It's Not About Flesh and Blood

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

Ephesians 6:12

In today’s focus verse, we learn two important things that we must understand and carry with us daily… The first is that upon this earth we will wrestle… There is a battle that takes place daily, the problem is that it comes in many forms… Laziness (a desire not to get up or go to work), jealousy (a desire to have what others have obtained), and malice (hatred, spite, or cruelty) which will cause us to be nasty to people or disrespectful just to name a few… Know that battles are at your door and sometimes have invaded your house… You must follow the guidelines outlined in this letter to the church of Ephesus… Paul teaches us in the verse that precedes this one that we are to put on the full amour of God… After instructing us about the importance of being prepared, he goes on in today’s focus verse to explain why we need to equip ourselves… Again, whether we recognize it or not, we are at war within ourselves and our societies…  We see many young men and women becoming chalk outlines, many kids having kids, and more and more decisions being made that lead to catastrophic outcomes… 

To understand the war we are fighting (this is the second lesson that we must learn and comprehend), we must understand who the enemy really is… When someone commits a heinous crime, we are quick to pass judgment, but the truth of the matter is that we should be praying for that individual to be released from the bondage of evil that has taken His life captive… This war we are fighting isn’t about the flesh; it’s not about what you see but about the motives and where the decisions are derived from… Consider Job from the Old Testament as an example; he lost everything (children, cattle) and then his wife told him to curse God and die… The physical things that we see on the surface of Job’s life weren’t the real problem, it was the decision to curse God or not… Paul’s letter speaks to us and Job’s situation confirms it… We wrestle not against the flesh (what we can see), but rather against the devil and all the traps that aren’t visible…

ALL FOR HIS GLORY!