When you are under attack

May I ask how this psalm of David would translate into a means of resisting the attacks of the enemy? It may seem somewhat self evident to say it, but the Lord does not ask us as believers in His Son to run anyone through as a means of resisting spiritual attacks. Similarly, we may also easily realise that the attacks of the enemy often come from within the Lord's house.

Thank you for your explanation.

I agree that our fight is not against flesh and blood, and as the scripture declares through the apostle Paul, but rather against principalities and powers in high places.

On the other hand James in his letter tells us that there is a wisdom from on high (heavenly wisdom) and a wisdom that is earthbound, natural and demonic.

It is that difference that I believe we need to lay hold of when 'running through' our enemies. James doesn't say that those who practise natural wisdom need running through and so I suppose that you haven't either. What you have said is that this effect in brethren in the churches needs to be rebuked as though it were Satan.

A believer is never Satan and so one would have to wonder how to rebuke Satan by speaking to a man!

Similarly, albeit that your explanation of your ex father in law's interference in your life is valid enough, he too is a man and one would have to know from whence his opposition comes before you can assert that it is an effect of spiritual wickedness in high places. No man has the power to rob you of your rightful inheritance in Christ - not even a father in law. Only a believer can do that if he has authority over you, be that by natural means of being a father or a father in law, or else by reason of being an elder or a minster in spiritual things. But that is a matter of your liberty in Christ and not a matter of natural things.

I am assuming you are speaking about your children. And so it may be easier to examine natural and reasonable paternity issues before God and take your position before the Father. In that place your paternity stands and it is in that place that the Father will answer your prayers no matter what your ex father in law does.

It may be a mistake to take a position of spiritual warfare against your ex wife's father. It may be better to take your stand in Christ before the Father in heaven and lay hold of your children there.

As to warfare in a spiritual meaning - well that does need to be warfare. Agreed.

Yes I agree whole heartedly that things need to be interpreted spiritually brother. And for those of us who have Christ in us, such spiritual discernment is often all that is necessary to find the liberty we need to walk in the Spirit on any matter and find both our peace and a basis for resting in Christ.

However, if we are inclined to make statements of necessity, seeing that we have found liberty by means of spiritual warfare as you have expressed, we may not have a spiritual meaning at all in truth by using the physical attributes of a man's expressions which are in your quote of the Psalms David and do not see that his words are entirely grounded in physical battles yet are necessarily confidently expressed with a spiritual reality of God when we are obedient. If we do that then we miss men all together, or else we assert that men are Satan without understanding what that would mean if we do not make clear from the Scripture how the Lord rebuked Satan whilst speaking to a man (Peter).

For myself, in a prophetic voice, as your own words are set in a prophetic voice, my [our] burden ought to be otherwise. Which is to say we ought to never fail to give a good account of the word of God - otherwise our brethren may take our words to heart on any matter and mistakenly apply a wrong meaning and attribute to men the person and ambitions of Satan who is the father of lies and a harbinger of sin and death.

In personal matters that effect or inclination to speak to men and rebuke Satan as though we were speaking to Satan is a mistaken precept, in a direct sense, because where the man is in Christ he is not Satan at all but a new creature. So to whom are we speaking when we rebuke Satan and then turn away or at least leave our brother or sister bereft of a way of deliverance?

W are not asked to rebuke Satan in his person as a fallen Cherub.The name, Satan is a description of who he became. It simply means God's opponent. And even though he endlessly usurps believers and seeks to trap them - in the instance of Peter's words that led to this rebuke of the Lord, Pater was opposing God by trying to turn Christ away from the cross. So when Jesus spoke those words to Peter He was not speaking to Satan as He did in the wilderness, he was speaking to a man who's words were contrary to the will of God.

That Satan had a hand in this affair of Peter is clear because the Lord then tells Peter that despite his claims of being willing to raise the sword for Christ (warfare) and lay down his life to preserve Christ (courage) Satan had been granted permission to sift him - and that sifting would take place precisely at the hour of Christ's arrest. Peter not only didn't understand these things but he even took a sword to the last supper table and thence into the garden, and even struck a man who was seeking to arrest Jesus.

If we are unwilling to rightly divide the word of truth now that we have come into life, then rebuking a believer as though he were Satan can only cause stumbling. It may very well give us a liberty because we see the hand of our enemy when our brethren or our ex father-in-law seeks to harm our very flesh when he sets about to remove our children from our paternal authority - yet he cannot do it if we go before the Father and evoke our paternity in a supplication with confidence knowing that in the sight of God our children are indeed our children and before Him they cannot be removed. Therein lies true authority for the father of children and not in telling our ex father in law to get thee behind me Satan.

That is all I felt burdened to say to you brother. Nothing more than that.