It was called the Thrilla in Manila—Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier’s third and final boxing match. Frazier had won the first bout, and Ali the second. The last fight would test both of their wills and stamina unlike any fight they had been in before.
The fight took place at 10:00 a.m. local time in the Philippines on October 1, 1975. Officials said the time it started was for international viewing audiences, but it was the worst time to hold a fight because of the humid and hot weather conditions. They were in an aluminum-roofed stadium, and that added to the heat. It was so suffocating you almost couldn’t breathe.
They battled for fourteen rounds, taking shot after shot, in temperatures that some say reached 120 degrees. After the fourteenth round, and with Joe Frazier’s eyes almost completely shut, his trainer Eddie Futch threw in the towel that ended the fight. People would call it the greatest fight in the history of boxing. Even though Ali won the fight, he felt the effects. During his fourteen fights that followed the Thrilla in Manila, Muhammad Ali wasn’t the same.
After the Thrilla in Manila, Joe Frazier wasn’t the same either. Ali had called him so many names leading up to the fight that Frazier felt he had suffered under a barrage of verbal abuse. Although it was just Ali’s way of getting into the head of another fighter, Frazier would never forgive him for it. He chose to call Ali “the Gorilla.” Until Frazier’s dying day, it was reported he couldn’t understand why Ali treated him that way, and he could never let the hatred completely go.
How many of us have felt like we just went fourteen rounds with our own enemy? It may not have been physical, but it was a mental and spiritual fight. As a matter of fact, it might as well have been physical for the toll it’s taken on you and your family. You were pummeled repeatedly by depression, fear, anxiety, and pain. You may have come through the fight, but it was so difficult, you will never be the same.
I have seen divorce pull apart couples and families. Sometimes they have gone through so much, they don’t even recognize themselves anymore. The punches of distrust, betrayal, and hateful words have gone back and forth for so long, they forgot that they had cared deeply about one another. We have felt the challenges of being special-needs parents when the punches of life so deflated us that we wondered if there would ever be relief. I’ve seen people who have lost their jobs (the first blow), and then they feel like they’ve lost their dignity (the second blow), and if they keep on taking punches, they wonder if the fight is worth it.
One of the Enemy’s strategies is to pick a fight and get us in the ring. The struggle is real. The attacks are frequent. They range from physical (health related) to financial to verbal and relational assaults that are designed to not just stun you but also knock you out. Whatever the obstacle is in your life, the Enemy wants you to think and sleep on that problem until he has beaten you to a pulp. But he can’t do anything unless he gets you in the ring.
Your response to the Enemy’s taunts will determine whether you get in the ring. He can’t hurt you if he can’t reach you. You can’t be scathed if you don’t accept the challenge. We have been taught that when opposition comes against us, the best thing we can do is to defend ourselves. But our best defense is God’s offense. God is fighting for us. He wants to fight for us. But sometimes we don’t allow Him to do it. Every time we worry, we are putting ourselves in the ring with the Enemy. He’s taunting us like a bully to get us in the ring.
When dealing with a bully, it’s easy to feel powerless and all alone. The Bully Project describes bullying as complex and appearing in many different forms, but in general it is an action that is carried out deliberately to cause emotional or physical harm to another.1
As Christians, we are facing a similar bully called the Devil. He uses opposition in many forms to do his dirty work. Sometimes he uses thoughts in our minds to inflict the damage. The average person cannot defend himself or herself against the ridicule and shots the Enemy will shell out. They will try for a while, but the barrage of blame when someone has failed, or the hurt of a bad situation, gives the Enemy ammunition that he will use to defeat his opponent. That would be you or me. When you’re facing a bully, you can’t do it alone. If you don’t tell someone, you may not make it through the battle. If you do make it through, you might be emotionally and physically injured.
You need an advocate who will fight for you. An advocate is a champion, upholder, supporter, backer, promoter, proponent, exponent, spokesman, campaigner, cheerleader, fighter, crusader, booster, and the ultimate flag-bearer. The advocate I’m talking about isn’t just any advocate; He is the Creator of the universe. He is undefeated; He’s never lost a fight in His life. Even when the Devil thought he had the Son defeated, He came back from what looked like defeat with the greatest return in the history of mankind. The Thrilla in Manila had nothing on this fight. It was the fight for the ages, and at the end, there was only one Champion.
There is no one stronger, no one greater, no one who wants to fight for you more than God Himself. Here is the key, though: if you worry or try to figure things out on your own, you are entering the ring with the Enemy. You are opening yourself up to a beat down. God never asked you to take the blows. He sent His Son to the cross to take the blows for you. Stop fighting the battles God means to fight.
In 2 Chronicles 20, three bullies were not only trying to push the people of Israel around, they wanted to take them out. The armies of the Moabites, Ammonites, and Meunites came against King Jehoshaphat and his people. Let’s just say it didn’t look good. King Jehoshaphat knew they were in trouble. The Moabites and the surrounding nations marched against Jehoshaphat. That’s what bullies do. They gang up on you. Have you ever felt ganged up on? It’s tough defending things by yourself. The odds for the Israelites did not look good with three nations against one. But odds don’t exist with God. The house of God always wins.
The enemy armies were set up and encamped at En Gedi. The king and his people were alarmed and afraid. They didn’t stand a chance, and they knew it.
When you are surrounded by problems, are you going to let fear and despair overwhelm you, or are you going to let God defend you? This is a crucial time in a person’s life.
Instead of giving up, Jehoshaphat cried out to God. He had a choice: He could stay afraid and start to worry and become distraught, or he could call out to God who was ready to fight for him.
When I was a kid, my dad thought I bullied my sister. I can’t for the life of me see where he got that idea. Even though she was older, I always got in trouble. Of course, I was an angel. Well, maybe I could sometimes be in the wrong, but not all the time. You see, all my sister would have to do was yell, “Daddy!” The next thing I would hear was my dad coming down the hallway of our house like the cavalry ready to defend my tattletale, back-stabbing sister. Before I knew it, I was toast. I’m still working through the emotional scars of my sister’s wrongful, misguided accusations. (As you can tell, I still like picking on her . . . just a little bit.)
My sister followed Jehoshaphat’s lead. When enemies surrounded them, he cried out to God, “O our God, will You not judge them? For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do; but our eyes are upon You.” Translation: “Daddy!” Then, something powerful happened. In the silence, a man named Jahaziel, standing out in the crowd, shouted a bold declaration from God: “Listen, all you people of Judah and Jerusalem! Listen, King Jehoshaphat! This is what the Lord says: Do not be afraid! Don’t be discouraged by this mighty army, for the battle is not yours, but God’s.”
Bam! There it is! The ultimate declaration of victory. King Jehoshaphat was probably thinking, Wait a second. We don’t even have to fight? He probably said to his royal attendant, “Did I hear that right?”
So how are Jehoshaphat and the people going to beat these bullies if they don’t fight back? Remember: God’s ways are not our ways (Isa. 55:8). When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. came up against racism and prejudice, God told him to not fight back with force but to fight back with peace. I’m sure some in the black community thought that was ludicrous. You can’t make a difference with peaceful marches when the enemy is using brute force. But God knows the best way to beat a bully is not physically but spiritually. The peace of God ultimately pushed back the oppression of a people during the Civil Rights Movement because the battle was not theirs. The battle was God’s.
Yet, that declaration, “The battle is not yours, but God’s,” was not the end of the story. Jahaziel first declared God’s promise, but then he gave them God’s plan. God will never give a promise without a plan. Jahaziel said, “Tomorrow, go down against them. But you will not even need to fight. Take your positions; then stand still and watch the Lord’s victory.” In other words, go to where you are supposed to fight, but don’t get in the ring. The Heavyweight Champion of the World will fight for you. He’s your partner, saying, You just take your position, give Me praise because praise precedes the victory, and watch Me do it.
So King Jehoshaphat and the army of Israel went down to where the bullies were hanging out. They gave God praise all the way there, took their positions, and then watched God do it. The three armies that had come against Israel started fighting among themselves. They ended up killing each other while King Jehoshaphat and his army looked down in amazement at what they saw. When it was finished, not only had the three bully armies killed each other, the Bible says that they left more plunder than the army of Israel could even carry. It took them three days to carry back all the treasure left behind.
They didn’t even get in the ring. God wiped out their enemies, and they kept all the spoils of war. That’s the difference between us fighting the battle and letting God fight for us. The Bible says that when they went back to their homes after the battle, all the other nations heard about what God had done and would not touch them.
God didn’t just help them win the battle and carry more plunder than they could contain, He also fought the battles that were yet to come. They knew for sure, if God was for Israel, who could be against them? No one. That’s the power of God fighting for us.
When I reflected on this story, God revealed something powerful in my spirit. He said to me, “You see, Craig, when you worry and get depressed and try to figure things out, you are entering the ring with the Enemy and fighting a battle I was meant to fight. Here’s how gracious I am, Craig. I am so gracious I still let you win that battle, but here’s the difference. You walked away with only one day of plunder. If you would have let Me fight the battle, you would have walked away with three. You walked away worn out, with battle scars and memories that I never intended for you to carry.
“If you would have let Me fight the battle, you would have come out unscathed. If you will let Me fight for you, I won’t just fight the battle you are currently in, I will fight the battles yet to come.”
Who are the bullies in your life? When you are thinking the worst, God is planning the best. You can get in the ring and take your chances, or you can go to where you’re supposed to fight, take your position, give God praise, and then watch Him do it. I don’t know about you, but I would rather sit ringside watching the punches than be in the ring taking the punches. The best part is that, when God fights for you, the only one getting demolished is the Enemy. It’s no contest. God has never lost a fight. All you have to do is let God do it and take home the prize. The Enemy has just entered a no-bully zone, because God is fighting for you!