Wrestling

Now he arose that same night and took his two wives and his two maids and his eleven children, and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. He took them and sent them across the stream. And he sent across whatever he had. Then Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.

When he saw that he had not prevailed against him, he touched the socket of his thigh; so the socket of Jacob's thigh was dislocated while he wrestled with him. Then he said, "Let me go, for the dawn is breaking." But he said, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."

So he said to him, "What is your name?" And he said, "Jacob."

He said, "Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel; for you have striven with God and with men and have prevailed."

Then Jacob asked him and said, "Please tell me your name." But he said, "Why is it that you ask my name?" And he blessed him there.

So Jacob named the place ^d]">Peniel, for he said, "I have seen God face to face, yet my life has been preserved."

Now the sun rose upon him just as he crossed over Penuel, and he was limping on his thigh.

Gen. 32:22-31

In the womb he grasped his brother's heel;
as a man he struggled with God.
He struggled with the angel and overcame him;
he wept and begged for his favor.
He found him at Bethel
and talked with him there-
the LORD God Almighty,
the LORD is his name of renown!

Hosea 12:3-5

I try to picture Jacob on this night. Restless, anxious over the necessary encounter with his estranged brother the next day, he rises in the middle of the night to send his family across the river. He sends all he has with them. He lingers, alone. Helpless, hopeless. Praying to God for favour to be granted.

Then, as if the inescapable adversary of the next day was not enough, the divine itself makes an appearance on the scene. There was no blessing for Jacob as there was for his ancestor Abraham. There was no burning revelation as there would one day be for Moses. Jacob is crying out for peace, and God comes down to struggle against him.

He is a desperate man. He fights, he strives, he clings. Even when crippled by Heaven, he refuses to relinquish his hold apart from the blessing of God.

And he steps into the dawn of the new day broken, limping, blessed--having seen the face of God.

It's nighttime. Everything is across the river, and I am standing before an open sky, desperate, waiting. God has come. We are struggling against one another.

It's incredible how clearly I can see the love in His eyes as I strive. I am at once wrestling against Him and with Him. I see that as He struggles against me, He is not fighting me but rather everything that is not me inside of me. He fights the supplanter of my birth to reveal the favoured friend of my maturity.

It seems as if this would be a terrible condition in which to find oneself. But it's not. Better to be wrestling and beholding Him than to be sleeping by the river, motionless and empty.

Let's go at it.