Battles You Were Never Sent to Fight
"No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier." — 2 Timothy 2:4
A Growing Practice
It has become common for believers to travel in groups on trips advertised as evangelistic. There is nothing whatever wrong with travelling together, and many people are genuinely blessed by such trips.
But some of these tours are organized for an additional stated purpose: to pull down the spiritual powers ruling over particular regions.
Asked how they actually accomplish this, tour leaders have given a consistent answer: We take the people into the temples and have them pray directly against the gods of that temple and pull them down.
Why This Does Not Work
Can believers walk into a temple and pull down the powers of that temple through prayer?
No. And the reason is the principle that runs through this entire study.
As long as the temple stands, those powers hold a legal right to be there.
Look at how God instructed Israel to deal with the gods of Canaan. Never once were they told to pray against them while leaving the shrines intact. Always they were commanded to destroy the altar, cut down the image, and burn the carved gods with fire.
"But thus you shall deal with them: you shall destroy their altars, and break down their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images, and burn their carved images with fire." (Deuteronomy 7:5)
We serve a God who is completely just, and His justice extends to the adversary's legal claims. Until the temple, the altars, and the images are gone, those powers retain their standing.
Gideon's Assignment
Consider Gideon, whom God used to defeat an enormous army with three hundred men.
Before any of that, God gave him a different assignment first:
"Take your father's young bull… and tear down the altar of Baal that your father has, and cut down the wooden image that is beside it; and build an altar to the LORD your God on top of this rock." (Judges 6:25–26)
Cleanse your own ground first. Destroy what is on your own family's property.
Only after Gideon physically demolished the altar in his own yard did he have power to defeat the enemies of Israel.
The Test Nobody Applies
There is a simple test for whether such prayers have accomplished what is claimed.
Ask the tour leaders whether they return to the same temples on subsequent trips. Many say they do.
But if the previous group had genuinely destroyed the power of that temple's gods, the temple would not still be there. It is. Year after year.
Meanwhile the believers who were led inside have entered ground held legally by another power and engaged in a battle their Commander never authorized. Many of them leave with curses of destruction on their lives and on their children's lives, entirely unaware.
Point to Ponder
Gideon tore down the altar in his own yard before he ever fought a national battle. That order is not negotiable.
Verse to Remember
"Take… and tear down the altar of Baal that your father has, and cut down the wooden image that is beside it." — Judges 6:25
Question to Consider
Am I trying to pull down something far away while an altar still stands in my own house?
Today's Practice
Two questions today.
First, have you ever participated in a prayer campaign, tour, or event that involved entering a place dedicated to another power in order to pray against it? If so, repent for engaging an unauthorized battle, and break every curse that came upon you and your family through it in the name of Jesus Christ.
Second, and more importantly: what is still standing in your own yard?
Objects in your home. Habits in your life. Compromises in your family. Agreements you have never renounced. Deal with those first. Everything in these lessons up to this point has been Gideon's first assignment.
Prayer
Father, I have wanted to fight impressive battles far away while leaving the altar in my own yard untouched.
Forgive me for every engagement I entered without orders. Where I have gone into places I was never sent, and taken on powers I was never authorized to confront, cover me and cleanse me by the blood of Jesus Christ. Break every curse that came upon me and my household through it.
And give me the humility to do the unimpressive work first. Show me what is still standing on my own ground — in my house, in my habits, in my family — and give me the resolve to tear it down.
Make me a Gideon: obedient at home before I am ever bold abroad. In Jesus' name. Amen.
You cannot pull down a temple you are unwilling to tear down.