Jacob & Leah

[Read Genesis 32:22-32, 47:28]

For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered.

Back when I was in high school, I was on the football team. There was another player who also participated in wrestling. That player remarked how the football players who were also wrestlers did well on the football team. Wrestling takes conditioning, strength, endurance, and skill.

Wrestling matches have time limits of three rounds, each lasting just two minutes. Jacob wrestled with a man beginning sometime in the night until daybreak. Neither man prevails and they should be utterly exhausted, yet Jacob’s opponent has the strength to strike Jacob on the hip and put it out of joint. But, even with the pain of a dislocated hip and exhaustion, Jacob will not give up.

We’re told the man with whom Jacob contends in this lengthy wrestling bout is God. Jacob is being tested by God and God chooses to end the bout when he strikes Jacob on the hip, yet Jacob will not let go until he receives a blessing. As a result of the testing Jacob is told “you have striven with God and with humans and have prevailed.”

Jacob receives the great blessing of becoming Israel, whose twelve tribes will populate the promised land. “Strive for the greater gifts,” wrote St. Paul [1 Corinthians 12:31]. We offer and receive simple blessings in our daily lives, but recall also times in your life when you’ve striven to receive great and life changing blessings.

Father Bob Stegmann
St. Joseph Catholic – Sturgeon Bay
Saints Peter & Paul Catholic – Institute



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