What Is Spiriutal Warefare? Series

What is spiritual warfare?

Ephesians 6:12, “For we are not fighting against people made of flesh and blood, but against the evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against those mighty powers of darkness who rule this world, and against wicked spirits in the heavenly realms.”

In this wicked and perverse generation there are curses and wickedness that abound. We live in technological age of computers fax machines, and all sorts of other gadgets. We live in an age where true biblical teaching is not accepted, nor cherished it is flat out looked at as if among the false. We live in an age, where adultery, pornography, greed, sloth and murder are no longer viewed as bad, but instead accepted culturally accepted realities of our everyday life. This has not always been the case; however, for America’s founders at least the majority of them including the writer of the Declaration of Independence was a believer, the Founding President even of the American Bible Society.

We live in a militaristic society. When a General goes to battle, he has hundreds of people on his staff. These people help assist the General in planning and organizing the war. Before the battle even begins plans are made and preparations are made for battle. A huge board full of where the tanks will go, where the foot soldiers will go, where the plans will bomb, and where the ships will be is drawn up and finalized. It is the same in the heavenly realms as well. Satan has generals and officers in his army people who deny Christ are among them but they are merely false teachers. False teachers have gone out into the world those who deny the existence of Christ being among them (1st John 4:1-3), but there is hope that 1st John 4: 4 But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won your fight with these false prophets, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world. 5 These people belong to this world, so they speak from the world’s viewpoint, and the world listens to them. 6 But we belong to God; that is why those who know God listen to us. If they do not belong to God, they do not listen to us. That is how we know if someone has the Spirit of truth or the spirit of deception.”

The battle lines have already been drawn. These powers of darkness can be defined also as principalities. Principality finds its origins in ajrchv translated arche, meaning, beginning, origin , the person or thing that commences, the first person or thing in a series, the leader, that by which anything begins to be, the origin, the active cause, that by which anything begins to be, the origin, the active cause, the extremity of a thing, of a corners of a sail, the first place, principality, rule, magistracy, of angels and demons. Our fight is against the fallen demons who wished to rebel from God. Satan is a created angel and the author of sin. He incurred the judgment of God by rebelling against his Creator (Isaiah 14:12,17; Ezek 28:11-9), by taking numerous angels with him in his fall (Matthew 25:41; Revelation 12:1-14), and by introducing sin into the human race by his temptation of Eve (Genesis 3:1-15). Satan is the open and declared enemy of God and man (Isaiah 14:13-14; Matthew 4:1-11; Revelation 12:9-10, the prince of this world who has been defeated through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ (Romans 16:20), and that he shall be eternally punished in the lake of fire (Isaiah 14:12-17;Ezek 28:11-19; Matthew 25:41; Revelation 20:10).

Now you see our fight is not against the flesh and blood, the human in and of itself. Often in Jesus ministry He would not let the demon itself speak but spoke directly to the demon and cast the demon out. Now why would Jesus our Lord and Savior have done this? The reason is that in God’s eyes demons have no authority. Paul stated that we are conquerors in Christ. Romans 8:37, “Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.” The Greek word here Hupernikao meaning to be more than a conqueror, to gain a surpassing victory. This clearly gives us a military usage, much like the above used example between Generals and officers. Satan can prowl around like a lion trying to destroy us, but Satan is merely only a lion on a short leash. If we take a look into the beginning of the story of Job we can understand that Satan has to have permission from God to come after us. God permits this not because He Himself is evil, because God is not evil, He is holy and without spot. God in His wisdom chooses to allow Satan to test and try us, so that our faith will be perfected. James 1:2-3, “2 Dear brothers and sisters, F2 whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. 3 For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow.” You see God is intensely interested in is changing us and molding us. In His sovernity He has foreseen the challenges that we will face us, and the choices that we will have to make. He also knows that in life we will more than often have to walk through the valley in order to experience the mountain top. In order to fully appreciate the mountain top though you must first walk through the valley, for it is in the valley of life where we most often and clearly experience and see God’s miracles in our life as we walk with Him in communion with His Spirit which gives us our joy and our peace.