The following is the transcript for a recent video put together on the topic of spiritual warfare, which can be seen here:
By Steven Bancarz| In this video we are going to look at the topic of spiritual warfare, how it functions, and how to become free from ongoing attack and oppression. Spiritual warfare is a bit of a debated topic in the body of Christ, and there are definitely some weird teachings we want to avoid. While we don’t want to become undiscerning as we navigate this topic, we don’t want to create a false solution either. We don’t want to look for a demon under every rock, but when warfare is happening, we want to categorize it and address it Biblically. And so we are going to consider what the word says are the essentials to remaining free from the enemies influence.
Those essentials are repentance from willful sin, walking in forgiveness, repenting from idolatry false spiritual beliefs and practices, and framing relationships righteously. We are going to dive into each of these and then cover some additional principles of freedom for moving forward. Now there are going to be many things about spiritual warfare we won’t be covering in this article. We could have a nuanced conversation about mental health, demons versus the flesh, oppression vs possession, etc., but in this article we are going to look at how to become free from what we already know is demonic activity.
For some of us it may be recurring night terrors or nightmares, sleep paralysis, manifestations, a sense of spiritual darkness or oppression, very strong urges toward a particular vice, voices or chaos in the mind that we know isn’t coming from us, etc., and for some it may be something more mild but still detectable, such as us feeling the enemy toying with our emotions or inspiring strongholds of false belief in our thinking.
While this topic may seem a little bit taboo or ever strange, the Bible is filled with verses that speak to spiritual warfare. If we look at the amount of verses mentioning powers of darkness in various forms, we are looking at roughly 140 verses in total, not including Satan. If we look at Satan as well, we are looking at an additional 215 references, for a total of almost 350 mentions of the powers of darkness, most of which are contained within the 4 biographies of Jesus.
Most of what is said about demons in the Bible comes from Christ. And in fact, The Gospel of the Kingdom that He preached was often tied into the theme of spiritual warfare. You’ll see the preaching of the Kingdom coincide with deliverance from demons over and over in the Gospels. Jesus claimed to be King and then demonstrated His Kingship by establishing His rule over demons in the souls of people. Jesus is the King in God’s Kingdom, and wherever Jesus reigns demons don’t. When Jesus died on the cross, He was destroying sin, which the devil brought into the world in the Garden, and when He rose from the dead, He proved that Satan, Hell, and death had no power to keep Him in the grave. His ministry, death, and resurrection demonstrated and secured total victory over the powers of darkness.
So we are not looking to defeat the enemy, because Jesus did that already. We are looking to enter into His victory, and align ourselves with what Jesus has secured for us. Christ’s ascension to the right hand of God established His dominion over creation as the God-man, and we are seated with Him in the heavenly places (bring Eph. 1:19-2:7, Col. 2:9-10 on screen). We are in a spiritual union with Jesus, causing us to united with Him in His ascension, giving us authority over the enemy because of our positioning in Him. Jesus also verbally gave his disciples authority over the enemy, which they demonstrated during their ministries (Lk. 9:1, Lk. 10:19, Acts 5:16; 8:7; 16:18; 19:12–16; 2 Cor. 10:3–4; Eph. 6:10–13; Jas. 4:7; 1 Pet. 5:8; 1 John 2:13–14). Through our position in Christ and the verbal delegation of authority to us, we already have authority and victory of Satan secured for us.
Charismatic Bible scholar Sam Storms notes, “We must never envision ourselves as operating on a level playing field with Satan and his demons. Alone and in the power of our own identity, we don’t stand a chance against him. But in Christ and on the basis of who we are in him, and in light of the authority of the risen Lord that has been bequeathed to us, Satan and his demons are a defeated lot…Don’t ever think of yourself as at one end of a rope and Satan at the other, both of you struggling to overpower the other. No! You are in Christ, who is over all. Satan is beneath you, in Christ’s name.” – Sam Storms, Understanding Spiritual Warfare: A Comprehensive Guide (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Reflective, 2021), 259.
Since Jesus has the victory, we should fear God only. We don’t need to fear the demonic, and we don’t want to glorify it or give Satan more credit than he deserves. But we do want to be aware of how he functions. 2 Timothy 3:16 says All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable for training that we would be equipped for every good work. Everything it teaches us about demons is for our benefit, not for their glory. And so before we look at these four lines of freedom mentioned earlier, lets lay a bit of a foundation for how warfare generally functions.
Satan and demons operate from the spirit world
Ephesians 2:2: “following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience,”
Ephesians 6:12: “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”
Peter tells us “the devil prowls around like a roaring lion” (1 Peter 5:8). And Satan tells God he has been roaming the earth (Job 1:7).
Since demons exist in the air, or, the spirit realm, they are looking to translate their influence and power from the spirit to the natural. There is a veil separating us from them, and they want to pass through that veil to affect the world and its people. But they can’t do this whenever they want. If demons could do whatever they want at any time, Christians would be immediately taken out upon conversion, and the world would have been utterly destroyed a long time ago.
When it comes to demons affecting the world, they don’t have sovereignty over themselves. They don’t have free reign to do what they want, and they don’t operate by their own rules. Jesus Christ is King, and he says that all authority in Heaven and on earth has been given to Him (Matt 28:18). Paul says Jesus has been exalted “far above all rule and authority and power and dominion,” (Eph. 1:21).
The demons who want to affect us are subject to Christ, who is King of kings. Demons are at the mercy of the rulership of Jesus, and so before they can affect us or bring something to pass in the natural, it has to first pass through the siphon of Christ’s permissive will.
God is Sovereign over demons
We see instances where Jesus grants demons permission to do something, like when he gave them permission to enter into the pigs:
“Jesus then asked him (the demon), ‘What is your name?’ And he said, ‘Legion,’ for many demons had entered him. And they begged him not to command them to depart into the abyss. Now a large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside, and they begged him to let them enter these. So he gave them permission.” (Lk. 8:30-33)
We see instances where God gives Satan/demons limited permission: “Satan answered the LORD and said, ‘Does Job fear God for no reason? Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.’ And the LORD said to Satan, ‘Behold, all that he has is in your hand. Only against him do not stretch out your hand…(Job 1:6-12)
And we see instances where no permission is granted: “And he (Jesus) healed many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons. And he would not permit the demons to speak,” (Mark 1:34)
Though not known for his spiritual warfare or charismatic material, the reformer John Calvin rightly says “we ought to accept as a fixed certainty the fact that he can do nothing unless God wills and assents to it…Indeed, when we say that Satan resists God, and that Satan’s works disagree with God’s works, we at the same time assert that this resistance and this opposition are dependent upon God’s sufferance. [B]ecause with the bridle of his power God holds him bound and restrained, he carries out only those things which have been divinely permitted to him…” – Calvin, J. (2011). Institutes of the Christian Religion & 2. Vol. 1, p. 176). Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press
While God of course hates the devil and his activity, and will one day do away with him, He has permitted Satan to act for a limited season. Since Christ is all-powerful, He can stop anything at any time, but chooses to permit Satan a measure of access to the world as people make their decision to choose and believe on and follow Jesus. And once we do that, we enter into a union with Him and become recipients of His delegated authority. And yet, it seems at times we don’t always experience this authority. In some seasons the spiritual warfare seems to increase, even though Jesus is still on the throne and we are seated with Him. So if Christ hasn’t changed, and if our position in Christ hasn’t changed, there must be some other factors present that give Satan greater leeway to affect us.
Legal Ground / Open Doors Explained
God has decreed that under certain conditions, their influences in the life of a believer are allowed to increase. With how God has set up things in this life, there are conditions upon which Satan is granted permission to act. Some have called these conditions, open doors, which we will be using, and others have referred to it as legal ground.
What is sometimes meant by the term “legal ground” is that since Satan is under God’s rule, he must have a legitimate basis for action before God will allow him to motion an attack. Satan is bound by God’s law, and unless God’s law permits something to him, Satan can not act. Satan is only able to act if and when God’s governance over him allows it, but there are conditions given in Scripture that tell us Satan is able to gain a foothold once these conditions are present. When this conditions are present, Satan can use this as grounds before God for motioning an attack, meaning we want to avoid doing anything where the devil can point to something in our life and make a claim before Christ, that he is legally permitted to oppress us because the conditions on which Christ grants permission to him have been satisfied. We mustn’t see this as literal conversations that he has with Christ, but Christ as King requires Satan to have a legitimate basis for action, according to the laws he is governed by. Satan is not allowed to have a free for all, but is allowed a certain measure of access upon certain conditions being present.
Now, Satan doesn’t need open doors to tempt us. Jesus was tempted in the wilderness by Satan, and yet Jesus never opened up a door to him. Satan tempted Eve in a sinless environment. I think God may sometimes allow an occasional blindside attack to remind us what we are up against and sharpen us for His purposes, and sometimes as we make major decisions in the Lord we experience more warfare as the enemy retaliates. But when it comes to ongoing oppression, persistent attacks and strongholds in the life of believer, when it comes to us being perpetually and regularly affected and influenced by demonic powers, this is when we want to consider what the Bible says could be acting as an open door for them.
We are going to look at common open doors right now, and to be clear, this is not an exhaustive list for every case of oppression (as will be specified more later), but the goal is to cover the most essential starting points for entering into Christ’s freedom.
Open Door 1) Willful unrepentant sin
Now we aren’t talking here about making a questionable comment and repenting after conviction, we aren’t talking about stubbing your toe and colorful language slips out and you repent after, what we want to look at is where our life is perpetually and willfully out of alignment with the moral will of God. If there is any area of our life where we are practicing willful sin, this can serve as an open door to the enemy.
“Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” (Jam. 4:7)
If the devil flees when we resist and submit to God, that implies the devil won’t flee if we don’t resist and don’t submit.
“Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil…Therefore take up the breastplate of righteousness,” (Eph. 6:11-14)
Righteousness means right-living, or personal holiness. Right-living is how we protect ourselves. No righteousness means no breastplate, meaning the fiery darts of the enemy can pierce us.
We are going to see this play out in the life of Saul, Israel’s first king, where envy opened him up to demonization:
“and Saul was very angry, and this saying displeased him. He said, “They have ascribed to David ten thousands, and to me they have ascribed thousands, and what more can he have but the kingdom?” 9 (David was mighty in war and was getting more glory than Saul, causing him to resent David). And Saul eyed David from that day on. 10 The next day a harmful spirit from God rushed upon Saul, and he raved within his house while David was playing the lyre (liar), as he did day by day. Saul had his spear in his hand. 11 And Saul hurled the spear, for he thought, “I will pin David to the wall.” But David evaded him twice.” (1 Samuel 18:8-10).
Though Saul had committed other severe sins prior to this, it was the sin of envy that caused things to bubble over into the demonic, where the evil spirit rushed upon him, provoking him to try to kill David. While we don’t want to think of every instance of demonization as being God sending a spirit to afflict us, we do want to think of every instance as being something He is permitting to occur, and while we don’t want to walk on eggshells fearing that an imperfect thought or action here or there will attract Satan, ongoing sin patterns in thought or action will certainly make us vulnerable to the attack of the enemy.
As The Apologetics Study Bible notes: “God created a universe with built-in rewards and punishments that reinforce divine moral law…Saul had lived a life of chronic disobedience to God, and therefore had opened himself to demonic oppression”. – Ted Cabal et al., The Apologetics Study Bible: Real Questions, Straight Answers, Stronger Faith (Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers, 2007), 431–432.
Submitting to God
Now what does it mean to “submit” to God? (Jam. 4:7) Submitting to God means giving Him full reign over our lives by coming underneath the authority of His word, and the Spirit when He convicts us. A.W. Tozer once made the point that sometimes we want to be delivered by a half-Christ, someone who is saviour acting as a doctor we pay visits to, but someone we can think about making Lord at another point in the future. But when it comes to entering into Christ’s victory, He will not divide his offices. As Lord, He is sovereign ruler over all, and if want to be free from the enemy, we must relinquish all of our rights to Jesus Christ and allow Him to function as who and what He is as King and Lord. Any sense of having a right to act or think independently of His moral will must be repented for.
This would including doing 180 from anything the Bible says is sin. Gossip, slander, unwholesome speech. Making sure we aren’t operating in deception but living a lie or telling lies. Repentance from intoxication, whether from drugs or alcohol. Repentance from any form of sexual immorality including sexuality outside of marriage, pornography, etc. There’s slanting to be said about repentance from horror media including movies, novels, and video games, or anything that is explicitly dark. We are commanded to flee from the appearance of evil, and to have nothing to do with unfruitful works of darkness, and to set no wicked thing before our eyes.
Wherever there is an ongoing pattern of willfully sinful thinking, this can serve as an open door as well. We are told to take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, and to destroy every high thought that exalts itself against the knowledge of Jesus. And most of the spiritual battles we experience take place in the mind, where the devil lays something up that we take hold of and run with, instead of calling our thinking back into alignment with Scripture.
As an analogy, it’s one thing for a bird to fly through a barn, it’s another for us to make a nest for it. Passing thoughts that we ignore are one thing, but when we latch on to something and meditate upon it, that’s when we can run the risk of giving the enemy place through disobedience in our thought-life. Jesus says adultery and murder begins in the heart. Saul became demonized after sinful thinking pushed him over the edge, and so we want to practice fighting the temptation with specific relevant Scriptures like Jesus did.
Repentance in thought and action looks like making a full decision to never sin on purpose again. It looks like committing ourselves to obeying God, pledging a full allegiance to the Lordship of Jesus. Maybe we want to keep just enough sin to keep us self-medicated, or we feel God has held out on us and so we have a sin or two we give ourselves occasional license for. But if we want to be free, we must be fully facing Jesus with all of rights laid down before Him.
While perfection isn’t required for freedom, direction is. We need to be aligned with the Lordship of Jesus, under the authority of the word of God in thought and action moving forward. And so a prayer of repentance may look something like this;
“In Jesus name, I repent of all my sins. Forgive me Lord for where I have been sinning against you in thought or action. To the best of my ability, I am going to submit to you and resist the devil. I pledge full allegiance to you as Lord, and I chose to bring my life into alignment with your word. I want you and you alone to reign over me. Help me to identify any thought patterns or behaviours that may be giving the enemy place in my life. And in Jesus name, I command any spirit that has been affecting me to leave. I thank you Lord for total deliverance as I fully yield my rights. In your name I pray, amen.”
Even if we don’t experience total deliverance after submitting fully to Christ, this is an area where deliverance can be gradual. As we continue to submit and resist, we make ourselves more and more inhospitable to the enemy. Let’s look at the second open door, which is the specific sin of unforgiveness.
Open Door 2) Unforgiveness
“Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil” (Eph. 4:26) The word for “opportunity” is “topos” in Greek, and means “region, district, or place”. It’s also translated as “foothold”. While not all anger is unrighteous, and is sometimes righteous, to let the sun go down means we haven’t forgiven that day’s offence, and if the offence is held on to rather than forgiven, this can give the enemy room to act.
“Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed, what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ, so that we would not be outwitted by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his designs.” (2 Cor. 2:10-11) Paul urges people to forgive quickly so that we do not get outwitted by Satan. Unforgiveness is a design of the enemy, it’s how he outwits us and gains a foothold in our lives. Sam Storms is a Bible scholar who has pastored in these kinds of contexts for many decades, and He says in his book on spiritual warfare:
“Virtually every counselor with whom I have spoken says that most of the ground that Satan gains in a Christian’s life is the result of unforgiveness. The willful refusal to forgive, together with the incessant nurturing in one’s heart of bitterness, anger, and resentment toward the offending party, often leads to severe cases of both spiritual oppression and demonization.” – Sam Storms, Understanding Spiritual Warfare: A Comprehensive Guide (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Reflective, 2021), 201–202.
From personal experience I would say this is definitely an area we can become prone to the enemies activity.
To be clear, Biblical forgiveness does not mean:
- You have to convince yourself you’re ok with what happened
- You have forgotten it or no longer feel the pain of it.
- You have to revert back to how things were. (it may mean new boundaries are put up)
- You no longer desire justice. (You can desire justice, just not personal revenge).
- You want God to bless their sinful actions.
What forgiveness does mean, is:
- You’re extending to them the mercy Christ extended to you. (You’re letting them off the hook as Christ did with you)
- You are not not allowing yourself to harbour bitter feelings against them.
- You don’t smear them to others, you don’t let them feel afraid of you, and you let them save face.
- You entrust justice into God’s hands.
- You pray God gives them what they need to become who He intends them to be.
Jesus often emphasized the importance of forgiving others like we have been forgiven. And He says in the parable of the unforgiving debtor that a person who won’t forgive is like someone who has been forgiven a few million dollars turning around and putting someone in jail for a few thousand (Mat. 18:21-35). This is not to minimize the pain we experienced, but is meant to highlight how much we have been left off the hook by God. All our sins past present and future sins against God have been wiped clean from our record. When we see that through the cross our case has been dismissed for a lifetime of sinning, we shouldn’t hold the sins of others over their head because God has not done that with us.
Now when it comes to very painful acts of injustice, these can be the hardest to forgive because it feels like in letting them off the hook we are making light of their behaviour, But Biblical forgiveness recognizes that we are releasing them into the hands of God who promises justice in His way and His time:
Romans 12:19 – “Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.’”
1 Peter 2:23 – “When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.”
2 Thes. 1:6-8 – “indeed God considers it just to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to grant relief to you who are afflicted as well as to us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, inflicting vengeance on those who do not know God and on those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.”
We can afford to forgive, because a holy God reigns over the universe. We can forgive with the comfort of knowing He is perfectly just, in control, and promises to judge the world justly in His time. As a perfectly holy God, He knows what justice looks like better than we do, and so we can forgive, pray for their salvation, and leave them in His hands. And as it relates to demonic activity, unforgiveness really is like handing the devil an invitation. We can try to kick him out of our life, and we may not want him there, but as long as he’s holding an invitation with his name, he doesn’t have to flee.
Now in the act of forgiveness, I have found it effective to forgive people by name, and for specific offences, rather than trying to forgive everyone and everything with a broad brush. An example prayer of forgiveness may look something like this:
“Jesus, I confess to you that I’ve had unforgiveness in me towards so and so, for the offences of x, y, and z. Forgive me for holding these sins against them, when you have forgiven me of mine. Thank you for empowering me by the Spirit to forgive them like you have forgiven me. I am choosing to let them off the hook once for all, and I entrust justice fully into your hands. Please cleanse me of any negative emotions surrounding the offence. I entrust any remaining pain, anger, or bitterness to you. You tell us to bless those who have wronged us, and so I pray that you would bless them by giving them everything they need to fully become who you intend them to be. And in Jesus name, I command any spirit that has worked itself into my life through unforgiveness to leave in Jesus name. I am no longer cooperating with the tactics of the enemy, and moving forward will take all thoughts of bitterness and resentment captive to the obedience of Christ. In Jesus name, amen.”
It’s also normal that we have to keep recommitting ourselves to forgive. A new memory may come up, or something recurs again that we already forgave, and we have to keep letting them off the hook, entrusting them to God, praying God would bless them, and so forth, in order to keep our hearts free from bitterness. A third way we can open doors to the enemy is through idolatry.
Open Door 3) Idolatry & False religion
“Consider the people of Israel: are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar? What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons. (1 Cor. 10:18-20)
To participate in pagan practices is to participate with demons. The word for participants in this verse is koinōnos, which means a “companion”, a “partner”, and the idea of being bound to something. The Corinthians were eating food off the altars of idols to pagan deities, causing them to fellowship with demons. But even if we aren’t practicing idolatry, believing false teaching can also open the door to the enemy.
Paul says “Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.” (1 Tim. 4:1-3)
Other passages in Galatians 4:8-9, Colossians 2:8-18, 1 John 2:22, Revelation 2:24 and 2 Corinthians 11:1-14 credit false Gospels, false Christs, legalism, and other heresies to demons. New Testament Scholar Clinton Arnold notes “One of Satan’s key ploys has been deception. If he can’t prevent people from turning to Christianity, he can alter the Christianity to which they turn and make it into something that is not Christianity at all.” – Clinton E. Arnold, 3 Crucial Questions about Spiritual Warfare, ed. Grant R. Osborne and Richard J. Jones Jr., 3 Crucial Questions (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1997), 60.
In other words, if he can’t get you to deny Christ and the Gospel, he will distort it. If he can’t get you with beliefs, he’ll try to get you with practices. Whether it’s heresy or idolatry, both are works of the devil. When it comes to practicing idolatry, there are New Age practices like Yoga, astrology, energy healing, using crystals spiritually, and psychic readings. Also, things like trying to open portals, invoke angels, take self-induced trips to Heaven, make contact with the deceased, and other things that deviate from what the word endorses.
When it comes to heresy, believing Jesus wasn’t fully God or fully man, believing we are saved by works, being legalistic where the Bible is silent, and unholy abuses of the supernatural are some of the things the Bible ascribes to demons. Believing the essential teachings of the Bible about Jesus, salvation, the afterlife, etc., is necessary because we can only be fully free of the enemy if we are free of his teachings.
Also, the Bible tells us to keep ourselves from idols (1 Jn. 5:21). While participating in idolatry is sinful, possessing tools is also sinful. Repentance in the Bible always includes the destruction or removal of the idol. For example, in Acts 19:19, magic scrolls were burned when magicians came to Christ. In the OT, idols were devoted to destruction. Statues, jewelry, and other tools of idolatry and false spirituality need to be removed from our home so that we can honor the command to be free from idols.
While we may still have possessions from our former spiritual life, we may have residual attachments to that life as well. While we are born again through faith, maybe there is fear of total detachment, a left over fascination with darkness, nostalgia, or something else that has left a door open to a spirit that hasn’t fully left our life yet. In such a case, consider writing out specific practices and beliefs you repent for from your former life, especially ones which still seem to be lingering in your memory and seem to be coming up more than they should be. Verbally renouncing these beliefs and practices and committing yourself to taking these thoughts captive in this area will prove very helpful alongside cleaning our environment out of relevant objects.
Clinton Arnold notes: “People who have become Christians and have had a background in channeling, witchcraft, sorcery, or other religious practices, and have not yet renounced these beliefs and practices, may have left themselves open to continued and direct demonic influence. The hall closet needs to be unlocked, these things need to be repudiated, and a fresh confession of allegiance to Christ needs to be made.” – Clinton E. Arnold, 3 Crucial Questions about Spiritual Warfare, ed. Grant R. Osborne and Richard J. Jones Jr., 3 Crucial Questions (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1997), 119
A prayer of repentance may look something like this:
“In Jesus name, I repent of all practices and beliefs that are contrary to the word of God. I choose to align myself with your word alone on all matters of spiritual life and practice, and in particular, I repent of the specific practices of x, y, and z. I renounce my former beliefs in x, y, and z, and come out of agreement with these worldviews. I command any spirit that has entered my life through idolatry to leave in Jesus name. And convict me Lord of anything in my possession that may be an idol, or anything I am believing or practicing that may dishonour you in any way. In your name I pray, Amen.”
Open Door 4) Framing certain relationships unrighteously
A fourth way we can open a door to the enemy is by framing certain relationships improperly.
2 John 1:7-11 – “For many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh. Such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist…do not receive him into your house or give him any greeting, 11 for whoever greets him takes part in his wicked works.”
So if we endorse false teachers and receive them into our homes, we are collaborating with them in the eyes of God, making us liable for their heresy. And these false teachers are being influenced by another spirit:
1 John 4:3 – “every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already.”
1 John 2:18 – “as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come.”
Many antichrists are under an antichrist spirit, which we are endorsing with by receiving those who teach heresies. We are held spiritually culpable for the damage they inflict. John MacArthur notes:
“The prohibition here is not to turn away the ignorant; it does not mean that believers may not invite unbelievers—even those who belong to a cult or false religion—into their midst. That would make giving the truth to them difficult, if not impossible. The point is that believers are not to welcome and provide care for traveling false teachers, who seek to stay in their homes, thereby giving the appearance of affirming what they teach and lending them credibility.” – John MacArthur, 1, 2, 3 John, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2007), 236.
Another commentary notes: “there is a difference between hospitality to strangers whom believers can win for Christ, and hospitality to those who are focused on winning believers away from Christ.” – Bruce Barton et al., Life Application New Testament Commentary (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale, 2001), 1176.
Now chances are we are not hosting or receiving false teachers, but these passages demonstrate the general principle that failing to frame a relationship righteously can result in spiritual harm. The Bible teaches in many other places that our spiritual health depends upon righteous framing:
1 Corinthians 15:33: “Bad company ruins good morals.”
1 Corinthians 5:6 – “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?”
2 Corinthians 6:14, “Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers…what fellowship has light with darkness?”
Proverbs 14:7: “ Leave the presence of a fool, for there you do not meet words of knowledge….”
Proverbs 22:24: “ Make no friendship with a man given to anger…”
Proverbs 13:20: “ the companion of fools will suffer harm.”
Now, these all have certain contexts, but these are principles of wisdom and direct commands that link spiritual danger to unholy and unwise relational framing. We are absolutely called to save the lost, preach the Gospel, show hospitality, etc. So these verses are not telling us to live in fear about who we share Jesus with, but rather, to walk in wisdom with who we enter fellowship with. While the Bible gives grace for evangelism, it calls for wisdom in fellowship. But Jesus says that even in evangelism, there is a call for wisdom here as well. He tells us to be wise as serpents (Mat. 10:16), to not cast our pearls carelessly (Mat. 7:6), and to know when to kick the dust off our shoes and keep moving (Mat. 10:14). As we operate in the wisdom of Christ, we will be spiritually safe, but if we forsake the wisdom of Christ, this can come at a cost.
So let’s imagine you’re ministering to a someone who is a practicing Wicca. You start going out for coffee and it seems fruitful, but after a few times together they express they don’t want to hear about Jesus anymore, they just want to be friends. Let’s say you begin relaxing into casual hangouts with them, leaving talk of Christ and the Gospel off the table. Let’s also say the Spirit convicts you to draw back until they are willing to hear more about Jesus. If we keep entering through the veil of fellowship, there may come a point where we find ourselves experiencing spiritual attack. Going against Scripture’s wisdom in these areas can expose us to the enemy.
In this case, freedom would look like telling them that moving forward, you’re only really wanting to meet up to have conversations about Christ. You can bless them and tell them to reach out if they’re ever wanting to discuss things with you, but you can say you love them too much to leave the most important thing off the table. Until there is a willingness on their end, praying for them until they’re ready may be best. Four of the more common ways demonic attack may manifest from unrighteous framing are in these categories:
- People or churches operating under a different spirit, whom the Lord gives you discernment on, but you choose to enter into fellowship or ministry with them instead of addressing things upfront or exiting the situation.
- Evangelizing to the demonized, such as those in cults,, Wicca, New Age, etc, where our evangelist hat comes off and we relax into fellowship.
- Having soulish/romantic attachments to people God wouldn’t have us be with. This could be an ex, someone the Holy Spirit has told us no on and to distance ourselves from, or maybe someone who belongs to another person already.
- Remaining tied to abusive ex-partners who have more leeway in our life than they should, or whom we are dependent on in ways we don’t need to be.
A lot of people find themselves in sticky situations with exes who were or remain abusive, and they continue to have a foothold in their life of manipulation, gaslighting, threats, and abusive language. The best thing we can do for them is cut the chord entirely if possible, and leave them in the hands of the Lord for other Christians to witness to. If kids are involved and they are allowed to see them, may the Lord show us how to be platonic and put up healthy boundaries in our lives and interactions with them where attachments cant be fed and re-aggravated.
For these last two categories, closing doors here may look like selling gifts, giving possessions of theirs back, deleting photos, or if necessary removing them from social media, cutting off communication with certain friends or family members of theirs, or if you really need to, blocking them on social media. To be clear, sometimes attachments can just be a soulish and don’t cross over into the supernatural, so we shouldn’t think that for any of these four instances we will automatically become affected by the enemy. But it can reach that point through persistent neglect of the verses we went over, and in areas of attachment and boundaries, what starts off as purely soulish, if it’s outside of God’s will, can be used by the enemy over time to toy with our mind and emotions. Framing things with the wisdom of the word and the direction of the Holy Spirit is necessary if we want to give the devil no room to work with.
When it comes to walking with the Lord in the onset as a young believer, it’s pretty common that one or more of these doorways are open at the same time. We are learning what holiness means, the Lord is dealing with wounds from our past and leading us to forgive people, the Spirit is helping us clean our life out of old beliefs, practices and idols, and we’re learning how to frame our relationships according to the wisdom of Scripture. Warfare can be pretty tangible during this time, and the Lord is super gracious and will help us navigate it, and we should be encouraged that this initial exposure to warfare is a great training ground to learn about how the enemy operates so we can keep doors closed in the future.
Principles & Practices For Freedom Moving Forward
Now we are going to pivot here a bit and consider some Biblical principles and practices for walking in and sustaining freedom. The first principle we will look at for walking in freedom is to put on the full armor of God.
1) Put on the full armor of God.
“Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. 16 In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; 17 and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,” Eph 6:14–17.
Here is how each piece of these pieces of spiritual armor could be understood.
Belt of Truth – “Successful spiritual warfare begins with the question: ‘Do I accept the Bible as God’s Word, inspired, infallible, and inerrant, the sole authority for belief and practice?’…We must fight against Satan’s deceptive ways by standing firmly on the “whole counsel of God” as revealed in Scripture.” – Sam Storms, Understanding Spiritual Warfare: A Comprehensive Guide (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Reflective, 2021), 299.
Breastplate of Righteousness – Is living right before God, which we covered earlier in the open door of sin.
Shoes of the Gospel – “[Paul] may mean that we are to shod/fit our feet with preparation or readiness for making known the gospel of peace…[or that] our feet are to be fitted with ‘the readiness given by the gospel of peace.’.” Sam Storms, Understanding Spiritual Warfare: A Comprehensive Guide (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Reflective, 2021), 301.
The Shield of Faith – “the shield of faith functions each time we hold up the truth of the Scriptures under the onslaught of Satan’s lies.” It’s a trust in God and the contents of His word. – Ibid, 303.
The Helmet of Salvation – “The ‘helmet of salvation’ is most likely a reference to the assurance of our salvation. Satan knows he can gain a major strategic advantage over us if he can sow the seeds of doubt in our minds concerning our relationship with God. In every instance of serious and sustained demonic attack I have encountered, the individual was plagued with doubt concerning his or her salvation.” – Ibid, 304. Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
The Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God – “There are three primary ways in which we wield the sword of the Spirit. We proclaim the Word (as Jesus did; see also Rev. 12). We pray the Word (Eph. 6:18–19; Acts 6:4; John 15:7). And we praise with the Word (i.e., sing the Scriptures).” – Ibid, 304-305
So we want to be believing the whole Bible, living in obedience to it, appropriating it actively, and fighting the enemy back with it like Jesus did.
2. Prayer
A lifestyle of prayer is necessary to abiding in true freedom. In Ephesians 6:18 right after all the armor is listed, it says, “praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,”
Paul ends his discourse on the armor of God with four calls to prayer, which is to say our armor is made effective by prayer. Being aware of the armor is useful, but if we neglect these exhortations to pray, the armor won’t be empowered. It only remains tightly fastened through a lifestyle of prayer. When teaching his disciples how to pray, Jesus tells them to pray that they would be delivered from evil, or from the evil one (Mat. 6:13). Prayer is one of God’s methods of imparting strength and power to us in spiritual warfare.
We should be praying prayers of righteousness; that our hearts and minds would be purified and filled with righteousness.
Prayers for protection; that God would protect us from the enemy and deliver us from his influence.
And prayer of resistance; Jesus said get behind me Satan when he took hold of Peter’s tongue (Mat. 16:23). Jesus said he gave us authority to tread on serpents (Luk. 10:19). And so prayers of resistance may look like commanding whatever spirit may be tormenting us to leave in Jesus’ name.
And we should be persisting in all three of these prayers. The more quality time we spend with God in prayer, the better equipped we will be to navigate spiritual battle, and the more the enemy’s grasp will weaken in our life.
3. The Renewal of the Mind
we are told to “”be renewed in the spirit of your minds” (Ephesians 4:23)
and to “be transformed by the renewal of your mind” (Romans 12:2)
The renewal of the mind is essential to keeping the enemy at bay. Let’s say a demon is perpetually lying to someone about their worth and value, causing depression to set in. The enemy wants to build a house of lies in their mind, creating a stronghold. But the more our mind is renewed to our value in God, His love for us, our purpose in the Kingdom, and the inheritance He has in store for us, the less room the enemy has to affect our thinking. Whenever our mind is renewed to the truth, the enemy can’t get in there, and as the mind of Christ forms in us, the thorns that Satan planted there will get pushed out over time.
Taking in Christian teaching, immersing ourselves in devotion and study of the Word, creating new thought patterns by taking thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ, this things will help keep the enemies’ lies from taking root and becoming a stronghold. Paul prayed for the church that their eyes would be opened to see Christ and their union with Him (Eph. 1:18-20), and that their hearts would be strengthened by the Spirit to know the love of God in Christ Jesus. We should be praying for revelation from the Holy Spirit, that the truths contained in Scripture would be come spiritually real to us. As, the spirit of our minds is renewed, it causes Satan to lose ground in our thought-life because his lies seem unbelievable. Strongholds of fear, worry, rejection, are all based on lies. Lies about us, the world, and God. Lies are his primary ammunition. Faith in the truth is a shield that deflects his lies from being able to take root.
4. Fasting
Jesus overcame Satan in the wilderness while fasting (Mat. 4:1-11). Some renderings of Mark 9:29 and Matthew 17:21 have Jesus say some demons “only come out through prayer and fasting“. While other manuscripts omit fasting, this has been historically understood to be a useful element in warfare. Fasting strengthens our spirit, weakens the carnal nature, and empowers our prayer life, all of which aid in spiritual warfare.
5. Receiving prayer support in a Christian community
“Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” – James 5:16
Sometimes, breakthrough will be hemmed up for us in asking for prayer support from other believers. Jesus likes to work through His body, which may include bringing our struggles into the light with Christians we trust, confessing relevant struggles, and having them pray over us for strength, protection, and for the enemy to leave.
Proverbs say those who isolate themselves lack judgment (Prov. 18:1), and Hebrews tells us not to forsake the gathering of the brethren (Heb. 10:25). A sheep isolated from the herd is more vulnerable to wolves than one surrounded by a flock. Being a part of a church body and having other believers partner with us in prayer is part of what sets us up for spiritual health.
6. A Genuine Willingness to be Made Well
There was a man who hasn’t walked in 38 years who was beside a pool known for healing waters, and Jesus approached him and asked. “Do you want to be healed?” (John 5:2-6) This may seem like kind of a strange question to ask someone laying beside a healing pool, but there are many different ways we can hold ourselves back from total freedom: Maybe we enjoy the love and attention from others that comes from being in a state of spiritual crisis, and we are afraid of losing the nurture we get from others.
Maybe we wouldn’t know who we are if we were free, or maybe being distracted with oppression keeps us from having to deal with the real issues in our life. Maybe deliverance would mean facing things we aren’t willing to face yet. Sometimes being delivered means us getting back into a routine, back to work, or serving God again, and so maybe there’s a temptation to hold on to things because being free might come with responsibilities we would prefer not to have. Maybe we have self-medicated with a certain vice for so long, and being set free would mean losing what has been a crutch for us. Maybe holding on to bitterness is keeping from feeling the pain of what someone did. Or maybe there is pride keeping us from admitting we’ve given the enemy place in our lives.
And so are we willing to be made well?
We are willing to be made well when we are ready to submit to God and resist the devil, forgive our offenders, clean out our lives, frame relationships how the Lord would have us, and persist in the principles of freedom laid out for us in the word of God.
And so as we have seen, victory in spiritual warfare has everything to do with cultivating holistic spiritual health. A guiding principle to all of this is that we want to love Jesus well and be in proximity to Him. Loving and knowing Jesus needs to remain our primary focus as a Christian, because the greatest command we have been given is to love God. And so cultivating intimacy with Jesus, loving Him well and knowing Him in personal experience, these are our goals. A healthy relationship with Jesus is going to be the staple we want to keep in place as we navigate spiritual warfare, because spiritual warfare has everything to do with abiding in the freedom of Christ.
“[Steps for freedom in Christ] are to be used within the larger context of meaningful discipleship relationships, worship, prayer support, fellowship, teaching, and growth (131)…Resisting Satan and finding deliverance from the influence of evil spirits is an entire way of life in the context of Christian community. It involves drawing near to God in faith and prayer, becoming immersed in the Scriptures, attaching oneself to other believers in meaningful relationships, and understanding and appropriating the work of Christ. “ Clinton E. Arnold, 3 Crucial Questions about Spiritual Warfare, ed. Grant R. Osborne and Richard J. Jones Jr., 3 Crucial Questions (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1997), 131, 139
Conclusion
So to summarize, if we want to close doors to the enemy, this will include:
- Submitting to God (repentance, surrender, coming under the Word), and resisting the devil in thought any action)
- Walking in unconditional forgiveness
- Repenting from false spiritual beliefs and practices (including idols)
- Framing relationships righteously
We also want to:
- Put on the full armor of God (believing, appropriating, and using the truths of Scripture in the battlefield of the mind).
- Commit to a lifestyle of prayer
- Renew our minds (immersion in the word, teaching, and prayer).
- Fast for additional spiritual strength
- Receive prayer support from other believers in the context of a local body.
- Be genuinely willing to be healed
So if someone is experiencing ongoing spiritual warfare, the first place to consider addressing is these 4 open doors. Some of these doors may require more prayer ministry than others, and in some cases counsel and support from others, but ensuring they are all closed is the first and most important step. An example where more prayer ministry and counsel may be needed is in instances of trauma, where a wound is open that the devil keeps picking at and trying to capitalize on. As those wounds close, our soul heals and our mind is shaped by the truth, there’s nothing left for the enemy to try to pry at. And so there is a relationship between healing and freedom, which may require more time and attention, as it did for me personally. Thankfully, we don’t have to be fully healed to be fully free, but the more healed we are the more renewed our mind will be and the more protected our emotions will be, giving his lies nothing to stick to.
Again, this was meant to be kind of an introduction to the topic, and so depending on what someone is working through, any one of these prior points could be elaborated on more and tailored specifically to what an individual is going through.
