WATCH and pray is often watch and wrestle!

WATCH and pray is often watch and wrestle!
Paul watched the Romans wrestle and compared the warfare of believers to a wrestling match. “We wrestle not with flesh and blood but with Principalities and Powers.” We wrestle disembodied spirits that attack our circumstances in order to grab hold of our minds and emotions.
The Romans learned this sport from the Greeks. A wrestler would go into the arena with hours of massaging with thick oils pressed into the skin, the idea being that when the wrestling got intense you would work up a sweat and the sweat would mingle with the oil and make you so slippery your opponent would have a hard time getting a hold of you.
We, likewise, are anointed for our wrestling and when the battle gets tough we have an authority and anointing that corresponds with our assignment. Let the oil of the Lord make you slippery in your battles.
I like what Dalene R Black posted as a comment here: “Anointing also means to massage, to rub and smeared with oil…Let the oil of His presence saturate our whole being from the inside out…so when the “heat” is on… we become too slick for the enemies stronghold.”
Let that presence take the heat off your heated spirit….cool down and get refreshed. Then as a behavioural strategy –move in the opposite spirit. When pressured to be critical, find whats working. When pushed to look at what people do or fail to do, use it as an opportunity to put your attention and affection on the Lord and what He is doing.
This dual “presence and behavior” strategy makes you hard to get a hold of and after a while you will slip right out of this battle and hit a season of being “restored, established and strengthened.”
This is the rhythm of the life of someone who changes spiritual climates. Of course there are lots of other parts, but this is key.
I just arrived in China for some significant meetings. Im half jet lagged and gonna practice this…
“Oily to be and Oily to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.”
Join Gods Army- “Be oil you can be!”
– Lance