Gn 32:22-31

31 July 2005

“Encounter in the Night”

            When I was a kid in Virginia Beach, my dad and I would watch professional wrestling on television.  This was the 1970s, and things were a little different from the way they are now with WWE.  Back then, entire bouts would go by—not all of them, mind you, but some of them—in which the referee actually was in charge.  Of course, the occasional chair would get smashed over someone’s head, or a tag-team match would degenerate into one guy getting ganged up on by his opponents.

            And I’ll admit it:  since I was a kid, I haven’t paid much attention to wrestling.  In the few times I have seen it, it’s looked like all pretense at having any rules has been thrown out the window.  (Please correct me if I’m wrong!)  There doesn’t seem to be a point in even having a referee.

            Something else about watching wrestling as a kid:  wrestlers were clearly identified as either good guys or bad guys.  They each had their own assigned corners!  (Is that still true?  Will anyone admit to knowing the answer?)  After the announcer called out their name, the good guys would be greeted with cheers, and the bad guys would hear boos.  And for some reason, I’m better at remembering the names of the bad guys!  (I’m not sure what that means.)

            For example, there was Nature Boy Ric Flair, who along with the catcalls, would receive screams of delight from young women, while he flexed his muscles.  Then there was Two Ton Harris.  And unlike Ric Flair, he wasn’t even close to good looking!  Upon being announced, he would stroll around, running his fingers through his hair.  When the inevitable booing began, he would always pretend to be shocked.

            But it was a masked villain that always caught my attention—the Super Destroyer.  (The announcer would intone that he was from “parts unknown.”)  Clad in red and gold, he was one of the bad guys who never lost.  That is, except for the match he lost by forfeit, when someone tore off his mask.  He fled the scene, his face covered with a towel.

            There is a reason for my reminiscing about wrestling.  Our Old Testament reading in Genesis 32 relays the story of an encounter in the night—an encounter that turns into a wrestling match.  (Please forgive me if my sermon title sounds like the name of a perfume!)

            How has this wrestling match come about?  We need to put that night into context.  We need to recall with whom we’re dealing.  If this bout had been before an audience, there likely would have been more booing than cheering.

            In the chapters before today’s reading, we learn that Jacob’s name (bqo['y', ya`aqov) means “supplanter” or “deceiver.”  He tricks his brother Esau into giving up his birthright, his share of the inheritance.  Then, when his father Isaac is blind and dying, Jacob, with the collaboration of his mother Rebekah, pulls a fast one on his dad.  While Esau is out hunting, Rebekah whips up Isaac’s favorite dish, gives Jacob some of Esau’s clothing, and sends him in to get the old man’s blessing.  When Esau returns and discovers Jacob’s treachery, he is furious and vows to kill him.

            When she hears of it, Rebekah sends Jacob to live with her brother Laban, several hundred miles away.  I wonder if Jacob’s reputation has preceded him, considering the way Laban treats him.  Jacob agrees to work for his uncle for seven years.  In exchange, he is to marry the younger daughter, Rachel.  It seems he has way too much to drink on his wedding night, because upon awaking, Jacob sees Leah, the older daughter, lying next to him!  I like how the Bible puts it:  “When morning came, it was Leah!” (29:25).

            Laban tells Jacob, “Oh by the way, our custom around here is that the older daughter gets married first!”  I guess during the previous seven years, it just…slipped his mind to be really clear on that point!

            Eventually, though, Jacob decides to take his wives, their servants, all his children, and all his livestock, and go back home.  As he draws near his homeland, Jacob figures out a way to bribe Esau.  When he hears that his brother has 400 men with him, Jacob is terrified.  He imagines Esau, just itching for revenge.  He sends wave after wave of servants and gifts across the Jabbok River, hoping to calm his brother down.

            And so, we arrive at verse 22.  We arrive at the night that must have been the most agonizing of his life.  It was an agonizing night, but it was also a pivotal one.  Until now, Jacob has avoided facing the music, so to speak.  He has avoided the unpleasant task of making things right with his brother.  In that respect, he’s been trying to run from God.

            The former Dallas Cowboy, Deion Sanders, once said of himself, “The fastest man in the NFL couldn’t run from God.”  Likewise, in Genesis 29, Jacob flexes his muscles and rolls a heavy stone off the mouth of a well—after he sees Rachel coming his way.  So it’s only fitting that a strong guy like that find himself in a wrestling match.

            Jacob is at a crossroads in his life.  He hasn’t yet found the courage he needs.  I say that because he sends the women and children ahead of him.  Jacob wants them to face his brother Esau before he does.  As a result, he spends that long, horrible night on the bank of the Jabbok.

            He spends a night that seemed like it would never end.  I think most, if not all, of us have had nights like that.  We’ve had nights when we prayed for dawn to arrive.

            A few weeks ago, I had a dream about the incident in today’s scripture text.  This was before I had decided to preach on it.  At the time, I was thinking about Ecclesiastes.

            But in my dream, Jacob wasn’t wrestling with anyone—at least, not anyone else.  He was just a man…left utterly alone…in the dark…before God.  Again, I believe that that’s an image of us all.  The scripture says that Jacob sent “everything that he had…across the stream” (v. 23).  He tries to use his family and possessions to ward off the terror.  But it fails, as it always will.  The strangeness and abruptness of verse 24 ring out:  “Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.”

            What’s going on here?  Who is this stranger that appears out of nowhere?  Some people say that this story dates from the distant past, when it was believed that river gods guarded the access to the crossing—and had to be dealt with.  There are those who say that Jacob encounters a flesh-and-blood human being.

Others take a “more psychologically sophisticated interpretation, [declaring] this opponent to be Jacob's own angel—suggesting that Jacob must wrestle with himself (his old identity) in order to cross the river into his future and his new role as Israel.”[1]  I think there’s something to be said for this viewpoint.  Who among us does not struggle with themselves in making any progress in faith and love and wisdom?

Still, the scripture reports Jacob himself saying that he has seen God.  Most people (including me) would say that he encounters an angel, which to the Hebrew mind, is the same thing as encountering God.  Still, if that’s true, it does seem odd that the mysterious wrestler would be forced into the…questionable tactic of verse 25.  In striking “the hip socket,” he literally hits below the belt.  That doesn’t seem like conduct befitting an angel!  Where’s the referee?

In any event, we never discover the identity of Jacob’s opponent.  He’s in a hurry to get away before daylight, and he refuses to give Jacob his name.  This “super destroyer” will not be unmasked!

But that’s okay.  The result of Jacob’s night of struggle and pain is that he is forever changed.  He has become Israel (laer;c]yi, yis^era’el), “one who strives with God.”  In the next chapter, we find that Jacob (now Israel) was wrong about his brother.  Esau seems to have already forgiven Jacob.

            I really like the way our passage ends:  “The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip” (v. 31).  The sun rose upon him.  Why toss that in?  If it’s necessary to mention sunrise, why do it in that way?  The sun rose upon him.  What does that say to you?

            Maybe it has something to do with the way the verse ends:  “limping because of his hip.”  Jacob’s encounter in the night has wounded him.  Even though he’s been injured, he holds on for dear life, waiting for the blessing.  And that night—the pain of Peniel—has transformed him.

            “After Peniel, Jacob was a lot like Dalynne, a woman who was in a serious car accident at age 18, and has now lived with chronic pain for almost 20 years.  Her car flipped over, hit some trees, and ended up on its roof, leaving her with a life of constant headaches, stiffness in her neck, and daily discomfort.

            “’Just looking in the mirror, I see the effects of my pain,’ she says.  ‘Many gray hairs and wrinkles that let me know how bad the day before was.’

            “And yet, Dalynne sees herself as both broken and blessed.  ‘Even though half of my life has been spent in pain, I think it has made me a better person,’ she asserts.  ‘I can understand someone else's pain and will do what I can to ease it.  It may just be a kind word, or helping them to do what needs to be done.  But life goes on.  And so will I.’

            “Dalynne has experienced the transforming pain of Peniel, and allowed it to make her a kinder and more compassionate person.  The very same thing happened to Jacob, who was given a whole new perspective by his all-night struggle.”[2]

            Don’t misunderstand me.  I’m not saying that pain is good, or that God wants us to suffer.  The life of faith does not mean that abuse is part of the bargain.  Still, left to our own devices, we’re a lot more like Jacob as the supplanter and deceiver.  Sometimes God has to wrestle with us, and we have to wrestle with God.  And in the process, maybe arms and legs do get pulled out of joint.

            I’m quite sure that Jacob does not enjoy his limp, no more than Dalynne enjoys her headaches.  Still, each has allowed themselves to be transformed.

            “When we have a true encounter with God, we're never the same.  Meeting God is a transformational experience, and if we're not a transformed people, we're not God's people.”[3]

back to home page