Scripture and Spiritual Warfare

It should come as no surprise to Christians that the Bible is a book riddled with stories of warfare. After all, it is an historical account of much of human history, and humans quite often go to war with one another. In fact, humanity scarcely made it out of the garden before violence broke out between two brothers, resulting in the murder of Abel by Cain.

Oddly, then, it sometimes comes as a surprise to Christians to find the New Testament using warrior language to describe the lives we ought to live. Importantly, the war in which Christians are to engage is to be spiritually focused rather than combative towards other humans. For example, we read verses like Romans 8:13, which commands us to kill the deeds of the body which are fleshly and not spiritual. This command is to be violent with our fleshliness as we bring our bodies into subjection to God’s Spirit. Second Corinthians 10:4 reminds us that while we are at war, our weapons are not “of the flesh” but rather are spiritual. So, what do the Scriptures say about this Spiritual Warfare that we’re to be engaged in?

One: Scripture Tells Us Who Our Enemies Are – Our Sin-Nature and the Forces of Satan

Often neglected in the discussion of spiritual warfare is the first and foremost enemy of all God’s people, which is our own sin-nature. We must recognize from the outset that Satan is, all things considered, on the outside of us. He is our enemy and a powerful one at that, but he is nevertheless outside of us and does not “force” us to do anything. A much more formidable and dangerous enemy is, surprisingly, our own sinful desire. Peter pointed this out in 1 Peter 2:11, writing, “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.”

Our own “passions” or sinful desires of the flesh, Peter says, are waging war against our souls. We must recognize that we have a sin-nature that we must battle against every day of our lives. It is this very sin-nature that Paul refers to in Romans 8:13 when calling us to “put to death” the deeds of the body.

The second, and more widely recognized enemy of God’s people, is Satan and the forces at his command. Importantly, Satan is not omniscient (all-knowing), omnipresent (capable of being multiple/all places at the same time), or omnipotent (all-powerful). Still, he is powerful and hates humanity, because he is a murderer and has been from the beginning (John 8:44). He hates that God saves us, because God did not send His Son to save the fallen angels (Hebrews 2:16), nor did He offer them salvation (2 Peter 2:4). Satan hates God and he hates all that brings glory to God. He hates us for being forgiven; He hates us for being happy; He hates us for all that we are. Your sinful nature and Satan’s hatred for you are the two enemies you are at war with, biblically speaking.

Two: Scripture Tells Us What Warfare is Made on Us by These Enemies of Ours

Our first and most powerful enemy—our sin-nature—is said to be the primary cause of our temptation. James 1:14 tells us that “each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.” Imagine a child outside playing basketball, and their home is positioned on a very steep hill. He or she misses a shot, and suddenly the ball takes off at great speed, rolling down the hill. The child did not intentionally put that ball in motion, rolling down the hill. It was simply the inclination of the hill that made the ball roll so quickly in that direction.

Similarly, the sin-nature we carry is an inclination—and a strong one—that takes every opportunity it can to “roll” us down the hill towards sin, oftentimes quite surprisingly and quickly. James says that it begins with temptation that springs out of our sinful desire, but he goes on in James 1:15 to explain that, while sometimes these desires may only produce temptation, in many instances they will produce sin, which consequently produces death.

The Apostle John would sum up our chief “problem desires” as being threefold: “The desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life” (1 John 2:16). These each, in turn, serve as the inclination on which we find ourselves moving towards sin.

Satan, as a personal being, can take a much more direct approach towards leading us into sin. Scripture implies that Satan searches for our weaknesses. First Peter 5:8 speaks of Satan as “prowling around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” And he will use any resources available to him. He used the genuine love that Solomon had for his many wives to lead him into idolatry (1 Kings 11:1-4). First Corinthians 15:33 says that Satan can use our friends to corrupt us. There are even several instances in the Bible where Satan seemingly inspired certain thoughts to occur in peoples’ minds (John 13:2; Acts 5:3-4; 1 Chronicles 21:1).

While the story of Job is a unique one when considering the activity of Satan (and therefore should not be taken as testifying to the norm of his power), it does give at least one very good example of how remorseless Satan is. We are not surprised by how Satan torments Job physically, or in his depriving Job of all that he loves. But we should be struck with awe at how deliberate Satan’s tormenting is.

Notice that Job seemed to have had a lot of anxiety about his children’s relationship with God, as he offered sacrifices for them after every feast they had, just in case they had sinned against God (Job 1:5). So, when did Satan see to it that Job’s children died? When they were feasting and drinking (Job 1:18-19). Job did not have an opportunity to ask God to forgive his children, as was his usual practice, and likely spent much time wondering if that contributed to their death or their eternal state. Satan capitalized on Job’s anxiety over his children’s souls, just to further torment him.

We must never underestimate how cunning and hateful our enemy, the devil, truly is. Our sin-nature inclines us towards sin unrelentingly, and Satan desires more than anything to bring about our misery by using our circumstances, thoughts, or anything else he can.

Three: Scripture Tells Us Why and How God Allows This Warfare to Occur

As with many things, we might be prone to turn to God and say, “Why would you even let that take place?” Well, Christians must always keep in mind the promise of Romans 8:28, which states, “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” And yet, this can sometimes come across as a trite saying, seemingly avoiding the real problem of explaining the hardships or understanding the pain a person is enduring.

There are Scripturally explicit reasons for which God would permit us to be attacked in this spiritual warfare. For one, the Apostle James tells us that going through these hardships is a tool God uses to sanctify us (James 1:2-3). Furthermore, Peter would say that these attacks on God’s people produce confidence in the genuineness of our faith when we endure them gracefully, and that this results in “praise and glory and honor” (1 Peter 1:6-7). Charles Spurgeon wrote of this element, saying, “As children do not run away from their Father’s side when a big dog barks at them, the howlings of the devil tend to drive us nearer to Christ.”

Beyond these personally beneficial reasons, one should not neglect the fact that God uses these battles to show us who He is. He manifests His ability to sustain His people, even when they have no capacity for continuing in themselves (2 Corinthians 4:7-9); He shows His ability to endow His people with a greater caliber of living, even when enduring unbearable temptations (1 Corinthians 10:13); He shows His ability to deliver His people when they are overpowered and exhausted (2 Corinthians 1:8-10).

As if that would not be good enough, God goes further and chooses to permit these battles for the ultimate purpose of bringing Himself glory, by delivering His people victory through the warfare. In Romans 16:20, He promises that His people will crush Satan’s head just as Christ did. But, perhaps most inspiringly for us, God tells us that He permits us to engage in these battles for the sake of making us pure when we were unable to purify ourselves, so that He may have the ultimate glory (Isaiah 48:10-11).

Not only should we take hope in the fact that this warfare is meaningful, but we should be constantly reminded that the warfare is under the unwavering watch of the God, who loves us and cares for us. He decides how far to allow the attacks on us to go, as He did with Paul when he received a “messenger of Satan to harass” him, which God used to keep him from becoming conceited (2 Corinthians 12:7-10). Clearly, God did not allow Satan to have his way with Paul. God was in control of how much of an attack Satan could make on His servant, just as He was in the case of Job (Job 1:12). God limits the attacks we experience, both from temptations around and within us, and from attacks by the forces of Satan. This is sometimes called restraining grace (cf. Genesis 20:6). God has many good and righteous reasons for permitting us to go through this Spiritual Warfare, but He also should be understood as being actively involved in it alongside us.

Four: Scripture Tells Us About Our Resource for Waging Spiritual Warfare – The Word of God

The most famous passage regarding Spiritual Warfare is Ephesians 6:10-18. The imagery which Paul uses is quite inspiring, as he refers to Christians as wearing armor in a battle “against rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”

Accordingly, the armor is described symbolically: as a soldier wears a belt prominently around himself, let a Christian be encompassed in truth; as a soldier wears a prominent breastplate for protection, let a Christian display their righteousness; as a soldier wear shoes prepared to move swiftly or stand firm, let a Christian be ready to give the gospel in times of upheaval or peace; as a soldier defends himself with a shield, let a Christian take refuge in his faith; as a soldier wears a helmet to protect that which is most important in his body, let a Christian know that their salvation protects that which is most important—their soul.

But the final article described is the only article used for an offense rather than defense. As a soldier cuts down his enemies with a sword, therefore let a Christian cut down his enemies (spiritual forces in the heavenly places) with the Word of God. Here rests the single most misunderstood aspect of Spiritual Warfare. The Christian life, in general, is to be one prepared to defend and protect against attacks, but the Word of God alone is the method through which we are to fight back.

When Jesus was waging His most public example of Spiritual Warfare during the temptation of Matthew 4, He had many weapons at His disposal. We learn later that Jesus claims He could (at will) call down legions of angels to defend Himself (Matthew 26:53). Indeed, as soon as the temptation concludes, angels come to minister to Him (Matthew 4:11). And yet, He did not use the angels to fight Satan’s attacks. Christ, as God, had omnipotent power within Himself, through which He could simply have destroyed Satan, but He did not use His omnipotent strength. He was certainly smarter and wiser than Satan, but He did not use rhetoric or logic alone. He could have revealed His glory, which would have prompted Satan to flee in hatred or perhaps even die on the spot (Psalm 68:1-2). God sometimes speaks from Heaven to confirm that Jesus is His Son (Matthew 3:17), but when Satan questions His Sonship He doesn’t call for a miracle to validate it. No, He doesn’t do any of that. The only method through which Christ incarnate, the perfect man, waged Spiritual Warfare was through the written Word of God.

Repeatedly, He says, “It is written.” As Leonard Ravenhill once said, “He threw the book at the devil!” He used the Bible as the solitary weapon through which He would win victory in Spiritual Warfare, and through this, He set the precedent for us. Even though He was alone, even though He was at His weakest and most vulnerable, and even though Satan constantly tried to change the subject or shift his point of attack, Christ used the written Word of God alone to win the battle. And in turn, each article of the Christian’s armor in Ephesians 6 is grounded in our aligning ourselves with the truth of God’s written Word. It is alive and serves God’s people well (Hebrews 4:12). Jesus Christ had at His disposal every weapon of Spiritual Warfare we may wish we had, and yet He chose to use the only weapon we do have access to—God’s written Word.

Five: Scripture Tells Us How to Use God’s Word for Spiritual Warfare

We are to use our single weapon of Spiritual Warfare appropriately. Just as a modern soldier must respect and cherish his firearm, a Christian must respect and cherish their Bible. Nehemiah 8:5 describes God’s people as showing such respect for God’s Word that they stood to their feet when it was read.

Beyond simply respecting and revering God’s Word, we are to be reading and teaching it. The Hebrew Shema, an Old Testament prayer, calls God’s people (Deuteronomy 6:6-9) to be intimately familiar with His Word as nothing else that we know—memorizing it and committing it to our own memory and that of our children’s. Beyond regularly hearing it, we are to obey it. James 1:22 tells us to be not only hearers, but also “doers of the Word.” Importantly, hearing and doing are both expected of a Christian.

When we respect, know, and obey God’s Word, the Apostle Peter tells us that we can then do as Christ did, and wage Spiritual Warfare on all that opposes God and His people until “the morning star rises” (2 Peter 1:19) and Christ returns to win final and total victory forever. If a Christian will respect and reverence God’s Word, read and memorize God’s Word, and obey God’s Word, they will have—as Christ had—the perfect and only weapon necessary for fending off any attack and winning ultimate victory over their sinful nature or Satanic forces.