The Invisible Enemy
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
Ephesians 6:12
Last week a friend commented on his struggle to differentiate between the people who present themselves as enemies of God and the spiritual source of darkness found in the enemy of our souls. And still, we tend to focus on individuals or our circumstances, but how many times is our battle a spiritual one we ignore?
There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their exis- tence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them.
C.S. Lewis
From the beginning, when the serpent outmaneuvered Adam and Eve in the garden, our enemy has been at work, doing his best to undermine the work of God – both in the big picture and our everyday lives. The trouble is, too often we speak of Satan as a metaphor for the dark side of the Force and so we do two things mentioned by Lewis above: We underestimate the evil we face and we overestimate our ability to overcome him.
“Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith.”
1 Peter 5:8
Peter tells us to resist, but notice he also tells us how. We stand firm in the faith. And John reminds us that we “have overcome them because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).
As I mentioned in the opening lines above, recognizing the problem is a positive start. I’m thinking of some specific situations today where I have been blind. I’ve often mistaken the source of the conflict. How about you?
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