Seventh Pentecost

Proper 11 Year A
Genesis 28: 10-19a
July 19, 2020

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer. Amen. 

Last week, Bunker and I took a drive up to Wilton, NY – just north of Saratoga Springs – to take a guided tour of the Ulysses S. Grant Historic Cottage. Our interest in Ulysses Grant’s life was peaked by the History Channel’s 3-part documentary series. In fact, now both Bunker and Patrick have read Ron Chernow’s extensive book on Grant’s life, and are even diving into his personal memoirs – which were completed just prior to his death at the Cottage we visited in New York. His life as a 4-star General and 2-term President of the United States is certainly full of valor and notable accomplishments, but his life is also fascinating because it included countless failures as a businessman, struggles as financier, and problems as a judge of other people’s character. 

The same was true for Jacob, the focus of our first reading – from Genesis – this morning.  Jacob, like Abraham and Isaac, is a patriarch of the Hebrew people, and yet his life, perhaps more than any other person in Genesis, was filled with struggle and conflict. Even before he was born, and certainly after, there was struggle between himself and his twin brother, Esau. There was struggle between himself and his uncle Laban. Between his wives, Rachael and Leah. And even between his children, Joseph and his brothers. And yet, as our reading describes today, on a night when Jacob stops running and needs to sleep, he has a dream of a stairway – a ladder - which bridges the gap from heaven to earth, with angels ascending and descending on it. When he wakes, Jacob realizes that in spite of his many struggles and conflicts, the God of his forefathers and foremothers is with him.

Later in Genesis, Jacob will even wrestle an unnamed stranger, thought to be God himself, who then blesses him and changes his name from Jacob to Israel. It’s an important distinction that up until that point in his life, Jacob will only speak to his father about “your God.” (Genesis 27:20) But after recognizing God’s presence in his life, even in the struggle and in spite of his deceit, Jacob names God as “my God.” (Genesis 28:21). 

These spiritual encounters prepare Jacob for leadership of the Hebrew people, but they are also overlaid with his lifetime of wrestling with conflict – both within himself and outside of himself – so that ALL of it together shapes him to continue his journey of leadership and life.  

I don’t know why it is, exactly, that I am so drawn to the struggle and strain of both of these leaders – Ulysses Grant and Jacob – perhaps it’s because life, right now, life itself in this pandemic, is such a struggle. Or perhaps, it’s simply because I, myself have wrestled with what it feels like to live with perhaps more than my fair share of adversities and vulnerabilities.

This all reminds me, metaphorically of course, of the time I underwent a “stress test” for my heart. The techs set me up with electrodes and a blood pressure cuff, put me on a treadmill, increased the speed and the incline, all until a point when I could go no further. I asked the doctor there if this test was meant to see how far or how fast I could go? Of course, he said it’s neither – the test is actually meant to measure the speed of your heart’s recovery after undergoing the strain.

And I think THAT’s where we are right now. Just like Jacob. Just like Grant. Living with strain. Living with struggles. Living with pain or fear. We are living in a very complex and complicated time, right now – but being able to recover, OR even UNCOVER our faith, and our hope, and our love is crucial. 

Now don’t get me wrong, I use the word “recovery” this morning, not to mean returning to the way things were, as if the strain or the stress or the struggle never existed. I don’t think that’s possible. I’m using “recovery” in the way a golfer hits the ball from the rough or out of a hazard, and recovers just by putting it back on the fairway so that it’s playable again. I use the word “recovery” as in rowing or cycling or swimming. It’s the action of returning the paddle, the leg or the arm to a position ready to make a new stroke. None of it denies what has happened. It simply sets us up for the next step. And the one after that. 

In her book, Scarred by Struggle, Transformed by Hope, Benedictine nun and author Joan Chittister uses Jacob’s story as a paradigm for the “spirituality of struggle.” She speaks of being able to lean into the struggle, rather than run from it or fight against it. And through Jacob’s life she names eight elements that make up our human struggle. Perhaps you can relate to some – if not all of these (I know I can): 

She says we face: 

change, 
isolation, 
darkness, 
fear, 
powerlessness, 
vulnerability, 
exhaustion, and (interestingly) scarring.    

And yet Chittister finds the spirituality of the struggle by noticing God’s corresponding gift with each one: 

With Change – there’s Conversion; With isolation – comes the gift of interdependence; With darkness, comes faith; From fear comes courage; Powerlessness yields surrender; Vulnerability reveals the knowledge of our limitations; exhaustion uncovers endurance; and finally, scarring reveals transformation.

Chittister writes, “Jacob does what all of us must do if, in the end, we too are to become true. He confronts in himself the things that are wounding him, admits his limitations, accepts his situation, rejoins the world and moves on.” 

Struggle. Blessing. And Recovery. 

God has closed that gap between heaven and earth, and is not only present with us but moving in and through our lives and in our world. God is not sedentary. But constantly moving. Constantly creating. Constantly present. And is enabling our recovery, our next steps. Look at the rungs on your ladder for your next step. And notice that it is, indeed, the Lord, our God. 

Amen.