We all might have felt at some point that we were wrestling with God. Maybe you were or are wrestling with Him for healing, a breakthrough or a restored relationship. Many times God allows us to wrestle with Him for certain reasons. Let us look into why God let Jacob wrestle with Him and how we can apply these reasons to our own wrestling matches with God. Verse 26 gives us the reason why Jacob wrestled with God or His angel. It says, "Then he said, 'Let me go, for the day has broken.
Instead He was wrestling to keep God with Him. In our own lives we find that it can be a struggle to have God's presence remain with us.
But there is no wrestle more rewarding that pursuing God's presence and therefore His blessing. We won't always find it easy to have God around, but it will always be worth it. Jacob was known in the Bible to be a pursuer of blessing, but many times he sought it the wrong way. Esau's son and servants were sent to kill him on the first night of that journey, and he only survived by bribing them with this dowry. This is why he was empty-handed when he arrived in Mesopotamia. Twenty-one years later, as he was returning with his family, he heard of Esau's approach and plan to kill him and presumably his entire household.
Because he had signed and witnessed documentation of the sale of the birthright for a pot of porridge Esau would have to kill all his legal heirs to regain the birthright. When he was attacked he presumed he was fighting either Esau or one of his men, sent to spy out his location. It was only when the angel of God's face touched his hip and immediately disabled him that he knew it was actually a messenger from God that he was struggling with.
At this point he could only hold on and insist that God bless him because he could no longer fight against God, no matter the form or appearance he took. Here Jacob was admitting to his nemesis that everything Jacob had suffered at his hand he had actually suffered at the hand of God for his purification, edification and education. He literally was seeing the hand and face of God in his brother. On that night Jacob finally learned that God is sovereign so he was given the name Israel, which means God rules not ruling with God as some teach.
God rules, so when I seek to fulfill his promise by my own hand and in my own timing instead of his, I am not allowing him to rule, I am trying to rule in his place. This is rebellion, not faith. This is not a call for inaction.
God intends for us to act, but we do not act in our own timing, in our own understanding and according to the desires or beliefs of our flesh. We only act when God says, rise up and follow me as this angel of the face of God did when it appeared again to Israel's descendants in the wilderness as the pillar of cloud and fire, rising up to show them it was time to move on and settling down to show them it was time to set up a new encampment Num Much of that is lost to those of us reading it in English.
Jacob is a foundational figure — but that doesn't mean he's a great leader. He's a follower, a bit of a sneak; a usurper. This is all contained just in the pronunciation of his name. He lies to his father, Isaac. He's manipulated by his mother, Rebecca. He steals his brother Esau's blessing. Jacob runs for his life, and then ends up under the thumb of Laban, his father in law, for a couple of decades.
And [in his prayer] he says, '[Esau] might cut us all down, the women and children,' but then he sends the women and the children ahead of himself. Jacob has plenty of material possessions. But something is missing. He's still not really his own person.
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