Wrestling with God

Think of a time where you were coming to an important time in your life and it seemed like everything was crashing around you. You were looking for help but instead you had more people adding to your stress. You try to get away from it all and you take some time to quietly pray but again that is interrupted and you can’t understand why all this is happening in your life. Well, welcome to today’s devotional and what Jacob had to go through.

Read Genesis 32:22-32

We have to know the context of this passage in order to understand what Jacob is going through. There is a strong implication that Jacob sent everyone away so that he could be alone to both think and especially to pray. In Jacob’s mind, the next day was going to be so important because it would bring climax to all his life and his relationship with Esau. All his life he had been wrestling with Esau for the blessing. Esau was the one who had kept him from his blessing, his happiness, his destiny and his father. And now Esau was coming with a small army and tomorrow would be the last battle. So Jacob spent the night before, praying and reflecting. He was asking God for help but instead look at verse 24 on what happens. And Jacob was left alone” but finishes with “and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day.” This is so strange because we see that he is alone. So how can he be attacked when he is alone, and the answer is that the he was alone but the “man” who attacked him was no ordinary man. The attack really comes out of nowhere and really doesn’t make sense. Jacob would have been extremely surprised because he was looking for God for help and support but rather God wrestles with him.

God assaults Jacob in a life and death struggle that leaves him permanently crippled. This doesn’t make any sense to us as we see a man who is scared and weak. A man who is looking for answers to his prayers that God will fulfill His to bless and to love. Here we find the way that God sometimes responds to prayers of protection with difficulties and hardships. We have to go through suffering and wounds in order to truly learn what God wants us to know and understand. He sometimes allows us to go through great troubles for mysterious reasons that the Bible insists are wise and loving. Suffering and death is not God’s original design for the world and the cross shows his willingness to enter pain and suffering in order to someday end it all without having to judge and end us along with it!

What other things do we learn from this account of wrestling with God. First, we learn that the mysterious wrestler has enormous power in his “touch”. We also know that the wrestler names Jacob which is a sign of authority and power. Lastly, the wrestler is God and God has promised to bless and make Jacob great and be with him. So through this encounter, didn’t all that God want happen. Didn’t he want Jacob to hold on to him in faith and seek the blessing from Him?

We need to start looking at our life and the ways we are praying to God for protection and guidance. Are we looking for God to answer our prayers in the ways we want Him to? Maybe God is answering your prayers in ways that you don’t realize. God may have you go through hardships and trials to truly hold on to God and trust in Him through faith. Take some time to reflect and pray that God would reveal this to you in your life.