Wrestling in the Dark
Once again this week we get dropped into the middle of a very big story, this time the story of Jacob, the grandson of Sarah and Abraham, the son of Isaac and Rebekah.
Let’s back up and cover some key things that have happened prior to our text for today in Jacob’s storyline.
Jacob is a twin, the second born. He and his brother Esau wrestled in his mother Rebekah’s womb, and when Jacob was born, he was clinging to Esau’s heel.
There is a Hebrew word play woven throughout this story – Jacob’s name “ya – a - qov” and the word “heel” – “a-qev” are related words. Jacob is a name that can mean “heel,” as in Jacob was a heel grabber.
But in a more modern interpretation of that word – a 20th century reference – Jacob also turns out to be a bit of a “heel.” As in a “contemptable person.”
Playing a bit with the ancient context, it is worth noting that in the episode with Adam, Eve, and the apple, when God curses the snake for its role in story, God says to the snake:
“Because you have done this, cursed are you more than all the livestock, and more than any animal of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life; and I will make enemies of you and the woman, and of your offspring and her Descendant; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise Him on the heel [aqev].”
So there is some illusion based on language that Jacob is something of a snake in the grass, too, potentially. (Maybe I am just a geek, but this is an example of what is so FUN about studying scripture – it is a constant hunt for these little echoes and resonances….)
From his birth narrative, we get some foreshadowing about Jacob’s character. He might be kind of a jerk. At a minimum, he might be ambitious and competitive and untrustworthy.
As the story progresses, Jacob tricks his aging father Isaac into imparting his paternal blessing on Jacob rather than Esau. Isaac thinks he’s blessing his hairy son Esau, giving him his birthright – the privileges and rights conveyed in that culture to a first-born son. Essentially Jacob steals Esau’s birthright.
Esau hates Jacob for this and threatens to kill him. Before that pursuit happens, Jacob and Esau are sent in different directions to find wives so that they might carry on the family line, and while Jacob is traveling toward his mother’s brother Laban to find a wife, he makes a vow to God.
It’s one of those bargaining vows. Maybe we know these vows for ourselves in our time of need. If God will do this, then I will do that.
Jacob specifically says,
“If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go and will give me bread to eat and clothing to wear, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God, and this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will surely give one-tenth to you.”
This little bargaining prayer happens after Jacob has a dream in which God promises him a place, a people, and a blessing. That sounds familiar, right? The promises made to Abraham, and also to Isaac, have now been spoken into Jacob’s life as well.
Shortly after this, Jacob meets a beautiful woman named Rachel, daughter of Laban. Jacob asks to marry Rachel. Laban’s deal is that he needs seven years of service before he will give his daughter to Jacob in marriage. Jacob works for seven years, and Laban pulls a fast one, slipping his daughter Leah into the marriage tent. Jacob awakens to discover he’s sealed the deal with the wrong sister. He goes back to Laban and Laban insists on another 7 years of service in exchange for the privilege of marrying Rachel.
So Laban has tricked Jacob…Jacob who tricked his father out of Esau’s blessing.
There are two chapters of high drama about love and conception and birth order…suffice to say that when we get to today’s reading, Jacob has a large family, having 12 sons with four different women in his household. These sons will become the 12 tribes of Israel, a key part of God’s promise of a place, a people, and a blessing.
The drama continues with some wrangling between Laban and Jacob – what matters for our story today is that Jacob becomes quite wealthy with children and servants and livestock.
Feeling confident that he has enough wealth to reconcile with his angry brother, he leaves Laban and sends a messenger to Esau. The message that comes back to Jacob is that Esau is on the move toward Jacob with 400 men.
Last Jacob was with his brother, his brother was seething with anger. And so Jacob assumes that Esau is moving toward him for revenge.
And that is enough background on the big story to get us to our text for today.
We enter the story just as Jacob is praying. This is a different kind of conversation with God than the earlier one. It is a confession – I am not worthy of your steadfast love – the Hebrew word here is hesed – a word used throughout the Hebrew scripture to describes a loyal, grace-filled loving commitment that God expresses for God’s people. It is also a desperate plea – deliver me from the hands of my brother. Jacob ends by saying basically, God, you’ve promised me so many descendants that I cannot count…and that won’t happen if Esau destroys me and my family.
This is a different tone from the Jacob of all of the previous chapters. Jacob is scared. Jacob is humble.
In an effort to appease the anger Jacob assumes Esau has, Jacob divides his flocks, sending a portion of the best with servants in groups ahead of him with the message that each arriving group is a present for Esau.
Jacob deposits his wives and children on one side of the river Jabbok and crosses to the other side to spend the night alone – perhaps a means of protecting his family. Or perhaps as a means of protecting himself…it is unclear.
What is clear is that Jacob is anticipating a confrontation when he rests aside the Jabbok alone that night.
The rest of this text may feel more familiar to our ears. A “stranger” attacks Jacob by the cover of darkness and the two wrestle all night long. If you read closely, it is unclear who Jacob is wrestling with. Described as “a man” we know little else.
Now wrestling is intimate. It is physical. It is not diplomacy. It is body to body contact. And Jacob stays in the struggle.
All. Night. Long. With “the man.”
Remember that Jacob had wrestled in the tightness of the womb with Esau. In some ways, this nighttime wrestling echoes that, alludes to that.
As daylight breaks, “the man” recognizes that he will not prevail against Jacob and touches or strikes him on the hip, putting it out of joint. Jacob is injured in a way that will affect him from this point forward in the story. He is changed physically. He will limp through life.
But Jacob will still not let go, insisting on a blessing. Again, he is bargaining – if you give me a blessing, then I will let go.
The man asks his name. And then says this:
You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven (or struggled) with God and with humans and have prevailed.
Following that renaming, Jacob – now Israel - asks for the man’s name, and the man refuses, but at that point blesses Jacob.
Jacob then names the place of this encounter Peniel, a name that means the face of God…for here Jacob says he has seen God face-to-face and still lived.
There is a lot going on here. While the text doesn’t say that Jacob wrestled with God, Jacob’s understanding is that this has indeed been an encounter with God. And if we read the next part of the story, Jacob meets Esau who embraces him rather than killing him. And upon embracing one another, Jacob says that seeing Esau is like seeing the face of God.
Just a year ago, I preached this text and talked about how Jacob crosses over into a new life after this wrestling encounter. His physical injury is a manifestation of a significant character shift.
But today, I want to invite you to a different perspective on this text. This IS a story about a person…or about individual relationships. But it is also a story about community, about a people, about God’s blessing for God’s chosen people.
And this story functions in that way to set up what happens in the Exodus story – and really as a backdrop to the histories found in the books of Judges and 1 & 2 Kings, 1 & 2 Chronicles, 1 & 2nd Samuel, and the prophetic proclamations found in Jeremiah and Isaiah and all the prophets.
Israel is a people, a nation that won’t let go of God until God blesses them.
I need you to hear me say that as a reference to the Israel of scripture…not necessarily the same thing as the political entity we know as Israel today.
Last week when we talked about Abraham and Sarah, I noted that experience is the ground of relationship. There are conflicts and missteps and reconciliations. Over and over again. And through the experience of that with one another, we are shaped. Our relationships are shaped by our experiences.
Just as Jacob wrestled with Esau, and then with Laban and eventually with a stranger in the night, Israel will continue to wrestle with God, demanding God’s blessing. And throughout the scriptures, God will continue to show up to give that blessing. It won’t always be easy, but God will keep showing up to the relationship. Even when Israel is wrestling with other things.
This is hesed, God’s steadfast love.
Jacob is not perfect. Israel is not perfect. We are not perfect. The church (big C or little c) is not perfect. Our families aren’t perfect. God doesn’t ask us of this. But God does ask us to hold on, to wrestle, to stay in intimate relationship.
Today, as we rest in a few moments of silence, soaking in the Word for today, I invite you to think about what it means to wrestle and what it means to be blessed, not so much as an individual, but as a body of people seeking God’s grace and provision.
(hold silence)
May it be so. Amen.
Comments
Post a Comment