The lessons this morning focus on the power of determination and persistence. In the first lesson Jacob wrestles with a character whose identity is never quite revealed, but certainly celestial. There has always been a question in the commentaries about whether that being is an angel or actually God. One must think that if it were God, that Jacob would have lost the fight, but then again, it is a story after all.
The reason Jacob was there in the first place is the larger part of the story that's not included in our lesson. Jacob was caught between a rock and a hard place.
His two wives were sisters. He loved the younger sister, Rachel, and worked for seven years to win her hand from her father Laban. Laban tricked Jacob on the wedding day, substituted the older sister Leah hidden under a veil and made Jacob work an additional seven years for Rachel. In return when Jacob got the opportunity, he managed to cheat Laban out of a large portion of his flocks and before Laban figured out the trick, Jacob took his then sizeable family and entourage and fled the region. Laban, waking up and finding everyone gone, figured out he'd been cheated and the chase was on.
Jacob got a head start and it looks like he's going to get away and cross a border that would protect him, but he looked into the distance and standing between him, his family and their freedom was the large army of Jacob's brother Esau. Normally, that would have been good news, except that the reason Jacob was in Laban's country in the first place was that he cheated his brother out of his inheritance. With Laban at his back and Esau in front, Jacob sat at the stream dividing the territories between a rock and a hard place.
It was here that the celestial being shows up and they wrestle. Why Jacob needed to pick yet another fight is any one's guess -- especially with an angel. But in the language of story it makes perfect sense. Perhaps the Being was his conscience that he was wrestling with, having to face two adversaries, both of whom he'd cheated. His chickens were coming home to roost, as it were, and he had a lot to lose.
His decision was to face his brother, come what may. Still being cagey, he divided his family and entourage in half and went with the first half to meet his brother to see how things went. He discovered that his brother had in fact forgiven him and all went well. Jacob was able to establish a new homeland for his family. Happy ending to that chapter.
What's curious is the wrestling. Jacob stayed at it til morning. In a modern version, you could imagine him tossing and turning all night long before making a decision of huge importance. In the language of story it's a heavenly being that confronts him. His victory is in making a decision of integrity. Facing the wrongdoing he had done to his brother, who, unlike Laban, had never done any harm to Jacob and did not deserve being cheated. Jacob's victory earned him two things. The first is a blessing which brought with it a new name, Israel. He is the same Israel for whom the country is named to this very day, and you can imagine why this story is a beloved one for the people of that country. Perhaps it was this blessing that had somehow mollified Esau. The other thing Jacob got for his victory was his hip out of joint and a limp that lasted the rest of his life.
There was a play on Broadway a long time ago called, "Your arms are too short to box with God." And while that may be true, if you wrestle with God, you might win, but you will pay a price. There are a lot of stories of Jacob's adventures as a young man getting into trouble and as a wise older man. Something shifted in this encounter and Jacob grew up. He faced himself and God in a profound way and it changed him forever. In the language of story, it was a limp. In the language of faith, it was a conversion.
The Gospel story echoes the theme of persistence with the judge and the woman who pestered him seeking justice. He had no fear of God or respect for anyone -- a perfect candidate for a judge. Notice that he grants her justice because of her persistence, which he should have done anyway. But perhaps it was quicker because of her persistence. And Jesus taught them that God also will grant justice. The widow believed that her actions would wear the judge down and it did. I'm not sure we're supposed to see ourselves wearing God down -- or wrestling as Jacob did -- but perhaps that might not be a bad image.
Jesus often taught his disciples to pray and encouraged them to pray a lot. Prayer works in a way that we don' t understand, nor does it seem possible for us to do so. But it works whether we understand it or not. The trick is that it may not always work out the way we wanted or expect, but being open to the Spirit allows our prayer to take the shape it needs to. And that's often where the limp comes in.
I have a nephew who developed Lyme's Disease when he was in high school. It was misdiagnosed for a long time. There is a window of opportunity for which the disease can be easily treated, but having missed that window, he faced three years of intense fighting to where at one point it looked as though he might die. My sister doggedly chased every lead, fought the insurance companies which denied coverage for the treatments they needed, and yet never gave up. They finally found a proper treatment and several years later Nicholas is fully recovered, though the fear remains that the disease may appear again.
I asked him if he regrets missing the second two years of high school and all the traditional high school activities. It also delayed and impacted his college entrance. He said he did regret it to a degree, but what he's learned about himself and life more than makes up for it. There's a maturity in him that he credits the struggle of fighting his disease. The limp is what he missed, the blessing is what he gained. No one wants to go through that again, but having done so, there is gratitude for the lessons learned and the blessings received.
As a parish family we've observed some milestones recently. The death of our long time member Hubert Pierson who as a six year old sang in the St. George's children's choir -- and was such an important part of the leadership and vitality of the church, he died at age 87. He was bed ridden for many months prior to his death and as I visited him, heard stories about his life, the best of which I cannot tell from here. But his life was full of joys and struggles in various issues, some of which were blessings and some left a limp that went well beyond his hip replacements. Shortly during the prayers of the people, we'll have the pleasure of witnessing the renewal of wedding vows for Nina Nicholson and Kirk Petersen. It's their tenth anniversary and a wonderful story of how they found love after struggles in their own lives. Nina often boasts that she can find anything on the internet, including a husband.
The bottom line is that we all wrestle the angel at some point in whatever form that might take. Conscience, fear, frustration, confusion of how to deal with conflict, and we need to make difficult decisions and choices. Between the stories of Jacob and the widow, the wisdom of our scriptures is to pray, wrestle a little bit, but ultimately trust in God and choose authenticity and integrity in making those decisions.
The gamble is the limp, and there generally will be one. But the blessings will outweigh any limp. You may not get your name changed or a country named after you, but you will face your issues and find your blessings. Amen.
©2010 St. George's Episcopal Church, Maplewood, NJ
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