GodSprings - January 15, 2016

Submission is the Answer

So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.

Genesis 32:24 (NIV)

Jacob’s name means “Heel Catcher,” which proved to be a very appropriate name for this Jewish patriarch. Most of Jacob’s life was spent trying to get what he wanted by using his own strength, always grabbing and scheming just to get ahead. He believed in God but was not fully surrendered to Him. He duped his brother, deceived his father, and defrauded his father-in-law, and all this was done in an attempt to bring blessings into his own life. Jacob, like many of us, needed to learn that blessings come at the hand of God and not by the hand of mankind.

Jacob would learn this one night while he was all alone in the wilderness and suddenly met with God in the most unusual of ways. Arms became interlocked, heads bowed down, and shoulder pressed against shoulder, as each used his weight and leverage to try and overpower the other. God was wrestling with mankind! We must realize that God was the initiator of this unusual encounter. He came to Jacob, and He was the one who reached out and wrapped him in a heavenly headlock. the point of any wrestling match is to bring your opponent to the place of total submission. This was something Jacob still needed to learn. Hour after hour, the two remained intertwined until God decided enough was enough, and the time had come to drive the lesson home. So, God touched Jacobs’s hip and permanently dislocated the joint.

The result was that Jacob could no longer wrestle. All he could do at that point was to hold on for dear life. As Jacob clung to God, he sought God’s grace and blessing in that moment. God, in His grace, saw a change in Jacob’s heart and gave him a new name: Israel. His new name means “governed by God.” With a new name came a new way of life for this former heel catcher. No longer was he seeking to live life his way by grabbing and scheming for blessings. He saw that the only way to true blessing was received by submitting to and clinging to God. Jacob was physically weakened from His encounter with God, but spiritually he was made stronger.

Have we ever wrestled with God? Have we ever fought to have things our own way, only to have God dislocate our plans? As we wrestle against the hand of God, we always will be on the losing end of that struggle. Only when we submit to and surrender to God can the true blessing of a new found intimacy with Him be experienced.