It was recently brought to my attention that most people aren’t like me. I know, I know…no major news flash there, but the person was referring to how I perceive the supernatural realm. He pointed out to me that mostpeople aren’t as fearless in their view of what’s going on around them. He reminded me that most people don’t comprehend the concept of legions of demonic entities stalking around us daily and most don’t want to.
It started my wheels turning.
He’s right.
Most people don’t really have a grasp of the spiritual warfare that encircles us at every moment of the day.We walk around in a perpetual fog. Don’t get me wrong; I do feel that most Christians are aware of spiritual warfare. After all, the Bible reveals to us that there is an unseen spiritual realm that affects the physical world. Satan and his demons are waging a vicious spiritual battle all around us, trying to prevent people from coming to a saving knowledge of God’s love and entering His kingdom.Their sole focus is to defeat God’s plans for our lives. As Christians, we need to know about this spiritual battle. 2 Corinthians 2:11 tells us that we need to be aware of the devil's schemes so that he doesn’t have the chance to overcome us. Without awareness, we cannot stand against the wickedness that we face, we cannot protect ourselves, our loved ones, and our ministries. God commands us to stand. He commands us to protect that which he has given us to protect. Ephesians 6:11-20 gives us that commandment when we are told to “Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.” If we are blind to the battle and unaware of what is going on around us simply because we cannot openly see it, then it becomes easy for Satan to deceive us in cunning, subtle ways and to prevent us from being effective at doing the work God intends for us.
So how do we make so many aware who don’t want to be aware? Once again, God gives us the answer. He tells us in Ephesians 4:15 to “speak the truth in love.” Realistically every Christian, every person, isn’t going to grasp fully the reality of the supernatural battles raging in their lives. What they likely can grasp though is that Satan can,and does, attack us and influence our minds, our thoughts, our beliefs, and our actions. Hopefully they can comprehend that we are all involved in spiritual warfare, every one of us, whether we like it or not, whether we even realize it or not. And while you may be fully aware that Satan’s demons are the culprits behind these attacks, some are still not at a point to wrap their minds around that and that’s ok, so long as they are aware that Satan is on the attack.
To help them understand, here is an example that I heard and wrote down some time back.
Imagine a soldier on a battlefield. He can't see or hear any enemies and therefore he doesn't believe that an enemy is out there, so he wanders around without his weapons, not carrying out his assigned duties, completely defenseless and vulnerable, stumbling into the enemy's camp without even being aware of it. The enemy doesn't care that the soldier was ignorant to his presence or if he was unarmed and unaware. The enemy is going to take advantage of the unaware target and attack!!
We can all quickly realize that soldier wasn't going to last long, yet that is precisely the way that many of us live. We don't know that there is a war being fought in the spiritual domain, we don't understand that there is an enemy of pure evil out there and that we are God's soldiers in this spiritual battle. We don't understand that God has an assigned place for each and every Christian or that we have all been given spiritual gifts and spiritual weapons (defensive and offensive) for engaging in the battle in the heaven lies while we are here on earth.
We can all quickly realize that soldier wasn't going to last long, yet that is precisely the way that many of us live. We don't know that there is a war being fought in the spiritual domain, we don't understand that there is an enemy of pure evil out there and that we are God's soldiers in this spiritual battle. We don't understand that God has an assigned place for each and every Christian or that we have all been given spiritual gifts and spiritual weapons (defensive and offensive) for engaging in the battle in the heaven lies while we are here on earth.
As I mentioned earlier, so many of us walk around in a fog, but God wants us to have unclouded minds that see what goes on around us! In fact, our greatest strategy against Satan is clarity of mind, accuracy of perception and awareness!!! And all of these are available to us through God's word and prayer.
