I think theology needs to be a collaborative effort, so this week in preparation for this morning’s text, I’ve been getting opinions on a theologically rich question. I’d love to have a conversation about it, but for now I just want to turn this question over for your thoughts:
In a wrestling match (to the death) between Pastor Al and Kevin, who do you think would win?
It’s been a really fun question to ask—partially because neither of them knew the poll was floating around—but also because some of the responses have been hilarious (I got to ask both spouses, for example, and one voted for her husband and the other voted immediately against) but it’s also been interesting to see the deliberation (“on one hand, Kevin is faster and younger, but Al has the advantage of size and wisdom…”).
Overall, it’s been a fairly competitive and heated race, but as of Friday, I have to declare that the winner, with 63% of the congregation, is………Al. (sorry Kevin).
With a few people, I took the poll a step further and said, “Ok. What about Al vs. God? Who would win then?”
So far, God has won every time. My husband (the king of manly hypotheticals) got a kick out of this question—especially when I flipped it back on him and said, “yeah? What about you? Think you could wrestle with God?”
So Matt, ever the sarcastic show-off, says “Of course! I could throw down; show YHWH a thing or two…”
And then (I love my husband) he immediately backpedals, “uh oh…I hope that doesn’t go on my permanent record….I can see my life playing back on the judgment day and then God will pause the giant screen and tower over me with a rumbling voice and be like, ‘Were you there when I created the earth? Do you know the secrets of the deep and the hairs on each person’s head? You really think you can take me?’”
I mean, let’s face it: If we were to imagine a WWJD smackdown with God almighty, infinite in power in one corner—even if the opponent is a 300lb beefcake like me, it’s not going to be much of a fight. I think that’s the attitude we usually have when we approach this text.
It’s certainly the most common artistic interpretation. One of the most famous images of ‘Jacob Wrestling’ is an 1855 engraving by Gustave Doré. (I’m going to back up a few steps and point out that this Genesis text is full of complicated questions—one of which is the identity if the wrestler. Depending on your translation, the wrestler will be called a man or an angel…and some scholars point out that the Hebrew text never explicitly says “Jacob wrestles with God”…but I think it’s God. The wrestler ends up blessing Jacob and changing his name—those are only things God can do). Anyways, Doré clearly depicts God as an angel, but note that Jacob seems to be the only one struggling—he’s on the edge with muscles tense, but the angel seems calm and unruffled.
In this other image from an unknown artist, the fight is depicted even more ridiculously. God is huge and Holy (with fork-like feet for some reason) while Jacob is little and skinny with his arms stretched in a futile punch that bounces off without effect. Rather than struggling, God seems to be patiently waiting for Jacob to calm down. There’s no doubt that God is all-powerful and all-mighty.
This painter has captured God’s identity as the Conquering One—the God who is victorious over sin, and injustice, over death, cancer, depression, and worry; conquering even our finances and our own moments of self-centeredness. God can conquer it all!
But I’d like to look at another artistic rendering of this text. One that goes verse-by-verse.
I’m not vouching for the historical accuracy of Lego-people, but I do think we’re missing something if we pretend the struggle in this story isn’t epic. It lasts through the night and even after his hip is broken, Jacob isn’t the one who says, “Let me go!”—that’s God. Surprisingly, the God depicted in this story is not one of omnipotence, but one who wrestles. It’s a conundrum—a radical reversal of our expectations—and we can respond in one of three ways:
1. We can lean on the angel image in Dore’s engraving and say, “The text is ambiguous and God is powerful, so this wrestler must not be God.” …but Jacob thinks it’s God. And who are we to say what God is and is not? We need to be very careful that our ideas of God are a reflection of God’s revealed self and not just a projection of our own best thoughts. In other words, our understanding of God needs to be grounded in all of scripture—not just our ideas about what god should be.
2. Our second option is to sidestep the physical power issue and say that God’s wrestling match with Jacob was a spiritual one. The actual wrestling becomes a nonissue and God’s power remains intact, but the text clearly says that Jacob is injured in this struggle and he walks away with a limp—a physical sign forever commemorated by Israel’s dietary laws. Certainly, as we read this story, we need to remember that Jacob is about to return to his brother, Esau (the brother that Jacob wronged and ran from) so yeah, there is spiritual struggle at work here, but that can’t take away from the fact that this is a God who initiates a real, physical, encounter. If anything, the spiritual connotations enhance the physical implications….
When Jacob first ran away from Esau in Genesis 28, God sent Jacob a beautiful dream about a ladder between heaven and earth—an image of hope and harmony; a promise of connectedness. But four chapters later, Jacob is returning to his brother—finally seeking peace and reconciliation and God decides that a vision isn’t enough. It’s not enough for God to just say, “Hey Jacob! I’m here—I’m kind of a big deal.” No, God wants to get involved. God wants to touch Jacob—in his strength, in his weakness—and God is willing to fight for that—even if it means holding back for our sake.
Which brings us to our third option: we can accept and struggle with this new image of God—the God who wrestles with us; the God who steps outside of omnipotence in order to be on our level. We can say that God is God beyond our definitions and outside of our boxes. Our God is Mighty and Powerful but also unexpected. Here and ready now to burst into our realities and stand with us in our struggles.
The more I think about this new image of God, the more I’m struck by the fact that this redefinition of strength—this wrestling God—isn’t new at all. We just usually call him Jesus. Jesus, the word made flesh, who emptied himself of divinity in order to reach into the reality of our brokenness. In Jesus, we see God fully engaged in human weakness even to the point of suffering and fatality. THIS is an unexpected God. But again, God surprises us. In Jesus,we see not only the same God who chooses weakness in order to be with us, but we also see the powerful God of victory when Christ wrestles death itself and walks away victorious. God turns a sign of weakness into life. Jacob’s limp was a proclamation which said “My God wrestled with me and I survived.” Likewise, Jesus had scars on his hands and feet, so that Thomas could touch brokenness and say, “My God lives.”
There’s a huge difference between our calm, collected, neat and pretty ideas about God and the messy, complicated reality of THE God who breaks into our facades and wrestles into our weaknesses. As Pastor Al said a few Sundays back, “God doesn’t tap us politely on the shoulder to get our attention. God is jealous.’ Jacob teaches that God tackles us and wants to be a part of our every day brokenness, weakness, and struggle.
Likewise, when we talk about the kingdom of God or the reality of Jesus’ forgiveness, we can’t just paint pretty pictures with our Sunday morning words. We have to get involved and fight for that to be a touchable reality—we have to let God struggle with us—in our hearts, in our communities, our workplaces, our bank accounts, our hospitals, our bedrooms, our kitchen tables ….Just as we allow scripture to define our understanding of God, we need to allow God to shape the way we understand ourselves.
So let us say, “Yes, God, wrestle with us. Come into every aspect of our lives and make our faith real. Let us be a generation who seeks your face, God of Jacob, but also a generation who seeks the faces of our brothers and sisters. Struggle with us through our brokenness for You are great.”
In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
