Skip to content ↓

Living Free in Enemy Territory

Book Reviews Collection cover image

As far back as six centuries before Christ, soldiers have been taught a simple strategy: know your enemy. It was the famed Chinese general and strategist Sun Tzu who coined the phrase, and it reveals an important truth. If forced to do battle, an army gains a distinct advantage by knowing everything about who it battles.

The call to follow Christ is a call to war. Every Christian wages a lifelong, all-out war against the world, the flesh, and the Devil. Satan was man’s first adversary, and he will be his adversary to the end. Yes, Satan’s reign was broken at the cross, but for the time being he still wields his power as we await Christ’s return.

It is good to know your enemy. Yet there is a particular temptation that comes with knowing your enemy: you may inadvertently become like him. They say that the way to train people to identify counterfeit currency is not to have them study counterfeit money but to study the real thing. When we know what is true, what is genuine, we are equipped to quickly recognize and root out what is false.

In Living Free in Enemy Territory, a book that deals specifically with Satan, Greg Dutcher takes just that kind of approach. Instead of dwelling on the person and work of Satan, he dwells upon Scripture, upon God’s source of light and truth. And in the light of Scripture, Satan looks exceedingly dark and his work outrageously horrifying.

As much as it is good to know your enemy, it is even better to know the One who can smash—who has smashed!—the head of that enemy. Dutcher does an admirable job of drawing the reader to the work of Christ, to the One who has done just that. This short book shows how to live free in enemy territory. And the way to do that is not to ignore the Enemy, but neither is it to dwell upon him. The way to live free is to bow before the One who has already conquered Satan and who now waits for the day when He will destroy him forever.

(I am posting this as a review of Dutcher’s book, though it was originally written as the Foreword to that book)


  • Pastors Mind

    What’s Going On In Your Pastor’s Mind?

    It is one of the strengths, or perhaps one of the weaknesses, of the human mind that it can have different “tracks” playing at the same time. Even as one series of words is emerging from a person’s mouth, an entirely different series of words may be flitting through his brain. He can have an…

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    A La Carte (July 30)

    A La Carte: How John MacArthur changed American preaching / David French and Chip Gaines / Baptism blunders / No one who abides in him keeps on sinning / Guardrails for humor and joking / and more.

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    A La Carte (July 29)

    A La Carte: The simple, but precious, faith of our fathers / Will my dog be in heaven? / Read books, not AI summaries / Remembering Hulk Hogan / Why am I anxious? / Tired of hard things / Logos and Kindle deals.

  • Dying Comfortably

    Although we face difficulties—the world, temptations, and self-love—an active meditation on and a constant view of things above will maintain our spiritual-mindedness. If we ignore these, death will take us by surprise. #Sponsored

  • A La Carte Collection cover image

    A La Carte (July 28)

    A La Carte: AI and the essence of creation / Life is absurd / Sharing the gospel without pushing others away / Don’t find your identity in your suffering / The drift toward cynicism / Kindle deals / and more.

  • Loveless Christianity

    Selfish, Lifeless, Loveless Christianity

    Hospitality is a concrete expression of Christian love and family life. Giving oneself to the care of God’s people means sharing one’s life and home with others. An open home is a sign of an open heart and a loving, sacrificial, serving spirit.