Genesis 32:24 So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.
A longtime friend sent me a note after my husband’s death: “[Alan] was . . . a grappler with God. He was a real Jacob and a strong reason why I am a Christian today.” I’d never thought to compare Alan’s struggles with the patriarch Jacob’s, but it fit. Throughout his life, Alan struggled with himself and wrestled with God for answers. He loved God but couldn’t always grasp the truths that He loved him, forgave him, and heard his prayers. Yet his life had its blessings, and he positively influenced many.
Jacob’s life was characterized by struggle. He connived to get his brother Esau’s birthright. He fled home and struggled for years with his kinsman and father-in-law, Laban. Then he fled Laban. He was alone and afraid to meet Esau. Yet he’d just had a heavenly encounter: “The angels of God met him” (Genesis 32:1), perhaps a reminder of his earlier dream from God (28:10-22). Now Jacob had another encounter: all night he wrestled with a “man,” God in human form, who renamed him Israel, because he “struggled with God and with humans and [overcame]” (32:28). God was with and loved Jacob despite and through it all.
All of us have struggles. But we’re not alone; God is with us in each trial. Those who believe in Him are loved, forgiven, and promised eternal life (John 3:16). We can hold fast to Him.
Read: Genesis 32:22-32
Jacob Wrestles With God
22 That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two female servants and his eleven sonsb and crossed the ford of the Jabbok.c 23 After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions.d 24 So Jacob was left alone,e and a manf wrestled with him till daybreak. 25 When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hipg so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. 26 Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”
But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”h
27 The man asked him, “What is your name?”
“Jacob,”i he answered.
28 Then the man said, “Your namej will no longer be Jacob, but Israel,f k because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”l
29 Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.”m
But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?”n Then he blessedo him there.
30 So Jacob called the place Peniel,g saying, “It is because I saw God face to face,p and yet my life was spared.”
31 The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel,h q and he was limping because of his hip. 32 Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip,r because the socket of Jacob’s hip was touched near the tendon.
Reflect & Pray
1. When have you wrestled with God?
2. How is it comforting to know He’s with you in your struggles?
Jacob’s wrestling match with a stranger, who turns out to be God in human form (Genesis 32:24-30), marks a turning point in his life and is the event that explains the origin of the name of the nation of Israel. The name Israel can be translated “the one who strives with God” or “God strives.” Israel is a combination of the Hebrew words sarah (“to rule,” “contend with,” or “strive”) and El, the Hebrew name for God. Jacob names the place of his life-changing encounter with God Peniel, which means “the face of God.”
PRAYER
Dear God, please help me to bring my questions and troubles to You knowing You hear them. One day my questions will be no more.
Read: GENESIS 32:22-32 | Bible in a Year: JOB 30-31; ACTS 13:26-52
