A Multi-Front War

We are always connected—to God, to one another, and to the world around us. We are not rocks, and we are not islands. While Scripture reveals a vast cosmic war, that war is fought through countless personal battles that must be faced, fought, and won. As Dr. Cornelius Van Til observed:

The war between Christ and Satan is a global war. It is carried on, first, in the hearts of men for the hearts of men. …There is not a square inch of ground in heaven or on earth or under the earth in which there is peace between Christ and Satan. ...It is of the nature of the conflict between Christ and Satan to be all-comprehensive.

If we fail to recognize the connection between our personal struggle with sin and Satan’s broader rebellion, we will never make meaningful progress in that cosmic conflict. The war is not fought only in grand, visible moments. At times we gather with others to storm a beach or take a hill, but far more often we labor alone from the foxholes where our Commander has stationed us. It is there—in the ordinary, unseen places—that obedience matters most and where our duty is carried out for the sake of His kingdom. Dr. Jay Adams wrote:

But though it is the same war, common in many respects, the battles fought in the soul of man each have their own peculiar elements, take on their own character, and call for special consideration, according to each individual involved. Moreover, from time to time the enemy shifts his point of attack and varies his tactics according to events transpiring in the global or cosmic theaters.

But the fact that the two wars are, in reality, but one war does not make the war within any less important. The war without is dependent on the war within. As battles are won or lost within the individual, so the overall war succeeds or fails. That is why it is so important to recognize the inner war as only one part of the larger campaign. Battles are won only as individuals fight valiantly on each chunk of battlefield turf. Wars are fought by individuals. And how they fight outwardly depends on their successes and failures in fighting within. So the importance of the inner war is obvious. [Jay Adams, The War Within]