[Teaching] "Wrestles With God"
13/07/20 | Genesis 32v22-31 | Story of the Bible: Genesis
The raw honesty of Scripture is challenging but, quite frankly, also comforting. A great example of this comes from the famous story of Jacob’s wrestle with God in Genesis 32. It’s during this episode that Jacob receives the new name “Israel,” a name signifying not only his physical struggle with the divine but the greater spiritual wrestle that’s permeated his entire life.
This wrestle is then inherited by the people who bear his name. The Old Testament is one long story depicting the people of Israel’s constant wrestlie with God, a wrestle which the New Testament’s Gospel is, in many ways, an answer to.
S,o when it came time to cover this passage in our Story of the Bible series, I eagerly put my name down for it. Not only does the wrestle with God have deep importance to the biblical narrative but also our spiritual formation. Reminding us that the spiritual life isn’t always a clean ascent but, oftentimes, a messy wrestle that God uses to refine and change us.
That’s what I was aiming for at least.
“Wrestles With God”
In 1980, Japanese novelist Shūsaku Endō released The Samurai, which tells the story of a band of low-ranking samurai warriors tasked with a diplomatic mission to Nueva España (modern day Mexico).
Accompanying the samurai is Father Velasco, a Spanish priest and missionary to Japan.
Velasco is an intelligent man, fluent in Japanese, and devoted to serving Christ by increasing the number of Christians in Japan - a country which, at the time, harbored a growing hostility to the Church.
Over the course of the novel we see Velasco tend to the sick, seek God in prayer, and press on to share the Gospel despite the odds…
…but he’s also ambitious. Ambitious for personal gain. He believes the success of their mission will convince the Pope to make him the first Bishop of Japan. And he’s not above using deceit and manipulation to achieve this end.
We also learn that Velasco is full of judgment and pride, often justifying this (and his manipulation) with pious reasoning.
Throughout the novel, Father Velasco constantly struggles with these two parts of himself, making him an excellent portrait of our topic for today: Wrestling with God.
Before we get into that, though, a recap of Jacob’s story so far.
Having cheated his older brother Esau out of his firstborn blessing, Jacob flees for his life and finds refuge with his uncle Laban in the land of Haran. Once there, Jacob falls in love with Laban’s daughter, Rachel, and agrees to work seven years for her hand in marriage.
Well, Jacob works those seven years only for Laban to deceive him by marrying him off to his older daughter, Leah, instead. In an ironic turn of events, Jacob the deceiver has been deceived.
So, Jacob is forced to work another seven years and only after that does finall he marry Rachel.
Then, one day, God tells Jacob to return to his homeland. So he packs up all he has, gathers his wives and children, and heads home.
Only, to head home, Jacob must face the very person he ran away from in the first place, Esau. And the last we saw Esau, he was ready to tear his scheming brother limb from limb.
To get a feel for the situation, Jacob sends messengers to Esau who return and inform him that Esau is heading his way with four hundred men.
Understandably anxious, Jacob fears the worst. It seems his life of deceit has finally cornered him.
It’s here that our story begins:
Genesis 32v22-31
22 The same night he got up and took his two wives, his two maids, and his eleven children and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. 23 He took them and sent them across the stream, and likewise everything that he had. 24 Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. 25 When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he struck him on the hip socket, and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. 26 Then he said, “Let me go, for the day is breaking.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go, unless you bless me.” 27 So he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” 28 Then the man said, “You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans and have prevailed.” 29 Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. 30 So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “For I have seen God face to face, yet my life is preserved.” 31 The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip.
I’m in the mood for Japanese art today, so here's Jacob Wrestles the Angel (1970) by Sadao Watanabe. Here, Watanabe portrays the scene we just read with Jacob (red) locked in an intense wrestling match against a divine figure (blue).
The two fight through the night and it seems like Jacob has the upperhand until the mysterious stranger touches his hipsocket, causing it to fall out of joint.
Jacob, ever the persistent one, doesn’t let this stop him. Despite the injury, he keeps on wrestling, demanding that his opponent bless him.
His opponent responds by changing Jacob’s name to “Israel”, explaining that:
…you have striven with God and with humans and have prevailed.
He blesses Jacob, their fight ends, and he disappears. Jacob walks away, now limping, convinced that he has encountered God.
As we continue through the story of the Bible, Israel will turn from a man into a people - and these people take on a very important role.
We’ll see that, as God told Abraham, they’re to be a special nation that represents God to the world. A kingdom of priests to a hurting people.
But what we’ll see is a continuous story of Israel failing to live up to its calling. They’re faithful for a while, but eventually abandon God only to return and have the process repeat again and again and again (see the book of Judges).
To put it plainly, the people themselves consistently wrestle with God.
In other words, they inherit the legacy of the man whose name they bear.
Because Jacob is not your typical “hero.”
He’s not big and strong - that’s Esau. Instead, Jacob’s a schemer and trickster. He cheats his brother and cons his elderly father. He commits polygamy and favors one wife over the other. And as we’ll next week, that favoritism applied to his children, too.
Yet, through all his mistakes, I believe Jacob does try to live up to his calling. Furthermore, we can’t get around the fact that God has indeed called him. God speaks to him and, in the long run, uses him to bless humankind. (He does this fully aware of all Jacob’s faults by the way).
In this, Jacob, or should I say Israel, is an excellent portrait of us all - flawed people following a flawless God.
All of us who follow God are, essentially, shooting for what in Latin is called the Summum Bonum (the highest good possible).
There is quite literally nothing better to live for!
But it’s far from an easy road.
In fact, following Jesus will put you in touch with your greatest flaws.
This has been my experience at least.
Because, on the one hand, I do want to follow Jesus. I want to be like Him and live in that beautiful communion of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
But, on the other hand, I’ve learned patterns that contrast with His Way of life. These patterns run deep, creating a tug-of-war between my desire to follow Jesus and my desire to live against Him.
In other words it’s, well, a wrestle.
Some examples…
I want to follow Jesus’ teaching on worry but I’m also unwilling to surrender control and, so, I act out of fear and anxiety.
I want to follow Jesus’ teachings on sex but I also want the thrill that comes with lust.
I want to follow Jesus’ teachings on childlike faith but there’s a part of me that treats cynicism as the better option.
I genuinely want to pursue Jesus’ example but, in order to do so, I must confront these parts of me.
What ensues? A lot of wrestling.
Aaron here is planning to run a marathon. In order to prepare for it he has to train. And anyone who’s run a marathon can tell you that training isn’t easy. So, why bother with it at all?
Well, because it grows you, challenges you, and enables you to do something incredible.
The same is true about following Jesus. We don’t decide to follow Him then wake up the next day as the spitting image of Christ. Not at all. It requires a process of drawing nearer to God and that takes learning, growing, failing, and repeating again.
So, why do it? Because Jesus’ Way of life is the answer to our deepest need - nothing could possible be better.
The wrestles that comes with following Him is a normal part of spiritual formation. There is no such thing as a follower of Jesus who “has it all together” after all.
The flawless Christian doesn’t exist, and if any of us are pretending to be them it’s best to drop the act immediately. We’ve all got our problems. Growth is possible but can only begin when we’re honest with God, ourselves, and others.
And that takes wrestling.
During their wrestle, Jacob’s opponent touches his hip socket and throws it out of place. When day breaks, Jacob goes forward blessed, but with a limp.
Jacob’s limp (in combination with his new name) is evidence that he wrestled with God. It shows that those who wrestle with God don’t walk away unchanged.
I liken the limp to the difficult (and often painful) experiences of life that God repurposes for our formation. The result sees us become not merely people who flee from hardship but people who have walked through it, shouldered it, and use the experience to serve God and others.
The limp means that we, by the grace of God, have survived - and are closer to God for it.
So, why do I tell you all this? It’s certainly not to discourage you but to make you aware.
If you want to follow Jesus - great! He is the highest possible good, there is literally no better decision you can make.
But be prepared.
Following Jesus will ask a lot of you and put you in touch with your shortcomings. This can feel discouraging, especially as we repeat the same mistakes again and again - but there’s hope. You see, God’s not looking for perfect people but persistent people.
People willing to return to Him, to keep on wrestling for that blessing. It’s these people who can weather the storms of life because they’re willing to let God strip them down to their core and then build them back up again.
In the end, Jacob come face-to-face with Esau, only Esau doesn’t come to destroy him, he comes to make peace.
This is what Jacob finds on the other side of the wrestle. Reconciliation with the brother he thought he ruined all chances of a relationship with.
He’s able to embrace his brother once more. He’s been humbled by his experiences, by his wrestle with God and, as a result, has become more like the One he serves.
He’s no longer Jacob, he’s Israel - he who wrestled with God and man, and prevailed.
Still, a question remains.
How did Jacob beat God in a wrestling match?
The simple answer is that God let him win.
The writer and minister Frederick Buechner called this a “magnificent defeat.” A defeat that mirrors the Cross.
On the Cross, Jesus confronted the many dysfunctions of the world and human soul. He allowed it to kill Him and, three days later, displayed His power over it by raising Himself from the dead.
In doing so, He used death to create life - the greatest life imaginable.
This is the very life Jesus offers. The invitation excludes no one but any who want to receive it (or already have received it) must be aware that it will require them to give Him everything. And we will, naturally, wrestle with that.
Wrestling with God is a normal part of the process. So don’t lose faith, keep returning to Him. Allow yourself to experience, in the words of Buechner, the “magnificent defeat of the human soul at the hands of God” because through that defeat we are made whole.
Even if we walk away limping.
Galatians 2v20
20 and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
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