Have you ever seen the movie the Ghost Busters? If you're too young to remember it, you can look at this site. It's a comedy about four unemployed guys who put up a ghost removal service and run into all sorts of goofy but dangerous scenarios, including one that almost catapults them into the end of the world. Think Spirit Questors (a local parapsychology/ paranormal experts group), fire fighters and astronauts rolled into one. The four characters who save the day have cool pest-control outfits, helmets and awesome ray guns used to point and shoot at slimy monstrosities.Ultimately they come up against the most dangerous character there who comes in the form of a beautiful demon-possessed woman. There are demons running around, portals opening up, inanimate objects coming to life and monsters messing around with human lives.
It's just a movie. But it also sounds like stuff you read from the the book of Revelation. Like stuff from people who suffer from paranormal manifestation.
Such things are indeed real in our world today, and will even become more so as we approach the end.
People think of movies like these at the mention of "spiritual warfare." We tend to think that spiritual warfare is a high-impact thriller, drama and horror movie rolled into one.
So is this what spiritual warfare is? Yes and no.
I'll keep it simple.
Spiritual warfare involves a state of war against:
- demons and evil spirits
- the world system
- your own self
People think that spiritual warfare is like the Ghost Busters movie. That's just one part of it. In the list above, the most important element you war against is yourself. When you use the Spirit and the Word of God to open your eyes to truth in order to put away a faulty world view, wrong principles, erroneous ideas, and deceiving beliefs then you will not cooperate with the world system and you will not open doors to demons and evil spirits. And when you do that, you don't do actions or cultivate habits and a kind of lifestyle that will damn you and the people you influence to hell.
When you lose the battle against yourself, then you're in critical danger. You've given up sacred ground to the enemy. You'll be needing help from other people to purge the evil out. That's when the scenario turns into a thriller-horror-drama.
So at the very core, spiritual warfare is battling against yourself because the battle starts in the mind.
THINGS TO REMEMBER
1. "Spiritual warfare" denotes that there is a battle going on (Ephesians 6:12). So that's lesson no. 1. We are in a state of war. The natural world merely reflects what is going on in the heavenlies. Why do we have wars, political conflict, ISIS, drug abuse, rebellion, the break down of families, crime and erosion of morals? It's because we are at war.
God did not create evil but he gave his creatures free will. With that free will Lucifer rebelled against the Lord (Isaiah 14:12) because he thought that he deserved worship and that he could "be like the Most High." When he was cast out from heaven (Revelation 12:7), his wrath has turned towards us because we are God's Beloved. God loved us so much (John 3:16) that even when we made a mistake, He provided a way out for us (1 Corinthians 10:13). He has given us the sacrificial atonement of Yeshua the Messiah (Romans 3:25). Unbelievers don't understand this sacrifice and mock it because they don't understand it. But at the very core of this act was a legal transaction. God used His own blood to redeem us. He had to take the rights away from Satan who became the ruler of this world because that authority was transferred to Satan when Adam sinned against God.
Through Christ's death and resurrection, the blood debt has been paid and now the rights to this world is reclaimed by Jesus (Revelation 11:15). But Satan continues to sit on the throne of this world as a usurper (2 Thessalonians 2:4) until the day the true and rightful king wrenches the seat of power away from him. On that day the Lord will save His people. He will heal the land and set up His kingdom to rule the earth (Psalm 72, Isaiah 11).
It sounds like a powerful plot for a Hollywood blockbuster. It'll make a great movie yeah? But unless you understand that this is our reality and not fiction you will not be able to wage against the powers and principalities. You have to understand what the real deal is because the war is invisible. What we see in our surroundings - Israel under attack, the persecution of Christians, laws that defy the Lord and desecrates his laws - are mere symptoms of what's going on behind the veil.
We are in perpetual war with wicked forces in the heavenly realms whose sole purpose it is to ruin your life and get you to turn your back on God and damn your soul to hell for all eternity. Satan hates us because when he fell, he is damned for eternity (Revelation 20:1-10). But when mankind fell, Jesus redeemed us with his blood.
He hates us because Satan has seen the beauty and purity of heaven and he knows he can never return there. He hates us because weak, mortals like us through the blood of Jesus have been given the power to become the sons of God (John 1:12) and to inherit eternal life.
2. The beings we are going up against are NOT benign. No matter how friendly you might imagine these creatures to be, they are not. They are not guardians, friendly ghosts, home spirits, elves (duwende) or whatever it is your imagination is making them out to be.
This reminds me of a story. I know of two women. One of them has a third eye. She can see spiritual beings through the veil and her daughter has the same - dare I say - "gift." Let's call her Lady A. One time, Lady A and a group stayed at an old ancestral house in the province. In the old houses the bathrooms are extremely large to make room to bathe several children all at once. It was an interesting and creepy old house and despite the number of rooms, all the guests huddled together in one room for the night. Lady A went to the bathroom to wash and change clothes. She put on her pajamas and when she straightened up to face the mirror, an evil-looking child (when I asked her what it looked like she just said - "maldita") twisting her neck and contorting her face was looking straight at her from the mirror. She was out of there in half a second and had to wait till the morning to retrieve the underwear that she left behind.
Meanwhile Lady B does not have a similar gift but Lady A claims that she can see a spiritual entity residing in Lady B's old car. Lady B believes this entity is a "bantay." In local parlance it means a guardian.
Now whether this entity is truly a guardian or not is up for debate. But it is worrisome that Christians or people who profess in God are quick to judge a spirit without testing it. As for Lady A's experience in the old house, this is a classic example of the nature of such entities.Some may pretend to be benign but they are not. At its worst, they exhibit malevolence; at best they are mischievous.
They seek to provoke fear into the heart of people. If not fear, the aim is to deceive (make you think it is benevolent so you will open your life to it or let your guard down), to enter your life, and have some form of influence that will lead on a sinister path.
In my younger days when I was a rebellious teenager, I was constantly harassed by these creatures. For all intents and purposes our house was definitely infested and these beings found a portal through my room and gained strength in my anger towards my elders. In the night they would torment me and in the daytime they would vanish that I would question myself whether these things were real at all. But they didn't just bother me each night. They increased strife, discord between the people at our home, put hatred and suicidal thoughts in my mind and increased my predilection towards depression. When God rid me of them the symptoms also disappeared.
continue to WHAT IS SPIRITUAL WARFARE? PART 2
