Elizabeth 🫧

This is what they took from us. 🎄

Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. Matthew 5:11

Don’t put your trust in this world, or the leaders of this world, or in idealistic movements promising to restore things to the glory days This world is dying along with its ways. Those who are of the world will die with it. The Titanic is sinking, Jesus is the life boat.

Ecclesiastes 7:9 Do not hurry yourself in your spirit to become offended, for the taking of offense is what rests in the bosom of the stupid ones.

What’s a polite way to tell someone, “I’m not discussing this with you because your entire understanding of the subject is built on so many interconnected misconceptions that correcting them would require uninstalling your current worldview and starting the tutorial from birth”?

There’s a night in Genesis where a man wrestles God and wins. Or does he? “And Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day.” - Genesis 32:24 No introduction. No explanation of who the man is. Just a stranger in the dark and a fight that lasts all night. Here’s the setup. Jacob is about to meet his brother Esau for the first time in twenty years. The last time they saw each other, Jacob had stolen Esau’s blessing, and Esau had sworn to kill him. Now word has come: Esau is on his way, with four hundred men. Jacob sends his family across the river Jabbok. He stays behind alone. And someone grabs him in the dark. Then comes the strangest detail in the story: “When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint.” (v.25) Read that again. One touch, and Jacob’s hip is dislocated. Whoever this was could have ended the fight at any moment. He wrestled all night anyway. He wasn’t losing. He was letting it go on. Then the stranger says, “Let me go, for the day has broken.” And Jacob, crippled, no longer able to fight, does the only thing he has left. He holds on. “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” (v.26) And the stranger asks a question that cuts deeper than any wound: “What is your name?” Here’s why that hurts. Twenty years earlier, Jacob’s blind father asked him almost the same question, “Who are you, my son?”, and Jacob lied: “I am Esau” (Genesis 27:18–19). That lie stole the blessing. Now he’s asked again. And this time he tells the truth: “Jacob.” The name means heel-grabber. Schemer. Deceiver. It’s a confession. And in that moment, he gets a new one: “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.” (v.28) Who was the stranger? The text calls him “a man.” The prophet Hosea calls him an angel (Hosea 12:4). Jacob himself named the place Peniel, “for I have seen God face to face” (v.30). Many Christians through the centuries have seen here an appearance of Christ before His birth. And Hosea adds one detail Genesis leaves out: “He wept and sought his favor.” So this is how Jacob “won.” Not by strength. By weeping, clinging, and refusing to let go of the One who could have destroyed him with a touch. That’s the God of the Bible. The God who lets Himself be held. Who comes down into the dark, into the dirt, close enough to be grabbed. Who stays all night. Who wounds only to bless. Centuries later, He came closer still. A God who let Himself be held as a baby in His mother’s arms. Who let Thomas touch His wounds. Who let sinners cling to His feet and wouldn’t push them away. You don’t win with God by being strong enough. You win by holding on. “The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip.” (v.31) He walked into the morning with a limp and a new name. Most people who’ve truly met God do.

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