Genesis 32:22-31

Have you ever had a problem that you wanted to run away from?

Most people do at some time—something, or someone, that you'd just rather avoid, something you wish would go away—or, as I suggested, something you want to escape.

People run from their problems in a lot of different ways:

• Some try to numb themselves to the problem, turning to drugs or alcohol or the endless possibilities of the internet.
• Some try to run from their problems by blaming them on someone else—a spouse, a parent, a child; a neighbor; a boss or colleague at work; a teacher, the principal—and I guess both students and teachers can do that. If that personwould just act differently everything would be all right.
• Some try to run by surrounding themselves with things. And while it is true that the world does look better from the seat of your new car, well, really, it might be simply because you’re running—running away from your problems.

Have you ever had one of those problems that you wanted to run away from? Probably so.

Look at Jacob. He's on the run.

And his problem is a big one, really. His brother, Esau, wants to kill him.

We heard an earlier part of this story last Sunday.

Jacob cheated Esau out of his birthright. Jacob also tricked their father into blessing Jacob rather than Esau.

In the years that have now passed, Jacob himself has been tricked by his father-in-law, Laban. In one of the many "R" rated stories in the Bible, Jacob ends up marrying two of Laban’s daughters, both Leah and Rachel. His family grows and eventually Jacob has twelve sons and twenty-one daughters.

It’s a big family.

And with all of them, Jacob is on the run.

As the song says, “Running away…is like running a business.” And Jacob has almost run out of time for running. His brother is close by.

Aside from the internet, Jacob has many of the same options that we have for running from problems.

He has lots of “things.” Between cheating his brother out of his birthright and later tricking his father-in-law out of much of his livestock and other property, Jacob is pretty well off. He even comes up with a present to placate his brother—two hundred female goats, twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, thirty camels and their colts, and more. All his possessions, however, don’t seem to be enough to shelter him from his problems.

Jacob could blame his problems on his angry bother, Esau. After all, Esau wanted the food Jacob offered in exchange for the birthright. How is it that he now wants to kill him? What’s wrong with Esau?

Jacob could blame his deceiving father-in-law, Laban, for his trouble. After all, if Laban had acted differently, Jacob might not be in this mess.

Jacob has many of the same options for running from his problems that we have. Still he finds himself facing the prospect of a difficult, final confrontation with Esau.

Running away is a short-term solution, at best. Eventually our problems, our lives circle around to our present and confront us head on.

Like Jacob, as long as we flee from conflicts and confrontations, we flee from the opportunity for personal transformation. Only through facing our problems do we grow. As M. Scott Peck explains: “Problems call forth our courage and our wisdom; indeed they create our courage and wisdom.”

Jacob is running. He’s not yet ready to turn and face his real problem—himself—directly. Jacob is running.

And now it is night. Jacob runs straight into reality—although it is certainly a strange reality.

Last Sunday we heard another night story—of Jacob sleeping and dreaming of a stairway to heaven.

But what happens now is one of the strangest of all the strange events told in the Bible.

Jacob lays his tired body down on the riverbank. The ground is harder for him than it was some twenty years ago when he dreamed of angels on a ladder reaching to heaven. He knows that tomorrow he will encounter his estranged brother for what might be the last time.

In the darkness he wonders if he will face that with fear or courage.

Is he finally ready to emerge from darkness into light, to assume responsibility for leading his clan and continuing in the covenant that God made with Abraham and Sarah?

Or is it death, the final veil of darkness, that waits for him on the far shore of the river?

In the darkness of night, on the shore of the Jabbok River, Jacob is destined to wrestle his personal demons and angels to the ground.

"Jacob was left alone and a man wrestled with him until daybreak."

Who is this man?

Is he Isaac, Jacob's departed father, from whom he wrested a blessing?

Is he Esau, with whom he wrestled in the womb and whom he must confront at dawn?

Is this man Jacob’s shadow self, the darker side of his mind, his doubts and fears?

Could this be death itself with whom Jacob wrestles?

Or is this “man” in fact an angel of God—or even the very God of Abraham and Sarah, of Isaac and Rebekah?

It seems that Jacob wrestles with all of these—his family history, his troubled present, is inner angels and demons, and yes, with God.

In this night by the river Jacob stops running.

He faces his problems.

But more importantly, he faces himself.

No longer is he the cheating, scheming adolescent. As he turns to face himself, Jacob engages in a wrestling match, the prize of which is his adult identity.

On his way to deal with his brother, Jacob first deals with his God and with himself. In doing so, he gets a new name. No longer “Jacob”—that is “He who supplants,” he becomes “Israel,” that is, “he who strives with God.” Jacob spent his entire life wrestling with all sorts of people. Now he faces up to his own life and becomes a new person.

Suddenly the old fears, the reasons to run, vanish with the rising sun.

Yes, he hurts. Jacob, Israel, goes limping into his new life. But that limp is, in some strange way, a sign of God's blessing. Our wounds often are.

Running gives way to a new reality.

But wait a minute. Is Jacob limping away from the wrestling match the end of our story?

After worship last Sunday, several people asked me about what happened to Jacob. They wondered—did he ever get his act together? Did he ever grow up and become a better person.

Does Jacob ever come face to face with Esau? And what happens?

Well, in the morning, the limping Jacob looks up and sees Esau coming toward him along with four hundred other men.

Watch what happens.

Esau runs to meet Jacob, embracing him, kissing him, and they both weep.

Esau offers to escort Jacob back to Esau’s homeland. But Jacob declines, urging him to go on ahead and saying he would follow at a slower pace with the cattle and the children.

It is a bittersweet moment, because, really, both brothers know that Jacob will not follow Esau to this new land. Both brothers know they are destined to dwell apart from each other, each pursuing his own way of life. Though they were reconciled, they will never live side by side.

Genesis offers us a realistic view of the challenges and limitations of reconciliation. It takes Jacob twenty years to face his own life and so be able to face his brother. His story shows us that reconciliation is not a passive process. Nor is it a quick fix.

Finally, Jacob's life teaches us the value of tenacity. Jacob's triumph is that he prevails over every obstacle life lays in his path—not by virtue of intelligence or righteousness (sometimes he shows little of either) but by having the faith to endure: faith in himself, faith in his destiny, and in his ability to outlast adversity.

This redeeming virtue of endurance is what sets Jacob apart from Esau and marks him as the leader of the family. While Esau is driven by the need for instant gratification, Jacob has the tenacity to persevere. He waits two decades to secure the real blessing that he could not win from his father, and on the shores of the Jabbok River, he finally earns it.

All of us are tested, in ways small or large. Our life has meaning and we have value as human beings. No matter how terrible our circumstances, others have probably endured worse and emerged to love life once more. Whether confronted by sickness, ill fortune, or political persecution, human beings have an incredible capacity to endure.

In his darkest hours, with all his senses of hearing, sight, and touch, Jacob apprehends God for a fleeting, searing moment. God's message is the same to him as it was to Abraham and Isaac: “Fear not.” It is the same message that occurs again and again throughout scripture: “Fear not.”

By refusing to surrender to adversity, Jacob shows us the amazing power of human perseverance. His new name would, for generations to come, symbolize eternal struggle and endurance, in more than one land, during more than one night. Sheer endurance is sometimes the most heroic act that we humans can perform. Jacob wrestles with the angel of his soul, demanding the blessing that he tenaciously clings to and claims as his birthright.

As Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel wrote about Jacob's encounter with the angel:

“Jacob has just understood a fundamental truth: God is in human beings even in suffering, even in misfortune, even in evil. God is everywhere. In every being. God does not wait for us at the end of the road, the termination of exile. God accompanies us there. More than that: God is the road, God is the exile. God holds both ends of the rope. God is present in every extremity, God is every limit. God is part of Jacob as God is part of Esau as God is part of each of us.”