Engaged in Warfare

II Timothy - 2:3-4
"You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier."

     There are two basic reasons to have soldiers.  One is to prevent, deter or be ready in case of war, and the second is because there is a war going on.  In our case, there is a war going on.  This war has been going on since God cast Lucifer and 1/3 of the angels out of heaven.  Since then, they have been attacking mankind on earth.  While the subject of this spiritual warfare is another deep topic that will be covered separately later, we need to get a feel for it now. 

     Put very simply, Satan wanted to be God.  He thought that he was better than God and he wanted to exalt himself above God.  What happened to Satan was he became prideful.  In the beginning, Satan was God’s most important angel--Lucifer.  God tells us about Lucifer through the prophet Ezekiel.  In Ezekiel 28: 13-15 it states:

      “You had the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.  You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering…You were the anointed cherub who covers, and I placed you there.  You were on the holy mountain of God; you walked in the midst of the stones of fire.  You were blameless in your ways from the day when you were created until unrighteousness was found in you.”

Satan was made so perfect, so beautiful, so knowledgeable that he became self-centered instead of God centered.  This is when God found unrighteousness within him and cast him out of heaven.  Since then, the devil has been striking out at God’s people.

He must hate us because we remind him of God.  God tells us in Genesis that He made us in His own image.  Maybe the devil knows that he can never defeat God, so the next best thing is to destroy His creations by fighting to keep them from salvation.

Whichever the case, our war as Soldiers of Christ is a real one.  We have a real enemy with real weapons and with a real plan.  Satan knows his fate in the end because it is foretold in Revelation.  His only consolation is to take as many of God’s people to Hell with him as he can.  As the old saying goes, misery loves company. 

      The focus of our consideration here has to be that our war is not of the flesh but the spirit.  This means that yelling, punching, kicking or taking other fleshly actions will only hurt our cause. 

     Our only enemy in this war is the devil and his band of demons.  Every other person on this earth has a spirit that God wants saved.  Our weapons in this war are prayer, fasting, love and the Word of God. 

(1)   Endure hardship
(2)   Soldier of Jesus Christ
(3)   Engaged in Warfare
(4)   Entangles himself
(5) Please our Commander