Called like the Midwives (Ex 1:8-21)

Fear 

I was ordained on September 11, 2011. Less than a month later, I was in an airport on my way to England to begin my PhD. I remember that near the gate to my plane, there were several men with long beards who were prostrating themselves repeatedly in prayer. At the time, the news media were showing similar images whenever they talked about the prospect of terrorism. So, as I watched these men pray, I felt a vague fear creep into my heart. I am a little embarrassed to admit it. But I understand now that I was being shaped by forces beyond my comprehension. As Paul says, we wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with unseen powers and principalities (Eph 6:12).

One of those chief powers and principalities is fear. And the fear that I felt was not entirely of my own making. It came from the images that were shown in the media repeatedly, the warnings that were proclaimed repeatedly, the slander that was so commonly and casually lobbed in the direction of Islam and its practitioners.

Fear has a canny knack for resisting the truth. To begin, fear keeps its distance. I never thought to approach those men and ask them about their faith. I imagine now we could have had a fascinating conversation. But I kept my distance. Sort of like Pharaoh, in today’s scripture, “who did not know Joseph” (Ex 1:8). Fear does not take the time to get to know the other person. It keeps its distance.

And because it keeps its distance, it is easier to distort the other person. We talk about our “worst fears,” but the truth is that every fear is a “worst” fear. Every fear catastrophizes and envisions the worst. Yes, those men prostrating themselves in the airport could have been terrorists. But it was infinitely more likely that they were faithful seekers of God. Likewise, Pharaoh absurdly claims that the Hebrew people are more numerous than the Egyptians and may one day pose a military threat. The irony of Pharaoh’s distorted fear is that these Hebrew people are the opposite of a threat. Not long before, it was a Hebrew man who saved the land. Joseph foresaw a great famine and ensured there would be a sufficient food supply for all the people. But Pharaoh could not see this, because fear imagines the absolute worst.

And because fear imagines the absolute worst, it demands absolute control. We all know how airports have changed in the last couple of decades. Pharaoh took things a few steps further and enslaved the people whom he feared. The Egyptians, we’re told, were “ruthless in all the tasks they imposed on them” and “made their lives bitter” (Ex 1:13-14).

Fear distances, distorts, and demands absolute control.

As it happens, in England I would share a flat with a business PhD student named Reza, a practicing Muslim from Iran, and I would meet many more Muslims who were scraping out a new life in England despite daily being misunderstood and mistreated. If fear distances, distorts, and demands control, then I have found that relationship does the opposite. As I became closer to Reza, as I got to know him firsthand, the distortions and demands of fear slowly evaporated. I learned how we share the same hopes and fears. I learned how our faith in God has much more in common than I may have guessed, how it nourishes us and invites us to live in the way of love. Now the sight of a person prostrating themselves is more of an inspiration than a threat. I see a person submitting to God rather than a terrorist preparing for war.

The “Fear of the Lord”

If unchecked, fear grows. It cannot be satisfied. Thus the king of Egypt is not content to keep the Hebrews enslaved. Instead he pursues a policy of infanticide, demanding the all Hebrew baby boys be killed. So he calls the midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, who may be Hebrew or Egyptian—the text itself is ambiguous, accommodating not only the translation “Hebrew midwives” but also “midwives to the Hebrews.” The ambiguity of the midwives’ ethnicity is significant because it suggests that their faithfulness to God transcends nationality or religion. Faithfulness to God is not an exclusive property of a flag or a confession, of Christians, Jews, or Muslims. It is a matter of the heart, where one truly prostrates oneself and submits to God.

What’s fascinating in our story today is that the midwives’ faithfulness to God is described by the same word that characterizes Pharaoh and the Egyptians: fear. “The midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live” (Ex 1:17). Clearly the midwives’ fear is different than Pharaoh’s. They do not keep a distance from the baby boys but rather find themselves inextricably attached to them, bound to protect their lives. There is no distortion of reality or demand for control, but rather an open-handed acceptance and honor for the life that is emerging among the Hebrew people.

The expression “fear of the Lord” is common in the Old Testament. Fear in this case refers less to danger and more to awe, less to struggle and more to obedience. There is still, to be sure, an overwhelming sense of one’s own smallness and lack of control. The only difference in this fear—and it makes all the difference in the world—is that it does not resist life but reveres life. To get a sense for what “fear of the Lord” means, we might consider the lofty passages of life, like marriage or a new birth, like leaving home or a loved one’s death, moments that overwhelm us with a sense that life is so much more meaningful and mysterious than the little plans and programs we’ve designed to contain it, moments that mark a loss of what we know and a sense of wonder about the possibilities for new life. The “fear of the Lord” can be frightening, but it also fixes us in an unassailable faith.

To give a trivial example from my recent past…I remember driving home from Portsmouth with two silent, frightened kittens in the cat carrier beside me. I drove more cautiously than usual, feeling that I was carrying the most precious cargo. When I got home and set the kittens up in the safe confines of a bathroom, I watched them with tender eyes as they explored their new surroundings. When I left the house, I would lock the door and wish that I could lock it still more. Completely irrational, of course, but the “fear of the Lord” is a matter of the heart, not the mind. It is sensing the fragile preciousness of life and feeling bound to serve. I would imagine this experience I’m describing is but a drop in the ocean of what mothers and fathers feel toward a newborn or what committed partners feel in times of great suffering or joy.

We all know the “fear of the Lord.” The challenge is to acknowledge this experience, to allow this feeling, to let it break our hearts open, to live faithfully from its wisdom. It is a challenge because it requires us to relinquish control. The “fear of the Lord” means the risk of life rather than the security of the same. The midwives risked everything for those Hebrew children. A loving parent may risk everything for their child. Jesus risked everything. And this, we’re told, is the fullness of life.

Of Empires and Midwives

I mentioned earlier my fear in the airport twelve years ago. At the time, there was much suspicion about Islam. I wonder what fears dominate our world today. I say this as an observation, not as a judgment: I believe we live in the world’s greatest empire. Just as Egypt was the world’s greatest empire at the time. And empires fear what threatens their control. I am particularly mindful today of the unhoused population and immigrants and individuals involved in drug and gang activity. It is so easy to let these groups become political objects of debate, which is to say, situations that I stand apart from and try to control. It is easy to live in fear and to distance myself from the people involved, to imagine the worst, and to demand measures of security.

Now, I don’t know that I am called like the midwives to become the savior of these populations. That strikes me as a legendary, larger-than-life feature of today’s story. But I do believe that I am called like the midwives to live in the “the fear of the Lord,” which means not to be inhibited by culturally manufactured fears, not to let my heart be hardened these little fears, but rather to see the individuals in these groups as the infinitely precious children of God that they are, to let my heart be broken open by them. Here, I find guidance in the example of the Jesuit priest Greg Boyle, whose work in gang-intervention and rehabilitation has led him to serve these three populations. He never tires of pointing out that the problem is not what it seems on the surface, whether that’s houses for the unhoused or the violence of gangs. The problem is a lack of kinship. The problem is that these individuals are living with the trauma of unspeakable wounds from unthinkably early ages—whether it’s abandonment or abuse or addiction. Tragically, the world’s fear keeps them isolated and wounded, and the fear becomes its own sort of self-fulfilling prophecy, as they live into the only, desperate roles that have been given to them.

My experience in England with my housemate Reza and the story of the midwives in Egypt both point me to the abundant life that is found beyond the small cultural fears that distance, distort, and demand control. The good news of the “fear of the Lord” is that there is so much more to life than the security of the same. If I can relinquish control and open myself up to the preciousness of God in all things, life will be an adventure well worth the risk.

Prayer

God of life,
Who is smitten with us
And smitten with strangers—
Thank you for those moments
When we have felt your awe and reverence
For the preciousness of life.
Help us in those other moments,
Moments of fear,
When we are tempted instead
To distance, distort, and demand control
…
May we, like the midwives,
Know the courage and joy of the risk
Of sharing life with others.
In Christ, who came to us while we were far off: Amen.

Just a Name? (Genesis 45:1-15)

Divine Disappearing Act

Have you ever wondered, “Why doesn’t God show up in my life the way that God seems to show up in the Bible?” Some religious traditions have developed explanations for God’s apparent absence in the modern world, suggesting, for example, that we live in an age when God has hidden himself but all will be resolved when Jesus comes back in unmistakable power and glory.

But I think the Bible is wise to our experience. I think, like us, the writers of the Bible wrestled with the question, “Where is God?” In fact, the book of Genesis itself can be read as an eloquent response to this question. Some commentators have pointed out that if you read Genesis carefully from start to finish, paying attention to the character of God, what you get is a gradual disappearing act.

Think about it for a moment. The story begins with only one character, God. God does everything, creating land and sky, vegetation and creatures, and of course, Adam and Eve. At first, God is a constant presence in this new creation, strolling through the garden where Adam and Eve live, disciplining Adam and Eve and then their son Cain, intervening with a flood when humanity has degenerated into violence, scattering humanity at Babel and giving them different languages. God is the main player in the first act.

But in the next act, featuring Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Sarah, Rebekah, and Rachel, things change. When God calls Abraham to leave his home and bless all the world, God is effectively deputizing him, entrusting him with God’s own work. From here on out, humans will become more prominent characters, their personalities more developed, their responsibility for outcomes more pronounced. Conversely, God will diminish as a character. We can trace God’s diminishing involvement through each generation. With Abraham, God is an occasional conversation partner. They talk to each other from time to time, even argue with each other. With Isaac, God makes a couple appearances, but there is no sustained back-and-forth dialogue. With Jacob, God visits only in dreams and in the night. In fact, the iconic scene in which Jacob wrestles with God at night symbolizes a turning point; its evocative imagery of God’s hands on Jacob suggest that this wrestling match is in fact a laying on of hands, a bequeathal of responsibility. God is handing over the reins.

For in the final act of Genesis, the story of Joseph, God is no longer a player on the scene who does things,[1] but only an object of human characters’ speech. To put this another way, we don’t see God as an actor on the stage anymore. We only hear God-talk from the human characters. God has migrated from being an actor to being only a name on the lips of human characters. In today’s scripture, God is just a name on Joseph’s lips. He declares to his brothers, “You sold me here…[But] it was not you who sent me here, but God” (Gen 45:5, 8). Earlier in the story, when the brothers have left Egypt for the first time and find the money that Joseph has secretly placed in their sacks, God is just a name on their lips. Fearing that their sin has caught up with them and that they will be punished for stealing, they exclaim, “What is this God has done to us?” (Gen 42:28). Later, when Judah stands before Joseph and owns up to the brothers’ wrongdoing, God is just a name on his lips. He says, “God has found the guilt of your servants” (Gen 44:16).

In this final act of Genesis, we arrive in a world that resembles our own, a world where God is not walking about in plain sight but is only talked about. In a way, Joseph’s story validates my experience and helps me to be honest. Joseph’s story invites me to ask in all seriousness, Is God here? If so, how?

Words

As children we may have learned, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” But of course our experience has taught us the exact opposite. Words have incredible power. A child who is bullied regularly by his peers, or a child who is constantly shamed by her parents, knows that words can reach deeper than any stick or stone and can cripple the soul. Conversely, words have the power to build up. A child who is bathed in words of encouragement and admiration, or a child who frequently hears the language of gratitude and hope, knows deep down that they do not face the world alone but in the company and help of loved ones.

In fact, it is our faith that words are the most powerful thing in the world. After all, they are how God creates the world, according to Genesis. God is the word, according to the gospel  of John. It really is a paradox. Words cannot touch us, yet they move us. Words cannot be seen, yet they reveal the most important things. A mystic might say both that words can’t change a darned thing, and also that they’re the only thing that can really change the world. In one sense, they’re powerless. And yet they reach into the heart, which is the most powerful place of all, which is where all true change happens.

From Cause to Call

Readers have commonly interpreted the Joseph story as an illustration of God’s masterful design. Although God is not present as a character on the stage, they discern God’s fingerprints all over the story. They read the story as an illustration of providence. God knew that there would be a famine in all the land, and he had to get Joseph into position as the Pharaoh’s second-in-command, where he could plan for the famine. So God began pulling all the strings. Joseph’s brothers’ selling him into slavery? That was God. Potiphar’s wife’s accusing him and getting him thrown into prison? That was God. And so on. But I must be honest. This kind of interpretation makes me uncomfortable because it risks absolving the characters of any responsibility. I don’t believe it is ever God’s will for brothers to hate one another. I don’t believe it is ever God’s will that people plot evil against one another.

Personally, I don’t see God as a divine puppeteer in the Joseph story. All I see is God as a name on the lips of the characters. Just a word. And yet this is precisely where I see God’s incredible power. God’s name is not “just” a name. (If we remembered the power of words, we would never say something is “just” a word.) God’s name is a word filled with stories, memories, dreams, a word that contains within it an uncontainable power, which is love. It is precisely through God’s name that I see hearts changed. When Joseph’s brothers exclaim, “What is this God has done to us?” (Gen 42:28), and when Judah declares, “God has found the guilt of your servants” (Gen 44:16), they are effectively expressing confession and repentance. God’s name infiltrates their hearts and haunts them and nudges them to take responsibility for the wrongdoing of their past. Likewise, when Joseph announces, “You sold me here…[But] it was not you who sent me here, but God” (Gen 45:5, 8), he is effectively proclaiming his forgiveness and making possible the redemption of a tragic story. God’s name inhabits Joseph and stirs him to let go of resentment and to reconcile. God’s name is the most powerful and decisive element in the story. Think about it for a moment. Even if God had been acting all along as a puppeteer, subtly moving characters to and fro, ultimately bringing Joseph and his brothers to this very moment, it would mean nothing if Joseph was not moved to forgiveness. Joseph could have held on to his resentment and not revealed his identity. He could have sent his brothers packing without provisions for the famine. The most critical moment in the story is a spiritual moment, a moment that can’t be captured on a camera because it happens in the heart. God’s name moves Joseph to see the possibility of forgiveness and reconciliation and redemption.

As a discrete character in the Joseph story, God does nothing. Yet everything good that happens, happens in God’s name. In God’s name are all the decisive moments of the story: the brothers’ confession and repentance, Joseph’s forgiveness and reconciliation, and the redemption of a tragic history. I don’t know about you, but I grew up thinking about God as the cause of things. Today’s story invites me to think instead of God as the call in things. The name of God is a call in our hearts. It is up to us, the faithful, to give flesh to God’s call.

Prayer 

Impending God,
Whose love will not leave us alone,
But is ever seeking to become a reality—
We see in Joseph’s story your invisible power,
Which moves people to be honest, to forgive, to reconcile,
To bring good from evil.
Therefore we entrust to you the difficulties of our lives
…
May your name be sweet to us,
Your call be what moves us,
And your story be our salvation.
In Christ, the Word made flesh: Amen.

---

[1] There are handful of references to the presence and blessing of the Lord in Genesis 39 (vv. 2, 5, 21, 23), but in contrast to previous divine interventions God does not speak to the human characters or engage them in a distinct, tangible manner.

"Great Power to Redeem" (Gen 37:1-4, 12-28)

Jacob’s Favoritism

Today’s scripture tells one of the most celebrated stories of the Old Testament. It has featured in many diverse settings, from Sunday School to Broadway. Most people refer to it as the story of Joseph and his coat of many colors. I remember as a child in Sunday School grabbing a handful of crayons and carefully coloring in the numerous stripes on Joseph’s special coat. Joseph is indeed the hero of the story, the special one whose dreams ultimately help to redeem a tragic situation.

But today I want to step back from focusing on Joseph and focus instead on Jacob and his family. Because that is how the storyteller himself introduces the story: “This is the story of the family of Jacob” (37:2). Now, readers have commonly interpreted the conflict in today’s story to revolve around Jacob’s favoritism, and I wouldn’t exactly challenge that. We learn early on that Jacob loves Joseph more than his other children, because Joseph is the child of his old age (37:3)—and, we might suppose, because Joseph is the son of his beloved late wife, Rachel. We learn that Joseph may be a bit of a spoiled brat, or at the very least an ignorant child with his head in the clouds. He tattles on his brothers (37:2). He not only has grandiose dreams of his family bowing down to him, but he also shares these dreams with his brothers. No wonder they resent him and cannot “speak peaceably to him” (37:4). Yet Joseph seems unconcerned. I imagine it is because his father’s love makes him feel special. Precious. Untouchable. A parent’s love is powerful indeed. If his father is for him, who can be against him?

The Love That Is Present Is a Good Thing

Should we fault Jacob for loving Joseph? Is that really the problem in the story? Here, I think a bit of nuance is helpful. The problem with favoritism is not the love that is present, but the love that is missing. To be clear, then, with the first part of that proposition: the love that is present is a good thing. The way that Jacob treats Joseph, making him to feel special and cherished, reminds me a little bit of God’s address to Jesus and to all of us: “You are my beloved child; with you I am well pleased” (cf. Mark 1:11). Jesus hears this right before he endures the wilderness for forty days, and it grounds him and sustains him for that experience. Likewise, I believe that Jacob’s love for Joseph is what strengthens him for the ordeal he will face. He will be thrown in a pit and sold as a slave. He will be falsely accused and imprisoned. He will live for twenty years in a foreign land separated from his family, some of whom are responsible for his tragic fate.

The traditional interpretation, of course, applauds Joseph for his faith in God, his reliance on God in the interpretation of dreams, and I wouldn’t want to dismiss his faith for one minute. But what I would want to suggest is that Joseph’s faith doesn’t come from nowhere. Faith is difficult when God’s love is only an idea for us, only an abstract concept, and not an enfleshed reality that we can feel or touch. Have you ever been in a difficult or lonely spot, and a well-intentioned friend reassures you that God loves you, but it rings a little hollow? You may think to yourself, “Well, that’s great, but what difference does it make? I’m still in this spot.” If you’ve had this experience—good! Your honesty gives expression to a central tenet of our faith, which is that God’s love means so much more when it takes on flesh and touches us. That’s why the incarnation is such a big deal. For us followers of Christ, God’s love is not just an idea. God’s love is meant to take on flesh in our world and walk alongside us, suffer alongside us, speak comfort to us, laugh with us, touch us with healing and hope.

What I mean to say is, I think Joseph’s faith in God is not a coincidence. It doesn’t come out of nowhere, as though he’s just a biblical hero who is specially gifted with more faith than most of us. I think Joseph’s faith in God, rather, is deeply rooted and nourished in the special love that he has known from his father, Jacob. He has heard what Jesus heard on the banks of the Jordan, “You are my beloved son; with you I am well pleased.” When he is in the pit, when he is in prison, when he is living as a stranger in a strange land, he is not defined by these conditions but rather by the love that he has known, that tells him he is special and of infinite worth.

I am reminded of one of the psalms of ascent, which begins, “Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord” (Ps 130:1). Joseph spends a great deal of his time in the depths and undoubtedly calls on God from there. The same psalm concludes, “With the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem” (Ps 130:7). And indeed, in the life of Joseph, God’s steadfast love expressed through Jacob will demonstrate great power to redeem, as Joseph does not give up but trusts, year after year, that good can come from evil.

The Love That Is Lacking

Jacob’s love for Joseph is not the problem in the story. The problem in the story is that Jacob’s love is lacking for his other sons. And here’s why that’s a problem. It is more difficult for them to know God, because it is more difficult for them to feel God’s love, because God’s love for them is just an idea, not the flesh-and-blood reality that their brother Joseph knows. Genesis is filled with juicy tidbits about how each of them acts out in unhealthy ways—and I think the reason for their waywardness is found in today’s scripture. They do not know that they are loved and precious. You’ve probably heard the wisdom, “Hurt people hurt people.” That saying helps to explain the behavior we see among Jacob’s other, less loved sons. The eldest son, Reuben, becomes intimate with one of his father’s wives (35:22). The next two sons, Levi and Simeon, are filled with such anger that they essentially massacre an entire town (Gen 34). Judah simply departs from home to live with a woman of the land (Gen 38). Lust, anger, disenchantment. Jacob’s less loved sons live in a very different world than their brother Joseph.

The Sun and the Clouds

Their experience reminds me of a story I heard once. A woman in recovery from addiction shared how she’d grown up in a home wrecked by trauma. Her single mother, who provided for her, was always angry and bitter, sometimes even violent. When the woman left home, she became estranged from her mother. Much later in life, she learned that her mother’s health was declining and that she had also been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. She knew her mom had no one else in her life, and so she decided to come back into her life. Trembling with fear, the woman walked into a nursing home to see her mom for the first time in decades. Her experience was surreal. On the one hand, her mom clearly recognized her. Her eyes lit up. She spoke with energy. On the other hand, she made very little sense. But what surprised the woman more than anything, was the tone of her mother’s voice. Her nonsense was in the conversational lilt of someone who was happy. The woman broke into tears as she described what she felt for the first time in her life. Her mom’s love for her. She concluded that it had been there all along—as the sun is always there, even when it is obscured by clouds. It’s just that her mother had had a lot of clouds in her life. I wonder if the same could be said for Jacob. His love for his other sons was always there. It’s just that there were a lot of clouds in the way, a lot of hurts and hangups that obstructed Jacob’s love for them.

Jacob’s favoritism is a real paradox. It contains both the conflict of the story and its resolution. The conflict is that the less loved sons, the hurt sons, act out in a very hurtful way. The resolution is that the loved son, Joseph, trusts in God’s love and helps to bring good from evil. The good news of Jacob’s family is the same good news of the woman in recovery. God’s love may be blocked, but it never stops. The sun is always there, even when it is obscured by clouds. What does that mean for me today or you? I’m not certain. If anything, Jacob’s story reveals the complexity of our experiences, how we may be dealing with different weather, sunny, cloudy, rainy. Joseph felt the sun on his face. His brothers saw a sky full of clouds. I suppose the invitation remains the same in any case—namely to trust that whatever the weather, God’s love is steadfast (like the sun) and has the power to redeem. Whatever our various problems, the resolution is the same. It is God’s love given flesh that brings good out of evil.

Prayer

God who is unseen
And yet in all things,
Sometimes we feel the radiance of your love,
And so faith is simple.
Sometimes there are clouds,
And it is not easy.
…
We cry out from the depths of our heart,
Be with us, as you were with Joseph,
That your tangible love would redeem,
And would bring good from what is not good.
In Christ, who leads the way: Amen.

Blessed, Broken, Given

What Is God’s Blessing?

Three weeks ago, we began our journey with the character of Jacob. Jacob was wrestling then. Even before he was born.

Today he is wrestling still. Not much has changed.

But today, everything is changed. Today Jacob receives God’s blessing.

What is God’s blessing? 

Up until this point, Jacob has striven for human blessing, which is to say, anything he’s been able to get his hands on. For him, blessing means taking what’s there for the taking. Blessing means success: power, prestige, possessions. So far, Jacob has had a lot of success. He has been able to get his hands on his brother’s birthright, his father’s blessing, his father-in-law’s daughters, and much of his father-in-law’s fortune. Jacob has done alright for himself.

The Dark Side to Jacob’s Success

Or so we might think. But in Jacob’s success, there is a dark side.

The dark side to getting what you want is struggle. Not only the struggle to get ahead, but also the struggle to stay ahead. The struggle not to lose what you’ve won.

In the verses that immediately precede today’s story, we are told that Jacob is “greatly afraid and distressed” (32:7). Why?  His brother Esau is coming to meet him. With four hundred men by his side. To Jacob, this is dark news. All that he has won could soon become lost. The struggle never ends.

At the beginning of today’s scripture, night has fallen. Jacob sends his family and all that he has across the river ahead of him. It seems a rather odd move. Why doesn’t he join them?  Perhaps he is a coward and simply wants a shield between him and his brother. But more likely, I think, he’s in a reflective mood and wants to be alone.

It has been said that before you die, your entire life flashes before you. Perhaps sensing the end, Jacob wants to stand back for a moment, separate, alone, to try to drink it all in: to look across the river upon the sum total of his life, all that he has won. Perhaps he is trying to claim the success for which he has been struggling his whole life. Perhaps he is trying to feel it. Because perhaps right now all his success feels strangely hollow. And so he stands back and gazes upon all that is his, and he tries to savor it.

Defeated

And it’s in the pitch black of that moment, when Jacob’s happiness feels hauntingly hollow, that a shadow seizes him and throws him into the dust of the earth. Dislodged from his lonely thoughts, Jacob does what he has always done. He wrestles. He and the stranger tumble about the ground, seizing at each other’s heels, holding fast to whatever can be grabbed, never letting go.

Jacob exerts every last ounce of energy and appears to be gaining the upper hand. But then as the night nears its end, Jacob suddenly feels his hip put out of joint. How did that happen?  The stranger merely touched it. It is almost as though the stranger had been waiting to touch his hip just so, as though he had been waiting until Jacob had given everything, so that when he was suddenly overcome, he would know that he was truly and completely overcome. He had given the fight his all but had been defeated. For once, he would have to acknowledge he was not in control.

With his hip thrown out, the tide has turned. Jacob still hangs on—only now he grabs the stranger “not [out] of violence but [out] of need, like…a drowning man.”[1] As the dark of night gives way to the new light of morning, the stranger speaks for the first time. “Let me go, for morning is upon us.” But Jacob holds on for dear life. “Not until you bless me,” he gasps. So the stranger asks his name, and Jacob tells him. Then while the two remain in an embrace that looks less and less like fighting and more and more like friendship, the stranger proclaims: “No longer will you be called Jacob, but Israel” (32:28).

From Wrestling with Humans to Wrestling with God

In the Old Testament, names contain entire stories. Do you remember Ishmael and Hagar?  Ishmael’s name means, “God hears,” and Hagar’s means, “the outsider.” Put them together, and you get the truth of Ishmael’s and Hagar’s story. “God hears the outsider.” The name Jacob means something like wrestler. The name Israel means something like wrestler, too. In other words, Jacob’s new name is not a great departure from his old name. But there is one tiny difference, and it makes all the difference. It’s the “El” in “Israel.” “El” means God. In the past, Jacob wrestled with the world: his brother, his father, his father-in-law, all in an effort to get ahead, to get what they had. But now the terms of conflict have been reversed. No longer does Jacob wrestle with the world. Now he wrestles with God.

From “Jacob” to “Israel.” The names tell the story. The stranger seems to be saying, “In the past, you, Jacob, held onto the heels of others. Now you will hold onto God. You will not let go, and neither will God. Now…let go of the heels you have been grasping at so that you can hold onto God.”

And sure enough, when Jacob meets Esau the next day, he lets go of his older brother’s heel: he gives him many possessions and also a blessing. He essentially returns what he has stolen. Power, prestige, wealth—whatever happiness can be found in these things—this is no longer what Jacob is grabbing after. Now he is wrestling with something else.

Wrestling with God, Hoping to Lose

A Greek writer, Nikos Kazantzakis, recalls from his early years a visit to an old monastery, where he spoke with an old monk, Father Makarios.

He asked the monk, “Do you still wrestle with the devil?”

“Not any longer, my child,” Father Makarios replied. “I have grown old now, and he has grown old with me. He doesn’t have the strength…. [Now] I wrestle with God.”

“With God!” Nikos exclaimed in astonishment. “And you hope to win?”

“I hope to lose, my child,” the monk said. “[But] my bones…continue to resist.”[2]

“I Am Poor and Needy”

The good news of God’s blessing can also be difficult news. Because it means accepting our brokenness. And I don’t know about you, but accepting my brokenness is something I resist.

By brokenness, I do not mean defectiveness or sinfulness. I mean simply the reality that we are finite, limited creatures, subject to powers greater than ourselves, whether that’s the weather or another person or our cultural heritage or an addiction or a disease or our biology which demands things like sleep and nourishment, whether we want them or not. By brokenness, I mean simply that we are not in control and cannot do it on our own.

The surprise of Jacob’s story is that the real blessing is not in control or getting what we want, which actually leaves us empty and exhausted. The real blessing is in our brokenness. Only after Jacob could not escape his brokenness, only after his hip was thrown out of joint, could he receive God’s blessing and grow into the fuller, richer life of clinging to God, wrestling with God instead of for worldly gain. I’m reminded of how the psalmist repeatedly declares, “I am poor and needy.” A true Israelite, a true son of Israel, the psalmist is declaring his brokenness and his need for help.

I’m reminded also of Jesus. At the table, he blessed the bread, broke it, and gave it to others, just as his own body was blessed, broken, and given for the life of the world. He understood his brokenness to be not an obstacle but an opportunity. In his death—and death is the supreme brokenness—he would trust in the love of God. And the love of God transformed that most woeful brokenness into a gift for all the world, a story of God’s steadfast faithfulness and mercy for all creation. The cross, which was a symbol of death, has become for us a symbol of life. It is the good news that God is with us to the end, and that the end is actually a new beginning.

Prayer

Intimate God,
Who comes supremely close to us
In our moments of weakness,
Our moments of vulnerability,
And invites us into an embrace
That is both a struggle and a blessing:
Soften our hearts
That we might accept and be honest about
Our own brokenness
…
We dedicate our limitations to you,
Asking that your love
Transform them into a gift of life,
For ourselves and others:
In Christ, blessed, broken, and given for the life of the world: Amen.

---

[1] Frederick Buechner, The Magnificent Defeat (New York: The Seabury Press, 1979), 11.

[2] Conversation from Nikos Kazantzakis, Report to Greco (trans. Peter Bien; New York: Simon and Schuster, 1965), 222-223.

"Because of the Love He Had" (Gen 29:15-28)

A Glimpse Inside

Today’s passage is a rarity in the Old Testament. Because seldom in the Old Testament do we learn what a character is actually feeling inside his heart. When God calls Abraham to leave his family, his home, and his land, to go somewhere unknown, how does Abraham feel? We don’t know. The story only tells us, “Abram went, as the Lord had told him” (Gen 12:4). When God calls Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, how does Abraham feel? We don’t know. The story only tells us, “Abraham rose early in the morning” and gathered his son Isaac and his supplies (Gen 22:3). Here at the crucial junctures in Abraham’s life, the storyteller is silent about what is going on inside his heart. Some readers have carelessly mistaken this silence as a mark of primitive storytelling. They take the Old Testament to be crude and unsophisticated, just telling us what happened and little else.

But I think this silence is actually the genius of the ancient Hebrew storytellers. The genius of the Old Testament is what it doesn’t tell us, because these gaps become gateways into the story. We as readers or listeners are invited to imagine how the characters are feeling. We are invited to imagine how we would feel in their place. How we would feel if God called us to leave everything we knew. How we would feel if God called us to do the unthinkable. We talk about the Bible as the “living Word” because somehow its story lives on in us. For thousands of years, humans have looked into the Bible as though looking into a mirror, recognizing themselves and God in this story.

But as I mentioned, today’s passage is a rarity. For in today’s passage, we do learn what a character is feeling inside his heart. Jacob has just arrived at Laban’s home and has been received well. So well, in fact, that he appears to have taken up work around the home as part of the family. Only after a month has passed, does Laban acknowledge this, saying, “It’s not right that you’re working for nothing. What can I pay you?” (Gen 29:14-15). And it’s here that we learn what is inside Jacob’s heart. “Jacob loved Rachel” (Gen 29:18). Which is a big enough revelation in itself, but it gets even bigger in just a couple of verses, when we learn this: “Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her” (Gen 29:20). For a story that is awfully reserved when it comes to sharing characters’ emotions, this is a significant disclosure. The storyteller doesn’t just share these sort of details without a reason. We know that this must be a crucial point in the story.

The Turning Point

Jacob is perhaps best known for the moment when he wrestles with God. Many readers identify this juncture as a turning point in Jacob’s life. After all, he receives God’s blessing, a new name, and he walks away with a limp, forever marked by the encounter. But today I’d like to make the case that the definitive turning point in Jacob’s life is actually earlier. It is the moment in today’s scripture when we learn that he loves Rachel. In other words, the reason that the storyteller gives us a rare glimpse inside Jacob’s heart is because this is a turning point in his life. Love is the turning point. Almost everything that happens from this point on can be explained by love.

Consider Jacob’s life up to this point. Born with his hand on the heel of his brother, Jacob is indeed a grasper, a clasper, a grappler. His name means something like “heel-grabber.” He is a go-getter. The decisive moments of his childhood show him prevailing over others through cunning and deceit. First he finagles his brother out of his birthright. Then he tricks his father into giving him the firstborn’s blessing, which (again) belongs to his brother. Jacob may not be completely honest, but he cuts an impressive figure and would do well, I imagine, in our culture today. He will do whatever it takes to get ahead. He is a born winner.

But what happens when love enters the picture? He begins to lose. The very next story after we learn he loves Rachel shows us his defeat, as his father-in-law tricks him into marrying Leah instead of Rachel. Jacob, the deceiver, is deceived. The master of deception is beaten at his own game. He didn’t see it coming. He was blind to it. Why was he blind to it? “…because of the love he had.”

Later in Jacob’s life, on the night before he sees Esau for the first time since their monumental falling out, he wrestles with a stranger. Now Jacob is a born wrestler, but this is unlike any struggle he’s faced before. The timing suggests that he is in fact wrestling with his past, that this is a divinely inspired reckoning or coming-to-terms with his own history. For the next day he will be meeting Esau, and the deeds of his past now threaten not only him but his loved ones; he’s afraid for their lives. What if Esau should seek vengeance? The result of this nocturnal struggle is blessing, but not the kind of blessing that he’d grown up chasing, the blessing of wealth and prestige. No, this blessing comes at the cost of a limp. What is it that has made him vulnerable? Why does he walk away wounded? “…because of the love he had.”

As Jacob gets older, he continues to lose. He loses his beloved wife, Rachel, who dies in the act of giving birth to her second son, Benjamin. Then he loses his beloved son, Joseph, as his other children mercilessly deceive him—another instance in which the master of deception is beaten at his own game. Jacob is learning what perhaps any loving father learns. His children are beyond the bounds of his control and protection. His children bring him to tears more than once (cf. 37:35; 44:31, 34), and at the end of his life this born winner will have lost so much that he will summarize his life for Pharaoh in this way, saying, “Few and hard have been the years of my life” (47:9). Why has Jacob suffered so much? “…because of the love he had.”

What Cannot Be Seen

If love is indeed the turning point in Jacob’s life, then his “before” and “after” shots may make us think twice. Because before, he looks like a winner. And after, he looks rather like a loser. [Love blinds him, love wounds him, love brings him a great deal of suffering.] Here I’m going to have to take the apostle Paul at his word, when he says, “We look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen” (2 Cor 4:18). Love may look like losing, but perhaps there’s more than meets the eye here.

What comes to my mind is Jesus’ invitation to take up our cross daily. To the outside observer, the cross may look like losing your life. That is what the eye can see. But in fact, Jesus says, the cross is saving your life (Luke 9:23-24). That is what the eye cannot see. So, it may look like Jacob is losing and losing and losing, but in fact he is being saved. “…because of the love he had.”

When most people look at the cross, they see only suffering. But behind the suffering, is the real meaning of the cross. It is not suffering that saves us. It is love.

“More Pleasure Than Pain”

I’m reminded of a Harvard research project that recently published its findings. The researchers had undertaken an eighty-year study to investigate the sources of happiness. The researchers’ primary finding is that happiness has one key predictor: meaningful relationships. The authors tell the story of two men: one was a very successful lawyer, and the other took a second-choice career as a high school teacher.  The lawyer made tons of money, was respected widely, and had the means to do just about anything he wanted. People would probably consider him a “winner.” The teacher, on the other hand, was more strapped for cash but had a network of close friendships through his students and their families and his role in the community. What fascinated me most were how these two men answered a series of true/false questions when they were 55 years old, at the height of their professional lives. The lawyer indicated in his answers that life had more pain than pleasure, and that he often felt starved for affection. The teacher indicated the opposite: life has more pleasure than pain, and he did not often feel starved for affection.

Is this not the story of Jacob’s life? In the first half, he is a winner who looks out for number one. Yet he must feel terribly alone and exhausted, as he competes with others and then runs from the resulting danger. But then in the middle of his life, something changes him. “…because of the love he had.” From that point on, Jacob begins to live for others. The good news of his story, is the same good news of the cross. Even when Jacob loses, he wins. Because now he is living in love, which means he is never alone.

He has Rachel. Joseph. Even his brother Esau. There is, of course, an element of loss in each of these relationships, for love invariably entails loss of some kind. But what the Harvard researchers discovered, is the gospel truth that Jesus proclaims. Loving relationships fill us with life even beyond their loss. It is why we like the high school teacher might indeed affirm that, even when things don’t go our way, life has more pleasure than pain. That, because of the love we have, this life is more than worth it.

Prayer

God of life,
Your love is the turning point in our stories:
But sometimes we lose sight of what cannot be seen,
And our tears, our pain, and our loss
Can become overwhelming
…
May Jacob’s story teach us anew
The power of your love,
Which endures loss
And fills us with life.
Grant us contentment, please,
In the relationships that sustain us,
And draw us evermore into your abundant life.
In Christ, crucified and risen: Amen.

"The Greater Shall Serve the Lesser" (Gen 25:19-34)

The Last Shall Be First 

Jolien Boumkwo is an expert shot-putter. She holds the national record in Belgium. It is safe to say that she is used to coming in first place. But until last month, I’d never heard of her. I probably never would have if it hadn’t been for a strange turn of events in the European Athletics Team Championships. All of Belgium’s hurdlers were injured, and the country stood at risk of falling out of the competition if it did not complete the hurdling event. Up stepped Jolien Boumkwo, the shot-putter—big, broad-shouldered, muscular. Not anything like the light and nimble hurdlers with whom she would be competing. But that did not faze her. With a servant’s heart and a brave smile, she took on and completed every hurdle for her country.

Of course, she was much slower than her professional competitors and came in last place. But she was the talk of the tournament and made headlines all over the sporting world. Even her competitors gave her high fives of admiration at the end of the race. It is a heartwarming story, and I would like to think it gives us a glimpse of gospel truth. Though she was last in the competition, she was first in the eyes of many viewers. Her greatness was not in competing and prevailing over others. Her greatness was in serving her team. She did not care that she would come in last or stand out like a sore thumb. She cared about helping her teammates.

An Ambiguous Prophecy

Jacob and Esau are on the same team, you could say. They are brothers, part of the same family, part of team Abraham. But in fact they are bitterly divided. Many readers of scripture assume that their conflict is preordained. After all, when Rebekah inquires of God about the pain of her childbearing, God’s response seems like a straightforward declaration of fate. “Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples born of you shall be divided; the one shall be stronger than the other, the elder shall serve the younger” (Gen 25:23). Esau is the elder, and he will indeed lose out to his younger brother on multiple occasions. First, he willingly forfeits his birthright. Later, he unwillingly misses out on the blessing for the firstborn, which his younger brother steals from him. Jacob’s repeated gain at the expense of his older brother seems like fulfillment of what God had foretold. Case closed, right? The elder has served the younger. Esau has relinquished to Jacob, sometimes willingly, sometimes not, the privileges that originally belonged to him.

But there’s a little detail that complicates this clear-cut interpretation of events. In the original Hebrew, God’s words to Rebekah are more ambiguous. A more literal translation would be: “The one shall be stronger than the other, the greater shall serve the lesser” (Gen 25:23). Here God differentiates the brothers not according to seniority, but according to greatness. “The greater”—not the elder—shall serve the other. Greatness itself is ambiguous. In the Old Testament, it regularly refers to power and wealth, in which case God would be saying that the more prestigious or successful brother would serve the other. That would certainly be a twist of its own in the story, and we could see it, perhaps, when Jacob, after years of prosperity, meets Esau again and bows down profusely before him and gives him a tribute of flock and servants (cf. Gen 32:13-15; 33:3). Is this not the greater serving the lesser? The one who got ahead, serving the one who fell behind?

But there is yet another interpretation I’d like to consider. So far, we have read God’s revelation to Rebekah as fate. In other words, God is saying who will come out on top, as though the story has already been written and is not subject to change. But to me, fate seems contrary to the freedom that, elsewhere, God regularly gives humanity. Even when God issues prophecies of destruction, God also holds out the possibility that humanity may change its ways and God may change God’s mind. Thus Jonah announces the imminent demise of Nineveh, yet Nineveh surprisingly repents and then so does God. A seemingly sure fate is averted, because Nineveh is free to change its mind, and so is God. I wonder, then, if God’s revelation to Rebekah—“the greater shall serve the lesser”—is less a foretelling of fate and more a declaration of principle. That is, serving others is the mark of greatness. The greater does not serve the lesser in spite of his greatness, in an act of condescension or concession. Rather, it is precisely his service that makes him great.

From Strugglers to Servants—How?

If service is indeed God’s hope for these brothers, then it is a long road for them to get there. Even before they are born, scripture says, they are locked in a struggle with one another (Gen 25:22). They are born strugglers, not servants. Esau may seem to have won the struggle, as he comes out of the womb first, but locked onto his heel is Jacob’s hand. In fact, Jacob’s name means “heel-grabber.” He is scrappy, persistent, a go-getter that does not give up. Jacob and Esau may have different personalities, but they share in common one trait: they serve no one but themselves. Esau is at the service of his appetite, seeking only to satisfy his immediate desires. In the defining scene of their childhood, he comes in from the field and cannot see beyond his hunger, so he thoughtlessly exchanges his birthright for some food. Jacob is at the service of his ego, his social appetite, his desire always to win and come out ahead. There’s only one outcome to the brothers’ endless struggles. Conflict. Separation. They cannot live under the same roof.

Yet after twenty years, they do reconcile (Gen 33). Technically, that’s not part of our scripture today, but I want to look ahead at it for a moment, because in their reconciliation there seems to be a radically different spirit between them, a spirit that seems to match with God’s prophecy of servitude. Both are vulnerable in their own way. Jacob, perhaps fearful of retribution, strikes an especially submissive pose, repeatedly bowing and calling his brother, “lord.” Esau falls on his brother’s neck with tears and kisses.

What has brought them to this place of servitude? In short, I think they have both finally been broken by their struggles. Defeated by their own exhaustion. We see this dramatically in the famous episode where Jacob wrestles the angel and walks away with a permanent limp.

On the one hand, both characters could theoretically look back at their lives and feel some satisfaction at their little victories. Jacob has prospered in building a family and acquiring a wealth of livestock. Esau may count it a victory that it is Jacob who flees home and he who remains. On the other hand, what is the cost of these little victories? The poet Rainer Maria Rilke gives simple but profound expression to the brothers’ struggle and its ultimate futility:

When we win it’s with small things,
and the triumph itself makes us small.
What is extraordinary and eternal
does not want to be bent by us.
I mean the Angel who appeared
to the wrestlers of the Old Testament.[1]

“Whoever Wishes to Become Great…”

Could it be, I wonder, that Jacob and Esau’s reconciliation later in life is a fulfillment of God’s prophecy at their birth that “the greater shall serve the lesser”? Could it be that the measure of this prophecy is not the triumph of one brother over the other, but rather that both brothers have become greater as both submit to one another? The brothers that were born in struggle, who served their own appetites before anyone else, have finally learned the greatness of service. In yielding to one another, they have broached the gospel truth that Jesus would encapsulate: “You know that among the nations those whom they recognize as their leaders lord it over them….But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all” (Mark 10:42-44).

Living as a servant may seem like foolishness and weakness to the world. And yet the world’s response of admiration and awe for Jolien Boumkwo tells me that something about serving others resonates deep within our hearts. We sense intuitively there’s something to this strange, upside-down “greatness” of being last, about which Jesus speaks. Maybe it’s because we’ve won enough as it is but feel empty inside, or maybe it’s because we’ve gotten ahead of others only to feel alone. Maybe it’s because we’re tired of the struggle and the competition, and we’re walking with a limp, and we wonder if there’s another way. Maybes when we see the freedom and joy of a person who has little but helps much, we realize that relationship is more fulfilling than control. I don’t know exactly what it is that resonates within us when we hear the story of Jolien, or the story of Jacob finally bowing before his brother Esau, or the story of Jesus who gives his life for others. I only know that these stories ring true. Real greatness is not just self-exertion to the maximum, whatever that may get you. Real greatness is living together. And if the gospel teaches us anything, it’s that living together means mutual submission—serving each other.

Prayer

Humble God,
In Christ you have emptied yourself
Of every claim to authority
And drawn near to us,
As a servant, as a friend:
This is greatness,
Greater news than any other.
…
Thank you.
Help us as your children
To live in your way,
To serve and befriend
Neighbor, stranger, enemy,
All the world.
In Christ: Amen.

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[1] Rainer Maria Rilke, “The Man Watching” (trans. Robert Bly).

"You That Are Carrying Heavy Burdens" (Gen 24:58-67)

Classic Scenes

Have you ever watched a movie and known almost exactly what was going to happen—not because you had paid extra close attention and determined the hidden motives of characters, but because the plot was so obvious? Maybe it’s a sports movie, and the team is decimated with injuries, but you know that one of the players in the background is going to emerge as a leader and lead the team to the championship. Or maybe it’s an action movie, and the hero is finally cornered by bad guys, but you know he’s got an ally lurking in the shadows who’s going to turn the tide. Or maybe it’s a romance movie, and the two lovers have just had a monumental falling out that seems to have mortally wounded their relationship, but you know it’s all based on a tragic misunderstanding and somehow the two will end up in each other’s arms at the end.

These obvious scenes and plot sequences are not necessarily the signs of a poorly made movie. In fact, familiar scenes and sequences are fundamental to our enjoyment of a movie. When we know what will happen, but we do not know exactly how, we watch with special interest. It’s the little twists and tweaks that give us pleasure. When I watched the original Star Wars movies, I knew that Luke Skywalker and his buddies would emerge triumphant. What I didn’t know, however, was that it would only happen through the help of one of the “bad” guys. The classic line from Darth Vader, “Luke, I am your father,” is so famous because it reveals one of the central surprises of the Star Wars trilogy and foreshadows how Darth Vader will end up saving his son and winning the day for the rebels.

The Woman at the Well…With a Twist

The Bible contains its own catalogue of familiar scenes and sequences. There’s the “divine revelation in the desert,” which we see in the stories of Hagar, Moses, Elijah, and Jesus. There’s the “barren mother who miraculously conceives,” such as Sarah, Hannah, and Mary. There’s the “bitter conflict between rival wives,” like Hagar and Sarah, Rachel and Leah, Hannah and Penninah. And then there’s the scene that we have today, “the woman at the well.” It happens again and again in the Bible, not only here, but also later with Jacob when he meets Rachel watering the flocks, Moses when he meets Zipporah watering the flocks, even Jesus when he meets the Samaritan woman drawing water for herself. Each story begins with a man journeying in a foreign land, where he meets a woman at a well. Typically the man draws the water. Next, the woman rushes home to share news of the stranger. Finally, the woman is betrothed to the man, often in conjunction with a special meal.

Each instance of this classic scene provides its own twist. When Jesus meets the Samaritan woman, for instance, the obvious tweak is that the result is not a worldly marriage (of which the Samaritan woman has already had many), but a spiritual one. The water that matters is not the well water but the Spirit that the woman (and other Samaritans) draw from Jesus. In today’s scripture, there are several twists. First, Isaac is absent at his own betrothal. He has no say or responsibility in the matter. Instead, it is a family servant who meets Rebekah and arranges the marriage. In direct contrast to Isaac’s absence is Rebekah’s initiative. She is the one who draws water for the man, not vice versa. And she is the one who has the final say in the betrothal. Usually it is the father who finalizes the arrangement, but as we see in today’s text, the family asks her, “Will you go with this man?” and she says yes. (It seems as though Rebekah’s family appreciates her for who she is: a strong woman. No one dares to tell her what to do.)

Isaac’s absence from his own betrothal and Rebekah’s remarkable presence and initiative result in a reversal of gender expectations. Here, in this iteration of the classic woman-at-the-well scene, the man is passive, and the woman active. I don’t think this is just a fanciful twist, a little variation to spice things up. This characterization of Isaac and Rebekah fits well with what we see elsewhere. Isaac is commonly the passive object—the victim—of others’ actions. As a child, Isaac is a bound victim of his father’s near-sacrifice; as an aging father, he is a victim of his son Jacob’s deception. In contrast, Rebekah is an assertive personality; later she confronts God when she’s in pain, and she manipulates both her son and her husband into doing what she wants (Gen 25:5-17; 46).[1]

“I Will Give You Rest”

Some readers have suggested that Isaac’s passivity is in fact a sort of juvenile dependence. They point out how the moment of his marriage is oddly sandwiched between references to his mother, who has recently died. When Isaac marries Rebekah, he takes her where? His mother’s tent. Not the usual honeymoon destination. And what happens there? He is “comforted after his mother’s death” (Gen 24:67). In this interpretation, Isaac is a momma’s boy, overly dependent on the care and nurture of a maternal figure. Rebekah becomes not so much his wife but a replacement for his mother.

But when I read the gospel text for today, I find myself thinking of Isaac in a very different light. “Come to me,” Jesus says, “all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens…” (Matt 11:28). Is that not a fair description of Isaac? I think it is quite possible that Isaac is carrying a lot, that he is paralyzed by the trauma of his past. Instead of growing up in safety and care, Isaac grew up as his mother’s unhealthy obsession and his father’s near-sacrifice. First, his mother had impossible expectations for him, namely that he would fulfill her life and make her complete. Her obsession for him led her to wreck the lives of others (Hagar and Ishmael), and undoubtedly he felt the strain of her expectations, the need for him to be a certain person for her to be happy. If that weren’t enough, then his father made him carry the wood to his own sacrifice, bound him up, and nearly brought a knife down upon him. Has Isaac felt the love of his parents? Or has he felt instead the need to be someone else, someone lovable enough that his father wouldn’t sacrifice, someone whose every move would bring satisfaction to his mother?

I’m nearly certain that, when Isaac meets Rebekah, he is weary and carrying heavy burdens.

So, when the text says, “He loved her [and] so [he] was comforted after his mother’s death” (Gen 24:67), I think it’s not a matter of the wife becoming a substitute for the mother. I think, rather, it’s a matter of love helping Isaac to heal from the wounds of his past. I think it’s a matter of him knowing now, what he never fully knew as a child: someone who loves him as he is. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this verse is the first expression in the Bible of love in a partnered relationship. This is a special, life-changing moment. Isaac’s heart, which has long lain dormant behind walls of fear and insecurity, awakens and comes to life in the face of a person who sees him as he is and says, “Yes.”

Jesus says, “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matt 11:29). I think that is what Isaac has found in today’s story—rest for his soul. He has found the “easy” yoke of Christ. How can that be? For the first time in his life, he does not need to strive; he does not need to secure his father’s love or meet his mother’s needs. For the first time in his life, he loves and is loved. And “so,” the scripture says, he is “comforted” (Gen 24:67). Love brings rest to his soul and puts him at ease. He experiences then what we experience now in Christ, who sees us as we are and says, “Yes.” This love—the one that Isaac encounters, perhaps for the first time in his life, the one that we know today in Christ—liberates us from the need to be someone else and sets us on a gentle and humble way.

Prayer

Compassionate God,
Whose blessing breaks through
The traumas of the past
And brings rest to our souls:
Meet us, please, where we have need,
Where we are bound
By unhelpful expectations or hurtful patterns
…
Teach us your gentle and humble heart,
The one Isaac discovered. 

In Christ, whose yoke is easy: Amen.

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[1] More specifically, she orchestrates Jacob’s deception of his father (Gen 25:5-17) and manipulates her husband into sending Jacob to her family (Gen 27:46).