We are in a very real war. The stakes are high, the enemy skilled, heavily armed and determined. We are living in the crossfire of this spiritual war; struggling to shield ourselves from the shackles of spiritual wickedness. But we seem not to have any headway because our struggle is carnal and therefore humdrum.
The devil and his cohorts are restless in ensuring that mankind lost the battle. This he does by deploying different killer strategies to maim and destroy. Realising this, Christians are urged to bear in mind that a hostile strike requires completely different and neutralising tactics.
Mindful of this, Pastor Joses Hizkiah; the helmsman of Unfailing Life Ministry has produced what might be termed “tips for neutralising devilish attacks.” This he did by publishing this manifestly helpful book Weapons of Our Warfare.
He maintained that “Weapons of our warfare is good at all points, good for defence and for attack, to guard our whole person or to strike through the joints and marrow of the foe.”
The book instructs that “we must understand that our warfare is fought with the mind set of a winner; for Jesus Christ has won the battle …
Weapons of Our Warfare is a book of 19 chapters spread over184 pages excluding the 14 pages of prelims. It is compartmentalised into two sections namely “Principles of Spiritual Warfare” in part one which is made up of 10 chapters and “Armour for Warfare” in part two which boasts nine chapters.
The book sets off with the introduction where Pastor Hizkiah reveals that “the Word of God is very comprehensible about the fact that negative spiritual powers are behind the woes and the battles that many Christians go through,” even as he maintained that “the full armour of God is our spiritual defence against all the attacks of the evil one which is the devil and other fallen angels.
These weapons of our warfare are manifested in the intrinsic energy of the Holy Spirit…released upon us at baptism of the Holy Spirit.”
The author opines that our motives, operational mode, purposes, war tactics and goals change from natural to supernatural once we switch camp from carnal beings to a born anew spiritual being redeemed by the blood of the Lamb.
Reeling off the three stages or steps of spiritual warfare, Hizkiah said they are manifested in demolishing all that are opposed to Christ, holding captive and bringing into obedience to Christ all that were at one time opposed to Him.
Acquiescing with the views of Joyce Meyer in her book Battlefield of the Mind, Pastor Hizkiah said: “[We are] maintaining our faith walk and tearing down all the strongholds or fortresses of ungodly thoughts, imaginations, reasoning and lies that Satan uses to delude and deceive [us] in order to hold captive…It is time to demolish evil forces with the sword, truth and the Spirit. Get set to use your offensive and defensive artillery weapons which have the capability to deflect with the shield, the sword of the spirit to pierce asunder, truth to set free, feet shod with the gospel to gain a sure footing, helmet to protect the mind from wrong thoughts and effectual fervent prayer …to involve the God-head who answers prayers…”
The author described Satan as the foe and goes on to warn the reader that “Satan our foe is not to be taken with levity.”
The author notes that barraging us with an intention to get us to fall into sin, disobedience, immorality, transgression and iniquity is one of the strategies of Satan, in a bid to harm, indwell or fall us from glory.
Warning that “sin is evil or immoral acts, words and deeds; it is the act of violating God’s will and a transgression of God’s moral law… an offence against the standard of God, Pastor Hizkiah likened these shortcomings to the actions of little foxes that come into the vineyard when the grapes are developed and juicy to destroy the fruits.
Forewarning that battles are inevitable, Pastor Hizkiah reminds the reader that “the world’s solution is superficial, shallow and short-lived; but our God’s weapons annihilate the weapons of the evil one. The Lord is battle ready. He is raising a war cry but with victory assured [because] Jesus is set to fit us with all the spiritual equipment needed to fight and win…”
He noted that weapons of our warfare are divinely potent; custom-made to pull down all that oppose Christ in us. These, he said, include depression, oppression, repression, discouragements, bad health, financial problems, social pressures, sexual pressures and family problems, among others.
He reveals that “strongholds are any evil thought (in our minds) that are contrary or opposed to the objectives of Jesus Christ and bring with them deadly sins.”
He identified three kinds of sins which are the “heart” sins, utterance or “speech” sins and “mannerism” sins.
Other issues discussed in Weapons of our Warfare are renewing our minds, war is inevitable, lifestyle of a warrior, different types of warfare weapons, helmet of salvation, sword of the spirit, shield of faith, belt of truth, feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace, praying always with all prayers, keep standing on the word and crushing Satan under our feet.
Normally, every first edition of any publication does have some errors. Some of these are but not limited to the following: …monastic life that separate (separates) (page 40) …let our light shines (shine) (page 40) …the world (world’s) (page 40) …opinions that expresses (express) (page 45) …when (where) Satan caged men who has (have) (page 48) …evil thoughts that is (are) (page 49). These and other lexical and structural flaws noticed in the book are expected to be taken care of in subsequent editions.
