What is Your Name? Genesis 32:24-32

In the text before us, we have a story that might be familiar to most of you and so like many of these stories from Genesis we must be careful not to allow familiarity to dull our desire to hear God and his word or to assume that we have learned all we can know from a passage. We have before us a story that is amazing and mysterious. Jacob had prayed to God. He admitted that he is not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that God had shown him. He recognized that it was God who prospered him in Mesopotamia. He has cried out to God to deliver him from the hand of his brother. He has recalled the promises which God had made to Abraham, Isaac, and him. God had been faithful to Jacob and the promises for the past 20 years. And we will see that God is not done yet. Jacob is about to go through a very dramatic and life-changing evening. He starts the night in great fear and distress. He will wrestle and be crippled. He will cling and be changed. He will testify and in the end, will walk away limping. This night will forever leave an imprint on Jacob’s spiritual life.