Spiritual Warfare- Ephesians 6
Our reading from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is about spiritual warfare. He says,
“put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil”.
We don’t spend much time talking about the devil, so our images of spiritual warfare might be more shaped by Hollywood, rather than theology or our Christian Tradition. So, when we hear the phrase “spiritual warfare” we might think about the movie “The Exorcist”, but the practice of exorcism is not the primary way that Christians do spiritual warfare.
About 13 years ago I was in a Christian bookstore and I picked up a book called “The Tools of Spiritual Warfare”. With a title like that my curiosity was piqued, but the book wasn’t what I expected. I’m not sure what I was expecting to find. I think I was expecting information about demons, and ways to pray against them. That wasn’t at all what I found in reading the book. It started with the sacrament of Baptism as a declaration of war. It said that the armour described in Ephesians 6 is what Christians put on at Baptism. We wrap ourselves in Jesus, who is the truth, like a belt. Jesus is our righteousness, which we strap to our chest like a breastplate. Jesus is our peace, and we walk in his gospel of peace, like sandals. Our trust is in Jesus, and that faith is our shield. Jesus is our salvation, and we wear it like a helmet. And Jesus is the Word of God, which we wield like a sword.
The book spoke about the importance of humility, attentiveness to our calling, the guarding of the intellect from negative influences, the importance of continually praising and thanking God, prayer (to connect with God and on behalf of others), forgiveness, fasting, dealing with intrusive thoughts and desires, and receiving communion as sustaining spiritual food. … The book was about a healthy spiritual life, but I hadn’t thought about having a healthy spiritual life as spiritual warfare.
In the worldview of the Bible there is no neutral territory. Everything is under some sort of authority. To be baptised, is to declare yourself a follower of Christ, and a citizen of the kingdom of God, which puts you under the authority of God, and that implies that you came out from under some other authority. There is no neutral territory. … It is in that sense that baptism is an act of war. To live as a baptized person is to enter into a struggle. It is to pick a side in a war.
Ephesians says that our struggle is
About 13 years ago I was in a Christian bookstore and I picked up a book called “The Tools of Spiritual Warfare”. With a title like that my curiosity was piqued, but the book wasn’t what I expected. I’m not sure what I was expecting to find. I think I was expecting information about demons, and ways to pray against them. That wasn’t at all what I found in reading the book. It started with the sacrament of Baptism as a declaration of war. It said that the armour described in Ephesians 6 is what Christians put on at Baptism. We wrap ourselves in Jesus, who is the truth, like a belt. Jesus is our righteousness, which we strap to our chest like a breastplate. Jesus is our peace, and we walk in his gospel of peace, like sandals. Our trust is in Jesus, and that faith is our shield. Jesus is our salvation, and we wear it like a helmet. And Jesus is the Word of God, which we wield like a sword.
The book spoke about the importance of humility, attentiveness to our calling, the guarding of the intellect from negative influences, the importance of continually praising and thanking God, prayer (to connect with God and on behalf of others), forgiveness, fasting, dealing with intrusive thoughts and desires, and receiving communion as sustaining spiritual food. … The book was about a healthy spiritual life, but I hadn’t thought about having a healthy spiritual life as spiritual warfare.
In the worldview of the Bible there is no neutral territory. Everything is under some sort of authority. To be baptised, is to declare yourself a follower of Christ, and a citizen of the kingdom of God, which puts you under the authority of God, and that implies that you came out from under some other authority. There is no neutral territory. … It is in that sense that baptism is an act of war. To live as a baptized person is to enter into a struggle. It is to pick a side in a war.
Ephesians says that our struggle is
“against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places”. These terms were used to describe “geographical domain rulership”.[1]
Scholars like Michael Heiser believe Paul is referring to spiritual beings here. Paul is suggesting that there is a war happening. Spiritual beings that are rebelling against God have claimed geographic territory, and God is taking this territory back through his people.
When we are baptized, and live into the life we are called to in our baptism, then the bit of geography that is ‘me’ and the things that I have authority over are won over to God’s Kingdom. As a follower of Christ, when I act for the good of others, that is warfare against the forces that desire the destruction of God’s creatures. When I resist temptation, that is a spiritual battle over the territory that is me and whatever is under my authority. My battle against temptation has an effect on this church because I’m in a leadership role here. My battle against temptation has an effect on my family because of my role as father and husband. … It is the same for all of us. We are in a struggle for the territory of our souls, and our homes, and our church, and the people we influence.
Believe it or not, this way of looking at the world helps us to love our enemies. Most of us would agree that loving our enemies is one of the most challenging things we are called to do as Christians. Paul says that
When we are baptized, and live into the life we are called to in our baptism, then the bit of geography that is ‘me’ and the things that I have authority over are won over to God’s Kingdom. As a follower of Christ, when I act for the good of others, that is warfare against the forces that desire the destruction of God’s creatures. When I resist temptation, that is a spiritual battle over the territory that is me and whatever is under my authority. My battle against temptation has an effect on this church because I’m in a leadership role here. My battle against temptation has an effect on my family because of my role as father and husband. … It is the same for all of us. We are in a struggle for the territory of our souls, and our homes, and our church, and the people we influence.
Believe it or not, this way of looking at the world helps us to love our enemies. Most of us would agree that loving our enemies is one of the most challenging things we are called to do as Christians. Paul says that
“our struggle is not against blood and flesh”.
So the enemy standing in front of you is not actually the object of your struggle. They are flesh and blood. That’s not what you are struggling against. Your struggle is with the powers behind them.
For example, imagine someone is making choices that lead them into addiction. At some point they lose their ability to not be addicted. Maybe they can choose if they take 1 pill or 2 pills, or 4 drinks or 6 drinks, but they seem to have lost the ability to take no pills, or to not drink. At that point that have been captured by a power. They are being ruled. I’m not saying they are possessed. I’m saying that they have entered into a kind of trap that they can no longer escape from on their own. It is a destructive pattern that the enemies of God are happy to have in place. These powers can’t attack God directly, so they attack and seek to destroy what God loves. They seek the destruction of the image of God. So, they set up patterns and temptations that draw us into places of destruction.
Now, that person who has been drawn into the pattern of addiction might be a friend, or a child, or a grandchild, and they might do or say some awful things as a part of being trapped in their addiction. In a very real spiritual sense, your battle isn’t with them. It is with the addiction and the powers behind them that have set up that pattern in the world. They are like prisoners of war. Or, people who have been infected with a poison by an enemy.
Another example, and probably an overused example, is Nazism in Germany that led to World War 2. There were plenty of good and intelligent people in Germany that were completely swept up in the movement of Nazism. It was like a power that swept through the country and grabbed onto people, which resulted in them doing horrifying things. … I’m not saying that there isn’t any personal responsibility involved in this. But there was a power that seemed to overtake people. It trapped them and poisoned them.
We could say the same about the French Revolution, and the various Communist revolutions of the 20th century- Russia, Mao’s revolution in China, Pol Pot’s Cambodia. We could look at the genocide in Rwanda, in a similar light. Human history is full of these kinds of movements that seem to overtake people and they end up doing things that they could never imagine themselves doing. They are caught in a trap and poisoned.
The description we see in Ephesians of these evil powers pulling the strings behind the scenes can make it easier to love our enemies. They have been captured and enslaved. We want their good. We want them to be released from this power that has grabbed onto them and is trying to destroy them. We want them to be healed from the poison that has infected them. That is love.
You might know someone who has been overtaken by a particular ideology, or philosophy, or political movement, that seems completely contrary to the ways of God. It is a pattern of thinking that ensnares them. It draws them, it tempts them, it fools them. They might even be convinced that what they think is good, and perhaps there are good aspects of it, which makes it all the more tempting. We are told that
For example, imagine someone is making choices that lead them into addiction. At some point they lose their ability to not be addicted. Maybe they can choose if they take 1 pill or 2 pills, or 4 drinks or 6 drinks, but they seem to have lost the ability to take no pills, or to not drink. At that point that have been captured by a power. They are being ruled. I’m not saying they are possessed. I’m saying that they have entered into a kind of trap that they can no longer escape from on their own. It is a destructive pattern that the enemies of God are happy to have in place. These powers can’t attack God directly, so they attack and seek to destroy what God loves. They seek the destruction of the image of God. So, they set up patterns and temptations that draw us into places of destruction.
Now, that person who has been drawn into the pattern of addiction might be a friend, or a child, or a grandchild, and they might do or say some awful things as a part of being trapped in their addiction. In a very real spiritual sense, your battle isn’t with them. It is with the addiction and the powers behind them that have set up that pattern in the world. They are like prisoners of war. Or, people who have been infected with a poison by an enemy.
Another example, and probably an overused example, is Nazism in Germany that led to World War 2. There were plenty of good and intelligent people in Germany that were completely swept up in the movement of Nazism. It was like a power that swept through the country and grabbed onto people, which resulted in them doing horrifying things. … I’m not saying that there isn’t any personal responsibility involved in this. But there was a power that seemed to overtake people. It trapped them and poisoned them.
We could say the same about the French Revolution, and the various Communist revolutions of the 20th century- Russia, Mao’s revolution in China, Pol Pot’s Cambodia. We could look at the genocide in Rwanda, in a similar light. Human history is full of these kinds of movements that seem to overtake people and they end up doing things that they could never imagine themselves doing. They are caught in a trap and poisoned.
The description we see in Ephesians of these evil powers pulling the strings behind the scenes can make it easier to love our enemies. They have been captured and enslaved. We want their good. We want them to be released from this power that has grabbed onto them and is trying to destroy them. We want them to be healed from the poison that has infected them. That is love.
You might know someone who has been overtaken by a particular ideology, or philosophy, or political movement, that seems completely contrary to the ways of God. It is a pattern of thinking that ensnares them. It draws them, it tempts them, it fools them. They might even be convinced that what they think is good, and perhaps there are good aspects of it, which makes it all the more tempting. We are told that
“Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (2 Cor 11:14).
Your struggle isn’t against that person. They have been overtaken. They have been captured, they have been poisoned, and enslaved. You are called to love that person who has been overtaken. The flesh and blood person in front of you is made in the image of God. Christ came to save them. They are loved by God.
Perhaps Paul felt this way as he preached in towns full of Gentiles. What does it do to a culture when it worships a serial rapist like Zeus, who also killed his own father? Or Hera, who is a bitter and vindictive goddess? What happens to people when the object of their worship is easily offended, obsessed with power, and has no commitment to love you.
The gentile cities Paul walked through were full of Pagan temples, some of the temples owned slaves who served as prostitutes. Everywhere, the strong trampled on the weak. There were games where gladiators fought to the death, and prisoners were fed to hungry animals in front of cheering crowds. Unwanted babies were killed or left to the elements on garbage heaps.
But these people were not Paul’s enemy. The powers that lay behind them where his true enemy. Jesus died for these people, who were made in God’s image. And God sent him, like Moses, as an instrument to rescue them from their slavery, even though they don’t know they need saving. Paul could love them, because they were prisoners of war, they had been poisoned. In the words of Jesus
Perhaps Paul felt this way as he preached in towns full of Gentiles. What does it do to a culture when it worships a serial rapist like Zeus, who also killed his own father? Or Hera, who is a bitter and vindictive goddess? What happens to people when the object of their worship is easily offended, obsessed with power, and has no commitment to love you.
The gentile cities Paul walked through were full of Pagan temples, some of the temples owned slaves who served as prostitutes. Everywhere, the strong trampled on the weak. There were games where gladiators fought to the death, and prisoners were fed to hungry animals in front of cheering crowds. Unwanted babies were killed or left to the elements on garbage heaps.
But these people were not Paul’s enemy. The powers that lay behind them where his true enemy. Jesus died for these people, who were made in God’s image. And God sent him, like Moses, as an instrument to rescue them from their slavery, even though they don’t know they need saving. Paul could love them, because they were prisoners of war, they had been poisoned. In the words of Jesus
“they know not what they are doing” (Lk 23:34).
On the surface they seem like they are his enemy, but Paul knows who is really pulling the strings.
So, when we bump up against someone, lets try to look a bit deeper. Maybe it is your husband or wife. Maybe it is a neighbour. Maybe it is a child. Maybe it is a fellow Christian. Maybe you catch yourself, and it is you that has been tempted into a destructive pattern. Don’t just look at the surface, look deeper. Look for the pattern of behaviour, or the pattern of thinking. Look for the idol that is being worshipped that has taken the place of Jesus. The power that is pulling the strings.
So, when we bump up against someone, lets try to look a bit deeper. Maybe it is your husband or wife. Maybe it is a neighbour. Maybe it is a child. Maybe it is a fellow Christian. Maybe you catch yourself, and it is you that has been tempted into a destructive pattern. Don’t just look at the surface, look deeper. Look for the pattern of behaviour, or the pattern of thinking. Look for the idol that is being worshipped that has taken the place of Jesus. The power that is pulling the strings.
Above all, prepare. Be alert. Set healthy spiritual patterns up in your own life, so that you aren’t going into battle without your breastplate, shield, or sword. Bathe your life in prayer so that you won’t be caught unprepared, and you won’t be going into battle alone. AMEN
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