Genesis 31-33
Inevitably our sins always come back to us. We can never truly escape them. No matter how far away we go from them in time, emotion or even actual geography there will always come a time when we have to face the truth. Time can be an amazing healer. It can provide enough distance that our perspective changes, allowing us to see the truth more clearly and possibly even come to accept the truth for what it is, but in the end that truth must still be faced. In the end, there really is no place for us to hide from our sins----except beneath the shelter of grace that God provides.Jacob deceived his brother, cheating him out of his birth-right. After running away to hide for 14 years away from his brother's wrath, he now realizes that he must face his brother in order to truly be at peace within himself. On the eve before this long awaited meeting, Jacob worries himself to sleep and ends up in a dream that turns to be much more than the usual dream. In this dream Jacob faces the truth of the very sin he used to deceive his brother. In a wrestling match with an angelic figure, Jacob essentially wrestles with God over the guilt and shame he feels of having deceived his brother. Jacob's sin was to lie about his identity. Jacob disguised himself as his brother in order to steal Esau's birth-right from their dying father. Jacob's sin was to say to his father, "I am Esau." Now, that sin has returned to him. In his wrestling match with God, Jacob begs for God's blessing. Just as he had wanted his father's blessing, he now begs for God's blessing. Only this time, Jacob must tell the truth. The angelic figure asks him, "What is your name?" The very question confronts Jacob with the truth about his sinful act, which has separated him from his brother and family for 14 years. This time, though, its not his father's patriarchal blessing, its God's blessing. God will not be deceived. Instead God uses the wrestling match with Jacob to bring Jacob to declare his true identity. Jacob answers, "I am Jacob." With this confession, Jacob's sin is forgiven, the wrestling with God ceases, and Jacob is blessed by God and claimed with a new name. He will be called Israel. His new name literally means "one who wrestles with God". As followers of Christ we are inheritors of a legacy in which wrestling with God is embedded within our very name. We are the ones who wrestle with God. We all have sins of our past, sins that have placed us on certain paths of life, sins which we've tried to hide from, sins that altar our very identity. Do you trust God enough that you could allow yourself to be completely vulnerable and exposed before Him? Have you ever really wrestled with God about who you are, and why you exist? If not, maybe its time to try. God is the only one who can take all the pain, all the shame, all the wounds from our past sins and point us toward a new articulation of what difference all that makes to our identity today. God is the only one who can help us make sense of our past, and at the same time present to us a perspective of how all of it fits into His extraordinary plan for the future. God is the only one who can take your past, and show you how all of it--even the sinful stuff--as the means with which God has re-created you and given you a purpose for today. God takes all of our actions, and gives it meaning and purpose. But, to see God's purpose for your life requires a bit of wrestling with God. Ask yourself---and then ask God, "Who am I?" What you'll hear, no matter how great or small are your sins of the past, is God respond, "You are my beloved in whom I am well pleased."
Lord God, thank you for helping me make sense of the sins of my past. Thank you for helping me reconcile with you and with others. Thank you for loving me and claiming me no matter what I've done in the past. Strengthen me today to trust you with my deepest, most difficult pain. Give me the grace necessary to wrestle with you when things make no sense, and encourage me trust in your sovereign ability to take all of my life and re-make it this day for your purposes. In Jesus' name. Amen.
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