Have you considered the almost violent language of the Book of Acts? “the place was shaken”; “Ananias fell down and gave up the ghost”; “they were cut to the heart”; “they gnashed on him with their teeth…and stoned him”; Herod “killed James with the sword”; “O full of all subtilty and all mischief, thou child of the devil”; “having stoned Paul they drew him out of the city, supposing he had been dead”; “And when they had laid many stripes upon them, they cast them into prison” – so it goes. This was no sham battle.