Real Life: Grappling with God
Blessing in the Struggle
Genesis 32:22-31
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. Aug. 2nd, 2026
This morning we pick up the story of Jacob and Esau once again. God has richly blessed Jacob. He now has two wives, two maids, eleven children, and a host of livestock. But he faces a danger from his past. His brother Esau has found him and wants to have a chat. The last time Jacob saw Esau he had sworn he would kill him once their father was dead. Now their father was dead. Esau was a strong and mighty hunter skilled with the bow. Whereas Jacob was a pencil neck geek who hung around the tents. Surely he had finally met his end.
He prayed to God, “Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. But you have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’” But he also sent gifts to Esau, “two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, thirty female camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys.” He split them into two herds. He hoped to impress Esau with his wealth and generosity.
That night he sent his family across the river and was alone by himself. It was then that he was beset by a man who wrestled him until daybreak. The pencil neck geek somehow was able to make a stand against the stranger. Indeed, when the man realized he was not going to be able to take Jacob down he cheated. He struck him at the hip so as to put it out of joint. That ought to have been the end of the bout. You cannot wrestle without strength at the hip. But Jacob clung on and refused to give up.
So the man pleaded with Jacob, "Let me go, for the day is breaking."
But Jacob refused. Like Jacob made Esau swear away his birthright for a pot of stew he told the man, “I will not let you go until you bless me.”
We must imagine there is a long pause before the man asks, “what is your name?”
“Jacob.” He said. Heel. Supplanter. Jacob who took the blessing of Esau. Jacob who took the daughters and flocks of Laban. And now Jacob who has struggled successfully with the man of the night.
"You shall no longer be called Jacob,” the man said, “but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans and have prevailed.” Much like Abram became Abraham, the father of many nations, Jacob was given a new name. A name that would be his blessing. A name that would speak to his character and purpose. He is the one who wrestles with God and man, and emerges victorious.
Israel asked the mysterious man for his name, but he wouldn’t give it. Israel let him go. He named that place Peniel. Why?
“For I have seen God face to face, yet my life is preserved.” It was not a mere man that Israel struggled with that night. But the angel of the Lord. God himself. And by the grace of God he survived with only a limp. And it was with that limp that he would go to meet his brother.
When he does finally meet his brother they embrace. They kiss. They weep. Esau refuses the gifts that Israel has offered. But accepts them when Israel insists. Esau offers to follow Israel but Israel declines. They part their ways. To me the most significant part of their meeting is that Israel tells his brother, “For to see your face is like seeing the face of God, now that you have received me favorably.”
Indeed. Israel is the one who struggles with God and with people and prevails.
Paul, this morning, pivots to a discussion of the salvation of Israel. That is, the children of Jacob. And he says, “They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and from them, according to the flesh, comes the Christ, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen.” Now by this he means the physical people of Israel, he means Jews. But perhaps we would not be so amiss if we read “Israel” here as those who struggle with God.
Those who are children of Jacob by blood are children of the one who wrestled God in the dead of night. And we who are children of Jacob by adoption are also children of the one who grappled with God.
We have every permission to struggle. The disciples struggled to understand Jesus when he said he would die and rise again. Jesus himself struggled in the garden of gethsemane when he prayed “if it be your will take this cup from me, but not my will but your be done,” as he sweat blood. Abraham, too, struggled with God when he asked him to save Sodom and Gomorrah if a handful of righteous men could be found.
There are all sorts of things we may struggle with. We may struggle to make sense of scripture. That is why we have this community. We may struggle with where we feel God is leading us. We may struggle with discerning what God is doing in our lives. We may struggle with the problem of evil, the world God has created, and how it meshes with who he has revealed himself to be.
We are not asked to accept without question. Struggling is not a sign of doubt or unbelief. It is a sign of lively faith. And in the struggle, as with Jacob, we may find ourselves blessed. Because for many of us unless we lead a life of struggle we cannot possibly find happiness.