GCD Short - Thoughts on Spiritual Warfare, Attachments and Character Traits

 This weekend my family engaged in spiritual warfare for each other as we interceded for each other to rid ourselves of the demonic attachments that have accumulated over the course of the last year. I have written an article on this type of intercessory battle which you can read here, which goes into the nature and the process by which you can engage in this type of warfare. This article that you are reading now is just going to be a short one outlining a couple of things that I think I am beginning to figure out and understand about intercessory spiritual battle.

The first thing that I want to talk about is the matter of attachments that we receive through our interactions with others. As my family took turns praying over each other, there were certain attachments that we called out and dealt with that seemed to be out of character for us; things that the individual that we were praying over has not dealt with as a temptation or a character trait. This has led me to believe that these may have been attachments that we have received from other people. When we interact with others, be that on a regular basis or possibly even just one time, there may be attachments that the other person is carrying that move over to us. We have done nothing to invite the demonic attachment; it has just transferred over. Maybe the demon recognizes some similar spirits and decides to join them; I really don't know. I don't even know if this is a theologically sound idea, so I am really just spit-balling here. But if this is the case, I think it indicates how careful we must be about whom we spend our time with, and when we choose to minister to the unsaved, we need to be intentional about our own spiritual protection, and we should probably act to cleanse ourselves of whatever spiritual attachments may have come upon us during the interactions with others.

The second thing that I want to talk about is the possibility that, as we continue to deal with our demonic attachments over and over again, I wonder if there is a possibility that we can dig a little deeper with each progressive cleansing. My family has been engaging in this type of warfare for a number of years already, but this time I noticed that we were calling out some things that the individual has been dealing with for many years; things that we would chalk up to being a part of their personality, but this time we were dealing with those things as demonic attachments. They have probably been there for a very long time, but we haven't been led by the Holy Spirit to deal with them before now. It's like we have been able to cut deeper this time than previous times.

I almost picture it like cleaning an infected wound. We clean up as much as we can, getting out all the gunk that we can see and maybe cutting away dead flesh, then we have to wait a while so the wound can heal a bit. That healing process brings additional contaminants to the surface of the wound and we are able to clean those away on the next cleaning. This goes on again and again; the body is rejecting the foreign objects as layer upon layer are removed and the wound is cleaned. As we clean the wound again and again, this action is making room for the dirt to come to the surface and is even encouraging it through the agitation caused by the cleaning process. This is a natural healing process of the physical body.

I'm sorry if that seems a little gross to any of you, but that is the nature of a severe wound in our flesh, so why can't that also be the nature of a severe wound in our spirit? As we are open to the work of the Holy Spirit in us to cleanse us, why can it not be the case that deeper infections become revealed to us that we can accomplish a deeper cleansing? Would this not be a good way for God to draw us closer to Him, by the renewing of our spirit through spiritual cleansing?

God is holy, but we are unclean. We cannot approach God due to our uncleanness except through the intercessor that is Jesus (Hebrews 7:25; Hebrews 9:24; 1 John 2:1). This does not mean that we are destined to remain in our unclean state. On the contrary, we are called to strive to become more like Jesus everyday! I have written an article about Christian Perfection in which I lay out that while it is not possible for a human being to attain to true perfection, this is still supposed to be our goal that we strive for, and by doing so, we will draw closer to God.

This short article is threatening to become a long article, so I will end it here. But I want to encourage everyone who is reading this to consider the condition of your spiritual health in the context of spiritual contaminants that you may be carrying and which may be keeping you from approaching the throne of God in the way that you desire.