Bible Text: Matthew 14: 13-21, Genesis 32: 22-31 | Preacher: Rev. Berlin Guerrero | Series: 2020 | It all right that each of us is marked by a certain ailment, pain, dislocation, emotional and physical scar because of our struggle with God. Christ bore those marks as well. Like Jacob, we are limping. And we can be joyful about it because those scars and limps are a sign of God’s blessing.

Jacob wrestles with God

 

The Genesis 32:22-31 text tells something about struggles within and outside our selves. “Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak” (verse 24). Was it a dream, similar to the “Jacob’s ladder’ dream found in Gen 28:10-22? Was it a symbol for his fear of his brother (Esau)? Was it an angel or God? The text does not identify the “man.” He does not give his answer when Jacob asked. What we can say perhaps is that he was representing God.

 

The encounter with this man left Jacob wounded. The man did not prevail over Jacob, so he struck him on the hip socket. Jacob’s hip was dislocated (Genesis 30:25). We do not know if the injury was permanent, but the text notes he was limping as he left the place (verse 31). There was a visible physical manifestation of that struggle that Jacob carried away from that place which he called ‘Peniel’.

 

We also learn Jacob did not give up the fight, the “man” did. Jacob was tenacious and at daybreak, he “won” the match by refusing to let go.

 

Life is like that. There are things we struggle within us. Most of the time we hide it. And these conflicts occur in our dreams, sometimes in symbols, sometimes like reality. We don’t tell anybody about these except perhaps when we need to let it out.

 

Conflicts in our lives leave us with an indelible mark. For Jacob, it was a dislocated hip. Physical conflicts leave us with scars. Conflicts and struggles can also leave us with mental and emotional scars.

 

But what we get from these conflicts and struggles are important lessons in life. When we emerge as winners and even as losers, we can say we benefit a lot because they bring changes in us, in our view of life. We become better persons because of self-recognised imperfections.

 

One more thing: Jacob refused to let go unless he was blessed. The man answered, “You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, because you have striven (or struggled) with God and humans and have prevailed.”  Think about that for a minute. We think of the name “Israel” as a noun, a name, but it is more of a verb, an action. It is not only about Jacob, but all of us. Life is about a constant struggle towards a right relationship with God even as God continue to reveal the Godself to us.

 

One thing strange, but interesting, in the sports of wrestling is that while you struggle with each other, you remain in a constant body lock not allowing each other lo be let go. Wrestling with God is grabbing of to God, even when we angry with God, in doubt and exhausted, or in pain in the relationship. We must fight for our unique relationship with God.

 

 

The feeding of the five thousand

 

Jesus feeding of the five thousand men, women, and children is a widely loved and studied miracle account. Some scholars focus on the blessing of the loaves and bread and suggest that this miracle is perhaps the precursor of the communion meal. Others focus on the satiated crowd or the symbolism of the twelve basketfuls of leftovers. While all of these observations are notable, the simple detail that Jesus did not send the people away to find food for themselves is very remarkable.

 

Instead of commanding them to leave, Jesus, instructs the crowd to stay and sit down on the grass. He the gives thanks to God for the loaves of bread and fish made available by another provider. He broke the bread in smaller pieces and have them to his disciples who in turn, gave to the crowd; and also with the fish. Something happened.

 

In the Philippines, I have seen how five thousand people or more have been fed not just a meal but three meals each day for more than seven days. As a student activist, our school organization was invited to join a people’s march that would start in our province and would proceed to Manila. It would be a 30 + kilometre walk through several towns leading to the more populated city centres in Manila, the national capital. A people’s march is basically a protest march which carried issues such as human rights violations and militarization, protest against frozen wages and high prices of basic commodities and public services, and carried the call for a just peace, genuine land reform and national industrialization. Participants come mainly from peasants, rural and urban poor, workers, youth and students, church people and other sectors of society.

 

As a first timer, I wondered how the people would be sustained. Where would they eat, rest, sleep, bath and the do the daily necessities? How will they be fed?  Where will the provisions come from? Who will cook and where is the kitchen?

 

All my questions were answered only because I took part personally in the march. It was the people’s organizations in the communities, churches, and ordinary people who provided the basics of food and shelter, sometimes clothing as well. For me it was a miracle. The collective efforts of the people, done in many ways, sustained the whole march until it reached the department offices for labour and agrarian reforms, the Houses of Parliament and the gates of the Presidential Palace.

 

In my reflection, I felt that God was with the people in their plight and in their aspiration for genuine justice and peace.

 

A wonderful thing happens in God’s presence. Jesus was God’s presence who had compassion for the people. The people were sustained as they begin to experience what the kingdom of God is about. It is about a shared meal and a shared meal can mean a lot of things.

 

As we share in the Lord’s table today, let us remember the feeding of the multitudes manifesting Jesus’ compassion and God’s provision and grace. Let us live out Christ’s compassion that enables us to make miracles in our lives especially that is able to feed and free people from what oppresses and enslaved them.

 

Let this meal inspire us to work for a world where no one gets hungry because of marginalization and deprivation by unjust social and economic structures. As we break bread, and drink the cup, we remember the Lord’s body broken so that each of us and the whole world can be made whole again.

 

It all right that each of us is marked by a certain ailment, pain, dislocation, emotional and physical scar because of our struggle with God. Christ bore those marks as well. Like Jacob, we are limping. And we can be joyful about it because those scars and limps are a sign of God’s blessing.