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Call to Worship (Psalm 130:1-8)
Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord.
Lord, hear my voice!
Let your ears be attentive
to the voice of my supplications!
If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
Lord, who could stand?
But there is forgiveness with you,
so that you may be revered.
I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
more than those who watch
for the morning, more than those
who watch for the morning.
O Israel, hope in the Lord!
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
and with him is great power to redeem.
It is he who will redeem Israel
from all its iniquities.
Let us worship God!
Opening Prayers
God of all glory,
on this first day of the week you began creation,
bringing light out of darkness.
On this first day you began your new creation,
raising Jesus Christ out of the darkness of death.
On this Lord’s Day grant that we,
the people you create by water and the Spirit,
may be joined with all your works
in praising you for your great glory.
Through Jesus Christ, in union with the Holy Spirit,
we praise you now and forever
Gracious God, we confess to you today, that like the Apostle Paul
we don’t always understand our own actions.
For we do not do what we know to be good,
but rather we do and say those things which we know to be wrong.
We wrestle with what you want us to do
and be and wrestle to be faithful and committed to you.
We confess too that we would rather relate
to the more gentle, comforting and peaceable aspects of your character
than to your disturbing, confronting, and challenging nature.
And yet O God, like Jacob of old,
we need your disturbing presence to wrestle with us
and challenge those things in our lives which are inconsistent
with what you have taught us through Christ.
Forgive us for wanting to hide from you because we fear combat;
we know your love is such
that you will not let us go until you fulfill your plan for us.
We seek your blessing and make us worthy recipients of that blessing.
Today, remind us the Good News of Christ that
God sent his son into the world not to condemn the world,
but that the world might be saved through Him. (John 3:18)
Jesus himself bore our sins in his body on the cross,
that we might be dead to sin and be alive to all that is good. (1 Peter 2:24)
Almighty and Gracious God,
be pleased with the worship we offer you today.
This we pray in the name of Christ our Lord.
Amen.
Hymn: Love Divine all love excelling
words: Charles Wesley. music: HYFERDOL
Prayer for Understanding
Lord, fill us with the knowledge of your will
in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,
so that we may lead lives worthy of the Lord Jesus,
lives that are fully pleasing to him,
and live that will bear fruit in every good work
and as we grow in our knowledge of You.
In Christ we pray, Amen.
Scripture
Genesis 32:22-31 Jacob wrestles God before his meeting with his estranged brother Esau by the Jabbok River
Romans 7:14-8:2 Paul wrestles with his desire to do good while at the same time not doing good.
Sermon: Wrestling with God
In Genesis today we have a story of the Jacob’s of his wrestling match with God along the Jabbok River. This is quite fitting since Jacob means literally Jacob means “one who grabs by the heal”. This sound like a wrestling move, something akin to what my cousins used on me growing up.
When Jacob came out of Rebekah’s womb, he came out grabbing on to his brother’s Esau’s heal. The term later came to mean “one who tricks” or the “one who gets ahead by trickery.
Jacob’s whole life would be one of getting the upper hand or achieving his personal goals by whatever means possible. Jacob’s whole life reveals how much of a little heal grabber he is.
For example, Jacob cheats his brother Esau out his birthright, which included land, status, and a leadership role in the family. As a result Esau threatens to kill Jacob for his deception.
Jacob then flees and goes to live with his family in his grandfather Abraham old stomping ground in Haran. There Jacob is out-smarted by his father-in-law Laban into working twice as long for him in order to marrying both of his daughters, and not just the youngest daughter whom Jacob loves.
Jacob who will not be out-smarted by anyone. He succeeds in carrying out a plan to trick Laban out of the best of his herds. Laban’s sons are furious with Jacob. God tells Jacob to leave and go home to Canaan. When Laban and Jacob meet, they promise to keep their distance from each other.
In order for Jacob to go home, Jacob must first make peace with angry brother Esau. And so Jacob devises yet another plan to make that happen so he can claim the birthright of the land that God gave to Abraham and Isaac and which he stole from Esau.
To tell you the truth; Jacob is not the righteous role model we lift up to our children. He cheats, tricks, and swindles his way to wealth, power, and fame. Jacob truly lives up to his given name of the “heal grabber.”
At the Jabbok River, Jacob will stand face to face with the brother whom he has so grievously wronged.
Will Esau receive him or kill him?
Who would blame Esau if it did the latter?
When you first read the story, you can’t help but think this is going to be a bloody family reunion.
Jacob, the win at any cost son of Isaac, sends his wives, children, and animals on ahead as a test of Esau’s mood.
Jacob figures if he hears their screams across the Jabbok River, he’ll re-think the idea of a friendly reunion with Esau. Jacob again shows his true devious character.
On the night before he meets his estranged brother Esau, Jacob camps out under the sky and is left alone with himself and his thoughts. And there on the bank of the Jabbok River, a dark stranger assaults Jacob.
Who is the stranger who jumps Jacob in the night? Nobody knows. The storyteller only says in verse 24…
“a man wrestled with him until day.”
Is Jacob wrestling with his brother, locked here on the riverbank after midnight like they once were locked in the dark waters of their mother’s womb?
Is the stranger a demon, who has survived out there in no man’s land, resisting taming, and religion?
The nighttime opponent has no name and Jacob never sees its face for it is dark. But, by the end of this eventful night, Jacob will be convinced he has fought with his God (v. 30).
But the God with whom Jacob wrestles is not the gracious God of daylight, who blesses Jacob, who promises to make a great people of him. This is a terrifying force of the God of night. This is a God who shall not be appeased with flowery phrases in prayers. This is not a God to be stared at, picked apart, and discussed in religion classes. Jacob feared the wrath of his brother, but first he must endure the assault of his God.
The fight lasts all night. It was almost an even match for neither wrestler will have their way. You have to think to yourself,
“What a man Jacob must be to wrestle God and to almost triumph?”
And you have to wonder “what kind of god is this who is almost pressed to a draw by this man!”
Near dawn, gasping for breath, exhausted in conflict, and they are reduced to speech. Jacob clings to the dark stranger who he has wrestled with throughout the night.
“Let me go, day is breaking,” says the dark stranger.
“Bless me first,” says Jacob. Jacob as we know would do almost anything to get a blessing.
“Well what is your name?” asks the stranger. A kind of odd question to ask especially if you are God or an angel. There must be more going on than simply asking for a name. And there is.
For when Jacob confesses and declares, “I am Jacob,” You have to believe that since names generally reveal the character of the individual, as it does in this case, Jacob finally acknowledges who he truly is before God. It is as if he declares, …
“I am the Heal Grabber, the Trickster. I am the one who has spent his entire life trying get the upper edge on everyone and in every situation. This is who I REALLY am!
I don’t know of anything worse than to acknowledge that one is a Cheat, a Trickster, and a Heal.
The mysterious nighttime opponent, who we now know to be God, then declares,
“You are no longer called Jacob. You are Israel.
You have struggled with God and with humans
and have prevailed.”
Now Jacob, the “Heal Grabber” he is RE-NAMED “Israel” which means “God prevails, or God fights, or God Rules.” In the new name, given by the stranger, there is a new being. Power has shifted in God’s relationship with the world. A new man, a new people have been formed, and called forth by the will of God.
Jacob/Israel is the one who faced God, who has been gripped by God, prevailed, gained a blessing, and who has been re-named.
Jacob will continue to be Jacob, but we will see in the later chapters of Genesis, a dramatic change in which has taken place in his life.
When daylight came, God was gone and so was Jacob. Now, only Israel remains, walking with a permanent limp after his nighttime wrestling match. This was to be a permanent reminder of his encounter with God, who loved him enough to show him his true and unflattering self.
It was a reminder of how God made a new man, with new insight of himself and of his God. He is left with a profound blessing from God. That night, Israel was both blessed and wounded by God.
We see Jacob’s story of his wrestling match with God echoed in the Apostle’s Paul struggle with his sin in Romans 7. Here too in the midst of his struggle, Paul comes to hear the blessing of God’s words of assurance at the beginning of chapter 8…
“There is therefore now NO condemnation
for those who are in Christ Jesus.”
Paul will write in his second letter to the Corinthians about how he bears a thorn in his flesh, for which there is much discussion about. Regardless of what it is, Paul proclaims that God’s grace is sufficient for him.
We hear Jacob’s story echoed in Jesus’ own wrestling match with God in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here the powers of God and the powers of evil battled for Jesus’ loyalty. Jesus struggled to be obedient to God’s call and to live up to his name and role as “God Saves.”
At the end of his wrestling match, Jesus decides to go to the cross for us in order to win for us God blessings of eternal and abundant life. And here too, Jesus would forever be marked by the signs of God’s victory over sin and death on his body.
I don’t know about you, but these stories of wrestling matches resonate within my spirit. We have all wrestled different aspects of our personalities both positive and negative. We have wrestled mentally, spiritually, emotionally with the pandemic and our response to it. We have wrestled with God crying out for answers and the resources to face the pandemic. Sometimes we have had the upper hand in the conflict and sometimes we have felt overwhelmed and out of control by it.
Jacob’s story, Paul’s story, and Jesus’ story encourage us to wrestle fearlessly with God and the important issues we face. We do so knowing that God will not abandon us to our fears, our weaknesses, our sins or our failures.
Jacob’s and Paul’s stories encourages us all the more to hang on and to wrestle God, until the Spirit’s work of inner transformation within us brings about the blessings of a changed person in us that God desires.
The result of our spiritual wrestling matches always leaves some permanent mark upon our lives, as it did with Jacob, Paul and Jesus. Those scars we carry remind of how much God loves us and is willing to wrestle with us to make the new people God desires us to be.
And in sharing our personal stories of our spiritual wrestling matches with God, we open the door for deeper discussions about how our wrestling with God can bring about a deeper relationship with God, ourselves and others.
Let us continue to wrestle boldly with God in these strange times of ours, in order to discover again the amazing nature of God’s persistent and amazing grace.
AMEN!
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Song: Amazing Grace
words: John Newton, music: NEW BRITAIN
Moment for Mission
Making Space for a New Generation of Believers
The Well Church in Mississauga, Ont., started with a group of only 13 people. They were drawn together by their deep love of Jesus and a desire to share that love with others.
Inspired by a vision to become a welcoming space for second-generation immigrants, they developed a style of evangelism and worship that spoke to those they desired to reach.
Since the congregation started worshipping together three years ago, their community has grown and has become a home for many young people who had strayed from the church.
Please pray for the Well Church and the many other churches in The Presbyterian Church in Canada that are making space for a new generation of believers.
Presbyterian Sharing supports new faith communities
Prayers of the People
We thank you that you come to us when we least expect you to engage us powerfully in the life-changing struggle for our growth and good.
We thank you that you consider us worthy of wrestling and will not cease to struggle with us until we are conformed to the image and likeness of your Son.
We thank you that you leave us with reminders of deep and meaningful encounters with you,
for you give us the new name of Christian,
you give our lives purpose as participate with you
in blessing the world through our caring and service.,
and you enable us to walk in newness of life.
We thank you for all who are celebrating birthdays this month. Continue to bless them and meet each of their different needs. Help them to continue to grow and deeper in their relationship with you.
We pray for those who try by every means to avoid a life changing encounter with your grace.
We pray for the faint-hearted who endure so long with you, but then give up on the very verge of receiving your divine blessing for life.
We pray for deliverance for those who wrestle with destructive habits and attitudes.
We pray for those who long for the healing of their minds, bodies, souls, and memories.
We pray for ourselves for the grace to engage the darker sides of our personalities. Come to us with blessing and healing.
We pray for the courage to wrestle with the important issues of reaching out with your love to our communities,
and for the courage to be wounded and blessed in the process.
We pause to offer you our other concerns in silence . . .
We now join together to boldly pray as Jesus taught us to pray
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name, your kingdom come,
your will be done, on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power, and the glory
are yours now and forever. Amen..
Song: “O Jesus I have promised”
words: John Ernst Bode, music: ANGEL’S STORY
Charge and Benediction
Go out to participate with God
in being a blessing to our world
knowing that God is present
in the midst of your struggles
to shape and conform you
in the image and character of his Son.
The blessings of
the Wrestling God,
the victorious Christ,
and the empowering Spirit
is upon us now and forever more.
Amen
We bless each other using the words of the Spirit Song,
Prayer Partnership
Monday, August 3 We pray for new ministers in first pastoral charges.
Tuesday, August 4 We pray for congregational leaders who are taking vacation this month. May this be a time of rest and renewal.
Wednesday, August 5 We pray for the Assembly Council as it continues to give leadership to the denomination during these changing times. Give thanks for each member’s leadership and commitment to serving our church, and especially for the convener, Ms. Sandra Cameron Evans.
Thursday, August 6 (Anniversary of the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima) We remember the victims from the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 and pray to God for an end to the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Friday, August 7 We give thanks for the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as a guiding light on the path to justice and reconciliation.
Saturday, August 8 We pray for Indigenous women in Guatemala as Presbyterian World Service & Development works alongside them to improve empowerment and self-esteem.