Year
A, Pentecost 8
My
family gathers at a cabin on a lake in upstate New York in the summer. If you walk into our basement, you will see a
rather strange pictorial wall of fame…or really a wall of pain. It’s all pictures of injuries that were
acquired while at the camp. I am not
sure how this bizarre custom began. I think it had something to do with one of my brothers
who seems to always be around when someone is injured. We started documenting all the injuries that
happened in his presence. Then it just
took on a life of its own. Of course a
fascination with injuries is not really surprising when you have a family with
three boys. I remember them telling me
early in life not to be friends with someone who did not have scars. Apparently, scars were the sign of a life
well lived and experienced, even at age 9.
It signified a tough individual who knew what it was to experience pain. I guess my brothers did not want their little
sister to be friends with anyone who could not hold their own in a street
fight.
According
to some (who have absolutely no way of proving this), this story from Genesis
is one of the most frequently preached stories in all of Genesis. That is just one book of the Bible, so
perhaps that is not very impressive to you.
But Genesis is full of awesome stories.
You have the creation of the world, Adam and Eve, Noah and the Ark, the
Tower of Babel, Abraham and Sarah, Joseph and the coat of many colors (they
even made that into a musical)… So what is it about this text that attracts so
many preachers and commentators? I cannot speak for every preacher in the
world, but there is something mysterious and wild in the text. We all love a good mystery and this story has
a couple mysterious elements.
The
first mystery is who Jacob is wrestling.
It’s so mysterious that most of us do not even realize that it is a
mystery. Most Bibles provide handy
subtitles which make it very clear that this is an angel or God, or both. What we sometimes forget is that subtitles
were not in the original text. Some
translator just added them so we could find things more easily. The text really just says it is a man. Many infer that it was God or an angel
because Jacob commented at the end, “For I have seen God face to face and yet
my life is preserved.” Because of that,
it seems like a fairly safe assumption. Why
some struggle with the idea of Jacob wrestling God is that it sounds a little
ridiculous. Why would God wrestle
someone? And if God did, I don’t think
the other person would last very long. This is God…all powerful God. What human could possibly contend with that?
That
brings us to the next mystery: who won?
Some conclude that Jacob won because the mysterious wrestler asked Jacob
to let him go and Jacob was in a position to demand a blessing. If this is true, then it would be really hard
to believe that the wrestler was God.
It’s one thing to think that God might wrestle a human, but to lose to a
human…that’s just too much. However,
others contend that the stranger won because Jacob walked away with a
limp. Also, the wrestler named Jacob,
and naming someone often implies having power over that person.
Here’s
my theory on both mysteries. Jacob was
wrestling God and there was no winner or loser.
That was not what this match was about.
This match was about a couple of things.
We learn something of the character of God. Our God is a God willing to get down in the
dirt with us, to struggle with us in very real and concrete ways. God is even willing to let us be a part of
that struggle. Sure God could have
pinned Jacob in less than a second, but that would not have taught Jacob very
much about himself or his relationship with God.
Let’s
consider the context for a moment. So
far in the story of Jacob, he has been a bit of a twerp. He cheated his brother and lied to his
father. Instead of facing either of
them, he ran away. When he ran, God
provided for him and Jacob agreed to follow the one true God as long as God
continued to provide for Jacob. It was a
provisional acceptance. Jacob found two
wives and did pretty well for himself.
He became quite prosperous. He
decided it was finally time to return home, but realized that he would
encounter his brother, who was out for blood when he last saw him. Right before our story for today, Jacob had
sent people ahead of him to try to bribe his brother so that his brother might
spare him. It would be a stretch to say
that things had been easy for Jacob, but he seemed to consistently come out
ahead without ever having to sacrifice much.
His relationship with God was one of give and take. God gave and he took.
The
wrestling match changed that. God was no
longer at a distance. God was there
trying to wrestle him to the ground.
There was no easy way out. Even
so, Jacob remained true to his nature and demanded a blessing. God would not give him the blessing until
Jacob provided him with not only his name, but his truth.[1] The name Jacob literally means heel. When he came out of the womb, he was grasping
the heel of his brother Esau. When Jacob
revealed his name to his opponent, he was telling more than his name, he was
telling his past which was rather shameful.
God would not allow Jacob to be defined by his past. This match meant that the sins of the past
would no longer define Jacob because God would not just provide a blessing, he
provided a new identity. The name God
gave Jacob was Israel, which means, “You have striven with God and with humans,
and have prevailed.” One commentator
summarized that as “scrapper with God.” [2]
That sounds a lot better than heel!
The
last sentence of our reading for today is: “The sun rose upon him as he passed
Penuel limping because of his hip.” The
limp was a result of God dislocating his hip during the all night wrestling
match. It was a small price to pay for a
new identity and a more profound understanding of God, but it was a price.
I think it’s easy to forget that being a
Christian is not an easy path. It is not
the path of least resistance. Life will
be full of struggles and some of those struggles will leave scars or maybe a
limp. Those scars tell a story of times
when we have taken risks, times we have gotten so close to God that we have
ended up a little singed by God’s blinding light. Yet it is not only we who bear the scars of
life, Jesus did as well. Even after
Jesus was resurrected he carried the scars of his crucifixion because they told
a truth that could not be denied and should never be hidden. It’s why we have crosses all over our church-
not so we can remember triumph, but so we can remember a God who was nailed to
a cross just so we would wake up and realize that God will always be down in
the grime with us and he’ll stay there until the struggle is over.
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