The ESV adds this heading to Genesis 32:22-32, "Jacob Wrestles with God". I've always found this passage difficult to deal with exegetically. What is going on here? What is it really about? Is Jacob really wrestling with God? How can he prevail over God? I feel like every time I wrestle with the passage, it always prevails over me!
As we considered this text again last week at church I thought about how amazing it seems that God let Jacob wrestle with him, and even let him prevail. It feels like something that should be blasphemous in other conceptions of God. And I thought about the language we sometimes use of "wrestling with God in prayer" (Paul comes close to this in Romans 15:30 and Colossians 4:12; the NIV actually translates the latter using "wrestling in prayer"). And many Psalms show us this, as we see the psalmist striving and arguing with God, struggling over his difficult circumstances and asking the LORD, "Why?", wrestling against doubt and with God to grasp at hope.
Perhaps Jacob's wrestle is an invitation to all of us, that God lets us wrestle with him for answers, when faced with many challenges in life. In the astounding and condescending love of God, he welcomes us to wrestle with him, even all night if we need to.
