Bearing Up Under Spiritual Attack

Enemies are foes because they work strategically and tactically and operationally — at all levels of threat engagement — to bring a land, a people, a kingdom, an entity, even a person, to their knees. It can seem there are enemies littered through life, but truly most of the time the litany of threats perceived are not from a physical entity, but from a spiritual nemesis.

Satan is in view, here; with his legions of agents and angelic aggressors.

His agents are those who speak and act — whether knowing so or not — in his name. His angelic aggressors have simple, focused roles; to bring us down in a little way; to destroy us through discouragement or fear. And their very best weapon is to make us self-conscious — to the point it plays on us.

Spiritual attack comes in myriad form, and one obvious sign is the felt experience of a destruction of functional self-confidence. Note, I don’t just say “self-confidence,” because Satan often wills us on from there through pride. There is no need of attack when we are already his agent. When we are in pride, we speak and act in his name, not Jesus’. Functional self-confidence, on the other hand, is what gives us the belief and creativity to act for the Kingdom, when we might otherwise shun the idea of being a servant.

Satan hates — with a perditious passion — anything done for Christ’s Kindgom.

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So, if we are agents for God and we are given to serve the Kingdom, we will be subject to attack, whether we perceive it or not. Perhaps better are we when we serendipitously go about our work without any awareness of the evil that lurks! But, no, that is not really so.

It is better to wrestle with the idea of competing spirits — the battle that rages silently and invisibly. It is better to wrestle with our fears; to bring them into subjugation to Christ. It is better by far to wrestle with the knowledge that, there in eternity, a war has raged since almost the very beginning.

The battle continues today.

We may, in our own little lives, feel almost invisible ourselves. But each of us is equally fought for in the realms of eternity — even as we live and breathe. Nothing is insignificant. Everything is part of our Lord’s (his) story.

So, the battle continues today. It’s nothing to be fearful of, just to be aware of. It’s nothing to stop us, just knowledge to keep us going. It’s everything to assure us that everything we think, say, and do is powerfully significant.

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When the enemy of God,

Tries to knock you off your course,

Know that the Spirit who defends us,

Doesn’t need us to react with force.

Simple awareness is the end of the matter,

As we turn within and say,

“I know what you’re up to, Satan,

And you won’t be having your way!”

© 2015 S. J. Wickham.