THE FIGHT

People who are not followers of Christ are living a surrendered life to Satan in what they think, do and say.  They might not appear to be bad people and often are trying to do good but without Jesus in them, are living disjointed lives (apart from God) and are part of Satan’s family not God’s (John 8:44).  They are spiritual prisoners destined for an eternal life and destiny that is based on who they belong to.  Satan does not look to be evil and in many ways is super attractive to our flesh desires (2 Corinthians 11:14) which is why the default is belonging to him without Jesus in our being and in our life.

Christ followers are part of God’s family (through the blood of Jesus Christ) and because we are not part of Satan’s family, fight him (spiritual battles) in our daily living (Ephesians 6:1-20).  They are battles of discouragement, doubt, suffering, temptation, uncontrollable emotions, pride, guilt, shame, loneliness, persecution, false doctrine, spiritual dryness and darkness (1 John 5:19).  These are all in the fragility of our humanity (James 1:13-15) and it is easy to cave in to them and default to living a life as being part of Satan’s family to deal with them (1 Peter 5:8).  That is why we are called to put on the armor of God which is the armor of salvation (Jesus), the armor of the Gospel (God’s Word - the Bible), and the armor of faith (God in, for and with our daily living) (Ephesians 6:10-18).  That we remind ourselves in prayer who were are in Christ - accepted, pardoned, and adopted into the family of God.  That we were given His Spirit in us and have access to Him in prayer to help, guide, and protect us and that we have the assurance of a resurrected life for an eternity with Jesus.  That Jesus is victorious (past, present and future) over our Enemy (Hebrews 2:14) and that we live in His victory despite what the immediate circumstances might be telling and showing us in our fragile thinking (Hebrews 11:1-3). We live surrendered lives - the question is who did you surrender to?