I noticed the other day that the TV news sportscaster was covering professional wrestling, just like it was a real sport! I wonder what the play-by-play would sound like for Jacob’s all-night match with God. Regardless of what the sportscaster would make of it, this story presents an image of a God who engaged Jacob soul and body in a much earthier way then we typically think about God in our lives.
Perhaps we, like Jacob, should see God more intimately involved in our daily struggles.
Like Jacob’s all-night wrestling match, have you ever wrestled with something that wouldn’t let you go, and you wouldn’t let go of it either? Something that perhaps you obsessed about, or pinned a lot of hopes on, or something that just plain took a lot of work or courage? Maybe it had to do with picking a life partner, finding just the right house, dealing with a serious illness, escaping a dysfunctional family…creating a dysfunctional family, or a healthy family. Think of something that you’ve wrestled with for a long time.
I have had a number of such wrestling matches in my life. One of my longest wrestling matches has been over career choices. I have hunted for years for the “perfect” career path. I have tortured myself with questions like, “Am I working where I can be of the most use?” or “Am I doing what my gifts best qualify me to do?” The issue of what kind of job I should have—as opposed to just doing my job—has consumed a lot of my time and energy over the years.
Have I been wrestling with God rather than trusting in God? Have you been wrestling with God?
Jacob wrestled all night because of his voracious desire to see God’s promise of abundance fulfilled. God had promised to make Jacob’s descendants a great nation who would draw the whole world to God. But as we’ve heard over the past months’ retelling of tales about Abraham and Sarah and all their offspring, nothing seemed to be happening very fast. This promise was taking generations to be fulfilled.
Maybe one way out of these wrestling matches—without dislocating our hip—is to simply trust in God’s promise of abundant life, even when all evidence is to the contrary. That is surely what Jesus did in the feeding of the five thousand.
We don’t know what actually happened in this familiar miracle scene. The traditional interpretation is that Jesus magically duplicated the bread and fish, but it seems to me that if that had actually happened, the account would read more like this: “Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and suddenly the loaves and fish began dividing and growing right before everyone’s eyes until there was more than enough food to pass out to everyone!” That’s not what the Bible says.
Another interpretation I have heard is that the miracle was not about the bread and fish, but about people’s hearts.
In a time when McDonald’s and 7-Elevens were not around every corner, most people would not leave town to follow Jesus to a deserted place without taking along at least some provisions—maybe a loaf of bread, a wineskin, and some dried fish. But you certainly wouldn’t have taken a lot of extra food; who wants to carry more than you need to on a hot, dusty trek?
When it came time to eat, apparently no one was willing to take out their food, probably for fear of having to share it with their neighbors who maybe didn’t bring enough, or didn’t bring something as nice to share back in return. We’ve all been in that situation, too. Think of that mysterious “group factor” when you try to divide a restaurant check and you always seem to come up short at the end. Or maybe you’ve been part of a workgroup where you didn’t think other members were going to pull their fair load, and so you held back some effort, too.
That is the hoarding, human heart that Jesus’ listeners probably carried within themselves to that deserted place—a heart full of fear that “I won’t get my fair share,” or even, “I won’t get what I need.”
Even Jesus’ disciples operated from this shortage mentality. First they advised Jesus to send the crowd away to fend for themselves, even though it was already late in the day. This “every man for himself” approach would have sent the crowd stumbling over one another in the dusk to get to the nearest town first to procure food, probably cursing one another all the way. Picture Nissan Pavilion after a big concert. People’s experience of Jesus would have ended with acrimony. The message Jesus had conveyed through his words and healings would have been buried by the experience of the crowd trying to get away from him.
Jesus didn’t agree with the disciples’ suggestion, and he told them to give the people something to eat. As is frequently the case, though, the disciples were unprepared to rise to Jesus’ challenge. Thinking in the usual ways of the world, they answered, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.” And they probably thought to themselves, “And if we share that, surely we’ll have nothing left for ourselves to eat!”
This strategy I’ll label the “we’d like to share, but we just don’t have enough” approach. This method would have led to continued inaction, with people in the crowd aimlessly milling around and muttering about how late it was getting, and what would we all do, and on and on, everyone unhappy but no one willing to do anything.
Jesus alone seemed to understand that addressing the problem in the usual ways of the world would not work. He reacted in a way not of this world, not of hoarding, selfishness, inaction, or simply wishing the problem would go away. He reacted with gratitude and trust. He simply took what was at hand, looked up to heaven and blessed and broke the food and started handing it out.
Jesus, in the midst of an imperfect situation marred by apparent shortage, reacted not with fear or secret hoarding, but with calm honesty. To paraphrase the situation, Jesus turned to God and said grace, and then turned to the people and said, “Folks, this is all we have, but we would like to share it with you.”
People in the crowd, inspired by Jesus’ act of trust, decided that they, too, could trust that even if they shared, their needs would still be met. Or they recognized that they were not starving and that if they shared and thereby didn’t get as much to eat themselves, they would still be okay, and maybe someone needier would be satisfied. In either case, sharing became more important than hoarding.
What Jesus did really is a miracle. It’s a miracle in the sense that it’s something we ordinary believers don’t fully comprehend or trust.
If you don’t think reacting to our imperfect world with gratitude and trust is a miracle, imagine all the times in your life when you’ve responded to shortcomings or shortage not with thankfulness and faith, but with fear and hoarding. I think that most of the time we really don’t believe in God’s promise of abundant life.
But Jesus’ miracle did happen, and miracles like it can happen today, to anyone who truly trusts God’s promises, even when all evidence is to the contrary.
Do you really believe it? Do you actually think that if you approach those imperfect situations in your life—those issues you wrestle with over long nights—with gratitude and trust, that you will find a way out of your problems?
Think back to that image I mentioned earlier of something that you have wrestled with for a long time—that issue that wouldn’t let go of you, and you wouldn’t let go of it either. Now picture yourself carrying that same image before Jesus. As you tell Jesus about your problem, Jesus reacts in some way that shows that he firmly believes in God’s abundance, even if you are not quite so sure about it yourself. What would Jesus’ reaction look like? And what kind of response of trust might it evoke in you? I hope that is an exercise you can pray over during the week ahead.
As you ponder the question, remember, too, the importance of blessing. To bless means to honor something as holy, as of God. Jacob wrestled over fathering a nation that would bless the world. Jesus sought God in even the smallest question, like what to do about dinner. I pray that we, too, may see our struggles—both the grand ones and the daily ones—in the light of our relationship with a God who gives life abundantly.