Is Physical Healing Part of Spiritual Warfare? Does the Devil Make Us Sick?
Spiritual Warfare Made Simple, Chapter 12, Part 13
As we keep exploring the last chapter in the book, keep the three main principles of spiritual warfare in mind, as we delved into in depth in the first few chapters:
God is sovereign.
You have dominion. You have the power. You are not helpless.
The devil lies. The devil tempts. But he has no ability to overpower you.
All three are displayed in the verses below:
“Whom Satan has bound”
Physical health often follows when Jesus casts a demon out of a person. Spiritual warfare is not merely spiritual. It affects the physical, given that the spiritual realm is higher than the physical. Here’s one example:
Now [Jesus] was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And behold, there was a woman who had had a disabling spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself.
When Jesus saw her, He called her over and said to her, “Woman, you are freed from your disability.” And He laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and she glorified God.
But the ruler of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the people, “There are six days in which work ought to be done. Come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day.”
Then the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water it? And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?”
As He said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame, and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were done by Him. (Luke 13:10-17 ESV).
Immediately upon reading this encounter, we witness a demon — a “disabling spirit” — who is able to keep a woman bent over, physical disabled, for eighteen years.
This seems like a powerful demon! This woman is coming to the synagogue, so she has some belief in God and some connection to God’s people. Yet the demon kept her disabled for nearly two decades.
How does this mesh with the principles discussed in this book?
Quite easily.
Consider: where did Satan’s influence over humanity begin? With Adam and Eve, in the Garden of Eden. Satan lied, and because Adam and Eve believed his lies, humanity fell into spiritual death. This spiritual death affected us physically. Before sin, there was no sickness and no death. With sin, both sickness and death spread to all humanity.
Satan could not make Adam and Eve sick, but he could lie to them, and when they believed his lies by acting on them, they killed themselves spiritually. Their spiritual death began affecting them physically, resulting in sickness and death.
Where did sickness and death come from?
Lies.
The devil lies.
Next, consider how this encounter ends. The woman stands up, healed and straightened, and glorifies God.
How did that happen?
Jesus exercised dominion.
Jesus commanded the woman to be freed, and she was. Far from being powerful, the demon is so weak that it leaves without so much as a whimper. The woman stands up, free of it and immediately healed.
Sickness came from lies.
Health came from dominion.
The disciples of Jesus continue to exercise this kind of dominion throughout their adventures spreading the Gospel of Jesus to all the world, as recorded in the book of Acts. When they exercise their dominion, it leads to healing.
Curiously, Jesus and the disciples never heal someone by asking God to heal.
Every time Jesus or one of His disciples heals someone, they do it by a command — by exercising their dominion over the demon and its diseases. In this example, Jesus commands the woman to be healed, announcing that she is freed by His command.
Note also that Adam and Eve began suffering physical deterioration and death because of their dominion — as a result of their spiritual death which resulted from their choice. Satan did not make them sick. He only tricked them into killing themselves spiritually through willful rebellion. Once they killed themselves spiritually, they began to suffer physical effects, including their eventual deaths.
But if that’s the case, how could Satan make this woman physically disabled for eighteen years? Jesus Himself said that Satan had bound this woman! How could the devil do this?
Again, the answer is dominion — or rather, a lack thereof.
No one in her life exercised their dominion to get rid of the demon. They left it on her. Some people, no doubt, thought it was merely a physical problem — nothing spiritual about it. Others may have believed God could heal her, but didn’t know they could visit that healing upon her through their dominion. Even the synagogue leaders, despite having the books of the Old Testament with them recording multiple healings, did not apply them to her.
Why did they believe these things?
Because the devil lies. He’ll convince you that spiritual bondage is entirely physical. He’ll convince you that you can’t do anything to heal someone. He’ll emphasize your Scriptural knowledge as mere head knowledge, without any sense of awareness that you’re meant to apply it to those in your life.
Much more could be said on the topic of healing. This is not meant to be an exhaustive discussion of the topic.
But it does highlight that everything about this woman’s suffering resulted from the devil lying, and everything about her freedom resulted from dominion being exercised.
This post comprises the thirteenth part of Chapter 12 of my book Spiritual Warfare Made Simple. Grab your copy of the ebook or paperback here!
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