Spiritual War?
Be serious! Be alert! Your adversary the Devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour. Resist him and be firm in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are being experienced by your fellow believers throughout the world. -1 Peter 5:8–9 (HCSB)
Spiritual warfare is happening whether you know it or not. Whether you have been trained for it or not. Whether you believe in it or not. Whether you are saved or lost, spiritually mature or spiritually ignorant, the conflict does not wait for your awareness before it begins. Spiritual warfare did not begin when you became a Christian, and it will not end when your earthly life is over if Christ doesn't return first. When we were born we entered a conflict that was already underway long before we arrived.
The biblical story itself unfolds against that backdrop.
In Genesis 2, there is no warfare between men because there is only one man and one woman. There are no armies, no kingdoms, no famine, no conquest, no murder, and no graves. God gives Adam life. He gives him a place. He gives him work. He gives him provision. He gives him a wife. He gives mankind dominion over creation under His own sovereign rule. And He gives Adam His Word. Everything necessary for life comes from God, and everything remains ordered beneath God.
Then Genesis 3 introduces another voice.
The serpent does not arrive with an army. He arrives with a question: “Did God really say...?” (Gen. 3:1 CSB). Spiritual warfare enters the human story first through deception. Satan attacks God's Word, God's character, God's motives, and man's confidence in what God has said. He convinces mankind that something better exists outside the boundaries of God's goodness. The lie is believed, rebellion follows, and death enters the human experience. That single sin begins spreading immediately.
By Genesis 4, deception has become murder. Cain kills Abel. Spiritual war is in full swing. The enemy whom Jesus later calls “a murderer from the beginning” (John 8:44 CSB) has found fertile ground in the fallen human heart. What began as a lie concerning God now produces the destruction of another human life.
By Genesis 6, violence has filled the earth. “The earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with wickedness” (Gen. 6:11 CSB). Sin is no longer merely an individual act in a garden. Violence has become characteristic of human society.
After the flood, God again gives mankind life, blessing, and an ordered world in which to live. He places His bow in the clouds as the sign of His covenant mercy (Gen. 9:13). God continues dealing with mankind in grace. Yet the corruption within mankind remains.
By Genesis 11, fallen humanity has organized itself around power, reputation, and self-exaltation: “Let us make a name for ourselves” (Gen. 11:4 CSB). The impulse that began in Eden – life apart from dependence upon God – has now become corporate. Men organize. Men build. Men consolidate. Men seek greatness. Dominion entrusted by God becomes domination sought by man. That pattern runs throughout the rest of Scripture.
Men desire land. Men desire wealth. Men desire authority. Kings rise against kings. Nations invade nations. The powerful exploit the weak. Empires expand through bloodshed. War destroys agriculture and trade. Scarcity follows conflict. Famine follows scarcity. Disease and death follow famine and war. Behind the visible actions of sinful mankind Scripture repeatedly reveals another dimension – spiritual powers working through deception, idolatry, accusation, temptation, pride, violence, and rebellion against God.
Satan exploits what sin has distorted. He does not have to create pride. He feeds it. He does not have to create greed. He uses it. He does not have to create man's desire to rule over other men. He exploits it. He does not have to force every man to murder. He lies until men become willing to destroy one another for land, wealth, power, ideology, vengeance, or glory.
The Old Testament continually exposes this relationship between earthly kingdoms and spiritual rebellion. Pharaoh enslaves and murders while opposing the purposes of God. Nations surround Israel and attempt to destroy the people through whom God's promised Redeemer will come. Kings exalt themselves. Empires rise and consume other peoples. Daniel even allows the curtain to be pulled back far enough for us to see spiritual powers connected with earthly kingdoms and political conflict. What happens visibly among men cannot always be understood merely by looking at men. Then Jesus comes. And when He comes, Satan immediately attempts to destroy Him.
Herod murders children in an effort to kill the promised King. Satan confronts Jesus in the wilderness and offers Him “all the kingdoms of the world” in exchange for worship (Matt. 4:8–9 CSB). Demons recognize Him before many men do. Religious leaders are deceived into opposing the very Messiah they claim to await. Judas opens himself to Satan's influence. Political authority, religious corruption, greed, fear, betrayal, lies, and violence converge at the cross. Yet the cross, which appears to be Satan's greatest triumph, becomes the instrument of his defeat.
Christ “disarmed the rulers and authorities and disgraced them publicly; he triumphed over them in him” (Col. 2:15 CSB). Satan's machinery of accusation collides with the blood of Christ. Sin's debt is cancelled. Death's claim is broken. The apparent victory of darkness becomes the decisive victory of the Son of God. But the defeated enemy continues to oppose the purposes of God.
For example, the book of Acts records persecution, deception, false teaching, imprisonment, political violence, demonic activity, and repeated attempts to silence the Gospel. The Epistles explain what believers are actually experiencing. Paul speaks of rulers, authorities, cosmic powers of darkness, and spiritual forces of evil. Peter describes the devil as an adversary seeking someone to devour. John describes the spirit of antichrist already operating in the world. James tells believers to resist the devil. The conflict that began before Eden continues through the age of the Church. Then Revelation shows where the entire machinery is heading.
Revelation 6 gives the terrible picture of the four horsemen. Conquest moves across the earth. Peace is removed and men slaughter one another. Economic collapse and famine follow. Then comes the pale horse whose rider is named Death, “and Hades was following after him” (Rev. 6:8 CSB).The sequence is devastating because it looks remarkably like the trajectory already revealed throughout Scripture.
The desire to conquer produces conflict. Conflict produces war. War produces scarcity. Scarcity produces famine. War and famine produce death. And beyond death stands Hades and judgment. What appears there in Revelation on an enormous scale is not foreign to the rest of the biblical story. It is the terrible maturity of the same rebellion introduced in Genesis.
Genesis opens with God giving mankind life, provision, purpose, relationship, and dominion beneath His rule. Satan enters with a lie. The lie produces rebellion. Rebellion produces alienation. Alienation produces murder. Murder becomes violence. Violence becomes domination. Domination becomes kingdoms fighting kingdoms. Kingdoms fighting kingdoms produce war. War produces famine. Famine and war produce death. And Revelation shows Death riding across the earth with Hades following behind. That is the machinery of destruction.
Jesus described its character with remarkable simplicity. The thief comes “only to steal and kill and destroy.” Christ immediately contrasts that purpose with His own: “I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance” (John 10:10 CSB). That's two trajectories. From Genesis onward, Satan works toward deception, bondage, destruction, death, and ultimately the eternal ruin of mankind and from Genesis onward, God is fulfilling promise, redemption, rescue, reconciliation, resurrection, and life through His Son.
Satan lies to the ignorant. He works to keep the lost from seeing the truth of the Gospel. He accuses those whom Christ has justified. He tempts those whom Christ has redeemed. He seeks to steal joy that could have been enjoyed, destroy usefulness that could have borne fruit, silence testimony that could have pointed someone toward Christ, fracture relationships that could have displayed the love of God, and keep defeated Christians living as though the victory of Christ had never occurred.
That is why spiritual warfare cannot be reduced to strange manifestations, dramatic encounters, or stories about demons. Spiritual warfare is woven through the biblical account from Genesis to Revelation. It appears wherever God's truth confronts Satan's lie, wherever life confronts death, wherever faith confronts unbelief, wherever God's purposes confront rebellion, and wherever Christ's kingdom advances into darkness.
The lost person is already in that conflict, and is in a losing position, even if he does not know there is a conflict. The believer remains in that conflict after salvation, although his position within it has radically changed. Salvation does not begin spiritual warfare in lives. Salvation changes the side you’re on. And Scripture does not reveal this conflict so that Christians will become fascinated with Satan. It reveals the conflict so that they will understand what Christ has accomplished and learn to stand in His victory.
The battle is real. The enemy is real. The destruction is real. But so is the victory already accomplished by Christ.
Trust Him completely. He is your victory.
More about spiritual warfare to follow this week...God bless you!