The Spirit of Division

Division is a tried and tested tactic of the enemy. He seeks to divide and conquer a unified body of believers. God calls us to be unified with one faith, one baptism, and one hope. There is only one body and one Spirit. We serve one Lord, and our service is to be sure. {Refer to Ephesians 4:1-6.} It is the devil's duty to destroy the bridge that links us together; to tear down families bonded together in unity; to ruin the relationship between husband and wife; to spoil the unity between parent and child. First Peter 5:8 tells us that he roars around like a lion seeking the weak and feeble to divide and devour. He stirs the body with strife, jealousy, angry tempers, disputes, slander, gossip, arrogance, and disturbances. We must be alert and vigilant to his ways or will risk being victims to his divisive practices.

There are many rogue churches today that were formed by angry, bitter, and rebellious persons. The enemy uses these divisive ways to bring confusion, which ultimately leads to division. He intoxicates the congregants that sit under his spell with pride, jealousy, lust, pettiness, gossip, and slander so they will be destructive with their words and unloving in their actions.

Families are not exempt from his tactics of delusion, division, and destruction. He has been working a plan for years to destroy the healthy image of the family. Ephesians 5:23 tells us that the husband is the head of his wife as Christ is the head of the Church. It's a common practice of war to cut off the head of the enemy whenever he is captured. The enemy practices this by cutting of the strength, respect, presence, and activity of the man so the rest of the body, which is represented by the wife and children, goes lifeless and headless. He knows that destroying the head will ultimately kill the body. And the enemy knows that he can influence the church by dividing the family. He confuses the communication and intimacy between the husband and wife, which causes tension and strife. He confuses the communication between the parents and children, which causes disunity.

Division is dangerous. It's violent. It's unfortunate! It makes the body fight against itself. It turns husband against wife, children against parents, church against church, family against family, preacher against preacher, sheep against shepherd, and so on. It creates an environment of "us" versus "them".

Romans 16:17-18 encourages us to stay away from divisive persons. It commands us to avoid them so we do not imitate their behavior. We are commanded to live at peace, be peacemakers, and be unified. And we must remember that those with this violent tendency are many, but we should never allow their destruction ways to keep us from seeking to be at peace through Christ. For those who repent, we must practice the ministry of reconciliation while celebrating the divisive spell of the enemy has been broken over them. We do not war against the person, but rather the spiritual principality and rulers of darkness in high places. The person is being used to spread a message of disunity and destruction. We must be vigilant and watchful.

For more on this subject, check out my sermon entitled: "The Spirit of Division".