Genesis 32:22–31
Jacob Wrestles at Peniel
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. He took them and sent them across the stream, and likewise everything that he had. Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. 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. Then he said, ‘Let me go, for the day is breaking.’ But Jacob said, ‘I will not let you go, unless you bless me.’ So he said to him, ‘What is your name?’ And he said, ‘Jacob.’ 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.’ 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. So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, ‘For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.’ The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip.
Reflection
Jacob had just sent some messengers ahead to meet with his brother Esau to find favor with Esau. Jacob was worried as he traveled, that Esau would try to kill him and his family. It is at this point, before Jacob meets Esau, that this wrestling passage occurs.
Jacob wrestles through the night with an unknown man. Jacob wrestled until the man struck Jacob on the hip socket, putting the hip out of joint. Jacob refused to let the man go, however, until the man blessed Jacob. Instead of a blessing, the man found out the name of Jacob and renamed him Israel. It was at this point that Jacob realized that the man he wrestled through the night with was sent from God as God's messenger.
Jacob had been one to wrestle all of his life. Jacob wrestled with man and with God. Jacob was a deceiver of men and God. Jacob came from the womb of his mother grabbing the heel of his brother Esau as if to wrestle with his brother even before birth. Jacob wrestled with his brother, Esau, and with his father-in-law Laban. Jacob's life was always surrounded by controversy and deception. But now in this wrestling with God, Jacob receives a blessing. A blessing and a name change. At the place that Jacob meets God face to face of sorts, God changes things for Jacob the heel grabber and names Jacob Israel, the one who strives with God.
And then... and then... the sun rose. The beginning of a new day and a new life for Israel.
How I wrestle with God in the middle of the night. In fear, I wrestle with my sin, with decisions, with God. Imperfect and sinful people are the very people God chooses to change. All of us wrestle with God in some way. We wrestle and struggle and fight God and his will and his way. We put off the calling God has sent to us and wrestle with God face to face.
Yet, it is God who continues to use us to accomplish God's will and God's way on this earth. God knows that the solution does not take place in the perfect lives of perfect people, but in the fallen lives of the fallen people. We are all fallen people with the exception of One, whom God sent to this world, to save us and redeem us. And that One became all of the fallen on the cross. All of the fallen to rise again as the first of all of the resurrected.
It's through Jesus that we are free from our sin to live lives that reflect God's will and God's way and God's Light to all of the world. It's through Jesus that the struggle is completed. We struggle with sin, for sure. We walk with a limp, for sure. But, through Jesus, we walk on in a new life, the heel grabbers that we are, to strive to live with God as God's people.
God's people saved and redeemed by Jesus. We live on in full relationship and face to face with our Savior Jesus. Thanks be to God!
Prayer
Lord, as I struggle with you through the night, bring me to morning Light that I may see your glory and follow in your will and your way... today... tomorrow... and forever. --- Amen
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