Prayer

Good Shepherd Lutheran Church

Marks of a Frontline Shepherd

"P"

Prayer

"Life's a Wrestling Match"

by Pastor John Kallerson, Chaplain, Walter Reed Army Medical Center

A lone figure strolls out on a field before thousands of people who are gathered that day. You can’t see all the faces but there is great anticipation and excitement in the air. Nobody pays him much attention until he raises he arms and the noise from the crowd slowly dies down. He asks one simple question with a loud booming voice, “What are we here for?” In unison the crowd responds back with one voice, “Football!”

The scene shifts to a crowd of about two hundred where every face can be seen. There’s not much anticipation or excitement in the air as a lone figure strolls to the front of the crowd. He raises his hands and asks a simple question, “What are we here for?” He is met by silence and quizzical looks. No unison of voice or purpose here.

There’s an old question asked in the church, “Is the church a museum for saints or a hospital for sinners?” I believe it is meant to be more like a hospital; at least it should be.

So, What are you here for? I can ask that question because I’m the guest preacher here today and I can get away with it. You could be at home under the blankets, reading the paper with a nice cup of coffee, have the children off in another room watching their TV, or maybe doing something you really enjoy: fishing, hunting, golfing, taking a leisurely walk. But your not; you’re here at church. Why? Why can we not speak with one voice as to our purpose here this morning? Should we be able to? I could cheat and tell you all to say “Jesus” when I raise my hands and ask the question but is that honest?

We all wrestle and struggle with life’s challenges every day. You know your wrestling all too well. Only you and God truly know what you are wrestling with in your heart and soul. We usually want to leave our struggles at the door of the sanctuary when we come here but life is one big wrestling match. Why do we want to pretend otherwise?

The word, wrestle, is used only one time in the Bible, and it is the story where Jacob wrestled with God that night on the edge of the Jabbok river.

The other old word that is used in the story for today is Jabbok. Jacob wrestled with an angel of the Almighty at the Jabbok River and the word Jabbok is an old word, which means wrestle. And so we find a story about Jacob wrestling with God on the edge of the Wrestle River. But, Jacob wrestled long before that night he finds himself at the river. He wrestled with his twin brother, Esau, with his mother, with his father, with his father-in-law, with his wives, with his children.

Now, one of the hidden keys to this whole story is the meaning of the name, Jacob. The name, Jacob, can be interpreted as cheater, manipulator, and liar: a person who is cunning and slippery. These are the people who will cheat you in life if given half a chance. This is Jacob’s life story.

Fundamentally, Jacob was a cheater. Now at this point in his life he decided that it was time to go back and see his older brother Esau. He was scared that his brother was going to kill him. Jacob had really taken advantage of him by stealing his inheritance and he was scared to face him again.

So how does this cheater approach his older brother? Carefully and cleverly. First, he sent his animals across the river into his brother’s land (they weren’t harmed); then he sent all his servants (they weren’t harmed); then he sent his two wives (that’s another sermon) and his eleven children (still another sermon) and none of them were harmed. Meanwhile, he remained on the safe side of the river. Very clever this fellow. Nobody said the guy was dumb.

That night, on the safe side of the Jabbok River, also known as the Wrestle River, Jacob camps in his tent by himself. At least he thought it was the safe side. He tried to go to sleep. But, he couldn’t sleep. He was really nervous and afraid about meeting his brother in the morning. So that night, he started wresting and turning and twisting and dreaming.

He didn’t know what was going on. Was it real? Was it a dream? In the middle of the night, he finds himself wrestling. Was it with an angel? Was it with a man? Was it with God? Was it his conscience? Tradition pictures Jacob wrestling with an angel. Genesis is vague on purpose in saying who Jacob’s adversary was.

Jacob finds himself wrestling with one of the Almighty’s special angels, an angel in whom you see and know the presence of the Almighty. Eventually this angel let Jacob pin down one hand and then the other hand. Finally, Jacob pinned the angel. When he pinned down the angel, Jacob said, “I want a blessing from you.” Now to receive a blessing was no little matter. It was an invitation to bring God into your life in such a manner that you acknowledged your need for God and your desire to have a change made within yourself by none other than the Creator of all that there is.

The angel said to him, “What is your name?” He replies, “My name is Jacob.” The angel said, “I will bless you. From now on, you will be called, Israel. Israel literally can mean, ‘let God rule your life.’”

This is a very important moment in Jacob’s life. There is this huge symbolic name change, from Jacob to Israel. And then surprise, the angel whacks him in the hip and Jacob stumbles out of the tent the next morning with a limp. To this day, Orthodox Jews do not eat the shank of a lamb’s leg bone because this was where God reached out and touched Jacob. Jacob was touched by his encounter with the almighty and left with a reminder of that encounter for the rest of his years.

Now, what is going on in this story? As Paul Harvey use to say on the radio, “Now for the rest of the story.”

The story is this: in that tent on that night, Jacob had a wrestling match with no other than God. Jacob had always been cheating people his whole life. He had cheated his brother out of the inheritance, cheated his brother from his father’s dying blessing, cheated his blind father; he tried to cheat his Uncle Laban. His whole life he had been cheating, cheating, and cheating. His whole life he had been manipulating people.

His whole life he had been clever and cunning and that night, that night, in that wrestling match with God, God touched him. God touched him in such a way that he was changed. And God gave him a new name Israel, which means, let God rule.

Any time in the Bible, when you get a new name, it is a sign of a dramatic and enormous change within that person; it symbolizes an enormous change of inner character. And so Jacob underwent this enormous change from being Jacob to being Israel, from being a cheater and manipulator and cunning and clever to being a person who finally let God rule in his life.

Now, what does all this stuff have to do with you and me so many years later? What are we wrestling with? Is it our conscience? Is it our thoughts? Is it an angel? We all wrestle. We wrestle in the middle of the night and sometimes it goes on for a night or for a week or for a month or for a year.

Of this I am sure, we all wrestle with God and we struggle to know “the peace that surpasses all understanding.” We all go through times where we make changes in our lives. At issue is whether or not we will be like Jacob: self centered, cheating, cunning, and manipulative or whether we will let God rule our lives?

Now, there are many things that we wrestle with in our lives. We spend a lot of time ourselves on the banks of the Jabbok River. We wrestle about things we are doing wrong or might do wrong. Regrets, fears, omissions, failures, you name them—there are so many personal issues we face daily in our lives: Drug or alcohol abuse, relationship issues, our marriages, job issues, money, our children, illness, how we plan our future years, and our fear of death. We cannot escape wrestling with very important issues. We will all wrestle with so events in our lives but we act like they don’t bother us.

This is so important to hear; we wrestle with God, too. God is in our wrestling matches even when we fail to notice. God lets us struggle, work, try, hope, and question. There is truly no doubt that all of us spend a lot of time on the banks of the Wrestle River. God can, if God wants to, with all his power, pin us down so easily and quickly. God could pin us within the blink of an eye, slam us to the floor and stomp on us. God could pin us down and make us believe and obey. But that isn’t the way that God wrestles.

God wrestles in such a way that we slowly surrender our lives to him. We put our hands in his hands, and God begins to lead us on a new path; a path of a renewed relationship involving love, forgiveness, renewal, hopes and strength for our future challenges.

In our surrendering, God hears our prayers during the tough times and the good times. There is a fundamental truth in our faith - God wants us to pray often - not to hide out in a tent by ourselves full of fear. We have a God who wants us to talk to him all the time because the truth is WE need it. We need the experience of talking to God all the time. We need to experience encounters with God regularly: limps and all. I have many limps in my life and I am sure you do to.

So who will rule in our lives: The power of Jacob’s manipulation and deceit or the power of God our creator and redeemer? This is one of the basic wrestling matches of life. Is your name Jacob? Or is your name, Israel?

I ask again, “What are we here for?”

We are here today to hear that God's in our corner, ready to bless us, to wash us, refresh us, renew us, and strengthen us. God is ready to return us prepared for our daily battles in the struggle we call life. We, as members of the faith, all bear an addition to our names: Christian, beloved child of God. Go from here knowing that God is in your corner this day and everyday. God bless you in your wrestling.

Amen