The Odd (But Very Real) Thing of Spiritual Battle
My wee girl kept breathing only via a machine, and was surrounded by nine focussed medical professionals working on her tiny body in the A&E department in Palmerston North.
Hands down, my worst moment as a parent. The powerlessness, the shock, the stress… the distress: awful.
She survived. It was touch and go; but she lives. I am very slow, as a person, to link spiritual warfare to moments such as these. But this one, absolutely.
Earlier that day Ana and I, along with our 6 month old Eilidh and our 4 year old son Ishmael, took off to a missional community camp made up of Wellington Jesus-seeking young adults. It was our first time involved with this fantastic crew of folk and Ana was one of the main speakers; a speaking gig that felt significant. Ana had a really strong sense of what it was that God wanted her to share – a slightly prophetic, high challenge call to follow Jesus.
We turn up to the camp, and all is well.
Thirty minutes before it's time for Ana to share, our little girl’s temperature begins to spike - her breathing slows, her fragile little body goes rigid, and my bub enters into a long and horrendous febrile seizure.
Frantically, we call the ambulance to this rural site. When they eventually arrive, the seizure has been on the go for quite a while. I’m in shock. The ambulance crew, working on Eilidh, are concerned. Next minute, I’m speedily following this ambulance on the hour-long journey to the nearest hospital – stopping in a forest car park where some doctors have met us to save her. I’m praying like I’ve never, ever, prayed before.
The seizure has lasted a harrowing 45 minutes by now - and so, still concerned for her brain, they induce a coma, restart the engine, and whisk her into the drama of A&E and the stress and prayers continue.
Fast forward a week - past ICU and hospital sleeps - we take our exhausted little girl home to recover. Utter relief. It didn’t happen again. It was random.
…Until 18 months later, when I was asked to speak to that same group.
This time, the sharing was to be at their church in Wellington. Neither Ana nor I had yet had the privilege of sharing with this missional community, but always sensed God was up to something significant with that crew. With that in mind, I travel to Wellington for their evening service. By this point, due to other experiences over that season, we had a prayer group praying for our family, particularly whenever we were involved in strategic leadership moments. I preach - and it’s one where you sense God is up to something among listeners. We have significant conversations and prayers afterward. God has been at work.
That night, back home in Whanganui, my wee girl gets a high temp. It leads to her second ever febrile seizure and the ambulance is called.
What the actual hell.
Fortunately, it wasn't as extreme as the first time, but the scary temperatures last over a week. The WhatsApp prayer support group was on form throughout; she settles. But it was all still very alarming. It was one of those outrageous moments where evil (perhaps overplaying its hand) became so visible and abrupt.
As we push into transformative moments for the kingdom, there is this push back – upon the most vulnerable in our family, even. It attempts to rattle and derail kingdom mahi.
From then on, we began on a more ‘aware’ journey of realising that spiritual warfare – while not something to be fearful of in light of Jesus – is something to not simply discredit or view as irrelevant. All these more intense times have come to the fore during our season of mission / church planting; a season where we have witnessed significant transformation in places and people where hope and love have seemed so minimal or fragile. I think that in those spaces, where you are pushing into ground that is held by players or powers that aren’t of the kingdom, you have to expect pushback.
Without an expectation that this will likely be the case, we run the risk of living with an illusion that will shatter and cause disillusionment, which can be hugely disorientating. Entering into that battleground with eyes wide open is important to living and praying well.
Taking new ground on the frontline will see you take significant hits. But alongside these deeply challenging and crucifying moments, you get to witness extraordinary game-changing moments of hope, change, beauty and love; all the good stuff we love to write books about.
For those, like Ana and I, who are slow to pin things upon ‘spiritual attack’, the strange and (somewhat) ungraspable space of spiritual warfare is not something we naturally veer into. But, along with a bunch of other significant moments, we’ve embraced the importance of prayer, and attempt to develop an attunement to the spiritual temperature among situations, communities and people.
There is a battle. And it's not, as that well worn passage says, all about ‘flesh and blood’. We need to wrestle in the space of prayer alongside Jesus.
The following year, (this year), I was asked to speak semi-regularly with that same community of faith. The week of my first speaking gig, Eilidh (outrageously I know!) battles for a full week with a temperature but doesn't hit seizure mode. And since then, she’s been completely fine. That ground has been won - but only with a community of prayer.
Pray. And from that place, go do!
Rev. Paul Fletcher
Paul, along with his wife Anashuya, are priests at St Peter's in Whanganui - a church they replanted 5 years ago. Paul is also on Leadership of Urban Vision - a monastic order of the Anglican Church that looks to catalyse kingdom work in challenging neighbourhoods around Aotearoa. Paul is also a co-founder of Common Good Coffee; supplying great tasting coffee that contributes money to sparking good in places of extreme poverty and modern slavery overseas. Alongside all this he is a dad to two hyperactive children who keep him exhausted but joyful. If he did have any spare time, it would go toward art and soccer.