“Fight The Snake Like An Eagle!”

“Fight The Snake Like An Eagle!”(Eph.6:10-17).
Yesterday, I was officiating at the funeral of a buxom lady who passed on at the prime of her life. It has been a few weeks since she died a sudden death. You and I may well say that, “The LORD giveth and the LORD taketh. Blessed be the name of the LORD.” But the gory tales about her demise and the worst of it, the stories of what happened to her corpse by the time they removed it from the mortuary were quite bizarre.
Again, you and I may want to dismiss such stories as superstitious.
When the brother of the deceased and her husband spoke, what we could read between the lines was that they believed strongly that her death was not natural. They also intimated that they were going to do everything possible for the dead to fight back and avenge her death by herself.
In my sermon, I emphasised that “vengeance is of the LORD,” but this seemed not to have satisfied them.
When I read today’s familiar pericope, I had this fresh revelation about how the eagle fights a snake: “The eagle does not fight the snake on the ground. It picks it up into the sky and changes the battle ground, then it releases the snake into the sky. The snake has no stamina, no power, and no balance in the air. It is useless, weak, and vulnerable, unlike on the ground, where it is powerful, wise, and deadly.”
Children of God are like an eagle in a fight with a snake. This battle is spiritual, but we force to fight it in carnality. Like the eagle, we have the “whole armour of God” that will ensure our victory in any battle with the agents of the devil.
Nonviolence advocacy insists that you do not fight the enemy on his terms, using the weapons he prescribes to you! Choose your weapons, and you will prevail.
The war is not physical! We are fighting against principalities and powers in the spiritual realm! We have been equipped with all the weapons necessary for this spiritual warfare. If we engage in the battle physically, we are bound to become victims, but if like the eagle, we lift the enemy(snake) up the spiritual realm (sky), then our victory is sure.
We are victors and not victims; provided we use the weapons that Paul prescribed to the Ephesians and by extension to us.
To win the battle, we should prepare ourselves by being “genuine Godseekers and God lovers, and cease from popular Christianity which makes us just mere members of another socialite club(the church)!
Weekend prayer: Holy Spirit, prompt us to put on our spiritual armour that assures our victory against principalities and powers. Amen!
Have a blessed weekend! Peace be with you!
Rev Babila Fochang.
22/02/2025.