Take Time to Wrestle With God Honestly

Sometimes we need to wrestle with God. We have all sorts of ideas about how life should be—when it comes to love, justice, fairness, happiness, etc.—and too often life comes up short of our expectations.  And too often so does God.

When life, or God, comes up short of our demands, we have at least three options. 1). We can pretend that everything is really OK because we’re afraid to question God, let alone be angry with God; or 2). we can be angry as hell with God; rant and rave and attempt to cut God out of our lives and shoulder all of the responsibility for making life right our way; or 3). we can wrestle with God. By wrestle with God I mean that we express our true feelings with God; be perfectly honest with God about who we are, where we’re at and what we need; and question God in every way possible.

Options one and two get us nowhere. Option one keeps us stuck in first grade spirituality and victim thinking. We will always be a victim of life and of our concept of God as unapproachable and unquestionable. Option two allows us to vent in an immature way that says “it’s my way or the highway.” We feel powerful at first, but then come to realize that we can’t make it through life on our own, and we end up crawling back to a God that we are still too afraid, or immature, to question and to be honest with.

Option three is the only winning solution when it comes to our burning need to figure out life and to in some way control the chaos of life. When we take the time to wrestle with God, like Jacob did; when we take the time to ask God questions, like Jesus instructed us to do; we will make great strides in our spiritual life. Jacob had no fear while wrestling with God and Jesus told us “ask and you will receive” because asking is how we get answers. Many people think “ask and you will receive” means ask for the winning lottery numbers and you’ll get them. That’s not what Jesus had in mind. Asking and receiving is all about gaining knowledge and spiritual, life-changing wisdom.

In order to receive this knowledge and wisdom, however, we have to be willing to be fully transparent—open and honest—with God. We have to express our true thoughts, desires and feelings; and be 100 percent open to giving and receiving in our relationship with God. This also means that we have to accept the answers that come to us, even if we don’t like them initially. Answers that we meet with resistance are answers we need to probe deeper in to understanding. Feelings of resistance are signs that we are being challenged in the very areas of our lives that we most need new mental/emotional/spiritual growth.

So wrestle with God. Don’t be a weenie. God is big enough to take anything we dish out. And God will be honest with us as long as we are willing to be honest with God. All we have to do is open the door and truthfully allow God into our lives. The more we allow ourselves to wrestle with our resistance, the more God can help us. And the more we grow into a deeper sense of self, the more our souls will shine!

Comments

  1. E.S. KraayJuly 5, 2011 at 4:30 PM

    Jacob's ladder and his wrestling debut as a husband with two wives and father of 11 kids are two of my favorite Old Testament stories and your post helps put it in perspective. "Truly, God is in this place and I knew it not!" Now that I know, I'm going for the full-nelson.

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