Study Guide: Shifting Spiritual Atmospheres
Inspired by the teachings of Dawna DeSilva. This is a Study Guide on Shifting Spiritual Atmospheres.
🌤 Introduction
In her book Shifting Atmospheres: A Strategy for Victorious Spiritual Warfare, Dawna DeSilva helps readers recognize and transform the invisible “spiritual climates” that shape their lives and communities.
In this guide, you will be walked through practical steps and reflection exercises so that you can begin displacing, discerning, and shifting atmospheres in your own life. It is ideal for personal devotion, journaling, or small groups.
🧭 Week 1: What is the Atmosphere Around You
Core idea: It all starts with awareness. This is your first step. You can’t shift what you don’t notice.
Scripture Focus:
“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, powers, and rulers of the darkness.” – Ephesians 6:12
Reflection Questions:
- What is the spiritual atmosphere that seems to be most common around you — confusion, joy, peace, fear, anxiety?
- What does the “air” feel like spiritually or emotioally, when you walk into a room?
- Have you sensed atmospheres change when someone, or you, entered the room?
Action Step:
Start noticing. It is that simple. Write down moments when you feel the spiritual climate as “different” – at home, church, public, at work.
🕊 Week 2: What is the Source – Discerning
Core idea: As you notice an atmosphere, ask yourself where it is coming from. Is this your emotions, someone else’s emotions, God’s Spirit, something else?
Scripture Focus:
“Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God.” – 1 John 4:1
Reflection Questions:
- When you sense heaviness of any kind, does it match your circumctances, or could this be coming from an external source?
- Test the atmosphere, how does this align with the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23)?
Action Step:
Write about one time or situation where you felt the emotional tention or pressure. Talk God and ask, “Lord, is this mine to carry, or something I am meant to shift?”
⚔️ Week 3: Take Your Spiritual Authority
Core idea: Through the authority of Jesus and the power of your words, you have the right to shift atmospheres.
Scripture Focus:
“Behold, I give you authority … over all the power of the enemy.” – Luke 10:19
Reflection Questions:
- What are the fear-based message or the lies that try to influence your environment?
- What counter those lies within the truths from God’s Word directly?
Action Step:
Based on the Dawna DeSilva model, write your own short declaration prayer:
“Atmosphere, I see you. You are _____. I do not partner with you. In Jesus’ Name, I send you back. Holy Spirit, release Your truth and peac in its place.”
Whenever you notice a negative shift around you, speak this prayer outloud.
💒 Week 4: In Your Home or Workplace – Shift The Atmosphere
Core idea: What you have internally become what you release externally; you can carry peace into any space.
Scripture Focus:
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” – Matthew 5:9
Reflection Questions:
- Ask yourself, what are spiritual “broadcasts” that might be active in your workplace or home (fear, joy, gossip, hope)?
- Can worship, gratitude, or prayer shift that environment? How?
Action Step:
Take just one area — maybe your office, car, or kitchen— and dedicate it to peace. Speak Scripture aloud, play worship music, or pray blessings over that space for one week. How does the difference feel. Notice the difference in how it feels.
🌍 Week 5: Shifting Cultural or Regional Atmospheres
Core idea: Your neighborhoods, schools, and even cities can experience a transformation when your shifting of atmospheres expands from personal to corporate.
Scripture Focus:
“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.” – Matthew 5:14
Reflection Questions:
- Think about your region. What spiritual patterns are you aware of – fear, despair, materialism, division?
- To release an opposite spirit, who could you partner with in prayer or service?
Action Step:
Drive or walk around your community and pray with intention this week. Speak words of hope, life, and restoration over your city. Ask God to show you a tangible act of love that helps to change/shift the atmosphere there.
📘 Additional Resources
- Book: Shifting Atmospheres: A Strategy for Victorious Spiritual Warfare
- Online Course: Shifting Atmospheres E-Course
- Teaching Video: Shifting Atmospheres Conference Session 1 on YouTube
✨ Closing Thought
Practicing awareness, mindfullness and having intention in prayer, the more you will sense the shift. It start in you, then around you. “You are an atmosphere shifter.” – Dawna DeSilva
The more you practice awareness and intentional prayer, the more you’ll sense the shift — first in you, then around you. As Dawna DeSilva often says, “You are an atmosphere shifter.”
Carry peace. Release truth. Change the air wherever you go.
➡️ Read the full article: The Power of the Invisible — Understanding “Shifting Spiritual Atmospheres”