Spiritual Warfare (2)

“Our struggle is…against…spiritual forces.” Eph 6:12 NAS

When the first plane hit the World Trade Center we thought it was accidental. When another plane hit it, we knew we were under attack. Dr. Robert Jeffress says: “Knowing the source of the problem is crucial…a navigational accident demands one response. A hostile strike requires a completely different strategy. Every day our world is invaded by what we consider random events. Couples divorce, so we develop marriage enrichment seminars; drug use increases, so we educate our children to ‘just say no;’ pornography among Christians rises, so we organize accountability groups; churches threaten to split, so we hire arbitrators to help with conflict resolution; Christians battle depression and suicidal thoughts, so we medicate them with the latest drugs. Please understand, I’m all for [such programs], but what if the source is more than random events and we’re under Enemy attack? Would we change our strategy? Through Scripture we discover there’s an unseen world and it’s at war. Paul writes: ‘Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against…spiritual forces of wickedness.’ You can’t just shrug your shoulders and say, ‘I don’t have a dog in that fight.’ You’re living in the crossfire of this spiritual war…the Enemy’s determined to destroy everything and everyone important to you. And those who dismiss such words as being over the top—do so to their own detriment. Martin Lloyd Jones said, ‘Not to realize you’re in a conflict, means you’re so hopelessly defeated and you don’t even know it.’ We’re in a very real war, the stakes are high, the enemy skilled, armed, and determined. The possibility of losing…is real. You must be aware of what’s happening and be prepared to fight.”

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