Book Review

War On The Saints is an extremely detailed discussion of the daily realities of our life: and how those realities indicate our level of subjection to evil spirits and heretical doctrines. It pries into every area of our inner-lives; calling us to give account to ourselves about our dreams, our social habits, our recurring thoughts, our persistent fears, the state of our health, the things that provoke us to anger, and etc.

This is the only book I ever read that I approve and recommend, while at the same time, I always approach it fearfully: for every time I read this book, I am forced to account for something that is going on in my life that frightens me. She makes no accusations, nor does she damn anyone for having these problems; but does hold the reader 100% accountable for every breach of peace or holiness in their life. EXAMPLE: if you have an evil dream, it's because you yet cherish some thoughts and considerations in your heart, upon which the evil dream is built. The demons play to your prejudices, and appeal to your own judgments, in order to foist upon you something you would finally reject, by appealing to the roots of those things, that you haven't yet rejected. You may not be willing, FINALLY, to commit adultery; but you yet secretly cherish a little "looking to lust;" maybe just a tiny little bit. [Note from the Editor: Mrs. Lewis calls these concessions "Ground"] The demons fasten on that concession to sin, and starting there with that which you WILL allow, they build a scenario which leads ever onward to the main sin. Upon being confronted in the dream with the main sin, you revolt (hopefully), and wake up: but the little root from which the appeal was made is still with you, so at another time, you have a somewhat similar dream, which while taking a somewhat different path, is still leading to the main sin. You revolt, and wake up; but still haven't renounced and rejected the little teeny sin in that area that you allow. So you have another dream sometime, with a different scenario......and here we go again.

Mrs. Penn-Lewis has it that you are both victim and responsible for every evil intrusion in your thought life, and she turns over every rock in your psyche, and exposes all the little vermin that we all try so hard to ignore. She posits that clinging with the mind and confessing with the tongue to the particular verities of the Word of God is our chief weapon of defense against these influences, and that a lack of escape from the problems she describes is the chief symptom of embracing false doctrine. Therefore, unlike most others who address these things, she does not leave you with ONLY "Appealing to God" to deliver you from said problems, but has it that God has already provided the means of relief in The Word; and that those who, thinking to "skip" past this, and demand that God prove Himself faithful by a fiat of deliverance, are only purchasing despair; since for God to ignore your ignoring of His Word, is tantamount to denying His own righteousness and faithfulness. Ergo: hungry child says: "Dad, I'm hungry." Dad says, "There's a bag of fried chicken in the kitchen, go eat that." Child responds, "Dad, I'm very hungry." Dad repeats his instructions. Child now says, "Dad, I'm so hungry, don't you love me?" The next answer is either silence or rebuke.