Angels are among us, the walk among us and even visit us and we can be unaware. Jacob wrestled with an angel, and angels led Lot out of the city. there is one fallen angel that can take on physical form. This is the true story of the day I wrestled with Satan.
It was 1975 in San Bernardino CA. I was 15 yrs old, the summer before starting high school at Aquinas High School in San Bernardino. My father was a teacher at nearby San Bernardino High School and he told me about a summer AAU wrestling clinic at SBHS that year. I attended and was coached by a big stocky man named Coach Davis. Coach Les Davis was also the head football coach at SBHS. I will never forget the heat in the torrid little clubhouse we trained in.
That next year I tried out for the wrestling team at my own school, and after a few months of very hard practices we had our first pre-season match against another school.
I was very nervous as I faced my first opponent. Would I have the aggression required? Did I have the nerve to fight a stranger and deiscover who was the stronger, the better?
In my mind I had a well rehearsed move, that an older teammate had taughtme. From the go I launched into it, and my surprised opponent was down and pinned in an amazing 5 seconds! My poor opponent, it must have been so demoralising for him. I controlled my amazement and joy and shook his hand.
Now I know that the Lord had delivered him to me.
My Coach at school was named Coach Dale Deffner. He always said to us "When you win, nothing hurts." he said it often and I never forgot it. I looked over at him after my victory for a sign of encouragement but I was surprised to find he looked downcast, even shocked.
About a week after that Coach Deffner told me to come to the gym that night for a special session. I figured he was starting series of training workshops, and expected to meet some of my teammates there but when I arrived the gym was empty.
At one end of the gym a mat had been set up and there was Coach Deffener with another wrestler, already in his kit and a third man that I assumed was also a coach.
The wrestler was a very good looking young man, blond haired with a confident grin. I would see this man often throughout my life, in various forms and guises. I didn't know it then, but after I was saved in 2004 things became clear. This man was Satan in earthly form.
What was going on? Did Coach Deffener want to take me down a peg after my performance the previous week? My opponent was older and stronger than me, I thought I was going to get my ass kicked.
Well, we grappled. the bout went on a long time and neither of us got an advantage or came close to pinning the other. I was getting tired but my pride wouldn't let me give in.
After the match I went home confused. What had just happened and why? Should I tell anyone? Would Coach Deffener get into trouble? Some time later I left the wrestling team because of the unspoken tension between Coach Deffener and me.
20 years later after I had been completely worn down and nearly defeated by Satan's constant attacks on me in a distraught state I phoned a work colleague who I knew was a Christian. He told me he would come right over and that he would bring his pastor with him.
When they arrived, imagine my surprise when standing next to Tony, my colleague was the huge hulking form of my very first wrestling coach Les Davis! Coach Davis, now Pastor Davis, together with Tony placed his hands on my head and prayed over me until I calmed down.
Afterwards I told them about the things I had gone through and I told them about the strange wrestling bout organised by Coach Deffener and his favourite saying "When you win, nothing hurts."
Tony was frozen to the spot, shocked! "Les, you say that all the time". Les Davis said it was a quote of Joe Namath's and a phrase he uses often in sermons. Indeed in Christ the game is already won, and pain is wiped away!
The coach of 20 years before had set me on the path to salvation and righteousness. It would be another 6 years until I was born again in 2004. When that happened all these past events in my life started to make sense.
I share these stories for two purposes. First to add weight to my testimony. So many things have happened to me that they go beyond coincidence and into proof.
Second, to counteract the modern heresy that Satan is symbolic, a symbol of evil, a figure of speech, when in fact he is real and he fights me daily to prevent me from spreading my holy message: San Francisco will be judged by fire in 2010 and that the antichrist is walking the earth and I know who he is.
