Effort is Needed!
Discipleship Questions
for Sunday
October 21, 2007
Scripture Readings:
First Reading:
Genesis 32:3-8,22-30
Psalm: 121
Second Reading:
2Timothy 3:14-4:5
Gospel: Luke 18:1-8
Gen. 32:3
Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau
in the land of Seir, the country of Edom.
4
He instructed them: “This is what you are to say to my master Esau: ‘Your
servant Jacob says, I have been staying with Laban and have remained there till
now. 5 I have cattle and donkeys, sheep
and goats, menservants and maidservants. Now I am sending this message to my
lord, that I may find favor in your eyes.’” 6
When
the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, “We went to your brother Esau, and
now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.” 7 In great fear and
distress Jacob divided the people who were with him into two groups, and the
flocks and herds and camels as well. 8 He thought, “If Esau comes and
attacks one group, the group that is left may escape.” 22 That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two
maidservants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. 23 After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all
his possessions. 24 So Jacob was left alone, and a
man wrestled with him till daybreak. 25 When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he
touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled
with the man. 26 Then the man said, “Let me go,
for it is daybreak.”
But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you
bless me.” 2
The man asked him, “What is your
name?”
“Jacob,” he answered.
28 Then the man said, “Your name will no
longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men
and have overcome.” 29
Jacob said, “Please tell me your
name.”
But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he
blessed him there. 30 So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I
saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”
Psa. 121:0
A song of ascents.
I lift up my eyes to the hills— where does my help
come from? 2 My help comes from the LORD, the
Maker of heaven and earth. 3 He will not let your foot slip—
he who watches over you will not slumber; 4 indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither
slumber nor sleep. 5 The LORD watches over you— the
LORD is your shade at your right hand; 6 the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by
night. 7 The LORD will keep you from all
harm— he will watch over your life; 8 the LORD will watch over your coming and going both
now and forevermore.
2Tim. 3:14
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have
become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it, 15 and how from infancy you
have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation
through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is God-breathed
and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God
may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 1
In the
presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead,
and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: 2 Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season;
correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. 3 For the time will come when men will not put up with sound
doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a
great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 4 They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn
aside to myths. 5 But you, keep your head in all
situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge
all the duties of your ministry.
Luke 18:1
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them
that they should always pray and not give up.
2
He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared
about men. 3 And there was a widow in that
town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me
justice against my adversary.’ 4 “For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself,
‘Even though I don’t fear God or care about men, 5 yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that
she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually wear me out with her
coming!’” 6
And
the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7 And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones,
who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and
quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
We’re
told that it had been ordained that:
“Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples born of you will be
divided; the one will be stronger than the other, the elder will serve the younger.
Gen 25:23.
The brothers would struggle with each other,
but the outcome was foreordained. The elder would serve the younger. Esau would serve Jacob. Now if it’s already ordained why isn’t Jacob
simply waiting for it all to turn in his favor instead of “helping the process.”
Does Jacob sound like any of us here? That sounds a heck of a lot like me – how
about you? Have you ever tried to “help
the process along?”
Jacob bought the birthright (25:27-34) from Esau, who was willing to sell it for a
pittance. The birthright is the right of the firstborn to inherit the family
estate. Then Jacob deceived his father, Isaac, into giving him the blessing
that was intended for Esau (27). The irony of the cycle is that Jacob did
not know he had been foreordained to prevail. He schemed to get what God had
already granted him at birth.
And so there was great enmity between these two brothers. Jacob was desperately aware that he had done his brother Esau wrong and he knew that Esau had every right to come after him for vengeance and so he turned in the darkness of his night to God and wrestled with Him for His blessing. So desperate was he to know that all would be well that He took God on and wrestled a blessing out of Him! For truly God did bless him. God gave Jacob a new name!
Listen again to Genesis 32:27-28:
Gen. 32:27
The man asked him, “What is your name?”
“Jacob,” he answered.
Gen. 32:28
Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but
Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome.”
Ah what a name that was: Israel, which means “the one who prevails with
God!”
Have you ever “prevailed with God?”
The Hebrew word being used here is the verb
“Sarah” - h∂r and it means to persist,
to exert oneself, to persevere — to exert great effort.
Have you ever
contended with God? Have you ever been
persistent with God?
Now it’s
important here that we not get the sense that we can badger God into giving us
His blessing. The key here is the fact
that Jacob wanted God’s blessing and God had always wanted to give it to
Him! It’s about wanting what God wants
for us!
Jacob wasn’t
asking for a new posche or a new washing machine or a new Rolex watch . . . but
rather “a blessing!”
The Hebrew word for
blessing is “Barak” and it literally means: to kneel or to bless!
Ah for Jacob to
receive the blessing he had to kneel to receive the blessing!
Can you see that
for Jacob to receive the blessing he had to submit to God – to bow his head in
submission and in so doing to receive the very thing that he had been wrestling
God for.
Think about this
for a moment. It was foreordained by God
that Jacob was to receive his father’s inheritance. You see God had always planned it this way
but Jacob kept jumping ahead of God so God literally had to wrestle with Jacob
always intending for Jacob to win but to win wanting what God wanted to give
him rather than wanting to get what he wanted to get regardless of God!
Ah!
Now we’re getting to the heart of our reflection this morning and it’s
this – God will wrestle with us until we bow our heads and receive what He has been wanting to give us from the beginning!
SO WHY THE WRESTLING?
Because we think we know what we want but
God knows better so He wrestles with us until we bow the head and knees and
receive what He has wanted to give to us from the beginning!
C.S. Lewis put it this way in his book
entitled “Weight of Glory:”
“. . . Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too
weak. We are half-hearted creatures,
fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us,
like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he
cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased!”
Did you hear that – “We are far too easily
pleased!” and so God wrestles with us and refines our desires. God is not wrestling with us to hurt us or
frustrate us but rather to bless us but the blessing which He has always meant
to give us comes only when we bend the knee, bow the head and receive what He
wants to give us and it’s always much much much much better than anything we
thought we wanted!
Yes, effort counts because it fuels the
refining process and brings us ultimately to a place where we can receive God’s
blessings!