Is It True That Only "breaking the Hedge" Exposes the Believer to Successful Satanic Attacks?
Direct Answer
Not exactly. The Bible shows two ways Satan touches a believer: (1) when the believer “breaks the hedge” by sin and unbelief, giving him a place; and (2) when God Himself permits a test. But only the first gives Satan a real advantage. When God allows a trial, it is limited and turns to the believer’s good—not to Satan’s victory.
Scriptural Explanation
- Job did not sin, yet Satan could afflict him only because God allowed it—and with strict limits (Job 1:10–12; 2:6). That was testing, not defeat. Job’s faith stood.
- “Whoso breaketh an hedge, a serpent shall bite him” (Ecclesiastes 10:8). That’s the warning: step out of the Word’s protection and you invite the bite.
- “Neither give place to the devil” (Ephesians 4:27). Place is given by disobedience—anger, lies, lust, unforgiveness (see Ephesians 4:25–32; 2 Corinthians 2:10–11).
- “Be sober… resist… steadfast in the faith” (1 Peter 5:8–9). The hedge is faith and obedience. Submit to God, then resist (James 4:7).
- God’s tests are bounded and faithful: “He will… make a way to escape” (1 Corinthians 10:13). They refine, not ruin (1 Peter 1:6–7). And the sheep cannot be plucked from His hand (John 10:28–29; Romans 8:35–39).
- Dwelling “in the secret place of the most High” is the place of kept protection (Psalm 91).
Simple Clarifying Logic
- If the only way Satan could touch a believer were personal failure, what about Job and Peter? Job was upright, yet tested (Job 1:1; 1:12). Peter was sifted, yet kept by Christ’s intercession (Luke 22:31–32). Those were permissions for proving, not permissions for Satan to conquer.
- When we break the hedge—leave the Word, harbor sin—we open a door. Then the serpent has a bite, and Satan gains an advantage.
- When God permits a trial while we remain under the Blood, Satan is on a leash. He may afflict circumstances, but he cannot overthrow faith. God turns it to our strengthening.
Reinforcing Statement
Stay under the Blood, stay with the Word, and give no place to the devil. If God allows a test, it will purify you. If you break the hedge, repent quickly and close the door.
Final Conclusion
No. Satan can touch a believer either by our breaking the hedge (which gives him an advantage) or by God’s limited permission for testing (which cannot defeat faith). Only breaking the hedge grants Satan a real foothold; God-permitted trials are bounded and work for the believer’s good.
Ask a Follow-up Question
What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Three kinds of believers
63-1124E §30
When that uncircumcised Philistine cursed him in the name of his gods, he said, "Am I a dog?" A little, bitty runt of a kid come out like that. "Why," said, "I'll pick you up on the end of my spear, and I'll hang you up there in the tree and let the birds pick your flesh!" Oh, my! Oh, what a horrible fellow he was! David said, "You meet me with a sword and a spear, with an armor; you meet me in the name of a Philistine, but I meet you without a sword or spear and armor, but I meet you in the name of the Lord God of...
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 4:E-120
...se children of Israel left Egypt about two million strong. They all journeyed together, all saw the same miracles of God, all partook of the same manna and water from the smitten rock, all followed the same cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night but ONLY TWO reached the Promised Land. ONLY TWO WERE TRUE OR REAL BELIEVERS. That is correct because the Word tells us that the rest died because of unbelief; and because of unbelief they could not enter in (Hebrews 3:19). Then since that is so, and only TWO ENTERED,...
The conflict between God and Satan
62-0531 §27
So, how Satan makes it look so real, it's appealing to them. But if they would've just stayed fortified with the Word, let the Word be their fortress, then see, they'd have been fortified. They'd have been behind the Word. The Word would've been in front of them always: "Thus saith the Lord, thus saith the Lord, thus saith the Lord," right or left, "thus saith the Lord." Like those angels down there that day when Isaiah ... met in the temple, he thought he was getting along pretty good. A fairly good preacher, the...
The conflict between God and Satan
62-0531 §64
When Abraham, the father of the faithful, pulled out the knife, pulled the hair back on his child's head to cut his throat, he said, "I'm persuaded that God's able to raise him up from the dead from the thicket that I felled him on." He was willing to follow the Word of God to the end. You get it? No matter what it is---stay right there if everything seems to be... You can't go one inch farther, go that inch. Then if you hit the wall, stand there until God makes a way through it.
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 8:E-79
...old, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee." Now we can note immediately that this problem of the false Jew or false believers was already in existence in the second age. These who falsely called themselves Jews appeared right after the first outpouring of the first age, and now they appear again in the second age after the reformation. This is hardly an accident....