Take aim
Thinking about the ‘principalities & powers’ in Ephesians 6 before going to sleep the other night, I realised I’d forgotten the previous bit ‘we don’t wrestle against flesh & blood’. And I wonder if it’s fair to paraphrase Paul thusly: We’re not fighting individuals, the people on the street. They are to a large extent pawns in larger systems of evil, and it’s the systems that need to be battled.
5 responses to “Take aim”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Im thinking i posted this already. But im thinking the post didnt work. IF i am posting twice, accept my humble appologies.
Im thinking maybe thats not it either, although it depends on definition of ‘systems’. Methinks maybe its contrasting the ‘flesh and blood’ with ‘spiritual’ warfare. He’s saying we ain’t fighting a physical war, but a spiritual war, and our enemies include the ‘powers’ of the spiritual realm (ie, demons et al.).
or something
to an extent, i guess(like i rant about on my blog). but i think the bible also talks about those who belong to God vs. those who don’t belong to God(John 8:47) and the children of God vs. the children of devil(1 John 3:10). methinks spiritual war is accurate though.
Yes I would say it is talking about spiritual warfare vs physical warfare. ie. don’t join the crusades (at least not the spiritual ones)
I don’t think spiritual and physical are opposites.
not opposites but different. We are generally good at looking at everything only through our ‘physical’ eyes, and therefor it is a tendancy of people to get caught up on physical reality which is what is throwing itself at us all day everyday, and ignore spiritual stuff, as it is less tangible. Paul is reminding that we arent just fighting in your everyday war for land or power or whatnot, but something beyond that; a spiritual war. This dont mean they are opposites just different.