Year A, Pentecost 8 Genesis 32:22-31
I once read (and have no way of
proving this) that 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 that 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 safe
assumption that Jacob was wrestling God.
However, some struggle with the idea of Jacob wrestling God because it sounds…
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 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. 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, God 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.” [1]
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 still 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. We all know that life comes full of
struggles. Those struggles can leave us
with physical and emotional scars. Some of those scars are related to our
religion. There are people who have been
have been hurt by Churches, church leaders, or even well meaning Christians who
are misguided. That’s an important
topic, but not what I am talking about here.
What I am talking about today are the
times when our faith/our belief system means that we have to do the hard thing,
or make a sacrifice that other people might not be making. It might mean we stand up to someone who has
said things that are disrespectful or cruel, and we pay a price. It might mean that we sacrifice some comfort
that has insulated us from the pain of our world. Even coming to church on a Sunday morning is
a small sacrifice of your time. Sometimes those hard things we do or experience
leave us wounded or extraordinarily weary.
We can resent those wounds or fatigue, or we can consider the way that Jacob’s
wrestling match with God left him with a limp, but also renewed commitment to
his God and his family.
We worship a transcendent and all powerful
God. But we also worship a God who was
born to a young, poor and unmarried woman and was crucified on a cross with
criminals. We worship a God…we are loved
by a God who is willing to get down in the dirt and the grime with us and stay
with us, until the struggle is over.
While the struggle is never over in this life, God never leaves us alone
in the struggle.
No comments:
Post a Comment