The Struggle for Blessing

11th Sunday after Pentecost

Genesis 32:22-31

Jacob is the third of the great patriarchs – he is introduced to us in chapter 25 of the book of Genesis. And it turns out that his story is the story of the last 25 chapters of the book. It is his story that ultimately becomes our story – for we too, by our grafting into the branch of Israel, are descendents of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. By our spiritual adoption, we are children of Israel as well.

We pick up with Jacob this morning in chapter 32. Last week we studied the story of Jacob marrying first weak-eyed Leah, and then Rachel. Several weeks before that, we left the story of Abraham just after he took his son Isaac to the top of mount Moriah to take his life as a sacrifice to Jehovah God. The succeeding chapters find Isaac leaving Abraham – wonder why?? – and taking a wife. He marries Rebekah. They have two children, Esau and Jacob – twins, actually. But Esau comes first – the first-born of Isaac. Like many children, they take after different parents – Esau more the outdoorsman – hunter, gatherer – and Jacob more the country gentleman, preferring the company of his mother and the coolness of the tents. Then comes the event – you know, the event in which Rebekah helps Jacob con old Isaac out of the blessing that is intended for the first-born.

As the lads grew, it became obvious that Esau was Isaac’s favorite, and Jacob was Rebekah’s favorite. Esau became quite the hunter, but like most hunters, didn’t score every time he went out into the field. One day he came in from an afternoon hunt, was looking for something to eat, and Jacob was hovering over a pot of stew. Esau asks for a bowl, and Jacob obliges – first making sure to sell the stew for Esau’s birthright. Esau didn’t think very much of his place in the lineage, or perhaps he knew that he was Isaac’s favorite, and counted on that favoritism, and so he gladly sold his birthright for a bowl of soup.

You can hardly read it anymore because of the fading, but out there on my pickup is a front license plate that has a picture of a deer, and the scriptural reference, Genesis 27:3. It reads best from the King James, I think – “Now therefore take, I pray thee, thy weapons, thy quiver and thy bow, and go out to the field, and take me some venison.” None of the other translations mention deer hunting, but evidently that was a pretty big thing back in 1691 when King Jimmy was having the bible translated into the “King’s English,” and as a hunter, I am oh, so grateful. But it is really the next verse that gives us a little perspective on our lesson for today. This is where the story starts to get really good. Verse 4 – “and prepare a savory dish for me such as I love, and bring it to me that I may eat, so that my soul may bless you before I die.” The blessing – so common among families – is about to be passed from father to son – to the first-born son. It is the blessing of promise. In this particular family, it is the blessing of God – first promised to Abraham, and then to Isaac. Now it is to be passed to the next of kin – the first-born son, Esau. But that doesn’t happen. We know the story. Rebekah helps Jacob pull a fast one. She was listening outside the tent, perhaps knowing that the time for the blessing was coming near, and she had a favorite son – Jacob. Rebekah sends Jacob to kill a couple of kids – young goats – and she helps him prepare a stew. He reminds her that his “older” brother is a hairy man, and so she helps him some more by dressing him in his brother’s clothes, and then lashing some kid goat hide to his arms and the back of his neck. He goes in to Isaac, feeds him the goat stew (mixed with enough herbs, I suspect, to taste like venison), and then receives his father’s blessing. Later in the day, the deception is revealed, Esau receives a sub-standard blessing – really all that his father could offer him at this point – and the stage is set for a conflict. As far as I’m concerned, this story has to be true – you couldn’t make this stuff up!!

Fast forward to chapter 28. The deception having been pulled off flawlessly, the brothers virtually at each other’s throats with the threat from Esau to take Jacob’s life the next time he sees him, Isaac makes the decision to send Jacob off to his uncle’s country to find a wife. On the way, Jacob has a dream – the ladder dream – and in that dream, he receives confirmation from God that God will bless Jacob as the heir to Abraham and Isaac. That little tid-bit, in and of itself, is reason for us to take seriously our verbal commitments toward God. God honors that which Isaac had said, even in deception, and he chooses to bless Jacob, rather than Esau, as the son of the promise.

Now we discover that Jacob arrives in Paddan-aram, where he makes contact with uncle Laban. Actually, he makes contact with Rachel first. He meets her at the sheep pen, rolls the stone away from the well so that her sheep can get a drink, and then he kisses her – I don’t suspect it was a peck on the cheek. He was smitten. But uncle Laban tricks the trickster, marries off the older daughter first, and makes an arrangement for his younger daughter, the one Jacob truly loved.

Now, we had to do all of that to make sense of our text for today. Chapter 32 – both of the boys, Esau and Jacob – have married, and settled into their respective lives. As brothers are sometimes wont to do, they begin to consider what kind of life their sibling might have discovered. Jacob decides to try to make things right with his brother, so he sends some of his men to tell Esau that he is alive and well in Haran, and would be willing to share his wealth with his brother if he would forgive him. They do what they are told, and return to report to Jacob that Esau is making his way toward Jacob – with 400 men, nonetheless. Not surprisingly, Jacob assumes that Esau is on his way to revenge the loss of his birthright and his father’s blessing. We probably would have thought the same thing. Jacob decides to make a stand, and offer what consolation he can to his brother. So, he sends half the herd toward Esau, praying to God that this offering will appease his “older” brother. Then he crosses the stream to spend the night.

Now, this is where the story gets really good. Jacob has another dream. At least we think it was a dream. The text is a little unclear. And during this dream, Jacob wrestles with an angel. At least we think it was an angel – again, the text is a little unclear. Some versions say he wrestled with a “man.” Whatever the case, the next details are rather clear. They wrestle all night, and toward daybreak, the angel touches the hip socket of Jacob, dislocating his hip. He doesn’t give up. The angel asks for him to relent, and he says, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” And so, the angel blesses him, and names him Israel, “because you have striven with God and with men and have prevailed.”

One of the great tools of modern psychotherapy is the examination of family systems. The psychologist will delve into the hidden recesses of the counselee’s mind by talking about their current family system and their family of origin – mom, dad, siblings, grandparents, etc– hoping to discover some clue as to why the counselee feels the way they do, why they make the decisions they make, what motivates them – that kind of question. Those who are willing to take the risk to do this kind of intense, difficult work generally find themselves more enlightened, if not more equipped for life.

Often that work includes the discussion of family blessing. Who received “the blessing,” from whom, and why. In a way, the “family blessing” is a blessing of family, and maybe more importantly, an acknowledgement of the precious nature of a single individual’s contribution to the story of that family by those who have already contributed to that story. It is passed on from fathers to sons, mothers to daughters, and from fathers to daughters and mothers to sons. This “blessing” is rather indispensable in the development of well adjusted adolescents who then eventually become contributing members of society, and even leaders in their communities.

Some day I will rewrite this sermon from the perspective of the psychiatrist talking to Jacob about his need for blessing. That need came out of his struggle with life. Jacob needed blessing in his life. He came out of a family system in which his aged grandfather actually planned to kill his father for the sake of a blessing from God that he might be “the father of many nations.” As far as we can tell, that action permanently destroyed the relationship between his father and his grandfather. Both of those men had such difficulty with fear that they were willing to deny being married to their wives for the sake of their own lives. Jacob’s father had only the one wife, Rebekah, and she had only the two boys, twins. Jacob received a lifelong blessing from his mother, but he craved a blessing from his father, who naturally had offered his “blessing” of life to the firstborn son, Esau. So, Jacob “connived” a blessing, with the help of his mother, only to discover that such trickery usually turns against the perpetrator. He is more or less banished from his homeland, makes a deal for his wife, is tricked into marrying a woman he doesn’t love, makes another deal for Rachel, ends up having, at this point, eleven children by four different women, and now finds himself in a familial struggle with his only sibling, his past, and most probably his future and his promised blessing.
Jacob has striven with man – actually with all kinds of people – so much that we remember him as “the trickster.” His life is a convoluted mixture of deception, greed, desire, unsatisfied expectations and unfulfilled dreams. He has done all that he knows to do with mankind, and he comes up short. There has to be something else. There has to be more.

Doesn’t that sound an awful lot like our lives? We struggle, we connive, we posture, we prepare, we accumulate, we procreate – only to come up short and need more in our lives. We still need a blessing.

Listen, friends. We have the larger picture of this saga. When we speak of Jewish people today, we understand the lineage. We refer to them as sons of Abraham. We acknowledge their descendence from Isaac, the original child of the promise. But we know the Jewish people as the “children of Israel.” We know of them in this way, because it was Jacob who received the ultimate blessing – the blessing of immortality. It is his sons who become the twelve tribes of Israel. He received this blessing because he did something that Abraham could not do – he struggled with God until he prevailed. He received this blessing because he did something that Isaac would not do – he struggled with God until he prevailed. This “trickster” knew that what he had manipulated and created for himself was not enough, and he knew where he could get what would satisfy his yearning for blessing, and when opportunity presented itself, he struggled with God, and held on until he prevailed.

Walter Brueggemann says of this exchange, “The upshot is a new name and, by implication, a new being. Jacob had asked for a blessing. Perhaps he dreamed of security, land, more sons. But what he got was a new identity through an assault from God. He had been named Jacob -- 'heel/trickster/over-reacher/supplanter.' Each of these is true, but not flattering. Now he is 'Israel.' The etymology of 'Israel' is disputed. Perhaps it means "god rules", "god preserves," "God protects." But whatever the etymology, a new being has been called forth. He is now a man (and a community) linked not only to a nemesis of the night but to a promise-keeper of the day. Something happens in this transaction that is irreversible. Israel is something new in the world. Power has shifted between God and humankind. Israel is the one who has faced God, been touched by God, prevailed, gained a blessing, and been renamed. There is something new underway here about the weakness of God and the strength of Israel . . . new possibilities are open to Israel that have not been available before. In the giving of the blessing something of the power of God has been entrusted to Israel. Unlike every other such relation in which God rules and humankind obeys, Israel is a newness which has prevailed with God.”[1]

I know that in our time of rampant, hyper-conservative theology that it is not popular to suggest that we strive with God. We are more likely to receive advice that suggests we submit to God, or that we pray about the matter for a little longer. But our forefather, Jacob, becomes known as Israel, the father of many nations, because he slugged it out with God, and he prevailed. The lesson for us is clear – as children of God, we are not only privileged to “scrap it out” with God, rather, it is indeed expected of us. God is not particularly worried about us getting too big for our britches. Even Jacob knew his place – he named that place where he struggled with God “Peniel,” saying, “I have seen God face-to-face and lived to tell the story!”[2]

This life is difficult. We search for human blessing. Some find it, others never do. We search for achievement. Some find it, others search their entire lives, only to come up short. We search for God’s blessing. Some, like Abraham, discover the promise short lived, and eventually handed off to the next generation. Some, like Isaac, are so wounded by life that they seem unwilling to struggle for anything else.

The promise of the story of Jacob is that our struggle with God calls for perseverance, tenacity - even relentless stubbornness. But we do not give up – we do not give up on God, and we do not give up on ourselves. This holy tension – this holy struggle – is what God wants.

So, grafted children of Israel – adopted children of the promise – struggle with God until you receive your blessing.

Richard W. Dunn, Ph.D.

[1] Brueggemann, Interpretation Genesis Commentary, page 268-9

[2] This week, all scripture references are from the NASV, except for the quote of Gen.27:3, which is from KJV, and this particular quote, Gen 32:30, which is from Peterson’s The Message.

I Will Give To You . . .

10th Sunday after Pentecost

Psalm 105:1-11
Genesis 28:15-28
Romans 8:25-39
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52

My friends who read my sermons – you know, my preacher friends – get a little antsy when I try to find something connective with all four of the lectionary scriptures, and then comment on them in a single sermon. There is a lot of material here, usually, and from time to time, I do have to stretch a point to make a point. I hope you don’t think that’s what I’ve done when you finish hearing my thoughts this morning. So I offer four vignettes of thought that, for me, bring together the scriptures we have heard this morning.

Let’s start with the psalm. Psalm 105. The psalmist expresses emotion and praise to God, and in the process, indicates that we are to do the same. We are to give to God. That may seem, at first, as a silly thing to attempt – to give something to God that God needs. Truth of the matter is, we don’t understand enough about God to understand why God would need, desire, or encourage our praise – but He does. And we gladly respond – from our hearts, from our minds, with our lips and our whole beings. We respond to God. We give back to the One Who has given all to us.

A person wouldn’t have to study our worship liturgy here very long to notice that we begin with praise. We open our experience of worship with the reading of a psalm of praise, and then we generally move into a series of hymns and choruses designed to help us approach God in humility and thankfulness. It is wise of us to begin our time with God with praise. I don’t know about you, but I never think of this as burdensome, or even think of it as a task that has to be done for the sake of the relationship. Rather, I view our opportunity to praise as a wondrous thing – in those moments, I am enraptured by thoughts of our God – of His goodness to us, of His love for us, of His provision for us – praise to our God is something of ease, and I count it as a real privilege, as well as a pleasure.

Our praise of God begins with our lips and our minds and our attitudes, and becomes something of a lifestyle for us. I was reminded of this at Youth camp last week, as the theme for the week centered around four statements, and five simple truths – laugh out loud, listen out loud, love out loud, and live out loud – those were the statements. Laughing, listening, loving, and living are means by which we express our gratitude to God, and means by which we manifest our ministry of proclaiming God in all quarters. Those are the four statements, but the fifth truth is the “out loud” part – all that we do, we do in a visible fashion, as testimony to others about the astounding greatness of our God, and our pleasure at returning thanksgiving and praise to the One Who created us, redeemed us, restored us, and now works with and through us to accomplish His purposes.

Well, that’s the first vignette this morning. We offer praise to God as a part of our general lifestyle. A few years ago, really more than ten years ago now, I was reading Robert Capon on how he interpreted the parables of Jesus. Among many others, he made one rather interesting point – the relationship we have with Christ is exactly that – relational. Most of us think of our relationship with God and Christ as transactional – God will do something for us if we do something for Him. There is a sense in which we come to that conclusion as a result of the covenants we read about in scripture. God established covenants with our forefathers, and those covenants were, seemingly, transactional. In our minds and in our theology, we have simply translated that thought about transaction to our contemporary theology, and to our understanding regarding our relationship with Christ. But Father Capon advocated in his writings, and I happen to concur with his teaching on this point, that our relationship with Christ in New Testament times is not transactional, but rather it is relational. Rather constantly, Jesus uses familial illustrations to describe our relationship to God. We know that familial relationships, when they are noteworthy and good, are indeed relational – for instance, my children will always be my children because I love them. They didn’t get to be my kiddos because of some great thing they did, nor do I disown them because of their occasional disappointing behavior. They are my children now, and they will always be my children. They are not made my children by anything which we exchange – as in a transaction. Our relationship is not transactional, it is relational.

I mention this, because the next three vignettes this morning consider those things God gives us as a result of the relationship, and it would be possible for someone to get the impression that God only gives these things to those with whom God “transacts.” I do not believe that to be the case. Rather, those who are the children of God are made more fully aware of the goodness and giving nature of our God.

Our Old Testament story for today comes from Genesis. We’ve been following the burgeoning relationship between God and His chosen people through the lineage of Abraham for the past several weeks. Today’s story finds us watching the trickster, Jacob, having the ultimate trick pulled on him by his prospective father-in-law. When it comes to women, it seems even the savviest of men let down their defenses. Here’s the story. Jacob meets Rachel. Jacob is smitten by Rachel. Jacob trots over to Laban’s tent to work out an arrangement for his younger daughter. He is most happy to agree, and since young Jacob is so “hot to trot” for his daughter, they agree to seven years hard labor. In Jacob’s eyes, it’s a steal of a deal. The years pass as days. Seven years roll along, and the wedding day comes. Jacob asks for his wife, Laban throws a party, the men of the camp gather round to toast the new groom, and papa Laban slips his older and weak-eyed daughter, Leah, into the tent for the honeymoon. Next morning, when Jacob discovers the situation, He has to work out another seven year deal with papa for the one he really loves.

You may think I’m making too much of a stretch on this one, but I couldn’t help noticing the number seven – seven years for Rachel, only to receive Leah, and Cornerstone has been around seven years.

You know, we have a wonderful church. If you were to poll all of us as a group, I suspect that the vast majority would incline that God has given us this church. It’s a good place – we have a sufficient space for the number of people we now minister to, we have a new parking lot, we have air-conditioning when the preacher remembers to turn it on and when the units are fully charged with freon – all in all, it’s not a bad deal. Let me ask you a question – what if we have been working for Leah for these past seven years, and God has yet to give us our Rachel? What if our best, our true love, is just around the corner, and we serve another seven years to truly become people of the promise? What if . . .?

Well, that’s just speculation. The point of this story is that God provides – God gives to God’s people - a promise and a hope of future glory. Throughout this elongated story of our patriarchs, God says to God’s people, “and I will give to you . . .” There is always a future element to the promise of God, and we find ourselves waiting expectantly for the fulfillment of that promise. We are given a hope, a promise, a future by God, even as we become the chosen people of God.

That is not dissimilar to our gospel story for this morning. The testimony of these parables is that the kingdom of heaven is near to us – and that the kingdom of heaven is something of a mystery. There is both a present and a future element to the kingdom of God. But most of what we know about the kingdom of God is that it is mysterious. Now, at the very moment the preacher says that the kingdom of God is mysterious, we expect to hear an explanation of the kingdom, don’t we. And we should – it’s only human of us to do so. But the kingdom of God is more mysterious than mere explanations. We do get a few hints. For example, the kingdom is near. That’s a reality. The kingdom is not some far off reality – it is a nearby reality. Near in time, near in proximity. The kingdom of God is near. The kingdom of God comes in a smallish form sometimes. Like a mustard seed. I’ve seen these seeds – they’re tiny, but they flavor rather mightily. The kingdom of God is small. The kingdom of God is always being hidden – in the field, in the meal for the flower, as a pearl in an oyster, like a fish in the sea. The kingdom of heaven is near, it is small, it is hidden. Tell me what else we really know about the kingdom of God. We suspect a great many things, but we know so very little – it is a mystery. We do know something about mysteries – they are generally revealed – in time. In time.

Our fourth vignette comes from the epistle of Romans. Chapter 8 has been my favorite passage of scripture for a lot of years. It speaks of our ability to know something of this promise of God, this hope of glory, and at the same time the mystery of the kingdom of God. That revelation comes to us in the form of – in the person of – the Spirit of God. Verse 26 – “and in the same way the Spirit . . .” Truth of the matter is that what you and I know about God has been revealed to us by God. What we know about our relationship and our future comes to us through and as an intentional by-product of the presence of the Spirit in our lives. What we know about the mystery of the kingdom of God as it permeates our lives and our society and our world comes to us through and as an intentional byproduct of the presence of the Spirit in our lives. God comes to us and at our invitation, God indwells us. In that indwelling, we discover our promise, our future, our place in the kingdom, and interestingly enough, increased motivation for our praise of God.

This is our authentic story about the relationship we share with God. You and I encounter people every day of the world who can’t believe that we believe what we believe, that we give up a portion of a day every week to worship God, and that we give our money to the church for the expansion of the kingdom of God. They have trouble believing that our story is authentic.

Let me tell you another story. A couple of years ago, I was on a trip to another state, and I visited some friends of mine.

“After dinner, we sat around and talked. The children played with the family dog, a large, long, narrow sort of dog.

‘That’s a full-blooded greyhound,’ my friend, the father in the house proudly told me. ‘We got him after his racing days were finished. He is great with children.’

The children rolled on his back, their head between his paws. He licked them affectionately. Well, eventually, it was time for the kids to go to bed. The parents gathered them up and made for the bedroom, leaving me alone with the dog.

I asked the dog, ‘What’s it like to be a greyhound and race professionally? I have never been to a greyhound race myself.’

‘It’s not a bad life,’ said the greyhound. ‘They treat you like a king. Feed you well. I had it made down there in Florida, racing.’

‘Well why did you leave? Did you just age out? You don’t look that old to me,’ I said.

‘No, I’m not old enough for retirement. I quit.’

I persisted, ‘Well, what made you quit?’

He replied, ‘Well, if you had ever been to a greyhound race, you might understand. In every greyhound race, all of the dogs line up, we are released, and then we follow a little white rabbit thing around the track. It’s not really a rabbit, it’s just some sort of stuffed thing that is white and is pulled around the track. We all chase it. One day, after a race, I got a close look at that rabbit. To my shock, I found out the rabbit wasn’t real! That meant the race was not real. So I quit. I was almost ashamed to have spent so much of my life chasing a fake rabbit.’”[1]

While others wonder about their eternal fate, and serve so many other inauthentic Gods, we serve the authentic, true God, who first loved us, created us, redeemed us, and brought us into His kingdom’s work. He continues to offer all of His good gifts to us, not as a transaction, but as a confirmation of the wonderful relationship we have with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Richard W. Dunn, Ph.D


[1] Shamelessly, I have borrowed this story from Will Willimon (Pulpit Resource, Vol. 33, No. 3, p.19), who in turn borrowed it from Fred Craddock (Craddock Stories, Chalice Press, pp106-7).