How Long Does Spiritual Warfare Last?
Jun 12, 2026Summary
Have you been stuck in a trial that has dragged on for months or even years, leaving you feeling completely running on empty? When the dark cloud over your home just won't budge despite your daily prayers and scripture study, it is so easy to ask: how long does spiritual warfare last? If you are exhausted from waiting for a breakthrough and tired of the toxic whisper telling you that God has forgotten you, do not believe that lie. You are exactly where you need to be!
In this episode of the Arise, Women of God podcast, host Tamara K. Anderson and licensed clinical social worker Wendi Christensen tackle the exhausting timeline of spiritual opposition. We dive into the biblical reality of delayed answers, looking at the 21-day spiritual battle in Daniel 10, and discuss how God uses our time in the "waiting room" to build a powerful spiritual immune system. Wendi vulnerably shares her seven-year infertility journey and how she fought off the enemy's attempts to make her blame God.
Discover the exact deception phrases the adversary uses to turn temporary waiting into permanent despair, and learn why something as simple as taking a nap or stepping outside can be your ultimate spiritual reset. Tune in to move from hopeless endurance to resilient authority in Jesus Christ today!
Episode Takeaways
- The 21-Day Delay: Just like in Daniel 10, God hears your prayer on day one, but there may be a massive spiritual battle happening behind the scenes delaying the answer. Trust that Heaven is working on your behalf.
- The Spiritual Immune System: God uses prolonged seasons in the "waiting room" (like Wendi's 7-year infertility journey) to build up your resilience. What feels like tearing down is often God building your spiritual immune system.
- Physical Reset as a Weapon: The enemy specifically targets us when we are physically depleted. Sometimes, the most powerful spiritual counterattack is stepping outside to ground yourself in nature or simply taking a much-needed nap.
- Escalate Your Defenses: When a normal prayer doesn't lift the cloud, remember Matthew 17. Some strongholds require an escalated defense, such as fasting or calling on a specific network of prayer warriors.
Free Resource
Ready to close the physical entry points the enemy uses to drain your energy? Get our free A Mother's Spiritual Defense Guide: 6 Empowering Steps to Fortify Home & Family downloadable PDF here: https://www.womenwarriorsoflight.com/A-Mothers-Spiritual-Defense-Guide
Reflection Questions
- Are you currently sitting in a spiritual "waiting room"? How can you reframe this prolonged season as God building your spiritual immune system?
- When you feel a heavy mental block or spiritual attack, do you check your physical needs first (like sleep, hydration, or grounding)?
- Have you caught the enemy using absolute phrases like "never" or "always" to convince you that your dark season is permanent?
Host & Guest
Tamara K. Anderson @tamarakanderson
Wendi Christensen @wendichristensencounseling
Transcript
Tamara K. Anderson
00:00:00.400 - 00:03:21.570
Have you been stuck in a trial that has dragged on for months or maybe even years, and you feel like you're completely running on empty? You check your spiritual checklist every day.
You're praying, you're reading, and you're trying to do your best, but the dark cloud over your home and the heavy anxiety in your heart just doesn't seem to budge. You find yourself asking, how long does spiritual warfare last?
Because you're utterly exhausted from waiting for a breakthrough, from the quiet toxic whisper that has started creeping into your mind saying, this is never going to change. God has totally forgotten you. Well, my friend, do not believe that whisper. You are in the right place.
And by the end of today's episode, you will understand the cosmic and individual timing of spiritual opposition and you will learn how to spot the precise deception phrases the enemy uses to turn a temporary season of waiting into permanent spiritual despair. We're going to help you solve the challenge of feeling like you're in a waiting room feeling exhausted.
By showing how God uses prolonged seasons of stretching to help build up a spiritual immune system and sharing a simple physical reset to shorten the adversary's daily attacks, we're moving from hopeless endurance to resilient authority. Stay tuned. Ordinary women, Extraordinary faith. When God calls, we say yes. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Arise Women of God podcast.
I'm so thrilled to be here with you today, joined by my co founder of Women warriors of Light, Wendy Christensen, who happens to be a licensed clinical social worker. And today we are tackling this exhausting question, how long does spiritual warfare last?
And when we ask this question, we have to realize that on a macro level, this conflict is not new.
In Revelation, chapter 12, we learn that the cosmic warfare has been raging since the beginning of time, when the dragon was cast out of heaven and came down to earth to target God's people. But on an individual daily basis, the timeline of a spiritual attack varies greatly.
In Daniel 2, 12, 13, we see a 21 day delay where Daniel fasted and prayed, hearing absolutely nothing. When an angel finally arrived, he revealed that God had actually heard the prayer on day one.
But a massive spiritual battle behind the scenes delayed the answer. So my friends trust that if you're on day 21 or 201, trust that God is seeing you and is opening up answers to you.
Maybe even with this podcast, our individual battles can feel like they are lasting forever. Sitting in a prolonged trial can make us feel entirely abandoned. And that's exactly how the adversary wants us to feel.
Wendy has noticed that One of the hardest parts of this journey is that our human clock rarely matches heaven's clock.
Wendi Christensen
00:03:22.200 - 00:06:14.690
You know, when God gives us, the prompting of this will be over soon. His soon is very different than my soon. And that makes it hard sometimes. So it's so hard to know how long that spiritual warfare is going to take.
And sometimes there's a purpose behind it. And that's the thing I love about God. When you know the character of God. Sometimes he's also working on resilience.
God can take any difficult or hard thing, or even being attacked by Satan, and turn it into a strength. So even sitting in your personal waiting room can be a strength. For example, I dealt with seven years of infertility.
I wanted nothing more than to be a mom. It took me a long time to get married, and then I'm like, okay, let's start having kids. Well, it didn't happen.
And year one went by, year two went by, year three went by. And of course, you start working with the infertility doctor, and they do everything that they possibly can. Nothing was working.
So come upon year six, and I start learning that I need to have a procedure. And it kind of came to a point where I was like, really, God?
And I felt so tired and exhausted and overwhelmed and just really sad that this was the conclusion that it came to. You know, I was in this space of difficulty that that's kind of when Satan weaseled his way in and was like, yeah, let's blame God.
It was God's fault that you're in this place. You've been doing everything that you can. You've been following your promptings, you've been listening.
And I went, no, I had to stop for a second and just look at.
Because it's easy to get into that place where you're really angry and you feel so helpless and you feel like God has abandoned you or he's rejected you or he's left you. Satan wants you to get into that space, and that's another tactic that he uses to isolate you from God. And we need to see that and recognize it.
For what it's worth, I know for me, I had to do some really deep soul searching and digging and actually turn to God during those moments. That's the time you really want to turn and face him, because he's your biggest weapon in conquering the isolation, the worry, the feeling worthless.
I can't do this. The burnout. God's the one who pulls you through that. And of course Satan wants to keep you from him.
And after seven years, we were finally blessed to welcome a beautiful girl. And I know it was in that waiting room that I became resilient.
It's almost like when you're, you know, when you're sick and your body needs to build up its immune system. I felt like that's what happened during those seven years of waiting for children. God built my immune system when I thought he was tearing me down.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:06:14.850 - 00:09:35.980
I love that clinical concept of a spiritual immune system.
While some spiritual battles drag on for seasons to build our resilience, other daily attacks can be shortened significantly when we pay attention to our physical bodies. Just earlier today, I was hit with an unusually heavy mental block while trying to work on this podcast.
I knew that by sharing this content on spiritual warfare, it's a way for me to share light and tactics that we can use against the adversary. And I think the adversary was trying to paralyze my entire day. He didn't want me to move forward.
So after lunch, I executed a physical and a spiritual reset. I went out in my backyard to kind of ground myself, putting my bare feet on the grass and said a prayer in my mind and in my heart.
As I sat there running my fingers through the grass, letting the wind blow through my hair, and consciously rooted and grounded myself in Jesus Christ, I felt peace. And I also felt a quiet whisper from God. He didn't give me a complex theological answer.
He simply whispered that I was running too hard and I wasn't getting enough sleep. The spiritual attack was capitalizing on my physical depletion, so I went inside and took a nap. I figured God said you need to rest. So I did.
And when I woke up, the gloom was gone and I could easily tackle this podcast. Sometimes taking care of our physical bodies is the ultimate way to conquer a spiritual attack.
And God will inspire you to know what you need to do to break the current siege to so ask God what you need to do to win today. He will guide you.
But my friends, when a nap or a normal prayer doesn't immediately lift the cloud, scripture shows us that some spiritual strongholds require an entirely different level of intervention. In Matthew, chapter 17, verses 14 through 21, a desperate father brings his severely afflicted sick son to the disciples.
But they fail to cast the demon out. When Jesus arrives, he rebukes the enemy and heals the boy instantly. Afterwards, the perplexed disciples ask the Lord why they failed.
Jesus tells them a two part answer. First, it was because of their unbelief, explaining that if ye have faith as a grain of A mustard seed. Nothing shall be impossible to you.
However, he also added this beautiful piece of insight that we can also use in our battles. Howbeit this kind goeth not out, but by prayer and fasting.
Certain strongholds require us to escalate our defenses through fasting or even asking a specific network of sisters who are prayer warriors to help pray the attack away.
But regardless of the method, we must learn to identify the specific words the adversary uses to trap us in the timeline of why this is taking so long. And Wendy's going to share some insights on this right now.
Wendi Christensen
00:09:36.460 - 00:10:26.700
In the opposition, I actually became stronger. And so I look at sometimes that opposition.
I recognize it when Satan comes in and think, you're trying to tear me down and take me away from God, but I'm going to join forces with him and overcome and come out stronger. I'm going to use it as a strength mechanism no matter how long the waiting is.
So when it gets so hard and so difficult, and I know it does, and I know it will keep turning to the Lord, and don't let Satan overtake you and think that you're never going to get through this. It's never going to end. It's never going to change. Those phrases in and of themselves come from Satan.
So we don't always know how long it will take, but we know when we turn to the Lord, he'll help us through however long it does take.
Tamara K. Anderson
00:10:27.340 - 00:11:58.690
Oh, my friend. The adversary wants you to believe that your current dark season is a permanent destination.
But God promises that morning will come and that he is actively using the waiting room to fortify your spirit.
To help you navigate these prolonged seasons, track God's hidden movements and fortify your home when you are physically, emotionally and spiritually drained. Wendy and I have compiled this strategic manual, a Mother's Spiritual Defense Guide. Six empowering steps to Fortify Home and Family.
You can grab it free at the link below. When you download your manual, turn to step number two, the Catalyst principle, and look at the maternal not to do list on page 11.
It will help you prayerfully audit things that are limiting your sleep, your energy, and your schedule so you can close the physical entry points the enemy uses when you are running too hard. Oh, my sisters, stand strong. Stand with God. You are a daughter of light, and you are a warrior of light.
May you stand with him as your general and king in this battle. And until next time, may you arise. Do it God's way. God strong. If today's episode helped you feel a little closer to God, please like and subscribe.
