Ephesians 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers… 1. The subject is confessedly difficult, obscure, and mysterious; but there is nothing incredible in the existence of unseen and evil powers, from whose hostility we are in serious danger. Give the faculty of vision to the blind, and they see the sun and the clouds and the moon and the stars, of whose existence they had known nothing except by hearsay; give a new faculty to the human race, and we might discover that we are surrounded by "principalities" and "powers," some of them loyal to God and bright with a Divine glory; some of them in revolt against Him, and scarred with the lightnings of the Divine anger. The moral objections to the existence of evil spirits can hardly be sustained in the presence of the crimes of which our own race has been guilty. There may be other worlds in which the inhabitants are as wicked as the most wicked of ourselves; we cannot tell. We may be surrounded - we cannot tell - by creatures of God, who hate righteousness and hate God with a fiercer hatred than ever burned in the hearts of the most profligate and blasphemous of our race. And they may be endeavouring to accomplish our moral ruin, in this life and the life to come. 2. Our Lord plainly taught the existence of evil spirits (Matthew 13:19, 39; Luke 10:18; Luke 22:31; John 12:31; Matthew 25:41). No use to say that as He spoke the language, He thought the thoughts, of His country and His time; for it was impossible that He should mistake shadows for realities in that invisible and spiritual world which was His true home, and which He had come to reveal to man. Nor can we believe that Christ Himself knew that evil spirits had no existence, and yet consciously and deliberately fell in with the common way of speaking about them. The subject was one of active controversy between rival Jewish sects, and in using the popular language Christ took sides with one sect against another. That He should have supported controverted opinions which He knew to be false is inconceivable. Again: He came to preach glad tidings; can we suppose that, if the popular dread of evil spirits had no foundation, He would have deliberately fostered such a falsehood? 3. The teaching of Christ on this point is sustained by all the apostles (James 3:7; 2 Corinthians 4:4; 2 Corinthians 11:14; Ephesians 4:26; 1 Peter 5:8; 1 John 2:13, 14; 1 John 3:8, 10, 12; 1 John 5:18, 19, etc.). 4. The teaching of Christ and His apostles is confirmed by our religious experience. Evil thoughts come to us which are alien from all our convictions and from all our sympathies. There is nothing to account for them in our external circumstances or in the laws of our intellectual life. We abhor them and repel them, but they are pressed upon us with cruel persistency. They come to us at times when their presence is most hateful; they cross and trouble the current of devotion; they gather like thick clouds between our souls and God, and suddenly darken the glory of the Divine righteousness and love. We are sometimes pursued and harassed by doubts which we have deliberately confronted, examined, and concluded to be absolutely destitute of force, doubts about the very existence of God, or about the authority of Christ, or about the reality of our own redemption. Sometimes the assaults take another form. Evil fires which we thought we had quenched are suddenly rekindled by unseen hands; we have to renew the fight with forms of moral and spiritual evil which we thought we had completely destroyed. There is a Power not ourselves that makes for righteousness; light falls upon us which we know is light from heaven; in times of weariness strength comes to us from inspiration which we know must be Divine; we are protected in times of danger by an invisible presence and grace; there are times when we are conscious that streams of life are flowing into us which must have their fountains in the life of God. And there are dark and evil days when we discover that there is also a power not ourselves that makes for sin. We are at war, the kingdom of God on earth is at war, with the kingdom of darkness. We have to fight "against the principalities," etc. And therefore we need the strength of God and "the armour of God." The attacks of these formidable foes are not incessant; but as we can never tell when "the evil day" may come, we should be always prepared for it. After weeks and months of happy peace, they fall upon us without warning, and without any apparent cause. If we are to "withstand" them, and if after one great battle in which we have left nothing unattempted or unaccomplished for our own defence and the destruction of the enemy we are still "to stand," to stand with our force unexhausted and our resources undiminished, ready for another and perhaps fiercer engagement, we must "be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might," and we must "take up the whole armour of God." (R. W. Dale, LL. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: 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. |
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