A Reflection on Genesis 32:22-32

The Old Testament reading last Sunday was a story from the life of the patriarch Jacob. After swindling his brother Esau out of his birthright, he deceived his father into giving him the blessing that rightfully belonged to Esau. This made Esau mad, so Jacob ran off to find a wife from his mother’s relatives. After being tricked by his twice over father-in-law, he managed to turn the tide and obtain a large family and great wealth through business practices that were opportunistic at best and downright deceitful at worst. Jacob is a thoroughly self-centered and self-serving opportunist. Not exactly hero of faith material.

I imagine Jacob experienced at least a smidgeon of fear when God told him to take his questionably gotten family and wealth and return to his home country, which meant that an inevitable meeting with his brother Esau. Not knowing how Esau would respond to his estranged brother, Jacob devised a plan to assuage Esau’s anger before it could find expression. The plan involved flattery, bribery, bargaining with God, and using his own family as a human shield behind which he could make his escape. However, before he could bring his plan to fruition, he encountered a mysterious man at the Jabbok River, with whom he wrestled until dawn.

The ambiguity of Sunday’s lection has left me with two prominent questions: who did Jacob wrestle, and why?

I think the wrestling match occurred to stop Jacob from escaping behind the shield of his wealth and family. Interestingly, though, it is Jacob who pursued the fight even after he was permanently injured. It was the mysterious man who, at the approach of day, pled with Jacob to let him go, prompting me to ask the question – why is Jacob holding on?

I think it is because he was afraid. Despite all of his elaborate plans, daybreak and his failure to escape meant that he was still going to have to face his greatest fear – his brother.

There is much that could be said about this encounter with the faceless, nameless stranger, the least of which is that it was profoundly shaping in Jacob’s life. His identity was changed because of it. Somehow, through this wrestling match, Jacob came face to face with himself, his doubts, his fears, and his guilt. He would carry a limp from this fight for the rest of his life. But that was a small price to pay for the victory of conquering his fear and humbling himself before his brother.

What is the message of Jacob’s wrestling match for us today? We could talk about the transformative value of encountering God, or the value and power that comes in facing our greatest fears. We could talk about the transformative affect of humbling ourselves before a brother or sister whom we have wronged. We could say one of a number of different things about this story. Or we could simply say that Jacob’s life was a lot like ours – complex, messy, filled with fear and self-doubt, faith at times hanging by a thread, and yet proof that all the while God is faithful; even when we are at our worst, God is at work fulfilling his purpose in us.