SPIRITUAL WARFARE: FROM THE LEAST TO THE MOST EFFECTIVE
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, June 6, 2025 – Scratch even nominal Christians and you’ll find spiritual warriors directly under the surface. They might not consider themselves spiritual warriors, but every gesture made by self-identified believers is a spear chucked or a bullet ducked in the spiritual realm. We all pray 24/7, whether we realize it or not. Even our dreams are prayers.
For us born-again believers, spiritual warfare is our number one priority. We know only too well (or we should know, because Jesus told us in scripture) how our every word, gesture, and thought contributes to the war effort. And so we strive to focus on God and God only and to do his will and his will only, knowing that all good things flow from him and him only. Whatever we direct to God, we know that God will purify, recycle, personalize, repackage, and send to whoever has it coming, in perfect measure.
LEAST EFFECTIVE
The least effective form of spiritual warfare is directed prayer, whether off-the-cuff or recited. When you specify who is to benefit and how, you restrict the benefit from spilling over to anyone else. In the same way, when you pray against someone (never advisable), you restrict your enmity to a specific target. God takes you at your word and respects your requests, but your prayers still can’t override his justice. If you pray for the benefit of someone God doesn’t want to benefit in that way (because it doesn’t align with his justice), your prayer has no efficacy. Think of David praying for the recovery of his first child with Bathsheba. A full week of fasting and prayer couldn’t override what David and Bathsheba had coming due to their collective sin.
PRAYER REBOUND
Even worse, if you pray specifically against certain people, whether they’ve earned the enmity or not, you run the risk of prayer rebound or bringing on yourself the negative rewards you wished on your prayer target. When Jesus taught us to treat others as we want to be treated, the lesson wasn’t simply to be kind for kindness’s sake; it was to be kind because kindness will then be your reward. In the same way, enmity will be your earned reward if you wish enmity on others. We born-again believers are not exempt from this spiritual law.
MORE EFFECTIVE
A more effective form of spiritual warfare prayer is to open wide the prayer windows and give God broader scope to act on your behalf. Instead of praying, for instance, for your mother’s physical healing, pray that your family be made whole. A prayer for a family to be made whole covers a wider group of people (not just your mother or even your family) and includes both physical and spiritual healing. This amplified approach gives God access to move in the lives of all the people who affect your mother’s wellbeing. The broader the prayer application, the greater the efficacy, and the more likely a successful outcome, keeping in mind that the optimum outcome is spiritual healing.
MOST EFFECTIVE
Ironically, the most effective form of spiritual warfare doesn’t appear to most people (even Christians) to be spiritual warfare. Jesus taught it to us in scripture and framed not just as a directive but as a command – that we’re to love our enemies. The recoil can be palpable when you remind people of this command. Even we born-again believers can find the thought distasteful if applied to certain individuals. This is where we need to set aside our feelings and act as soldiers by unquestioningly and unhesitatingly following orders. A command is an order, not a suggestion, and seeing that we’re all soldiers in this ongoing spiritual battle, obedience is our currency.
And how are we to wage this highest and most effective form of spiritual warfare? We love our enemies not by exposing them but by praying for them and protecting them. We love our enemies not by depriving them of what they need to survive but by blessing them with abundance. We love our enemies by seemingly doing the opposite of what we consider they’ve brought on themselves, consulting first with God on what precisely we should do and knowing that God will work it all out according to his perfect justice. And because we’ve been obedient to Jesus’ command, we can expect the rewards that come from obedience, both here and in Heaven. Those blessings will become part of our store of treasures awaiting us if and when we make it Home.
TL;DR
Our every thought, word, and deed contribute to the battle being waged in the spiritual realm. That battle is ongoing and non-stop, and we’re part of it whether we realize it or not. We can consciously contribute to the war effort through directed or broad-range prayers, but our most effective contribution—and the one most blessed by God—is to love our enemies. Jesus not only taught us to love those who hate us but commanded us to do so. In obeying Jesus’ command, we achieve the greatest spiritual victories and are rewarded accordingly.
THE DANGER IN PRESUMED INNOCENCE: THE BOOK OF JOB
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, June 4, 2025 – If we asked him, do you think God would describe any of us as “perfect and upright”, as he described Job?
I’m guessing not.
So, if God wouldn’t describe us the same way as he described Job, why would we draw a parallel between Job’s sufferings and ours?
I’ve had discussions over the years with people who for one reason or another are particularly drawn to the book of Job. They see their sufferings mirrored in Job’s and so see the reason for their sufferings as being the same as Job’s. In other words, they believe their sufferings were not earned but instead imposed on them for reasons unknown. In other words, they see themselves as innocent.
This is a very dangerous position to adopt spiritually. As born-again believers, we can never afford to presume our innocence: the presumption of innocence is a worldly default and mechanism that has no place in the Kingdom. We need to default to repentance when we suffer adversity, though there are also occasions when we’re being tested (God will let us know the one from the other). But regardless of whether we suffer an earned punishment or a test, our response should always be the same – humble obedience to God, and patient endurance
On the other hand, had he been asked about Jesus during his time on Earth, God would likely have described him as perfect and upright. God did come pretty close to offering that description when he stated he was “well pleased” in Jesus and that we should “listen to him”. Still, God also allowed Jesus to suffer extreme adversities as tests, culminating in his crucifixion. What Jesus never suffered—what sets him apart from every other human being—is earned adversity. Jesus didn’t earn his suffering. He agreed to it, but he didn’t earn it. This contrasts with the rest of us, who either suffer because we’ve brought the suffering on ourselves or suffer from being tested.
The danger in the book of Job is that people perceive their suffering as paralleling Job’s, without taking into account that they’re not perfect and upright as Job was. By falsely equating themselves to Job, people look past their need to repent, focusing instead on their perceived innocence. The result is not only a lost opportunity to come clean with God, but a prolonging of their suffering, which is then made worse by the pride of false innocence. In denying their guilt, they deny themselves the grace of peace that can only come from genuine repentance.
Self-imposed suffering is a painful place to be. To avoid it, we need always to be ready and willing to repent.
A BORN-AGAIN BELIEVER 