Not that I was much into wrestling. Me, really?? Yeah right! But professional wrestling was just something many of us would dull our brains with on a Saturday afternoon growing up, at least where I was from. Not that you could ever truly believe all that flash and antics playing out on the screen in front of you. Yet still there you sat watching the drama, and yes I mean drama, unraveling before your very eyes (any of you who ever watched WWF growing up will know what I mean).
Never in a million years (pardon the cliche') would I have imagined that wrestling would be a part of my daily existence.
As I sit here and chuckle a bit to myself at the image of all of my childhood friends grown-up in the flashy professional wrestling attire of the '80's, NO that is not what I mean. What I am talking about is how every day of our Christian walk you and I are wrestling.
Who are we wrestling with? Well it's not Hulk Hogan, although some days it may feel like it. The answer to who we are wrestling is revealed to you and me by God himself in His Word.
The apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 6:12:
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood,
but against the rulers, against the authorities,
against the cosmic powers of over this present darkness,
against the spiritual forces of evil in heavenly places.
(ESV)
Paul is speaking to us about wrestling with Satan, the very enemy of our souls, the one who wishes for us to share his fate in that fiery furnace at the end of days. And my guess is that each and every one of us as believers knows what Paul is talking about. We have felt this wrestling more times than we may have liked, always looking forward to its end.
But what about the times when it is not Satan who we are wrestling, the times when it is someone else?
The times when we are wrestling the Master himself.
Recently as I was reading through the book of Genesis, and I found myself drawn to Genesis 32:22-32, that well known portion of Scripture where Jacob wrestles with God one night while on his way back to reunite with his brother Esau. And it is verses 24 through 26 that continue to resonate in my spirit:
This left Jacob all alone in the camp,
and a man came and wrestled with him until dawn.
When the man saw that he couldn't win the match,
he struck Jacob's hip and knocked it out of joint at the socket.
Then the man said, "Let me go, for it is dawn."
But Jacob panted, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."
(NLT).
Jacob was wrestling with the Master, with God himself, for the promised blessing.
And as the reality of this thought struck me I couldn't help wondering about all the times that we as people, in our flesh, wrestle with God for his blessings. I know that I have, more times than I would like to count.
We wrestle with God
Over His fulfillment of the promises He gives us in His Word,
Over the fulfillment of the dreams He plants in our hearts and minds,
Over the personal promises He whispers to our spirits.
When the promises and dreams He gives to us do not happen as soon as we would like or the way we would like, no matter how hard we may have tried, it is then that we wrestle....not with the enemy....but with the master.
And it is then that He reminds us of two very important things:
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
(Isaiah 55:8 - KJV)
and
...Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts.
(Zechariah 4:6b - ESV)
So on the days when we feel like we are wrestling, who are we wrestling with? The enemy of our souls or the Lord?
Because if we are wrestling over dreams and promises the Lord has given us and has yet to fulfill, dreams and promises that no matter how hard we have tried, we cannot make happen, then we are not wrestling with the enemy. We are wrestling with the Master, our Father in Heaven. And it is a match we are not meant to win.
So hang up your wrestling attire....the spandex, the head gear (and sometimes the attitude).....and rest in the faithfulness of the Master, our Father in Heaven, and allow His Spirit to bring all His promises and dreams for you to pass.
Because He will.
In His Time
In His Way
And it will be so much sweeter, so much better than anything we could have done in our time
and on our own.
