“Wrestling with God” (Genesis 32:22-31)

Genesis 32:22-31

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Pastor Tom Johnson, October 16, 2016

Esau and Jacob are twins. Esau was born just minutes before Jacob. And as Esau came into the world, his twin brother Jacob literally had him by the heel. And so Jacob got his name—Yacób—which means to take someone by the heel. It is one of many wrestling moves. A fighter takes his opponent by the heel to bring him to the ground and subdue him. But it also means to deceive or trick someone—just as you might grab the heel of an unsuspecting passerby. And that is exactly how Jacob behaved his whole life. He tripped other people up. He was a trickster.

You will remember that he deceived his own father to steal his brother Esau’s blessing. Esau was so angry with his twin brother that he vowed to murder him. “Now Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him, and Esau said to himself, ‘The days of mourning for my father are approaching; then I will kill my brother Jacob’” (Gen 27:41). To escape death, Jacob ran away from home. He was the prodigal son who was gone not for just a few years but enough time to have two wives and eleven children. He became rich through livestock.

But as you will also remember, he did not come by his wealth honestly. He tricked his uncle Laban in order to take his many sheep. Laban was so angry with Jacob, that Jacob runs away a second time—with his whole family and livestock. Jacob has an angry uncle behind him. Who knows if Uncle Laban wants to kill him? And then he finds out that his long-estranged brother Esau is ahead of him. He is between the proverbial rock and a hard place. Uncle Laban is coming up from behind and brother Esau is coming toward him. Thankfully, when Uncle Laban catches up to him, they are reconciled. The go their separate ways in peace—in large part because God intervenes.

But now what of Esau? He wanted to kill Jacob last time he saw him. He vowed to do it. That is when Jacob prays a prayer that will change his life forever: “O God…I am not worthy …Deliver me, please, from the hand of my brother…Esau, for I am afraid…he may come and kill us all, the mothers with the children. Yet you have said, ‘I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted because of their number.” His sin is catching up with him. His deceitful past has haunted him for years. And now he may finally have to pay for all his misdeeds. “I am not worthy of your goodness and grace, O God,” he prays. Just as we prayed: “We are by nature sinful and unclean. We have sinned against you… We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We justly deserve your present and eternal punishment.” Jacob speaks truth. He is not worthy. Like him, we are not worthy of God’s goodness and his grace. And yet, Jacob asks for God’s forgiveness and deliverance. And he bases his request on God’s promise to bless his people.

Jacob does not just pray this prayer and go to sleep peacefully. He is restless. He cannot sleep. His anxiety gets the best of him. He pours out his worries upon his Lord and his God. He is literally fights for his life through prayer. He wrestles this “man” all night. Jacob knows he is also the One to bless him. Jacob persists. He endures the night. He finally gets the blessing he has prayed for. And then he realizes that he just had a tussle with God in human flesh. This is the amazing thing about our text—the great mystery of the One Jacob wrestled with. Jacob receives a new name: Israel. “He wrestles with God.” It is God in human form that he encounters.

Jacob—now Israel—can barely take it in. “I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.” No one should be able to survive an encounter with God. We should all turn to ash in the presence of him who is holy and almighty. Jacob—the one who deceives—is now Israel—the one who wrestles with God. He survives with a broken hip that will cause him to limp the rest of his life—a humble reminder of his night of prayer and struggle with God.

I love how this story ends. “The sun rose upon him…as he limped away.” His twin brother will not kill him. Esau will embrace and forgive him. Jacob’s deceitful ways are behind him. The new Israel moves forward in restored relationships. He will enter the Promised Land. It will not be an easy journey. He will continue to wrestle with God throughout his life. His limp will never go away. It will be a constant reminder that he is not worthy. But God accepts and loves him as he is. The sun is rising upon his future. The eternal Son of God came down to share the struggle with Jacob. God loses the wrestling match on purpose. Just as he will come again in human flesh to fight the good fight on the cross and appear to lose.

But just as the sun will rise upon Jacob, Christ will rise again from the dead. And so, we too, move forward in our life’s journey. We may be limping. But the sun’s light is on our faces. The Lord’s countenance is shining upon us.
We are on our way to restored relationships with God and one another. We are headed to our Promised Land. We may limp our way there. But we move forward in humility and by God’s strength. It is only by grace and his love that we fight the good fight and prayerfully move forward toward a new day as his people.