It Ain't Over 'Til it's Done

You know who I admire? I admire Jacob in the Old Testament. This man was seriously flawed. Flawed...but determined. My favorite event in Jacob's life is when he wrestled with God. Hip out of joint, in obvious pain, he wasn't letting go or giving up. This guy didn't know when to quit. 

"So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”
But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”
The man asked him, “What is your name?”
“Jacob,” he answered.
Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”
Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.”
But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there.
So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”
he sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip." 

~Genesis 32:24-31

Have you met people who thought God had enough to do without hearing of THEIR problems or who thought it selfish to request anything from God for themselves? That thought is a deception. The Bible is rich and full of verses encouraging us to present our requests to God. 

Jacob didn't just "politely request". He grasped, he wrestled, he held on... It takes a lot of pain for me to WANT hold on that tight, ready to pray until my "hip is out of joint!" I am ashamed to say, it takes a lot to drive me down to my knees for that long and that hard. I don't want to wait that long anymore.

So here I am this morning. Life is bigger than my own wisdom (which I always was but I can fool myself into thinking "I've got this" when I haven't stepped out in faith into what I would consider "difficult"). I'm quite honestly hiding in my room searching out wisdom from God and refusing to start the day until I feel God's "touch" and confidence that HE is over my day, that HE is doing the work, that HE is building "my house", that HE is working in my kids and in my marriage and in the details and the minutes of my day. I don't just want God in my day but in my minutes and in my seconds. 

The days of easy prayers and polite asking are over. I want to be the one whose prayers include wrestling and writhing in the dirt, sweaty and grasping tight, asking for what looks impossible, not ready to give up until it's done, walking away with a limp...