Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood:
but against principalities and powers.
—Ephesians vi. 12.
It is a most important truth, my brethren, and a very practical one for all of us, which is contained in these words of St. Paul; and it is the subject of the whole Epistle of this Sunday, from which this passage is taken.
This truth is that we have a host of enemies to contend with in the battle which we must fight to win the kingdom of heaven, who are much more powerful than flesh and blood—that is, than any human foes; much more formidable than any others which attack us, from within or from without.
Who are these enemies? They are Satan and all his army of fallen angels. That these are what the apostle means by "principalities and powers" is plain from these very words, which are the names, as you know, of two of the nine angelic choirs. It is plain also, from what he says immediately before, that we should put on the armor of God, in order to be able to stand against the deceits of the devil.
Who can doubt that these lost spirits are terrible enemies to our salvation? They desire nothing more earnestly than our eternal ruin, and labor most persistently to bring it about. They have a malicious hatred and envy for us, and spare no effort to induce us to sin, as that is the greatest evil which can happen to us. As there is joy before the angels of God upon one sinner who repents, so there is exultation among these fallen angels over every one who does not, and especially over every one who repents of his repentance and turns to sin again.
And besides the will which they have to injure us, they have an immense power to do so. They are superior to us in the order of creation; they have much more intelligence, knowledge, and strength than we. If they were permitted they could easily make us all subject to them, and reign over us with a more cruel tyranny than the world has ever seen.
"Well, father," you may say to me, "of course this must be true; but then they are not permitted to trample on us in this way. God holds them in check, so that they cannot do us the harm which they wish, and would otherwise be able to accomplish."
I grant you this. They certainly are not allowed to do us all the harm they might do and would like to do; but they are allowed to do a great part of it—so much that, without the help of God on our side, they would, even as it is, destroy us, soul and body.