If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

11 January. Genesis chapters 32 to 34

Jacob’s night-time wrestling match with a man who he believes to be an appearance of God is a curious story.  Although angels often appear in human form (yes, today as well as in Bible times), they normally have no physical contact with people, and are to be distinguished from an actual bodily incarnation of God himself. This is probably the closest we see to that in the whole of the Old Testament, as it was only with Jesus that anyone could “see God and live” – Jacob’s encounter took place in the utter darkness of a wilderness night when the Lord’s face could not be seen.

The incident is a turning point in his life, not only for the unique encounter with God, but for the limp with which it left him (my wife currently has a problem with her hip, so I can see how painful and limiting it would have been), God’s blessing with a new name (Israel, by which name God’s people would henceforth be known) and in the way that it preceded the reconciliation with his brother. There is a spiritual truth here that before we can fulfil God’s purposes for us, we have to recognise ways in which we have been struggling against God (“kicking against the goads” as St Paul puts it), and accept both his blessing and the limitations that living out our calling may have on our human freedom.