Wrestling with God

Today I was looking for something on my computer and I came across the following incomplete blog from a few years ago. Here it is still unfinished, and given the topic it probably always will be ...

The writer of Genesis tells a story of about a man named Jacob. Jacob was the son of Isaac, and in his early years was a swindler and a liar. Even his name, Yaakov (in the Hebrew), means a person who deceives or takes advantage of others, a liar. He was the younger of two twins, and his older brother was named Esau. In Jacob’s time and culture the older brother was the son of privilege. It seems that even from birth Jacob knew this and it drove him crazy.

When Jacob and Esau were older, Esau had grown into quite a hunter, and Jacob had turned into quite a cook. On one occasion Esau comes in from a hunt and is desperately hungry. He asks for some stew that Jacob was cooking. Jacob sees an opportunity, and tells his brother that he first wants the birthright.Stew for the birthright. After Esau had eaten he realized his mistake, and grew bitter.

The rift between the brothers only grows. As their father Isaac grew older he lost his eyesight. Once again Jacob jumps on the opportunity to exploit someone in their weakness. He disguises himself as Esau and goes into his father’s tent to receive the blessing before Isaac dies. This blessing, was reserved for the oldest son, but with the help of his mother, he lied to his father and stole the blessing.

First the birthright and now the blessing. Jacob was a liar and swindler. Esau figures out what happened and wants to kill his brother. Jacob runs away from home. He and his brother live for years estranged.

Years later Jacob has grown up, he has married, has children, has herds of animals, and an established household. He leaves his father-in-law’s place and wants to return home. He is preparing to meet his brother Esau.

On that journey Jacob sends his family ahead of him, and there the writer of Genesis tells us, he wrestles with a man. They wrestle all night, and at daybreak the man realizes he cannot overpower Jacob. The man tells Jacob to let him go, but Jacob wants the man to bless him.

Then this stranger asks an interesting question. He asks Jacob, “What is your name?” This question was deep and penetrating. A name in the Ancient Near East had deep meaning. It tied you to a people, it spoke of your reputation, it spoke about your deep identity. Jacob answers quickly. Another way of phrasing this question could be, “Who are you?” He answers, “Jacob.”

What is he saying about himself? The stranger says, “Who are you?” He replies, “I am liar, a deceiver, one who takes advantage of others.” Where did this answer come from? What informed and caused him to view himself like this?

He is asked, “Who are you?” And he responds by telling the stranger about all the stuff that he was when he was younger. Hadn’t he grown up? Had not God been with him? Jacob is a husband and a father, a man who received a vision from God in which God extended to him the promise he gave to his grandfather Abraham,he has established a household, and yet he still goes back to who he was.

It is at this point that this stranger, who we learn is God, gives him a new name. He says, “That is not who you are anymore, you are now ‘Israel’ because you have wrestled with God and humans and have overcome.” God says to Jacob, “You are someone new.”

It seems from the story of Jacob, that the question “Who are you?” is a difficult question to answer. Like Jacob, our past, all the things we were, what people told us we were, it just keeps getting in the way of who we have become and are becoming doesn’t it?

We want to grow up, grow past it, but people just keep dragging us backward and reminding us of who they believe we “really are”. In a world like this it can be so difficult to cut through all of that and answer the question that God asked Jacob, “What is your name?” “Who are you?” for Jacob he had to wrestle with God and humans to learn the answer that started him on a new journey.

This question of who we are is so essential. Yet, the longer I live the more I see that few people engage this question. Few take the time to wrestle with God, and hear him say we are new.

In the Native American tradition, young men would go on a vision quest. They would stay in the desert for days - fighting hunger, thirst, sleep, and a wandering mind - until The Great Spirit would give them a new name. They fought to find out who they were.

Today, it seems that we are content to let everyone else inform us. We give away so much of ourselves to others to find a label, because it feels better to wear the wrong label than nothing at all. But this is not the way ... we must fight, we must wrestle, we must hear from God what our name is.