Spiritual warfare (without spooking it up as some may want to do) is part and parcel of the Christian’s walk with God. It is always present, always occurring, whether we realise it or not, and it is always aimed at … you. The spiritual war in which we are engaged is a no holds barred, intense and brutal experience at times. And it is very personal. Jesus was well acquainted with it. In fact, immediately following His baptism in the Jordan river, the Gospel of Mark records that …
Mark 1:12-13 (NIV)
“At once the Spirit sent Him out into the wilderness, 13 and He was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended Him.”
We learn from this that, often, the first attempts of Satan in spiritual warfare are through temptation – and none of us ever avoid being tempted. It is important for us to realise that temptation is the most common form of spiritual attack – Satan doesn’t ever leave us alone. Temptation is always coming at us. There are other more brutal forms of attack, as well. Some of these are accusation …
Revelation 12:10 (NIV)
“Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: "Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of His Messiah. For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down.”
… and, disappointment, the hurts of life, doubts that assail us, tragedy, suffering … all of these may not necessarily be caused by Satan, himself, but he certainly does exploit these when we are at our most vulnerable because he is always working towards our destruction.
John 10:10 (NIV)
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy …”
There are sometimes very dark valleys where the spiritual attacks we experience are most evil, very intimidating, oppressive, suffocating and very real and terrifying; and it may take us some time to work out that we are, in fact, under spiritual attack. Of course, although the spiritual warfare is constant, not everything painful or disappointing in life is because of spiritual attack. Life happens and sometimes it does not seem fair from our human perspectives. We all get that. But when spiritual attack comes, we need to be ready for it, and not be cowed by Satan, or overwhelmed by his methods. The apostle Paul concluded his letter to the church at Ephesus with specific instructions and insights concerning the spiritual warfare. First, he warns that it is not flesh and blood we’re up against. None of the attacks originate with humans …
Ephesians 6:12 (NIV)
“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.”
Or course, this means that the warfare (struggle) needs to be engaged at a whole other level. That is, not on human terms, not merely on the plane of the intellect, or feelings, or flesh. Yes, these are useful indicators of the effect the warfare may be having on us, and the intensity, but that’s about it. Years, earlier, Paul had reminded the Corinthians that …
2 Corinthians 10:3-4 (NIV)
“For though we live in the world (i.e. “we are living in the flesh”), we do not wage war as the world (flesh) does. 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world (flesh). On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.”
My references to “flesh” in parentheses here, is what the ancient text actually specifies, as distinct from “spirit” – which is the point Paul is making. We do not do battle with evil spiritual forces out of our flesh. Why? Well, for one thing, our flesh is still corrupt – still sinful, and lacking any capacity on its own to defeat sin and evil. But we are born again and that means we have a sanctified, uncorrupted spirit. It is in our spirit – with the divine weapons Paul describes – that we take our stance against the enemy in the warfare. The apostle lays out an array of weapons that we need in the armed struggle (see verses, 11-18). The “full armour of God” he calls our defensive weapons – the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes of the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation (which is hope), and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
All these pieces of armour are crucial because they are all compatible and work powerfully with our sanctified spirit – our spirit has something to work with. The apostle mentions praying “in the spirit” (NIV trans.) or, more correctly, “in spirit”. In other words, do not even bother with soulish prayers – they won’t work. But the prayers we pray when we are truly “in spirit” have divine power to destroy all sorts of demonic strategies. There is one piece of armour that is for offensive use – the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
This does not imply that we simply quote scriptures we have memorised at the enemy in the midst of the warfare. Not that to do so isn’t helpful, it is, but it’s mainly helpful for us. The ancient text uses the word rhēma (ῥῆμα) here which is different to the word logos which many reading this text might assume is the intended meaning. Logos refers to the written word of God; rhēma is different. rhēma appears sixty-eight times in the New Testament, and it means the spoken word of God. Now “the spoken word does include the contents of the Bible, but it goes a step further here in Ephesians: It means when disciples speak the word of God out loud to one another.” When Paul wrote this, the New Testament as we know it did not yet exist. The Old Testament was all the church had but that is still logos. So here is the thing, what does rhēma mean, exactly? It means that which is or has been uttered by the living voice, a thing spoken, a specific word given. There’s the clue. Just as the warfare is personal, so is the rhēma that the Spirit of God whispers to us personally in the battle. Before we open our mouths to speak to one another we first pray and seek the specific word God’s Spirit wants to whisper to our spirit. This is so personal, so affirming and faith reinforcing. It is the key to winning be means of offensive actions, rather than having a purely defensive stance. Of all the armour Paul lists, the sword of the Spirit is the only true weapon we have.
And so, prayer is critical. Pray whereby we humble ourselves, very deliberately put on the armour of God – all of it, leaving no chinks – and confess, “Father, I need Your help.” This is humility. In fact, as the late great Billy Graham once said, “Prayer is the native language of humility because it says, ‘I can’t do it on my own.’” This is what invites rhēma – God’s specific, personal word of power whispered to you in the battle; and this may well be from the logos. Often it isn’t, and is of such a personal intimate nature that our faith stance is emboldened, and fear flees. We also encourage one another with rhēma for each other as we pray together and help each other. We are meant to defend as well as overcome in the warfare. Use the sword of the Spirit – don’t just stand there.
Think on these things
Ps Milton
[Sources: Chad Harrington blog (HIM) quoted directly; Greek New Testament]