way for them, that's deliverance. Someone who is constantly emotionally triggered by people or circumstances. When they realize that there's a reason for the trigger that's causing them to feel angry, jealous, or insecure, and if they can identify where their soul was hurt, they will find that they're set free and no longer triggered. And so a lot of deliverance has to do with emotional health. There are many things that deliverance is. God could deliver you from one place to another, or He could deliver you from believing a lie to understanding the truth. He could deliver you from a toxic relationship. Deliverance is vast, and it’s something that God has for us. He wants us delivered, set free, and walking in who we are meant to be. He wants the things that hold us back to come off of us so that we can then do the things that we are assigned to do on this earth and do His Kingdom work. And until we personally experience the deliverance we need, we are held back from reaching our full potential. Deliverance doesn't have to be scary. Some people are highly demonically oppressed, and they need serious deliverance. Others simply need to be guided through exercises using Scripture that help them with forgiveness and other aspects of their lives, because Scripture is truth. If we don’t fully understand scripture, we might need someone to help us unpack that truth. 

How is inner healing different from someone simply moving on, and what practical steps helped you walk it out? Yeah, it's so different when you invite the Holy Spirit into a situation, like you can have freedom from a problem that you've been getting counseling for, for 20 years, in one second with the Holy Spirit. So, I would say that inner healing is about asking God to reveal the hurt places in your heart and to search your heart to find them. And you'd be surprised. They're not always the big, bad, scary things. A lot of it stems from when you're young, because you don't yet have the emotional capacity to cope. And you know, time does not heal you. In fact, it often buries and compounds issues. Jesus is what heals us. And so because He is not in time, He can go back to that place when you were a child, and you can invite Him now to come back there and have Him heal you. He can heal your memories and triggers—He’s in the business of healing people, and every time I work with someone, He shows up. So, I don't even feel like I'm doing a lot, other than facilitating an encounter that they're having with Him and encouraging them to know that, 'You think you can't hear Him, but you can.' And teaching them this is how you hear Him. And as soon as they're connected to hearing God's voice, they can move forward. When they need help with something, they simply go to Him and listen to Him. And then, so my program is actually only 3 months long. It's not a long program because we jump in and I connect them to the source, which is the Holy Spirit. And once they learn how to work with Him, they no longer need me, as they have exercises that they can use with the Holy Spirit and Scripture. 

Could you share how your ministry began, who it serves, and how you help people find freedom in Christ? It's only been two years since this happened to me, when I experienced deliverance for the first time. Within those two years, I have taken a double degree program. I now hold degrees in business and ministry, and the Lord has also asked me to write a book. I couldn't believe God was asking me to do all He's having me do, and yet here I am, two years later, and the website is up and running. I am working with clients and getting seriously transformational results. I am always so surprised at how God shows up. 

For someone who feels stuck in pain, fear, or spiritual bondage, what word of hope would you share with them? Have faith in God. And if you feel that your faith is weakened or small, you need to find ways to stir it up, because it is real—the promises of God are real, so I would say, have faith and grow in your faith, your relationship with the Lord, and His Word. 

Kimberly shared her story on Truth, Talk & Testimonies

Kimberly's story can be found on the VictoryEmbraced: Truth, Talk & Testimonies podcast platforms

Living Your Best Life

 

Samuel, you wanted to share the meaning of your name. 

Yeah, I was sharing this anecdote with Dawn-Marie earlier that I didn’t grow up a Samuel. I was a Sam in my childhood, and I grew up in a small town in the mid-1970s; Sam was not a popular name back then. There were more Samanthas than Samuels. I was speaking with a colleague a few years ago, and I asked him if he preferred Josh or Joshua. And he was describing how he would much rather be called Joshua than be a joke, as in “Josh” or “joshing around,” and it got me thinking about my name, which is incredibly powerful. It’s such a powerful name, and I’m glad my parents chose it for me instead of my brother’s. My brother’s name is Darin, and my parents named him after Bobby Darin, the singer of Splish Splash; I was taking a bath. So I got the biblical name, and he got the musical name. However, this connection to the name is that God hears Samuel, and I didn’t just want to be heard. Throughout my life, I struggled, believing that no one was listening to me. This struggle, rooted in my childhood experiences, has significantly shaped my identity and my journey of faith. So, this was a transformation for me, transitioning to the name Samuel. This was confusing for some of my friends, and even my wife would emphasize my name by saying ‘Samuel,’ but I much prefer that God hear me and I am heard by Him. The name Samuel resonates with me in several ways, as he was the last of the judges before the time of the kings, and he anointed kings. What Samuel did was anoint not just one king but two. And he anointed the greatest king of the kingdom of Israel, King David. The few times that I’ve heard God’s voice, one time He said, “Get up. You are a king and a kingmaker.” God speaks to us; our identity is in Him, and it says in Revelation 2:17 that He will give us a new name.

When you were in fourth or fifth grade, you went through a hard season because of your parents’ struggling marriage. How did this season shape you and lead your path today? 

Yeah, there was a time when my parents were struggling in their marriage, and because I became a Christian as a child, when I saw my parents working, I asked them if they would continue taking me to church because they weren’t going. I just wanted to be there, and they took me, and I went by myself. At the time, my older brother was not as connected to faith. There was this gentleman that I knew who lived in my small town, a community of around 4,000 people. Everybody knew everybody, so I knew this man, but he was my parents’ age, and when you’re in fourth and fifth grade, you’re intimidated by them. One day, he asked me to sit down and talk to him. He told me that I was so brave, and I had no idea what he meant by that. It was normal for me to be there, and it reminds me of Samuel in the Bible because he was raised in God’s house, and I wanted to be in His house, too. Today, my practice is outside the church that I attend. I have always felt very comfortable in God’s house. So it’s like my living room. 

You shared with me that, at one point, you wanted to be a technical writer. However, it was during your time as a resident advisor in college that something began to happen, which became a clear indication of your calling and gift. 

Yeah. So, first, for those who don’t know what a technical writer is, it’s like getting those manuals, and now, sadly, most of them you can’t understand because they’re written in a language other than English. A technical writer writes for scientists. I have a very scientific mind. My family gets tired of me talking about it because I won the biology, chemistry, and physics awards, and I’m this touchy-feely dude in therapy, too, so I can bridge these two worlds pretty well. I have an undergraduate degree in English and a master’s degree in counseling. I had planned to work in technical writing, but I became a resident assistant at the college I attended instead. My roommate was also a resident assistant, so we split up the hall and would have meetings like all the other RAs. 

At the meetings, we would gather and go around, and many of the guys would talk about winning their basketball games and their intramural competitions. Another would say that it was a great meeting because they had to work on programs. The other RA would ask me, “Okay, Sam, so how are things with you?” And I’d say, “Well, this week, this one guy attempted suicide. I have one guy who’s strung out on pot, and he hasn’t gone to a class in four weeks. Another guy went to walk on the railroad tracks downtown, considering leaving school and just taking a train, you know, and then there was another gentleman who has a deep, affectionate place in my heart because he has a personality disorder and would pick up whatever personality or identity that suited him in the needs of the situation he was in. What became very clear to me was that God was leading me toward a profession in therapy where I could help people.

I had those pieces in my background. In high school, I was part of a group called Peer Helpers. I was always doing things that helped my friends. In college, I was an English major, and I thought to myself, “Oh my gosh, what am I going to do?” I’ve wasted four years?" No offense to English majors out there, but I had packed my schedule, so my senior year, I was going to blow it off entirely. I had available time in my calendar. It was God’s gift because I started calling schools and said, “What do I need to do if I want to get in?” And they said, “Take this, this, this, this, and this class.” And all of them fit into my schedule. It was meant to be. So, I took all these introductory psychology classes as a senior with freshmen. Lastly, my roommate, remember, was an RA as well, and one of the things that solidified my decision about my giftedness and calling was when he said, “Sam, when the guys are looking to have fun, they’ll come and find me, but when they need help, they will wait for you.

You shared that you had trauma. What kind of trauma did you have and go through?

Yes. Parts of my story I choose respectfully not to share because it also affects some other people, but certainly, I can add the experiences that my parents went through. They did remain married, but there was a lot of ugliness in their marriage. I remember looking into the mirror in fourth grade and saying, “I’m done with them. I’m done with them.” I swore them off and drew a line. Thankfully, that’s not where I stand with them today because I’ve had healing. I can share this bit, too. I also attended Christian camp, as I mentioned earlier, because I remembered sharing that the only place I wanted to be was in the house of God. If it weren’t for Craig, who we to this day are Facebook friends and stay connected—I shared with him and his sons that if it weren’t for their dad, I would not be here—I would have taken my life, as parts of my trauma left me suicidal, and Craig, my camp counselor, was very influential and is now a pastor and missionary. We’ll never know the seeds we’re planting in people’s lives this side of heaven.

You specialize in anxiety and OCD, couples work, Internal Family Systems, EMDR, brainspotting, and EFT. Could you explain all of these methods? 

Sure. Part of the reason I specialize in many of those areas, not all of them, but many of them, is that it takes one to know one, right? I have anxiety and a doctor would probably diagnose me with OCD. My wife certainly would think so, which is obsessive-compulsive disorder. Anxiety looks like being distressed or worried more than you ought to, and some people manage it just fine. Truth be told, a little of anxiety is good for you because it helps you perform to the best of your abilities, but it can also incapacitate you if not managed. What I’d like to be clear about is because a lot of people will say, “Well, I don’t have obsessive-compulsive disorder because I don’t check the knobs of the stove when I leave the house, or you should see my desk.” That has nothing to do with what OCD is. You can have different behaviors, and if you have a messy desk or if you have some area in your life that you can’t control, it could be a sign that you do have OCD because what people do is say, “Well, I can’t manage that so I’m not even going to try.” So, my type of OCD is much more about the inability to stop thinking. Okay, you can’t shut it off. The obsessions are the thoughts. You can have compulsions of counting and checking, and that is where mine shows up.

For example, I will lie in bed and count, check, and go through mental lists over and over, prepping for the next day. There are a lot of ways you can have obsessive-compulsive disorder. You also asked about some of the ways that I provide treatment. One approach is called internal family systems. So, if you’ve seen the Disney movie Inside Out, the movie represents various parts of a girl’s brain as animated characters. So, there’s an angry part, a disgusted part, a happy part, and a sad part. What we do, in a sense, is anthropomorphize them or give them life. We apply internal family systems to our system, meaning ourselves. In essence, we would engage in therapy with ourselves from a Christian perspective, guided by the Holy Spirit, which is a process designed to help one lead oneself more effectively. There’s also a way to do healing work with it as well that doesn’t look the same but takes you to the same result as EMDR, which is a trauma healing approach, and brainspotting is an offshoot of EMDR. 

Researchers discovered that EMDR involves eye movement—that’s what EMDR is—so the therapist moves their fingers back and forth. Then, the client watches them, and there’s a lot more that goes on. However, while that’s happening, it allows the brain to heal from what it was previously trying to keep away from or block out. Brainspotting is an offshoot of that. Whereas a gentleman named David Gran discovered that while he was moving his fingers, sometimes people’s eyes would wobble or stick, so instead of moving his hands back and forth, he found the spot where the distress “lives,” and you held it there, and the distress heals, so I use this approach as well. EFT is a couples therapy approach called emotionally focused therapy, and men tend to hate that name because they think they’re going to be required to cry. It’s not true. There are lots of emotions, but it’s one of the most researched and documented couples’ therapy approaches. Couples therapy approaches tend not to have as much research behind them as individual approaches, so I wanted to learn a skill because when I was doing all of this trauma work with people and helping them heal, they would say, “Can you please tell my partner what you’re telling me and explain to them what’s going on?” I also do neurofeedback, which involves placing electrodes on your head. My wife, daughter, and I do it. It’s not therapy, but what it does is shift your brain from a state of distress or fight, flight, or freeze mode to a state of rest, moving it to rest, digest, and relax mode.

What’s the difference between surviving and truly living? How do you help people reach a point of healing, freeing them from their struggles?

I love these questions, and they’re so huge, but let’s see if I can encapsulate them. But so, first of all, the difference between surviving and thriving. And by the way, surviving is necessary. Surviving is a good thing. Surviving is a skill that humans have developed and need to possess. Parts of our brain help us survive. Survival almost always revolves around protection and keeping you safe. Protection is beneficial, but it often hinders healing because protective mechanisms resist addressing the issue. Until you’re ready to heal, protection is a good thing. For a time, surviving is necessary, and it’s perfect. I’m always telling my clients that they need to do what they’re doing. You needed your OCD. You needed your depression. You needed your anxiety to keep you alive. You needed your ADHD, etc. It’s very unshaming, right? Because people come in like they believe they’re bad or wrong for having this mental health concern. And my first line is, “No, it kept you alive.” Literally, in many instances, I’ve experienced my own suicidal experiences.

In many cases, this depression, anxiety, etc., kept the person alive until they were ready and able to heal. And healing is literally that. So, let’s use an example. Let’s say you have a broken bone. And what you could do is you could wrap it up in gauze, and you could splint it, take some aspirin, and limp along. You could be okay, and your arm would probably heal, but it would probably heal deformed. However, if you visit a doctor, they can put it in a cast and use it, allowing you to return to your normal state, where it would be as good as new, if not stronger. When bones break, they heal—they’re stronger at the break. By the way, I believe that the same thing happens in these transformative healing approaches that I use. EMDR, brainspotting, and IFS were all accidental discoveries about trauma. All three experts, David Gran, Francine Shapiro, and Richard Schwarz, would say, “Well, I just found this serendipitously,” and it happened to work. I believe all of these serendipity experiences are God’s work. And they brought transformation to people. Other forms of therapy are excellent, necessary, and valuable because you might be in that place where you need to survive, and you’re not ready for healing yet. So, I don’t knock any other form of therapy. EMDR, as well as IFS and brainspotting, are approaches that help a person feel safe enough to allow that wall to come down so it doesn’t feel scary or threatening. It’s an approach that enables the wall to come down just enough, and then it can also go back up. 

How has your faith continued to influence your life and work today? 

I’ll throw in an anecdote about running here. For a season, I was a runner in high school. I’m not an athlete, and I don’t connect with those things. I’m a nerdy scientist type, but I’m currently in training and have just completed a 25K trail run, which is approximately 15.5 miles. Trail running differs from pavement running, and now I’m preparing for a Spartan Ultra, which will be 32 miles and feature 60 obstacles. The metaphor here is that we’re always in training, and when we permit ourselves to do hard things, God honors it and blesses it. God didn’t say things are going to be easy. No. God didn’t say your life is going to be a picnic. No. What God told me is that I experienced some complicated things in my life, and He allowed those things to be used for good. I received my healing. I got healing through EMDR, and after that happened, I said, “I have to bring this to other people.”

My life verse is Genesis 50:20. “But as for you, you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive.” I firmly believe that God wants me to do this work, and He allowed what happened to me. I don’t like saying, “He did it. That’s unfair and unreasonable. He certainly allowed it, and good came out of it.

Samuel shared his story on Truth, Talk & Testimonies

Samuel's story can be found on the VictoryEmbraced: Truth, Talk & Testimonies podcast platforms