Community against easy stragglers

Is that struggle something each of us has to do for himself or herself?

No. Satan is best fought within the community of the church. When I've preached on the shield of faith I was told shields in those days were beveled. They were linked together, so that one warrior was next to the other. It was like a wall going into battle. In the same way, I believe that it is in community where there is deliverance. It's in the context of community that we can find help, and where there is intercessory prayer, we fight together. So it isn't just you and the devil. It's you and other believers against the devil.

The other day I was watching the Animal Channel, and I saw something that really struck me. There was a huge herd of buffalo and about six or seven lions. And the lions were plotting to have a buffalo for dinner. Well, they found one buffalo that had strayed from the herd, maybe a couple hundred yards, and they went after that buffalo. So how do a few lions stop a buffalo? Well, as it happened, one lion grabbed the heel of one back leg of the buffalo, the other on the other back leg. And they just hung on until that buffalo slowed to a stop. Then one lion hopped on his back, another went after his stomach. And from there on you can just visualize what happened. It was gruesome.

But here's what shocked me. There were perhaps 100 buffalo, if not more, all standing and staring and watching this go down. I don't know if buffalo can think. But if buffalo could think, you know what they're thinking? Boy, am I ever glad that's not happening to me! Imagine if this herd had decided we're not going to let those lions get away with anything, and together they ran thundering in that direction with their horns down. Those lions would have scurried away immediately. The lions would never have a buffalo for lunch, if the buffalo stuck together.

There's a lesson for us there. First of all, Satan separates somebody from the herd. He makes them mad at the church and Christians, or angry because of some other reason. Once they're away from the herd, he intensifies his attack. And then when we hear of the spiritual/demonic struggles that a person faces we say to ourselves, Boy, am I ever glad that's not me! What we have to do as a congregation is to hang together. We have to close in and say we will not allow the devil to do this to our people.

Erwin Lutzer, Leadership