Blog Posts - Spiritual Warfare
Besides the Ephesians 6 passage that I talked about earlier, another Scripture on spiritual warfare that is frequently misunderstood (and often argued about) is this verse from James: Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. (James 4:7) Many Christians take this as a promise they can claim in their personal struggle against temptation, accusation, and other kinds of attack they experience from the Enemy. Others, especially some Bible commentators, point out that the passage in which this verse is found has a corporate dimension: What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: "God opposes the proud, but shows favor to the humble." Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against a brother or sister or judges them speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it. There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you — who are you to judge your neighbor? (James 4:1-12) It appears, these commentators say, that what James is actually talking about here is selfishness and how it poisons relationships among the people of God. And the antidote James appears to suggest is repentance, not "duking it out" with the Devil. Who is right? Both are, actually. For although the focus here of the exhortation to "resist the Devil" is to resist Satan's attempts to create disharmony and strife among us, the statement that the Devil will flee if we resist him is a general truth — a promise from God — that James is applying here to a particular situation involving the audience he is writing to. Look at Jesus for example. In Luke 4:1-11 when Jesus was "led by the Spirit into the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil" he experienced a whole range of different attacks from the Evil One of which the Gospel writer keys in on three in particular. Jesus resisted each attack however, and in the end after the Devil had emptied his quiver of flaming arrows, he left — probably to try and plan some other schemes to bring down Jesus. So the Scripture which says that if we resist (and keep on resisting!) the Devil, he will (eventually) flee from us — or at least walk away in frustration — is indeed a trustworthy promise. And it applies both on a personal level in our struggle against the Prince of Darkness and on the wider corporate level of God's people resisting together the attempts of Satan to cause division and disunity among them. Context is important when interpreting Scripture, but truth is true regardless of the situation it's being applied to. —Mitch
There's much poor teaching (and some very bad teaching) in the church on the topic of spiritual warfare. Much of it centers on the interpretation of Ephesians chapter 6: Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 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. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should. (Eph 6:10-20 NIV) Where interpreters get it wrong here is by focusing too narrowly on the meaning of words like belt, truth, breastplate, righteousness, sword, and so on. It's a case of missing the forest for the trees. For example, is it truth about God that Paul refers to here? Or truth from God i.e. the Bible that He has given us? Or does Paul mean we should be truthful in everything we say and do? And how exactly is truth like a belt? At this point the preacher or commentator will often start describing the way men dressed in Biblical times, the kinds of belts and materials used to make them, and so on. All very edifying I'm sure, but in fact missing the main point of what Paul is saying. Because what Paul is doing here is using a metaphor to describe the Christian life. He is simply saying that as followers of Jesus, we should consider ourselves soldiers fighting against an enemy who rules over this dark world, an enemy who uses lies, wickedness and fear to keep people under his power. And if we are God's soldiers, then we need to live disciplined lives, strong and courageous, always on the alert. As soldiers we also need to always keep our armor on and learn how to effectively wield our weapons. And we need both offensive and defensive equipment and skills if we're going to win these battles. Even more importantly, we need godly character as God's soldiers. For no matter how gifted we are, if our character is deficient then we won't be able to stand our ground. One day we're going to fall, and will likely bring down others with ourselves. Finally, we need to recognize that we are in a war we can't escape from. There is no opt-out clause or room for conscientious objectors in this war we are in. "He who is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters," says our captain. This then must be our focus as we read this passage in Ephesians. If we lose focus on the big picture — the image of us as soldiers under attack while boldly proclaiming God's message — and instead get stuck on drilling down into the root meaning of Greek words and obscure customs of Biblical times, we are going to end up arguing with each other while our enemy sits back and laughs. So be strong, be bold, be patient and kind. Be like Jesus. —Mitch
