When I ask people how they feel about spiritual warfare the most frequent answer is fear. Even people who don’t think spiritual warfare has anything to do with them become wide-eyed and wary when we start talking about this topic. There is overwhelming evidence in the Bible that Christians have nothing to fear from Satan and his followers.
Fear shows a lack of faith in God. It’s been said a fear of Satan is nothing more than faith in Satan. That may seem like an odd way to put it, but I think there is truth to that. Let’s look at the biblical evidence why this shouldn’t be true.
[Tweet “Some say a fear of Satan is nothing more than faith in Satan. Don’t fear him http://bit.ly/2awkJui”]
12 Reasons Why Christians Shouldn’t Fear Satan or Spiritual Warfare
- Jesus created things including Satan and spirit beings. He has authority over them. Colossians 1:16-17
- Jesus proved He is greater than Satan when he easily resisted Satan’ attack. Matthew 4:1-11
- All demons that Jesus encountered feared Him! Matthew 8:28-30
- Jesus gave His authority over demons to his followers which includes us. Luke 10:17-19, Ephesians 6:10
- Jesus destroyed Satan’s power by dying on the cross Hebrews 2:14 and disarmed spiritual rulers and authorities Colossians 2:15
- We have the Spirit of God indwelling us and He is greater than Satan. 1 John 4:4. Therefore Satan cannot control any Christian against his or her will.
- The Scripture promises Satan can’t touch us. 1 John 5:18-19 There are no warnings about or examples of Satan or any demons physically hurting any believers in the Bible except the unusual case of Job.
- We were delivered from Satan’s domain and transferred to Jesus’ kingdom when we trusted in Christ. Colossians 1:13
- Satan and his forces can only attack us if God allows. Job 1-2, Luke 22:31-32
- We have been given a defense, the armor of God, to resist all satanic attacks. Ephesians 6:10-18
- The fact that the Bible tells us to resist Satan assumes we can do it. 1 Peter 5:8-9, James 4:7
- In the one story in the Bible where God allows Satan to unleash his power on a believer, Job and his family, Satan did not win and Job ended up better off than before he was attacked. Job 42:10-17
Where does fear come from? God has not given us a spirit of fear 2 Timothy 1:7. Fear is an attacking thought from the enemy. Fear is the opposite of love 1 John 4:18.
3 things to do if you fear Satan.
- Make the decision to resist the specific fear with the faith in God. James 4:7, Ephesians 6:16-17
- Focus on fearing God, having a genuine informed respect for His power and majesty. Proverbs 1:7, 9:10
- Meditate on the love God has for you, which will drive the fear from you. 1 John 4:18
Think about all of the verses above and how great God is and the attacking fear will be replaced with love and comfort and confidence in the Lord.
Do you fear Satan and spiritual warfare? If so, why? What makes it hard to resist the fear? Please leave a question or comment below.
The real reason we don’t need to fear Satan or judgment… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fuwmi2EWAD8
The Baptists expect to lose half their churches in the
next 20 years. They revamp their
message, but nothing works because they can’t face the real problem that
plagues all churches.
According to the Christian website,
http://www.gotquestions.org, few young adults have a “biblical worldview,” because
they don’t believe in Satan, hell or that Christianity is the only true
religion. The problem is that
Christianity has an identity crisis that gives young adults good reason to
doubt the church.
Joseph Ratzinger (pope) quit his first seminary
because it conceded that two separate and
opposing Christianities existed in the second century. One was the Jewish Christianity of Jesus and the
other was the gentile Roman Christianity of Paul. They noted that Paul was “indifferent to the
teaching of Jesus… and the opponent of
the religion of love, Christ came to announce to the world.”
Jesus’ Christianity had no judgment, Satan,
hell, Easter or Christmas for 300 years!
These were not the teaching of
Christ, but pagan traditions added by the Romans when they commandeered the
religion later. These facts don’t discredit Jesus Christ at all!
Bishop John Spong of Newark says “the church has always dangled us
between their imaginary heaven and hell as a control tactic.” This savvy, secular world gets it, and is
unmoved by the church’s brimstone threats.
They know it has nothing to do with the religion of Jesus Christ.
The church is dying, but as they say, “When God closes a door, He always opens a window.” So now, Christian Spirituality, more like original Christianity, is a star on the rise.
Truly, Brad O’Donnell
Brad,
Thanks for posting a comment. I looked at your video on youtube and it would seem that we don’t share the same the same authority for what we believe. Everything that I teach is based upon my faith and trust in the Bible as the authoritative word of God. I can’t imagine you are unaware of this position. I am happy to engage in a discussion with you, but if our basis of authority is different we don’t have a common starting ground to even begin talking. We could talk about the basis of our authority, but once again my guess is that you have already had that discussion with others before. I’m not sure what you are seeking for in life, but I hope you find true joy and peace and fulfillment.
Ward
John Tessari: Thank you Ward! I am with you 100% Satan is a defeated foe and only has a spiritual influence. We, on the other hand, have been given the strength of our Savior, JESUS CHRIST, and through our absolute faith in HIM we are empowered to stand against the Devil – “and he will flee”. We can live life completely free from fear. Even if we die we will be in Heaven for eternity with Christ. What is to fear in that?
If Christianity is what Bread is stating then we, of course, are doomed and fear would be legitimate.
The PROOF I have is both personal and gleaned from situations where Christians were extremely persecuted. Take the circumstance of John Bergen and his wife Eloise. The machete attack they suffered destroyed many other peoples hearts when they received the same violent treatment. Their faith is exemplary and a very strong testimony to true Christian faith.
Thanks, John. I appreciate your comments. I have been teaching on this for many years and I have found that fear is the most common reaction to any discussion or thoughts of Satan. I agree with you that it should not be but it’s not helpful to just say “Don’t be afraid of Satan.” People have hear that and still fear so we must teach from the Word why that is so.
thank you for the encouragement! You are absolutely right, there is nothing to fear but only GOD.
I might add that Christians must understand that Jesus’s blood cleanses us of all sins when we confess them. One of Satans manipulative strategies is to keep bringing up past sins we have ALREADY CONFESSED and REPENTED OF. I capitalized those two because it is important to note that we must confess and repent of our sins and accept Jesus’s atoning sacrifice for our sins. After we have done these steps then we must believe that all is well with Jesus and that if the enemy is attacking it is because He wants to stop us from serving Jesus Christ. I am currently going through spiritual warfare and I have to admit that I get scared when a blasphemous thought goes through my mind. I reject it and then I tell God about it right away in my prayer room. I ask Him to help me and then I am reading Charles Stanley’s books on Overcoming the Enemy and When the Enemy Attacks and such books to build my faith. I believe what Charles said is also true,which is that we as believers are not to go alone in our battle against the enemy. We are to choose a prayer partner and confess our sins to Him or Her and ask that prayer partner to help us pray until the enemy is overcome.
I deal with with blasphemous thoughts too I Use Gods Word, I Praise Jesus for taking it away. Thank Jesus for everything. Rely on Gods precious Holy Spirit Gods my life and peace. I say I am Healed forgiven and saved 🙂
But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has authority to cast into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him! – confused on these from Jesus in Luke 12
NO, I do not agree on what you said when all christians cannot be harmed, If you believe in God then nothing shall harm you, doesn’t matter if your are a muslim, atheist, hindu or anything. God is the Greatest and nothing can harm us, just Keep Calm and Believe in God.
Once I was a hindu but I always had bad luck in my life, but since my dad was a believer I started praying to God and I felt like he was responding back to me. I am not a great son or anything but he still forgives me. Satan is nothing compared to God. Satan basically gets his power from fear and we shall not fear. If live in a haunted house or something like that you don’t need to put a bunch of cross signs just believe with your heart, believe and if nothing happens my God isn’t real!!
I was paranoid that if I wasn’t careful, satan would cause me to sin and Jesus would come and I would lose my salvation… But that turned into severe paranoia and fear. This article really helped me fyi, it is very clear and true Amen.