spiritual warfare

So we’re fighting a three-front war—something no one’s likely to win without divine power. Let’s take a look at the first enemy, the world.

I wrote some on this just a few posts ago, focusing primarily on definitional matters. Here I’d like to focus on how to fight so as to win. I think a key biblical source on this question is John’s first epistle.

The Right Family

I’d suggest that the essential requirement for this fight is being in the right family (or to continue the military metaphor, the right army); without this identity and the power it conveys, all is lost. John writes,

For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith (1J 5.4).

To be effective in battle, a soldier has to be alive. In the spiritual battle against the combined forces of the world as organized in opposition to God, the spiritually dead have no hope.

But to be spiritually alive, a member of God’s family—now that equips and mobilizes a person for spiritual warfare. And John identifies the impetus for spiritual life: faith.

The biblical authors are agreed on this. Paul writes, “By grace are you saved, through faith—and that not of yourselves” (Ep 2.8). Peter writes of “the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls” (1P 1.9). The author to the Hebrews states, “Without faith it is impossible to please [God]” (He 11.6).

Faith is simply trusting God to forgive your sins on the basis of Christ’s death on your behalf (Ro 3.21.28).

How do you know if you’re in?

Well, there are actually several signs of that, but let me focus on just one: your attitude toward sin will change. Whereas you once loved your sin, you now see it accurately as your enemy, the destroyer of your soul. And you turn from it. The Bible calls that “repentance.” You won’t completely stop sinning—in my opinion that’s impossible this side of the grave—but your attitude toward sin will change, and you’ll fight against it. As time goes on and you gain fighting experience, you’ll get better at the fight, but you’ll be attitudinally on board from the very beginning (1J 3.9).

The Right Focus

Any combat veteran will tell you that to succeed in battle, you have to pay attention. Focus is absolute.

Just after identifying faith as the key in the verse quoted above (1J 5.4), John writes,

And who is the one who overcomes the world, but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? (1J 5.5).

As a believer, you keep your focus on Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God, because he is the one we follow, we serve. He is the battlefield commander, and following his orders certainly eventuates in victory. Why is that? Because Jesus, as God, is all-powerful and cannot be defeated.

You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world (1J 4.4).

In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world (Jn 16.33).

To win this fight, every soldier needs to concentrate on Christ, study him, learn him. Everything else is a distraction.

Focusing on Christ will also enable you to focus on the long-term rather than the short-term. The English poet William Wordsworth wrote, “The world is too much with us.” It fills our peripheral vision with distractions, like the mobile over a baby’s crib, and we’re tempted to fritter away our limited lifetime on passing, temporary things: stuff, applause, pop culture, and a host of other trivia.

When your mind is focused on the eternal—most especially, likeness to the image of Christ (2Co 3.18)—the flashing neon roadside signs seem dim and worthless. Like an experienced driver, you focus down the road, taking in the whole scene and driving responsibly, safely, effectively, arriving at your destination, which was the whole point of being on the road in the first place.

Focus. It will enable you to defeat your enemy the world.

Photo by Henry Hustava on Unsplash

The Scripture often uses military language for the Christian life. Most famously, I suppose, Paul describes the “armor” (lit. “panoply”) of the Christian warrior, supplied by God for both defense and offense (Ep 6.13-17). Christians who take a more pacifist approach to life (e.g. Quakers, Mennonites, and others) are sometimes troubled by other Christians who emphasize this language; I had a high school teacher who mocked the hymn “Onward, Christian Soldiers,” particularly the line “marching off to war.” (Incidentally, the music typically used for that hymn was composed by Arthur Sullivan, of “Gilbert and Sullivan” fame.) My high school years were during the Vietnam era, with its accompanying protests, and my teacher was on the antiwar side. I note that the decades since have muddied the war/antiwar lines, with both the political left and the political right divided over US interventionism, as currently embodied in the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

But that’s off the point; sorry.

There’s certainly no question that the Bible uses military language, and not just in reporting conflicts in Israelite history, but also in noting the Lord’s active direction in those military exploits (e.g. Jos 8.1-29) and in applying the military metaphor to the Christian’s experience in the world (e.g. 1Ti 6.12).

God expects us to fight.

Against whom?

I note that while God indeed instructed the armies of Israel to fight against—and destroy—the Canaanite tribes (he gives the reason for that in his words to Abraham in Ge 15.16), and while he strengthened various kings of Israel in their military conquests against Israel’s neighbors, after the theocracy the Scripture seems uninterested in fighting political opponents. Jesus, for example, repeatedly refused to take on the Zealots’ cause against Rome (Jn 6.15), even though he allowed his followers to call him king (e.g. Jn 1.49; Lk 19.38) and willingly died under the charge that he was “King of the Jews” (Jn 19.3, 14, 19). There’s a theological reason for that, of course: Jesus’ purpose in his first coming was not to overthrow earthly kingdoms—physically—but to die for sin and to rise again, defeating death. But I also note that after Christ’s ascension, Paul commands submission to earthly powers (Ro 13.1-7), even when the emperor at the time was Nero. He does not hint at attacking, let alone overthrowing, even corrupt and unjust governments.

I conclude, then, that when the Bible uses military language about the Christian life, those passages are not talking about political fights. (Obvious disclaimer: of course we ought to use our God-given rights to oppose evil in society, among other ways, by engaging in political activity.)

So what enemy or enemies are these passages talking about? Paul’s “armor” passage names the devil specifically (Ep 6.11), and John focuses in his first epistle on “the world” (1J 2.15-17), right after he has referred to “the wicked one” (1J 2.14). And in his characterization of the world, he speaks specifically of “the lust of the flesh” (1J 2.16).

It’s no surprise, then, that our battle is routinely described as one against “the world, the flesh, and the devil.” Some people are surprised to learn that that phrase doesn’t actually appear in the Bible, though as we’ve demonstrated, the concept is solidly biblically based.

We’re not sure where the particular wording came from; the earliest use of it I can find is by Peter Abelard (AD 1079-1142), a French philosopher and theologian. He wrote extensively, including a series of “Expositions,” including “An Exposition on the Lord’s Prayer.” (I haven’t been able to find the text of this in English online, so no link; sorry.)

On the prayer’s sixth petition (“deliver us from evil”), he writes, “There are three things that tempt us: the flesh, the world, and the devil.”

And we’ve liked that summary ever since. The Catholic Church included it in the Canons of the Council of Trent (Sixth Session, Chapter 13), and the Litany of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer includes it as well (“From fornicacion, and all other deadlye synne, and from al the deceytes of the worlde, the fleshe, and the devil”). (That’s the 1549 edition.)

It’s a good formulation that has stood the test of time. I’d like to spend a few posts meditating on it.

Photo by Henry Hustava on Unsplash

Dan Olinger

Subscribe via Email

On Winning the War, Part 2: The World

On Winning the War, Part 1: Identifying the Enemy