I’ve been learning a lot, since June, about spiritual
warfare. God told me to focus on
learning about it and practicing it. The
other day I wrote down a list of what I’ve learned to do when I recognize
attacks. I thought it might help you
out. Or you might help me out by adding
to it or correcting anywhere I’ve overstepped.
Responses To & Wards Against Spiritual Attacks:
Prayer
Obviously
there are so many kinds of prayer. First
of all, I can simply ask God for what I want or need. Jesus truly says, “Ask and you shall receive.” I want to try to live that, to find out the
fullness of what it means. Talking to
God keeps me close to Him, keeps my perspective pointed His way. I pray Scripture sometimes, as God leads (Ephesians 6:10-20 if I can't think of anything else). I call out for help from the God who is
mighty enough to deliver me from my enemies.
He is a shield, a help, a comfort, a refuge. And He can guide me to the purposes He has
for me – the things His enemy is trying to distract me from. He can show me how to move past the ambush.
Thanks
So many of
the spiritual attacks come in the form of doubting God’s word and
character. Thanks remembers who God is
and what He has done and what He has promised.
It names them like a claiming for my collection.
Praise
Praise
takes thanks a step further. It shouts
to the world that my God is good. I feel
like it’s less defensive and more offensive in this spiritual battle, a tactic
that has the enemy of God wishing he could avoid bringing the subject up.
Rest
God created
rest. It’s just a fact. He made us to need it. Rest is related so intimately with waiting
and trust. It is an outward submission
to the fact that while I do nothing, He is able to work. He doesn’t need me; I need Him. And so I still my body and even sleep
sometimes, committing my concerns to my good Father.
Enjoying Good Gifts
If one of
the lies is that God isn’t good, it gains power when I refuse to take the good
that God gives. He uses these gifts to
refresh us and to speak to us of His love.
I have to be receiving from God.
If I am dependent on Him, it doesn’t mean that I just let Him do
everything. It doesn’t mean that I only
take from Him the things I perceive as useful for the battle. I take everything He gives. In the midst of sorrow, if He gives laughter,
I take that too. I remember that the
battle isn’t a punishment; it’s a privilege.
So I don’t act like a child pouting in time-out; I taste chocolate and
dance in the yard and I thank God for His wisdom!
Encouragement
I’m so glad
that God didn’t make us to fight these spiritual battles alone. I heard a preacher say once that God called
the Church to spiritual warfare – more than He called individuals. I haven’t figured out what that means or if I
agree entirely, but I do know that the members of the body of Christ have been
given gifts to build each other up for the ministries God has prepared for
us. I love it when my friends tell me
they are in this with me, when they remind me of truth, when they admonish me
to persevere. Sometimes I even beg them
for it.
Prayer Together
This one
has been coming up in my thoughts a lot lately, and I feel conviction that I’m
not very good at making it happen. I
believe that when we recognize spiritual warfare, we should come together to
petition God together for strength, guidance, and victory. For whatever reason, I think we’re supposed
to be doing this in groups and not just alone.
People
Sometimes I
get to be around people who aren’t aware of the battle in my life, and even
that can be a bulwark against spiritual attack.
It is good to be around humans.
We minister to each other. We are
made in the image of God, objects of His love, and instruments of His
righteousness. It is good to be reminded
that God is at work in lives, in situations completely unrelated to my
battles. He grows people. He answers prayers. He wins.
Speaking/Writing/Remembering Truth
When I’m in
the midst of the weightiest attacks, sometimes the only things to cling to are
prayer and truth. I can start small,
naming the truth I see about me: “That is a window. Today is Thursday.” And then I can tell myself, journal, or tell
others truths I know about God. I can
remember things He did in the Bible. I
can remember what He did for me yesterday, last month, last year, or when He
saved me the day I turned six. One very
important thing to remember is that God freely gave His Son to pay for my
sins. Paul springboards from that truth
to asking, “Will He not with Him also freely give us all things?” It doesn’t make sense for God to give us His
most precious possession and then to hold little things back just to be
mean! The final type of truth that I
focus on is who I am in Christ: “I am chosen.
I am sealed. I am empowered. I am loved.”
Fasting and Self-Denial
Mostly my
experience with fasting is experimentation.
I ask God whether to fast. I don’t
understand all of how it works or why God made fasting to have power in
spiritual warfare, but Jesus said it, so I believe it. Maybe it has something to do with recognizing
my dependence on God for the sustaining of my life. I think there is something to be said for
self-denial, for practicing being led by something other than the impulses of
what my body or mind want. Plus, since
the body is pretty good at sending those impulses, I can use them as a reminder
to focus on God and to pray.
Obedience
The Bible
warns me to take heed lest I am also tempted, when I’m pro-actively engaged in
the spiritual battle. So I regularly
evaluate whether I’m being obedient. How
have I failed to do what I know God wants me to? I put on the breastplate of righteousness,
believing that pursuing good works God has called me to puts me in the places
where He can readily use me to intercede for others. When I am obedient, I am not so distracted
with repenting – and I am not fighting to regain the foothold I had given over
to the Devil. But I also remember that
my God is merciful. When I fall, I cry
out to Him and He forgives. His grace
strengthens me for obedience; it isn’t something I do apart from Him and then
bring myself before Him well-armored in my own good works and strength. Unless the Lord guards the city, the watchman
stays awake in vain. I have to let it be
Him working in me.
Reading
and Hearing Truth
I want my
mind to be saturated with truth so much that it can’t even hear the lies of the
Devil. I want to be so confident in the
truth that deceits are easily identified and turned back. So I read the Bible, read books about factual
things, listen to Christian lectures or good Christian music.
Work
Rest is
important, but so is staying busy. The
last thing I need is down time when my prayers are exhausted and I’m bored and
the temptation comes to chase after my own pleasure. Work is therapeutic. It is a taking-back from the chaos, a living
out of the dominion God called the first Man and Woman to. In a way, that’s the same thing happening in
spiritual warfare.
Calling On Jesus’ Name
This one is
potent. If I feel strongly oppressed, I
need to speak Jesus’ name aloud, to claim the authority of the King of Kings to
fight this battle for me. It’s also
pretty potent before God. If I’m
confident enough that my prayer is for Jesus’ sake, for bearing fruit in
His kingdom, I present my supplications in Jesus’ name. And Jesus promised that whatever we ask the
Father in His name, we can have confidence that we have from Him. This is another form of acknowledging the
truth of God’s promises.
Rebuking Demons
Sometimes I
need to take seriously that there are personal creatures scheming against me
and that they do not have authority to oppose me, because I am a chosen
ambassador of God in the world. I openly
resist the Devil, and trust that the Bible is true when it says “He will flee
from you.” I don’t know how long it
lasts, or exactly how this works, but I try it because it is taught in
Scripture.
Prayer For Others
The
spiritual battle does not just affect individuals, so I pray for others
potentially involved to be guarded against the schemes, temptations, and opposition
of our spiritual enemy. I pray for them
to put on and take up the armor of God, being strengthened with His might. I pray for them to be vigilant. I pray that God would hedge their families,
their health, their jobs, their travel – and anything else that seems relevant
or that God leads me to pray for them. I
pray that they will be in right standing with God, repentant of sins and
practicing righteousness. Intercession
is one more thing that I think the spiritual warfare is opposing in the first
place, so to go forward doing it seems to me a good idea in resisting the
attacks.
Attention to God’s Works
Like
remembering what God has done in the past, and being around people in whom God
is active at present, I can look around me right now and observe the wise and
powerful works of God. These things don’t
have to be spiritual, though sometimes they are. I gain encouragement watching God change the
seasons, open up wildflowers, bring a bee buzzing by. I watch Him move the hearts of “kings.” This isn’t quite the same as praise or
thanks, because it precedes them. First
I slow down and give heed to what God is doing – I set out looking for it.
To God be all glory.
