Can God Really Help You?

Marriage is one of the most likely areas that Christians will come under spiritual attack. Why?

1. The Enemy absolutely hates marriage. Marriage was God’s idea for the human race right from the very moment that he created Eve. In Genesis we are told that a man leaves his father and mother, is united with his wife and becomes one with her. Jesus re-affirmed this; saying that two became one and that man must not separate what God has joined together. (see Matthew 19:5-6) Marriage between a man and woman is a reflection of the covenant relationship between man and God. It is a powerful relationship, more powerful than the sum of the two individuals. Jesus said that if two or three people agreed in his name, then God would be there and prayers would be answered. When a married couple pray and agree on something together the prayers are powerful and things happen.
Satan is jealous of this relationship. He was once in a relationship with God, but pride got the better of him and he fell from heaven. He is full of bitterness and resentment and he cannot bear to see people in right relationship with each other and with God. He will do everything he can to undermine marriage, particularly a Christian marriage.
Jesus also told us that Satan comes only to steal, kill and destroy. As most people from a broken marriage will testify, divorce destroys lives. If he can break up your marriage he goes a long way towards stealing, killing and destroying large parts of your life, peace and happiness. As an added bonus it will also affect the lives of many other people in your lives, particularly children.

2. Destroying a Christian marriage is often one of the most effective weapons to undermine a growing church, successful ministry or other Christian project.  We so often hear of ministries collapsing because the leader has an affair or ‘grows close’ to another woman, Todd Bentley was a recent example of this. Unfortunately we also regularly hear of incidents in our local churches. My own church was a victim of this a few years ago; the minister’s marriage collapsed due to his closeness to a member of the congregation. (He left the church and later married the other woman) A good friend once told me the story of how she had once been involved in a groundbreaking, city wide mission event and completely out of the blue two of the leaders’ marriages collapsed because they both had an affair with another woman. Whenever Christian leaders are involved in sexual impropriety, they are usually required to resign. This is the correct course of action, but it often results in a serious setback to whatever church/ministry/project they were involved in. It also undermines Christianity to the outside world.

The destruction of marriage really is a ‘win win’ situation for the Enemy and as such he is prepared to invest quite a lot of energy and resources into it. The most unfortunate thing about it; is that all too often we are extremely good at helping him along and therefore it is important to discern the difference between spiritual attack and your own (or spouses) bad behaviour. Sometimes people will claim to be under spiritual attack and the Enemy is nowhere around because he doesn’t need to be, they are doing very well on their own thank you very much. However, as the Bible tells us, he is prowling around, so if you are in general self- destruct mode but he suddenly sees an opportunity to help things along he will take it. He is particularly good at delivering the final death blow to a struggling marriage, or alternately putting in motion the final sequence of events that eventually lead to divorce. I know of one example of this amongst my own friends:

     “The Christian couple had been married with children for several years, generally just getting on with life. There were issues, but breaking up had never entered their heads. They were due to go to a concert together and one night while lying in bed the woman suddenly said ‘I don’t think I’ll come with you as it’s a school night, why don’t you take Sally (name changed)”. Sally was his very attractive, bubbly young assistant. Disappointed that his wife wouldn’t come and not wanting to go on his own he asked Sally to go with him. They enjoyed the evening together and it kick-started a relationship that eventually led to the breakup of the marriage. What on earth possessed her to say such a thing to her husband? What woman in her right mind would encourage her successful husband to take his attractive assistant on a night out? The answer is simple; the Enemy saw his moment and seized it. He had watched the marriage for years, he knew the problems within it and their individual struggles. He simply made a suggestion to her and she said it without even realising what she was doing. Had the marriage been under spiritual attack for years? No. They both had issues that had not been resolved and God was not at the centre of their marriage. There were open doors in the marriage and the Enemy took the opportunity afforded him. They were sitting ducks. Neither of them really knew what had happened and the next thing they knew they were in the middle of a nasty divorce.”

Marriage has to be guarded carefully. It needs constant care and more importantly, constant prayer.

If you are struggling within your marriage and you think that you may be under spiritual attack, then you need to begin using your weapons immediately. However, you first need to examine your own behaviour. There are probably a lot of doors that you can close simply by changing the way you think and behave. A good way to start is to write down a list of all the things that are wrong in your marriage. Once you’ve done this, read it through with a fresh pair of eyes. If most of the items on the list relate to things that your spouse is doing wrong then I am sorry to have to say this, but the change probably needs to begin with you. I know this may seem backwards, but if you can list lots of things that are wrong with your spouse then it means that you are full of bitterness and resentment. You are walking in judgement and condemnation and not in love. You are focused on their faults. It means you have left all your doors unlocked for the Enemy. All he has to do is come by every so often and point out a few more things that are wrong with your spouse. If you have suffered years of misery in a marriage there will be many deep wounds within you and it is a big ask to tell you to change, but it is the way forward. Jesus will walk it out with you and help you every step of the way.

A very good book to help you is ‘The Power of The Praying Wife/Husband by Stormie O’Martian’

If your spouse does have serious issues, particularly if they are not a Christian, then there is one piece of very good news. You are joined with their spirit and therefore you can change things in their life through your own faith and prayers.

I cannot emphasise the importance of prayer enough here, but remember one thing, God does not need a list of everything that they are doing wrong. Firstly he already knows and secondly it is not helpful for you to declare it as you are reinforcing it in the spirit world through your words. You need to make positive declarations:

      As for me and my house we will serve the Lord.  He that is in us is greater than he that is in the world. We love each other and we will have a happy marriage. We will triumph.

Finally, read Psalm 91 out loud and replace the word ‘he’ with ‘my husband/wife/family’