Spiritual Warfare < TheoLogosSite: what Christians must know

Beyond our bodies and environment, we must resist another force that works against us.

The Bible frequently mentions the Satan, who isn’t symbolic or figurative:

He tempted the first sin (Genesis 3:4-5).
He fell from heaven and roams the earth (Job 1:6-7, Isaiah 14:12-14).
He is exceptionally glorious, beautiful, and intelligent, and can disguise himself as an angel of light (Ezekiel 28:11-19, 2 Corinthians 11:14).
He continually steals truths people hear before they can understand (Matthew 13:19).
The original Bible’s word use calls him “the Satan”, not simply “Satan”, and our antagonists are numerous even while they share a similar goal.

He’s more powerful than most Christians think:

The entire world is in the Satan’s power (1 John 5:19).
You can only resist the Satan through Christ (Ephesians 6:11).
- God will protect you from him (2 Thessalonians 3:3).
- God has granted all Christians full power over the Satan in Jesus’ name (Luke 10:19).
- Even non-believers who use Jesus’ name have power over him (Matthew 7:21-23).
However, the Satan’s power only extends as far as God permits (Job 1:12).
- God keeps the Satan constantly within the range of temptations we can overcome (1 Corinthians 10:13).

We face an army of demons.

A large portion of Jesus’ ministry was casting out demons (Matthew 8:16, Mark 1:34).
Jesus’ followers were granted power to cast out demons (Luke 9:1).
The demons have names, and knowing their names gives us power (Luke 8:27-33).

The Satan’s battle campaigns in minds

The mind is the Satan’s battleground:

Every single conversation and interaction can become a spiritual battle (Romans 12:2, Ephesians 6:12, 2 Corinthians 10:5).
The Satan attacks at three degrees of intensity:
1. Harassment and oppression by alluding to lies that someone might believe.
2. If someone is willing to listen (including believers, influencing and speaking to people directly to their mind.
3. Directly controlling them through their loss of control via bad habits, which can include possession.
Our design means we become ineffective or destructive if he wins against our mind.

When we satisfy our sins, our thoughts dwell on them more:

We develop an anxious, distrustful, violent, envious attitude when we dwell on sins.
The Satan uses our sins as vectors of attack against us.

We only win the battle against the Satan when we fully submit our minds to Christ:

The Holy Spirit brings correct, healthy thoughts into your mind through Scripture and other believers.
Meditating on Scripture improves our ability to associate positive thoughts.
As little as fifteen minutes a day of daily prayer and meditation with God will calm your mind.

The Satan is extremely efficient with his resources

His strategy directly attacks Christians and the Church from many angles:

The Satan’s lies tend to exploit the fact that we can’t always be certain about many things.
He typically erodes our trust in good things.
He’ll also make us prefer to trust evil things more often.

Before anything else, the Satan traps people with their sins and idols:

The quickest way to tempt someone is in their body, but any desire will work.
The Satan can use the whole world’s variety of pleasures to distract, from large-scale media to natural forces to creature comforts.
Non-believers are trapped in their sin because their conscience knows the Law (Romans 2:14).
Believers can trap themselves in sin when they neglect to confess or acknowledge them.
At this stage, people are oblivious to the Satan’s presence.
People are responsible to repent to the Lord to prevent further enslavement by their sin.

The Satan tries to interest people in self-glorifying religion:

Outside their fruits, self-worship is difficult to distinguish from people who love God:
- They declare their belief in Jesus (James 2:19).
- They act in the name of Jesus (Matthew 7:21-23).
- If they teach, they’ll mislead people from the truth (Matthew 24:10-11).
- They’ll place personal experience before God’s word but will misuse Scripture to enforce those experiences.
These people must repent, and some of them have been possessed or oppressed by a demon.

The Satan attracts people with the occult and its practices:

Satanic practices have many things in common:
- Always some contact with the spirit world.
- Always uncovering hidden knowledge of the past or future.
- Most of them promise an experience of receiving power.
- They all require a passive meditative state before the spirit world can operate properly.
- Typically, participants will feel a strange magnetism with an underlying fear.
These activities open a door for massive demonic influence and can often lead to possession.
- These experiences can pass to the third and fourth generations of a family (Deuteronomy 5:8-10).

The Satan attacks any straggler sins believers may maintain:

Beware any odd temptations you haven’t desired in years or decades.
Watch for unusual feelings of guilt, fear, shame, lust, or anything else out-of-place for the situation.

If he can’t destroy someone any longer, he’ll find ways to entice and bring down close family or friends:

The Satan will often try to inspire those people to attack and undermine that person.
He’ll test someone’s patience by intensifying conflict or magnifying particular sensations.
The Satan will work progressively from closest to furthest affiliations.
As much as you can, pray for their protection and for God to deliver them (Matthew 6:13).
Children are an enormous distraction, mostly because tempting children is easy and because parents’ biological wiring is configured to protect them.

Anyone can detect demonic activity

The Satan only risks direct assault if someone directly observes spiritual activity without distraction:

The Satan’s forces are keenly aware that Jesus has ultimate authority, so he only attacks when he has nothing left to lose (Mark 5:6-7).
To cure any curses, make specific prayer requests to Jesus for protection and healing (Luke 9:1).
Even Christians risk experiencing curses (Deuteronomy 29:24-28).
Prayer and fasting is the most consistent, effective way to fight the Satan’s forces (Mark 9:14-29).

A. Rule out the possibility of any physical issues:

The Satan can easily sow distrust and fear in the Body through people who become “demon inspectors”.
We can frequently think awful things and even hallucinate when we’re exhausted, starved, or stressed.

B. Search for any violation of biblical principles:

You will need wisdom, which requires a strong relationship with God, to see how people misuse or invalidate Scripture.
Our training comes through the routine exercises we perform every day when we’re not in a demonic crisis.

C. Closely consider how the Satan is attacking:

Sins that are impossible to control:
- Immorality, which usually manifests as an abnormal desire for sex.
- Unrestrained, impulsive behavior.
- Any expression of feeling attribute taken to unreasonable extremes (e.g., unusual bitterness, severe rage).
Complete misery with no reasonable basis:
- Deep depression, which will be disproportionate and unbearably intense over a past action.
  - Expect a sense of darkness and evil to cloud out any will to live or behave appropriately.
- Self-criticism, a shattered self-image, and a powerful feeling of worthlessness.
- Suicidal thoughts, often accompanied by attempting it.
Supernatural behavior:
- Drug abuse (since most recreational drugs have a spiritual connection).
- Psychic power (the Satan has access to every physically proven fact, including information we imagine is private).
- Extreme strength or power, including the ability to influence (where demons can directly manipulate the environment through the person).
Irritation during prayer, Bible reading, worshiping or preaching:
- The most apparent sign is when that person reacted from a place they couldn’t have observed that person’s experience.
- Demon-possessed people (e.g., drug abusers, witch doctors) can often harass or curse Christians.
An abnormal physical presence:
- The air will feel heavy, almost as if it’s difficult to breathe.
- Often, slight pains and annoyances will be much worse.
Psychological and physical disorders:
- Antisocial and passive behavior, where someone will spend many days alone without any desire to connect with others.
- Epilepsy and seizures.
- Personality disorders (e.g., multiple personalities, schizophrenic behavior).
- Sickness or affliction that coincides with spiritual or good things.
- Hearing voices that oppose God or His values.
- An obsession with committing the “unpardonable sin” in Mark 3:29 (blaspheming the Holy Spirit is simply rejecting the Holy Spirit’s work that comes through Christ).

D. Test the spirits:

Test the spirit, not the person affected by the spirit.
- By the time spiritual oppression has set in, the person is a victim of that demon’s influence.
Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God (1 John 4:2).
An unholy spirit will either say “Jesus is cursed” or won’t be able to say “Jesus is Lord” (1 Corinthians 12:3).
The Holy Spirit bears witness that Jesus came by water and blood, not just by water (1 John 5:6).
Evil spirits acknowledge extra-biblical and non-biblical activity, but only the Holy Spirit confirms biblical things (1 Corinthians 4:6).

Systematically remove the Satan’s strongholds

Pulled straight from the Bondage Breaker by Neil T. Anderson

First, pray a few statements that affirm God’s presence and power:

Acknowledge God’s presence in the room and your life.
Affirm He’s the only all-knowing, all-powerful, always-present God.
Affirm your dependence on Him and how you can’t do anything without Christ.
Affirm you stand in the truth that Jesus has received all authority in heaven and on earth, and because you’re in Him, you share that authority to make disciples and set captives free.
Ask to be filled with His Holy Spirit and to lead you into all truth.
Ask for His complete protection and guidance.

Then, boldly declare Christ’s authority:

Declare you’re a child of God, seated with Christ in Heaven.
Command the Satan and all his spirits to release you in the name and authority of the Lord Jesus Christ to be free to know and choose to do God’s will.
Verbally commit yourself to do God’s will.
Verbally submit your body to the heavenly Father as a living sacrifice and an instrument of righteousness.
State your refusal to be intimidated by the Satan’s lies or to give in to any physical harassment.
Affirm you are a child of God and the evil one can’t touch you.

Step 1 – Counterfeit vs. Reality

Renounce previous or current involvements with demonically inspired occult practices or false religions, which isn’t always apparent:

Often, there are spiritual connections that have nothing to do with the thing itself.
Ask Him to guard your heart and mind and to reveal to you all involvement you’ve either knowingly or unknowingly had with cult or occult practices, false religions, and false teachers.

Write down everything God brings to mind:

“Lord, I confess I have participated in ___. I ask your forgiveness, and I renounce ___ as a counterfeit to true Christianity.”

Step 2 – Deception vs. Truth

(John 8:32, John 8:44, 1 John 1:8, Ephesians 2:6, John 16:3, Psalm 139:23-24)

Pray for God to give you direct understanding of the truth:

Affirm you know that God desires truth in the inner self and that facing this truth is the way of liberation.
Acknowledge the father of lies has deceived you and that you’ve deceived yourself.
Pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that God, heavenly Father, will rebuke all deceiving spirits by the shed blood and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Affirm that you’ve received Him into your life by faith and are now seated with Christ in heaven.
Command all deceiving spirits to depart from you.
Ask the Holy Spirit to guide you into all truth.
Ask God to search you, know your heart, try you, know your anxious thoughts, see if you have any hurtful ways, and lead you to the everlasting way.

Step 3 – Bitterness vs. Forgiveness

(Romans 2:4, Matthew 18:35, Matthew 5:23-24)

Most of the Satan’s victories in Christians come through unforgiveness:

Forgiveness isn’t forgetting; it’s choosing to submit the will.
Forgiveness agrees to live with the consequences of another person’s sin, and requires us to pay for the evil we’ve suffered from someone else.
Forgiveness only comes from the heart, so openly acknowledge the hurt and hatred you’re feeling.

Pray for the ability to forgive:

Thank God for the riches of His kindness, forbearance, and patience, knowing His kindness has led you to repentance.
Confess you haven’t extended that same patience and kindness toward others who have offended you but have instead harbored bitterness and resentment.
Pray that during this time of self-examination, God would bring to mind only those people you haven’t forgiven to do so.
Pray that, if you have offended others, that God would bring to mind people you need to find forgiveness from and the extent you need to seek it.

Step 4 – Rebellion vs. Submission

(1 Samuel 15:23)

Rebellion can be against many authority figures:

Ask for God’s forgiveness for your rebellion:

Confess how God has said that rebellion is like witchcraft and insubordination is like idolatry.
State you have sinned in action and attitude against God with a rebellious heart.
Ask for forgiveness for your rebellion and pray that by the Lord Jesus Christ’s shed blood all ground gained by evil spirits from your rebelliousness is canceled.
Ask for God to shed light on all your ways so that you can know the full extent of your rebelliousness and choose to adopt a submissive spirit and servant’s heart.

Step 5 – Pride vs. Humility

(James 4:6-19, 1 Peter 5:1-10, Proverbs 16:18, Matthew 16:24, Philippians 2:3, Romans 12:10)

Pride can arise in many regions of the mind:

Stronger desire to do your will than God’s will
More dependent on your strengths and resources than God’s
Sometimes believing your ideas and opinions are better than others’
More concerned about controlling others than learning self-control
Sometimes considering yourself more important than others
Tending to think you have no needs
Finding it difficult to admit you’re wrong
More focused on pleasing people than pleasing God
Overly concerned about getting the credit you deserve
Driven to get the recognition from degrees, titles, and positions
Often thinking you’re humbler than others
Anything else where you have thought of yourself more highly than you should

Pray to repent of your pride:

Confess how God has said that pride goes before destruction and arrogance before stumbling.
Confess you haven’t denied yourself, picked up your cross daily, and followed Him.
Admit you’ve given ground to the enemy in your life.
Admit you believed you could be successful and live victoriously by your strength and resources.
Confess you’ve sinned against God by placing your will before His and centering your life around self instead of Him.
Renounce the self-life and indicate that by doing so it cancels all ground that was gained in your members by enemies of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Ask that God will guide you so that you will do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard others as more important than yourself.
Ask God to enable you through love to serve others and in honor prefer others.

For each of the areas that have been true in your life, pray out loud for forgiveness:

“Lord, I agree that I have been conceited in ___. Please forgive me for my hubris. I choose to humble myself and place all my confidence in you. Amen.”

Step 6 – Bondage vs. Freedom

(James 5:16, Romans 13:14, 1 Peter 2:11, Romans 6:12-13, James 4:1, 1 Peter 5:8, 1 John 1:9)

Pray for forgiveness from sinning:

State how God has told us to put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh regarding its lust.
Acknowledge you’ve given in to fleshly lusts that wage war on your soul.
Thank God that in Christ your sins are forgiven, but that you’ve transgressed His holy law and given the enemy an opportunity to wage war in your members.
Entreat Him to acknowledge those sins and to seek His cleansing that you might be free from the bondage of sin.
Ask Him to reveal to your mind the ways that you’ve transgressed His moral law and grieved the Holy Spirit.

Pray through Galatians 5:19-21

Pray for sexual sins, sexual difficulties, and lack of intimacy in your marriage:

Ask Him to reveal every sexual use of your body as an instrument of unrighteousness.
Renounce the specific uses of your body with the people involved and ask Him to break that bond.

Commit your body to Him:

Renounce all uses of your body as an instrument of unrighteousness, and by doing so, to also break all bonds that the Satan has brought into your life through that involvement.

Confess your participation:

Present your body to Him as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to Him, and reserve the sexual use of your body only for marriage.
Renounce the Satan’s lie that your body is unclean, dirty or in any way unacceptable as a result of your past sexual experience.
Thank Him that He has entirely cleansed and forgiven you and that He completely loves and accepts you unconditionally, which means you can accept yourself.

Pray to renounce specific sins against the body:

Homosexuality
- Renounce the lie that God created you or anyone else to be homosexual, and affirm that He completely forbids homosexual behavior.
- Accept yourself as a child of God and declare that He created you as a man/woman.
- Renounce any of the Satan’s bonds that have perverted your relationships with others.
- Announce that you are free to relate to the opposite sex in the way that God intended.
Abortion
- Confess that you didn’t assume managing the life God trusted to you and ask for forgiveness.
- Choose to accept His forgiveness by forgiving yourself.
- Commit that child to God for His care in eternity.
Suicidal tendencies
- Renounce the lie that you can find peace and freedom by taking your life.
- Affirm that the Satan is a thief who comes to steal, kill, and destroy.
- Declare Christ, who said He came to give you life and to give it abundantly.
Eating disorders or self-cutting
- Renounce the lie that your worthiness depends on your appearance or performance.
- Renounce cutting yourself, purging or defecation as a means of cleaning yourself of evil.
- Announce that only the Lord Jesus Christ’s blood can cleanse you from your sin.
- Accept the reality that you may have sin present in you because of the lies you’ve believed and the wrong use of your body.
- Renounce the lie that you are evil or that any part of your body is evil.
- Announce the truth that you are fully accepted by Christ just as you are.
Substance abuse
- Confess that you have misused substances (alcohol, tobacco, food, prescription/street drugs) for pleasure, escaping reality or coping with stressful situations.
- Affirm how it’s resulted in abusing your body, harmfully programming your mind, and suppressing the Holy Spirit.
- Ask His forgiveness and renounce any satanic connection or influence in your life through your misuse of chemicals or food.
- Cast your anxiety on Christ who loves you.
- Commit yourself to no longer yield to substance abuse, but instead to the Holy Spirit.
- Ask the Father to fill you with His Holy Spirit.

After confessing all known sins, pray a final confession:

Acknowledge you confess those sins to Him and claim through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ your forgiveness and cleansing.
Declare that you cancel all ground evil spirits have gained through your willful involvement in sin.

Step 7: Acquiescence vs. Renunciation

(Exodus 20:4-5, Galatians 3:13)

Renounce your ancestors’ sins and any curses they may have placed on you:

Declare God’s power to break curses.
Declare that you here and now reject and disown all the sins of your ancestors.
Declare that as one who has been delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of God’s dear Son, you cancel all demonic working that may have been passed on to you from your ancestors.
State that as one who has been crucified and raised with Jesus Christ and sits with Him in heavenly places, you renounce all satanic assignments directed toward you and your ministry, and cancel every curse that the Satan and his workers have put on you
Announce to the Satan and all his forces that Christ became a curse for you when He died for your sins on the cross.
Reject any and every way where the Satan may claim ownership of you.
Affirm you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, who purchased you with His blood.
Reject all other blood sacrifices where the Satan may claim ownership of you.
Declare yourself eternally and completely signed over and committed to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Command every familiar spirit and enemy of the Lord Jesus Christ to leave your presence by His authority.
Commit yourself to your heavenly Father to do His will from this day forward.

Pray to God for cleansing:

Come to Him as His child, purchased by the Lord Jesus Christ’s blood.
Affirm that He’s the Lord of the universe and Lord of your life.
Submit your body to Him as an instrument of righteousness, a living sacrifice, that you may glorify Him in your body.
Ask Him to fill you with His Holy Spirit.
Commit yourself to renew your mind to prove that His will is good, perfect, and acceptable for you.
Pray it all in the name and authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Maintain prayer rituals that reinforce your relationship with Him.

Make a daily prayer to Him:

Honor Him as your sovereign Lord.
Acknowledge that He is always present with you.
Affirm that He’s the only all-powerful and only wise God.
Affirm that He is kind and loving in all His ways.
Express your love for Him and thank Him that you are united with Christ and spiritually alive in Him.
Choose to not love the world and promise to crucify the flesh and all its passions.
Thank Him for the life that you now have in Christ.
Ask Him to fill you with His Holy Spirit that you can live your life free from sin.
Declare your dependence on Him and take your stand against the Satan and all his lying ways.
Promise to choose to believe truth and refuse to be discouraged.
State that He is the God of all hope and how you are confident that He will meet your needs as you seek to live according to His Word.
Express with confidence that you can live a responsible life through Christ who strengthens you.
Take a stand against the Satan and command him and all his evil spirits to depart from you.
Affirm that you’ve put on the whole armor of God and submit to your body as a living sacrifice and renew your mind by the living Word of God to prove the will of God is good, acceptable, and perfect.

Make a prayer before you go to bed every night:

Thank the Lord that He’s brought you into His family and blessed you with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms in Christ.
Thank Him for providing the time of renewal through sleep.
Accept the sleep as part of His perfect plan for His children, and indicate that you trust Him to guard your mind and body during your sleep.
From your meditation on Him and His truth during the day, you choose to let those thoughts continue in your mind while you sleep.
Commit yourself to Him for His protection from every attempt of the Satan or his emissaries to attack him during sleep.
Commit yourself to Him as your rock, your fortress, and your resting place.
Pray it all in the name of Jesus Christ.

Cleanse your home of all false worship articles

Pray for the home you’re clearing:

Acknowledge that the Father is Lord of heaven and earth.
Express that in His sovereign power and love, He has given us all things richly to enjoy.
Thank Him for the place you live in.
Claim the home for your family as a place of spiritual safety and protection from all the attacks of the enemy.
On the authority of being children of god sated with Christ in the heavenly realm, command every evil spirit that claims ground in the structures and furnishings of the place based on the activities of previous occupants to leave and to never return.
Renounce all curses and spells used against the place.
Ask your heavenly Father to post guardian angels around the location to guard it against the enemy’s attempts to enter and disturb His purposes for everyone inside.

Pray specifically over your room:

Thank the Father for a place to live and be renewed by sleep.
Ask Him to set aside your room or portion of the room as a place of spiritual safety for you.
Renounce any allegiance given to false gods or spirits by other occupants.
Renounce any claim to the room or space by the Satan based on activities of past occupants or yourself.
From your position as a child of God and joint-heir with Christ, who has all authority in heaven and on earth, command all evil spirits to leave this place and never return.
Ask your heavenly Father to appoint guardian angels to protect you while you live there.

The Satan won’t stop

Getting rid of the Satan is technically temporary, and he’ll come back to harass us if we don’t continue in our relationship with God and keep removing sins (Luke 11:24-26).

We must contend with him until the day Jesus comes back.

However, we will prevail if we are His children, and the Satan can’t stop it (1 John 4:4, 1 John 5:4)