This document discusses spiritual warfare in marriage. It asserts that marriage is under attack from evil spirits because it represents God's love. It warns of various temptations the devil uses to attack marriages, such as negative thoughts, accusations, and physical temptations. It provides advice on how to resist these attacks through prayer, focusing on God rather than fears/feelings, developing godly habits, and asking God to protect and guide the marriage.

1. Spiritual Warfare and Marriage
The Battle To Believe The Best……

2.  Marriage is “under attack” by powers and
principalities in the heavenly realms
 Ephesians 6:10-20
 Marriage is attacked because it is a “type” of
Christ’s love and of the Father love of God
and is the place where we grow most as a
Christian, in love…
 The Devil attacks through our minds, our
hearts, our lusts and through the
temptations and frustrations of the world…

3.  Hopelessness, negative focus
 Spiritual lethargy
 Weird and ugly thoughts and ideas
 Powerful sudden impulsive temptations
 Spitefulness, vindictiveness, making threats
 A sharp cruel cutting edge in your words
 Unusual outbursts, prolonged sulking
 Accusation of one another
 Blasphemy, blaming God, spiritual anger
 Arguments before or after a time of ministry or before
or after church

4.  Aims to steal, kill and destroy, a liar from the beginning
 Puts lies in our head about others who are close to us!
 Accuses: Us to God
God to Us
Us to One Another
Us To Ourselves
 Legalistic, rules-minded, points out wrong-doing,
shortcomings and “debts” owed one to the other…

5. The Devils unholy plans, lies and suggestions…
 “I must have married the wrong person”
 “I must be cursed for marrying this person”
 “There is no hope for this relationship but to
separate”
 “I’m done…” Not wanting divorce or
separation, but there is a clear resignation
from engaging emotionally.
 “I guess I’ll just have to settle for this kind of
miserable life…”
 Take your thoughts captive (1 Cor. 10: 3-6).
 The Holy Spirit helps us in identifying such
times when we make agreements with lies…

6.  Satan wants us to focus on our fears
(paranoid scenarios)
 Satan wants us to focus on our feelings
(hurt, bored, deprived, insulted etc)
 Instead we should focus on:
God
The Heavenly Perspective
The Other Person
The Verifiable Facts

7.  Never be alone in a room/car with a person of
the opposite sex (other than your spouse) for an
extended period of time.
 Never flatter a person of the opposite sex
 Never sensuously touch a person of the opposite
sex even for seemingly “innocent” reasons.
 Don’t flirt and don’t try to use sexual charm as a
means of advancement
 Never make provision for the lusts of the flesh
(especially when traveling)

8.  Of when you are feeling lonely, trapped, frustrated or
very bored…
 Of when you are being inappropriately attracted
 Of when you are making an effort to be around
someone other than your spouse
 Of the deceptive feeling that you are “better off
without X…”
 Of when you have a grudge against your partner and
want revenge that will hurt

9.  Of your prayer, Bible reading dropping away
 Of slack church attendance / lack of zeal
 Of sudden doubts about the Bible or doubts
about Jesus, finding excuses why Bible morals
are “irrelevant for today”, reinterpreting the
Scripture, being “liberal”, criticizing the Church
or pastor, avoiding zealous Christian friends..
 Of trying to intellectually justify polygamy, These are often
warning signs that
adultery or other wrong behaviors you want to dodge
 Of suddenly making yourself attractive (for the the issue / guilt about
wrong motive), going to the gym or enrolling in what you are inwardly
courses that would make you more planning to do
“marketable”

10.  Resentments are the Devil’s “footholds” Eph 4:27
If issues are not resolved they turn into resentments
Resolve and start to fester within us.
Resent Eventually the resentments create distance and
rejection in the marriage and communication ceases
while irritation increases.
Reject
Over time irritation overwhelms the desire not to
Revenge act, it becomes fixed into an ambition to take
revenge, which may be explosive and destructive.

11.  Some “seemingly small” decisions / actions set off a
terrifying non-proportional sequence of events that I
call the “whirlwind”
 Hosea 8:7 “They sow the wind, and reap the
whirlwind…”
 The whirlwind is a blame game of rage, revenge, court
cases, custody disputes, property settlements, petty
bickering, family feuds etc.
 Whirlwind Triggers: shouting/verbal abuse, physical
violence, threatening divorce, secretive financial
maneuvers that get found out, devious “house-of-
cards” lifestyle choices, crime, one-night stands,
Facebook romances, actual affairs…
 NEVER do anything, that if it was found out, would
automatically set the whirlwind into motion…

12.  Develop the habits of holiness and the “ruts of
righteousness” in your daily living.
 Fill your week with good things “redeeming the
time”, do more of what works
 Have family rituals that are positive and joyful
 Have times of prayer together
 Develop a constructive lifestyle that is
interesting, educational, beneficial and which
expands and reinforces godly Christian principles
 Don’t see your family life / marriage as being just
about financial progress but about spiritual
progress and personal growth, you cannot serve
both God and Mammon.

13.  Thy kingdom come, thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven
 Pray that God’s heavenly will is
accomplished in your earthly marriage –
full of love, grace, unity, health, joy etc
 See your marriage as a place where God’s
will is being made real on earth as it is in
Heaven
 Love your spouse in the same manner and
high regard as as Jesus would

14.  Give us this day our daily bread
 It is legitimate to ask that our basic human
needs be met within marriage
 Meet the other person’s needs before asking
anything from them e.g. feed them, speak
nice words, let them unwind, do a small task
for them, inject with caffeine…
 Take care of the household finances and also
look to God’s faithfulness for daily provision

15.  Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors
 Forgive = let go of Debts = things owed
 Sins, shortcoming and failures
 Financial debts
 Debts of love and gratitude
 Debts of politeness and courtesy
 Debts of unfulfilled expectations in the marriage
 We need to “let go of the stuff…” whatever it is…
 See also 1 Peter 3:7
 God tends to treat us as we treat others!
 Sometimes we can forgive but need to be cautious about
trusting esp. violent behavior

16.  Lead us not into temptation (pressing
circumstances) but deliver us from evil
 Ask God to guard you and your spouse and to keep
you from tough and compromising circumstances
and from the evil situations of life
 Realize that you each need divine protection if you
are to make it through “this present evil age”.
 Make prayer a part of daily marriage routines e.g.
for safety before driving, saying grace before
eating, praying at bedtime etc

17.  We mainly pray for circumstances, but
Jesus mainly prayed for relationships and
moral qualities…
 Unity, Love
 Sanctification (holy living, purity etc)
 Being with Him
 Sharing His glory
 Realize that God loves you and loves your
spouse just as much as God loves Jesus
 Pray to take your marriage to a higher
spiritual level!

18.  Stay close to God
 Be filled with the Holy Spirit
 Keep good company and have good morals
 Walk in integrity with good sound boundaries
 Remember your High Calling as a Christian
 Faithfulness, endurance, forbearance ……
 Abundant forgiveness (70 times 7)
 Love is patient!
 Rebuke the Enemy and the Devourer in Jesus’ Name
 Pray for the solution (instead of worrying about the problem)
 Fight each day’s battle… one day at a time sweet Jesus…