When God Wrestles

Mike Leake


Those little subheadings in your Bible can be helpful. But they can also keep us from discovering meaning. One of those places is in Genesis 32. Let me explain.

In the first part of this chapter, Jacob is overwhelmed with anxiety at the thought of having to face his brother. If you remember the story, Jacob has always gotten the upper hand on his brother. He was grasping at his heel as they exited the womb, and that pursuit defined his life. Jacob was always chasing something.

In Genesis 25, he sought Esau’s birthright. He capitalized on Esau’s hunger and gained this blessing for a bowl of stew. In Genesis 27, he further messes over his brother by deceiving Isaac. He dressed up like Sasquatch to pretend like he was Esau. Jacob received the blessing. In Genesis 29 he spent 7 years chasing a wife. And then after being tricked, spent another 7 years to get the wife he actually wanted. He chased after property and financial success working for Laban. And it worked. Jacob was filthy rich for his time.

But all of this chasing had a cost. There was a trail of broken relationships behind him. Which meant that Jacob wasn’t only chasing after things, he was also running away. In Genesis 32, you the anxiety pours off the page. He knows that he has wronged Esau, and figures he is about to receive his comeuppance. Don’t read this section as if Jacob has stopped striving. Here he is striving for relational peace. He needs things to be cool with Esau. Jacob is still a chaser.

Maybe you can identify with Jacob—always chasing after the next thing. According to Chuck DeGroat, this is the human condition:

Whether the lie comes from the serpent or a marketer, we are invited to chase: Chase love. Chase soothing. Chase acceptance. Chase achievement. Chase recognition. Chase numbness. Chase certainty. Chase perfection. I even have a little plastic card in my wallet with the words “Chase Freedom”. The reality is, it’s not a one-off addiction that we’re dealing with; it’s a whole way of living. We are immersed in an exhausting chase after those basic needs to feel safe, seen, soothed, and secure. The lie that it’s out there, the fruit on a tree, the bonus in your checking account, the seductive glance of the person sitting across from you in the coffee shop, the adrenaline hit of a well-timed truth bomb on social media. So we’ll keep chasing, keep grasping, keep striving, even if it costs us in body and soul.[1]

Chasing and running is exhausting. No human can maintain it. That’s why we always hit a sort of rock bottom. Our finitude will always show itself. Whether that is from once again plunging headlong into an addiction or being sharp with your children. It always rises to the top. At first glance you might not see Jacob’s anxiety. It probably seems like he’s being a shrewd business person, once again slithering his way out of danger and into prosperity. But it’s all anxious.

He sends a host of gifts ahead of him, yet he also prays. And some commentaries view Jacob’s prayer here as a model prayer. Maybe so—but it’s dripping with worry and the fear of man. His prayer is similar to how we might pray when we become afraid. “Protect me. Keep me and my family safe. Help everything to work out. Give me this perfectly reasonable that I’m chasing after. You said, you’d do me good and this is what I think good looks like”.

It’s the prayer of a chaser.

Then he gets up from his prayer and goes into action. Which again, commentaries tend to praise his action here. He not only prays but he acts in accordance with that prayer. He uses his God-given noggin to make things better for himself and his family. It’s another plan to protect at least half of his assets.

I want to draw your attention to Genesis 32:20,

“…and you shall say, “Moreover, your servant Jacob is behind us.’ For he thought, “I may appease him with the present that goes ahead of me, and after I shall see his face. Perhaps he will accept me.”

You won’t notice it in English but the word “face” appears three times there. It’s a word that is connected to honor and shame. It’s connected to reconciliation. To have someone’s face to shine upon you means to have their favor—to have honor upon you instead of shame. Jacob is chasing his brother’s honor.

Really camp out on that phrase “perhaps he will accept me”. That is what it is all about for Jacob in this moment. This is the focal point of all his anxiety. This is what he is chasing. And it’s the heart of his anxious prayer in verses 9-12. Acceptance equals protection. It is the thing that Esau needs.

“Keep me safe! Move in Esau’s heart to accept me.”

Identify with Jacob here. Remember those prayers that you’ve prayed. “God, keep me safe. Keep my family from harm. Hedge of protection and all that jazz.” Feel your own anxious moments in this prayer of Jacob. And then scratch out that little subheading in your Bible and finish off the story.

Jacob hides his family. And how he’s all by himself. Raw. Vulnerable. Taking a risk. Trusting in God. Hoping for an answer to his prayer. And what happens…

Jesus shows up. Or, maybe Jesus. The angel of the Lord.

But not quite like you’d think. He shows up in wrestling attire. Jacob prays “Keep me safe” and God says, “Okay, let’s wrassle!”

What is this? What kind of God shows up to a vulnerable dude that is filled with anxiety and prays for protection, and then decides to drop an elbow from the top rope. It seems cruel. How is this an answer for prayer? How is this caring for Jacob?

—

God’s action here is profoundly loving to a “chaser”. Let me explain.

Some read these verses about Jacob’s wrestling match with God and come to the conclusion that God must not be all that powerful if he can’t even best a mere human. But that’s silliness. When my children were younger, we’d wrestle as dad’s do with their kiddos. My son seemed to always know we were playing, and he’d “fight” accordingly. My daughter didn’t catch that memo. She gave 110 percent with fingernails.

Yes, I could have broken her little 3-year-old frame in half. I could have easily bested her. But she was so scrappy that I couldn’t actually defeat her without hurting her. And there was no world in which I’d actually harm my daughter. So I’d have to resort to that move where you take your much longer parental arm, place it on her forehead, and let her wildly swing until she wears herself out.

I think God is doing something similar here. He could have wiped Jacob out in a moment. But he wasn’t trying to best him in that way. He was speaking to the heart of the chaser. He was letting him exhaust himself. And then when he touched his hip, striking him with a painful blow and communicating to Jacob that he wasn’t going to win, the chaser finally gave out.

He collapsed, but he also kept holding on. “I won’t let you go until you bless me”. You see what has happened here is that Jacob’s chase has now shifted. He realizes that he isn’t wrestling with a mere man, but God Himself. And so his prayer changes. He’s no longer praying about protection from Esau. That has taken a back seat to this quest.

His prayer becomes like that Syrophoenician woman who wouldn’t let Jesus go without blessing her, even if it meant table scraps. It’s the desperate pulling at the garment of Jesus from the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. Or the piercing cries of Bartimaeus, who just wouldn’t shut up until Jesus came and gave him healing.

Jacob is given a new name. Rather than “heel-grabber” or “supplanter” he’s now given the name “God-striver”. The chase has shifted. Oddly enough, as the narrative continues, he’ll sometimes be called Jacob and sometimes Israel. Shows the dual nature of the man. He doesn’t exactly give up “the chase”. Transformation is muddy. But now he’s asking new questions and has a new bent to his life. He’s Israel too.

And remember all that talk about Esau’s “face” in Genesis 22:20? Well, the name of the place is called Peniel, “because I have seen God face to face”. A new face now comes into view. He had been praying to “save face” with Esau. To meet with his brother face to face. That was his prayer. That was his chase, and he just wanted God to give him a bit of divine help in this quest.

That’s why God wrestled Jacob instead of nurtured him. And it’s why He answered Jacob’s prayer in a way different than he was expecting. He did get reconciled to Esau. That prayer was in fact answered. But you get the idea that it was answered in a different way—a less anxious way, a less desperate way.

God, I believe, is saying something similar to us today. In all of our broken, addictive, empty, struggling, striving, plotting, and anxious moments, God is asking us, “what exactly are you chasing?” What are you chasing today? Slow down long enough to ask that question, for a moment.

God doesn’t just ask these tough questions to wrestle with. He actively wrestles with us. He’ll hold us at arms-length (still graciously hanging onto us) and letting us swing ourselves dry. And then in those moments, when we’re but a heap of tears and helplessness, He makes himself “grabbable”. He makes Himself able to be held onto and able to hear us cry out for His blessing.

Rather than meeting us with disapproval and further shaming us for our foolish chases, I can almost picture Him laughing—much as I would when wrestling with my kids—and saying, “I thought you’d never ask!”

[1] Chuck DeGroat, Healing What’s Within, 163

Reclaiming Loss—How the Pull of the Past Explains The Rightward Turn of Young Voters

Mike Leake

photo-1473448912268-2022ce9509d8Apart from Reagan in ’84 and Bush in ’88, voters in the 18-29 demographic have decidedly gone Democratic. Even as early as April of this year (2024) polls showed that 66% of those who were 18-29 were leaning Democratic.[1] But the actual election showed something quite different, especially amongst young men. In 2020 41% of men 18-29 voted red, that number climbed to 56% in 2024.

Anecdotally, this is not shocking to me. I’ve been seeing this shift for a couple years now. Journalists seem to be baffled, wondering how this happened. Why are young men moving to the right? And some of them to the far-right?

I recently heard an explanation from Richard Mouw. Mouw gives a brief history of evangelicalism—persuasively arguing that in the 19th century the white evangelical owned the “table” of public discourse. But that shifted through the years and evangelicals were increasingly pushed away from the table. Now he believes, “evangelicals grieve the loss of a table that they are convinced they once ‘owned.’”[2] While I find Mouw’s argument persuasive for those 60+ embracing far-right ideology, I do not think it explains those who are 18-29. They have never had a seat at the table. To understand this demographic, we need a different story.

—

“Can I go to grandma’s house!?!?!?”

My parents probably heard that statement thousands of times. I loved going to my grandparent’s farm. It was 17-acres of adventure. Much of my time was spent on one of several makeshift baseball fields—pretending to be Ken Griffey Jr. or Bo Jackson, hitting homers against the gracious pitches from my uncle. On occasion, though, we’d explore the woods around their house.

When you take the boring rows of soybeans out of the equation, they had about 8-10 acres of woods to explore. Well, 8-10 acres that they still owned. In some directions it was only a short walk before you were on government property. On their land there was still a big rock with mysterious openings that invited my imagination to assume a hidden world underneath. That was my favorite place to play. Those little caverns made a great place to stash my toy guns and hide them from the quickly approaching Germans of Hitler’s army. I was continuing the legacy of fighting the Nazi’s which my grandpa had battled on D-Day in World War II.

There was also the pond where I caught my first fish. We called it the government pond. You could always hear a tinge of sadness mixed with anger when they had to call it that. Prior to the late 70’s that wasn’t the government pond. It was grandpa’s pond. Along with another 100 acres or so. But the government took the land. Okay, took might be a minor overstatement. They did pay him a paltry amount for his property and kindly left him 26 acres to farm—though that 26 was soon dropped to 17, when they decided they needed a bit more for their project.

If you’ve heard of the Mark Twain Lake in Northeast, Missouri that was the culprit. My grandfather’s land, by the way the crow flies, was only a few miles from the Cannon Dam. Once they put in the dam, it would stop up Lick Creek and create this massive lack for tourist from all around to come and enjoy themselves. But it took my grandfather’s land. And they paid him pennies for what it was actually worth.

Growing up I heard stories of shelf rocks and fields of sink holes. I heard about beautiful creeks, driving vehicles in the bottoms, leading horses through beautiful pastures, big hills to sled down, verdant land to explore and enjoy. To me they were only stories. Stories of a land that I would never be able to see or enjoy. (Technically, I saw some of it. I went for a last walk around the property when I was only a baby in my mother and father’s arms).

I often heard the story of how the land was taken, sorrow swelling and dreams drowned by a lake that everyone else enjoys. They, to use the language of Mouw, had the bitter disappointment of watching as others enjoyed a “table” they once owned. And there were moments of anger too. Signs that said “you can’t hunt here anymore”. Fees for trapping on a creek you once owned. And water covering places where you had a first kiss, or remembered your dad packing you on his shoulders, or the place you were bucked off that horse. Whole childhoods were submerged by that damned lake.

My experience was different though. I was able to enjoy the 17 acres. I didn’t have the same heat of passion when I crossed over that imaginary border of grandpa’s land and onto the government property. It didn’t hurt quite the same. But I still carried around with me a deep resentment towards those who took my grandpa’s land. Beauty which I was never able to see was engulfed in that water. I suppose that holds a different kind of weight, a different disappointment, but anger still.

I felt the disappointment the most when my family would gather around and tell stories of what had been. I was frustrated that I’d never get to play in the shelf rock, where my dad likely still had toys hidden. I wanted to see the footprints of their childhood with my own eyes. It always felt like a part of me had died too. But more than anything I felt sadness for them. I’d have given anything if I could somehow heroically drain all the water and give them that land back. Sadness, I was certain, would turn to delight. I would, to use a tired phrase, have made grandpa’s place great again.

I can only imagine the fervor I’d have felt, and the loyalty I’d have promised, if there were a wealthy man who promised me that he could do just that. As an 18-year-old, trying to discover who I was, I’m pretty confident I’d have sacrificed quite a bit if that man promised we could get all of the farm back. All my anger, discontentment, and disillusionment would converge on the man who could solve it all.

—

That might be closer to understanding the 18-29 demographic. They’ve only heard stories of a land they once owned. And when you match that with disillusionment (massive unemployment rates in some areas) and ideologies shoved upon you, you get the anger that we see among these young men.

Part of my own anger was the injustice of it all. If my grandpa would have received a fat check, and they’d have been well above the poverty line, able to thrive on that 17-acres we might not have felt the sting as bad. These young men feel similarly, hearing of others thrive and flourish on land that’s supposed to be yours. (It’s why some of the immigration rhetoric is so effective—whether true or not, doesn’t matter).

I think many of these young men feel as if a world which they never were able to see has been taken from them. And they are forced into a world they don’t want to be in. A world in which they are told by their very existence they are offensive. A world in which they aren’t able to voice thoughts—even thoughts they’ll later deem foolish—without great repercussions. Their “17-acres” feels smothering. And the anger only swells. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to play on that land?

As I’m writing this, I’m also having memories of growing up hating boaters. My family never told me to do this. They’d have been appalled to even think it. They taught me to love and honor all people. But I also knew that those boats didn’t belong on my grandpa’s land. I was never told to cringe when I heard a boat speeding down the lake, or parked in a cove—drinking and partying and making a mess of what used to be our land. But cringe I did. I never had a conversation with one of these people (notice my language, there), but that didn’t keep me from being angry with them. I can only imagine how deep-seated that anger would be and how potentially violent it could have been if my family had been stoking those flames and taught me to hate the “other”.

I think putting all of this together at least explains in part why we are seeing a movement towards far-right ideology amongst 18–29-year-olds. I think its why we saw so many voting for Trump. (And the two aren’t synonymous, to be clear). Trump is very skilled in knowing how to tap into these fears and hurts and points of anger and disillusionment. He positioned himself as the man to give you your dream back.

When you have someone who is disenchanted with what is, that is invited into a noble cause of taking back something which they view as rightly theirs, and when dehumanizing has taken root, all it takes is a passionate invitation to help in a restoration project and they’ll buy in.

—

As much as I can identify with this demographic, I’m also deeply concerned from a gospel perspective. I don’t say that in a “I’m biblical and you’re an idiot” type of way. I say that with a heart filled with sorrow watching as someone seems to be inevitably drinking poison that they think will save their life.

My biggest concern with all of this is that it all centers us away from the gospel. I understand when secular people might respond as they do. I’m baffled when Christians do. As much as losing grandpa’s land hurts, I know that it was never really “ours” anyways. None of it belongs to us. We cannot cling to things of this earth. And when we do, we lose sight of what really matters. We start fighting for fallen kingdoms and lose sight of the kingdom that is unshakeable.

It also moves us off of mission. It creates enemies out of those made in the image of God. It distorts the way we view the world. Take that little boy who hated boaters—even though I didn’t know them—and take it to its extreme end. It’s dangerous to think of what might come. And how far away one can get from the ethics of Jesus whilst thinking you are involved in some noble cause. And that’s my deep concern.

This is why I get so frustrated with political stuff. It’s practically impossible to have conversations because so many are no longer thinking through the lens of the gospel. I know that when I speak of the dangers of Trumpism and how I’m concerned it’s going to swallow up a whole generation of young men, and I can hear as a rebuttal, “What, would you rather them vote for Kamala and not know the difference between a cat and a child?”

But I’m not even talking about that stuff. I’m talking about the gospel. I’m not talking about getting back grandpa’s land anymore. It is what it is. Even if all the water receded, the dam shut down, and the government gave the land back, it’d never be the same. It can’t be. Those dreams wouldn’t emerge out of the deluge happy and smiling. They’d be water-soaked, pruny, and wildly disappointing. You can’t make the past your present no matter how much you try.

If you’ve lost a seat at a table your grandfather once owned, I suppose you can fight for it, but you need to know that once you wrest control again the table won’t be the same and your blood-stained hands won’t be able to appreciate it anymore anyways. Because it won’t just be a table anymore, it’ll be a wish-dream. And wish-dreams aren’t reality. And in order to sit at a phantom table you’ll have to become someone you aren’t meant to be.

It’s better to realize that you were made for far more than seats and tables. Even the beauty of shelf-rocks and sink holes are not worth comparing for the beauty which awaits us. And when we’re captivated by that and overwhelmed by the love of Christ it changes our posture towards others. We start to view those “boaters” with a different lens too. Yeah, he’s enjoying the table that once belonged to you—but you now realize that it’s really an empty table. And all his longings will not be fulfilled by a wild-weekend on the lake. He too needs the rest which only Christ gives.

And suddenly, I want to tell him—who was once my imaginary enemy–about this world to come. And I want to tell him about the Christ who lived and died and loves us and give us far more than we deserve. The gospel does more than restore land and dreams that once were. The good news of Christ is about something entirely different and entirely better.

What happens with our gospel is my chief concern. Trying to restore a land that is fading and fallen is a noble cause, but it isn’t the one we’ve been called to give our life to. In our quest to do that lesser calling we’ll miss out on the story that is unfading, if we don’t engage it with hearts and hands soaked in the love of the greater story.

I’m seeing scores of young men falling for this false hope and some even taking the name of Christ upon themselves as they do it. Bonhoeffer called it cheap grace. It’s cheap because it doesn’t hold a candle to the real thing. And my prayer is that the church will realize this growing movement and rather than celebrate how they’ve helped a political party rise, we’ll see the whole thing as the missional opportunity it is.

Jesus answers the hurt of loss.

[1] https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/04/09/age-generational-cohorts-and-party-identification/

[2] https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2024/02/92553/

On Cognitive Decline

Mike Leake

cognitive_decline
The year was 1806. John Newton, the author of Amazing Grace, was 81 (almost 82). He vowed that as long as the old African blasphemer had breath in his lungs he’d ascend to the pulpit and proclaim the Jesus who saved him.

But there was one problem. Newton could barely string together coherent sentences at this point. Always an extemporaneous preacher, Newton would begin one point and then launch into an entirely unrelated point. His eyes were so dimmed that he couldn’t even read the scant notes he brought into the pulpit.

He was no longer helping his congregation.

When he was in his mid-30’s Newton had been struck by this quote from Cotton Mather: “My usefulness was the last idol I was willing to give up; But now I thank the Lord, I can part with that also, and am content to be anything or nothing, so that His wise and holy will may be done!”

In his 70’s Newton wrote to a young John Ryland, Jr. about this “trial” of old age. He believed that stepping away from “usefulness” required even more grace than being active in ministry. Newton couldn’t bring himself to step down from the pulpit, though. A group of men in his church had to lovingly force him out of the pulpit. Newton would die a little over a year later.

Cognitive decline isn’t something to mock, it’s something to mourn. And it’s something for us to reflect upon for ourselves. I’ve watched as that first realization of cognitive decline falls upon a person. It is scary to them, and to those who love them. And they want to hang onto usefulness to the very end—you likely will too.

Yet there is also a path to loving a person in this position. There is a time when we must pull them away from their “pulpit”. For the sake of others, and for their own sake. That idol of usefulness must also be slain.

“You and I were never meant to repent for not being everywhere for everybody and all at once. You and I are meant to repent because we’ve tried to be.” -Zack Eswine

I suppose we could use this moment of the cognitive decline of an American president for political expediency. We can mock and meme, or we could press into the humanity of the situation. First and foremost, Joe Biden is a person made in the image of God. He’s likely battling fear, pride, and a swirl of other emotions. My prayer is that he will find his rest in Christ. And that those on the right and left will restrain from dehumanizing him–either by propping him up because of their own political calculations or by mocking him in the hopes it will help their opposing party.

Eisegesis, Exegesis, and Wonder

Mike Leake

At-Home Support for a Limping Dog - Ortho Dog
A dog, limping and whimpering, hobbles over to a preacher. He’s seen this before and knows that the poor pup has been hit by a car. Having a well-oiled imagination, this preacher is quick to concoct an enchanting origin story for his new pet, Lucky.

He’s hosting the prayer meeting for local pastors this week, he’ll joyfully bring his new pup and tell everyone about how he rescued it after it was clipped by that speeding teenager. It might even give him an opportunity to wax eloquent about the need for a speed trap in that area.

When the morning of the prayer breakfast comes our pastor begins to weave his tale. His excitement soon turns to horror as the Reformed pastor informs him, and the rest of the crowd, that this dog hasn’t been hit by a car. It has a thorn in its foot.

Our Reformed pastor had taken a closer look. All of the context clues surrounding that dog told him that it hadn’t been clipped by a car. “Lucky” seemed to be favoring his paw—not what you might expect if he’d been drilled by a fender. Rather than simply pulling a story out of thin air, he was able to rightly diagnose the issue and help the dog.

Eisegesis and Exegesis

This is the difference between eisegesis and exegesis. Those are fancy words for saying that the first pastor imposed a story onto the “text” (eisegesis) and the other pastor started with the “text” itself (exegesis) and was able to discern an accurate meaning. By doing this he was able to help the dog and guard everyone else from the silly story concocted by the rambling preacher.

Thankfully, we’re training our pastors these days to focus upon exegesis and leave eisegesis dying on the side of the road where that first preacher should have left his imagination. “It doesn’t matter what you think about the text”, we say. “It only matters what the text meant to the original author.”

We exegetical preachers can be disheartened when seeing sanctuaries swarming with people to hear the story-teller. They lack substance, often leaving people entertained instead of helped. But we have to confess, a narrative like “Lucky the dog who miraculously limped his way to a benevolent pastor after being struck by a speeding teen” will invariably attract a larger crowd than a straightforward account of “Lucky the dog who stepped on a thorn.”

We console ourselves by remembering our calling. We aren’t supposed to attract a crowd. We’re just supposed to be truth-tellers. And because of this commitment we become highly skilled in magnifying glass usage. We’re able to spot thorns and thistles and save all the puppies of the world from the fluff of eisegetical preaching.

The Need for a Third Preacher

The only problem is that after years of this focus you begin to lose sight of the dog itself. You can go back to that prayer breakfast and listen in to how the story shifted off Lucky and onto the danger of thorns. Soon, everybody is telling their own thorny tales, save for the embarrassed preacher who is silently licking his wounds.

Nobody has noticed that Lucky, no longer having the thorn in his paw nor being the topic of conversation, has now wandered off. The first preacher not only lost his story but also his pet. And even our exegetical preacher seems to have lost the plot. He’s left holding only the thorn he picked out—and somehow missed that there was ever a dog there.

We might change a word here or there to get it to fit our theme, but I think all of this is why Os Guinness speaks of appealing to “thinkers” instead of “intellectuals”:

Too many so-called intellectuals think solely within their own minds. They leave their conscience out of the discussion, and they have lost all sense of wonder. They are one-tool thinkers who have blindly devoted themselves to what can be discovered by reason, and by reason alone. As a result, they’ve become as shortsighted as mole. (Guinness, The Great Quest, 35-36)

Guinness is telling us that we need a third pastor at that prayer breakfast. This is a pastor who also noticed the thorn but after pulling it out he keeps his focus upon the dog. His sense of wonder is not satiated simply because he has now solved the riddle of the dog’s pain. He wants to know how that dog came to get a thorn in it’s paw. He’s still intrigued by the dog and the story it has to tell.

That third preacher, still firmly in the school of exegesis, adds to the equation a dedication to wonder. He realizes that the point of exegesis isn’t about thorns, or even making sure preachers don’t spin yarn, but his purpose is to grab that dog by the scruff of its neck and joyfully play with it. Lucky enjoys stirring up joy and dogs stick around for these things.