Biblical Championship Wrestling (Panel 5)
And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. - Genesis 32:28Hopefully some of you will get a little laugh from this. I'm not above using humor to make a larger point
The very name Israel has been paraphrased through translation as "One who contends/strives/wrestles with God", and while obviously applied to Jacob, one of the fathers of the nation of Israel and to his lineage in perpetuity, spiritually all who have come to the Lord in faith understand on multiple levels what it is to wrestle with God. Sometimes we struggle with faith, with trust, with taking Jesus at His word. Often when Satan bludgeons me with accusations (the name Satan meaning "accuser" or "adversary", and could there be a more fitting name?), I'm so prone to believing them that I spend an incredible amount of energy trying to wrestle against God when the Bible tells us that Jesus is our advocate; that if He is out Savior, then he has paid the penalty for our sins. Of course we're not good enough, not pure enough to atone for our sins. We never were. Even knowing this, sometimes it's all too easy to find ourselves in a dark place where we listen to that voice that tells us that we've messed up too much, or too often, and that God has had enough of us. And much of that comes from our own mindset. My dad, in his inimitable style, used to say "If I had treated me the way I've treated God, I would have taken me outside and beaten me to death a long time ago." Our patience is small, especially when we know all the darkest corners of our wicked heart, and by our own understanding, it's impossible to understand how the limitless love of Jesus can extend to someone like us. But we're made in His image. We're literally His creation, life breathed into us from the same who put all the stars in the sky, and he put more care into us than into crafting the galaxies. That not only means that He can love us far beyond our understanding, but it means that when we, as children, become defiant and push back like children do, He is strong enough to wrestle us when needed. He's also restrained enough not to finish us off, but to transform us through the process, as Jacob was transformed spiritually and prepared as one who would raise a nation. We may not birth a nation, but we can let the light of our Savior shine through us in a world that actively rejects Him, in hopes that some through us may come to Jesus. So keep wrestling, till the bell rings. #JesusForJulyJul 18, 2026
Comments
More from this artist
