Genesis 32:22- 31; Matthew 14:13-21
Rev. Laura J. Collins
August 4, 2002
I had been a solo pastor for almost one year at a small church. The assistant treasurer was quickly dying of an aggressive cancer in his liver and the wife of the treasurer was in the hospital recovering from a coma which resulted from brain surgery. Her recovery was complicated by her multiple sclerorsis and depression, with which she had been struggling for years. The treasurer and I had become good friends over the year, spending time either in the hospital keeping vigil during his wife's coma or at the church together, working out the monthly financial reports.
So when I got a call that he was also in the hospital I dropped everything and dashed over. I found him in intensive care and discovered that he had attempted suicide. I was astounded and prayed with him as best I could. A few days later he called from the psyche ward, where he had been moved for observation. He said he needed to talk to me and I could tell it was urgent. I went right over and when I arrived he wasted no time getting to the point. He had attempted suicide, he told me, because he had been embezzling from the church for months to cover all the family's medical expenses. The bank account was empty and there was no money there for this month's payroll.
It was an anguishing time for all of us -- for him, in his shame and physical pain. For his teenage son, who now had a mother in a brain rehab center and a father in a psyche ward. For me, as their pastor, feeling deep compassion and concern. And for the session, who now had to deal with the whole financial and pastoral mess.
The session came up with a compassionate but responsible plan for the treasurer to pay back the debt and avoid prosecution and eventually the financial piece of the picture got resolved to everyone's satisfaction. The wife got out of rehab and was doing better at home. The teenager got accepted into a college program that would allow him to pursue his interests and start fresh. And the treasurer, though he never felt he could show his face in that church again, found a job in a near-by city that allowed him to start over as well.
I stayed in close touch with all of them until they moved. Just before the move I was over for a last visit. The treasurer had fallen during his suicide attempt and badly damaged the nerves in one shoulder. As a result, even after months of rehabilitation, he had limited use of that arm. As I was expressing my sorrow for that disability he smiled at me and said, "No, Laura, it's OK. It's the reminder that God is leaving me. I know that you have forgiven me and that I have been given a fresh start. But I'll never be able to forget what happened. This arm will always remind me and humble me and bring me back to God."
In this morning's text from Genesis, Jacob wrestles all night long with an angel and leaves the next morning with a blessing and a limp. Like my treasurer friend, Jacob is a character with a past that involved cheating and stealing and hurting those he loved. And like my treasurer friend, he was left with a physical reminder of the struggle in his soul. This story embodies the spiritual struggle for many of us. We like to see ourselves as Jacob, wrestling with God all night, demanding to know who God really is and leaving, if we're lucky, with only a small limp but also with a deep sense of blessing.
Many of us have found ourselves in tough situations -- in desperate financial straits or in terrible illness or estranged from family, perhaps -- and longed to know where God fit into the picture. Are we being punished, we might wonder, even if that image of God doesn't really fit our understanding of a gracious God? Has God forgotten me and left me to my own devices? And so, in moments of vulnerability, like Jacob was experiencing in that dark night before he met his angry brother, we reach out for God, fighting to find a blessing in the midst of our distress.
And what we discover, in those vulnerable moments, is that the blessing may come, but the wound remains. We are people dependent on God for a life of blessing, though almost inevitably, we struggle to the point of woundedness to find blessings without God. Our woundedness reminds us of our vulnerability and keeps us humble -- not as a punishment, but as a sign along the road we each must travel on the way to find where God would truly have us be.
The story of the feeding of the 5000 is another story about blessing. It is one of the few stories of Jesus' ministry that is found in all four of the gospels. The last supper is also in all four -- two stories of food and blessing. In the feeding of the 5000, the gospels agree that Jesus had gone away to find some peace, but that the crowds had pursued him and found him out. They all tell of the five loaves that are available and the two fish. And they all report that twelve baskets of leftovers remains after all the people have been fed.
What struck me this week, as I read again the story in Matthew's gospel was Jesus' compassion and the disciples' frustration. Jesus sees the hungry crowds, who have prevented him from having any quiet rest time and rather than resentment, he feels compassion because he sees how badly they long for healing and love. The disciples see the same crowds and almost lose their minds: "Send them away before they turn on us in their hunger -- get rid of them, Jesus!" But instead of sending them away, Jesus turns to the frustrated disciples and says, simply, "You give them something to eat."
The disciples can't imagine how they can feed the crowds, but Jesus says, "Just give me what you've got and let me bless it." So they give him the small amount of food and he blesses it and everyone, somehow, gets enough to eat and more. Everyone is filled. Everyone is satisfied. There is even food left over.
It reminds me of the Luke passage I shared with the children this morning or of the 23rd Psalm: "my cup runs over." Not, "my cup is full," but my cup is more than full. Life lived in the blessing of God is abundant to overflowing.
I was reading a book recently about how to build a terrific church. The author was a little too peppy for my taste, but I was caught up short by this line: "...church leaders should stop praying, 'Lord, bless what I am doing,' and start praying, 'Lord, help me to do what you are blessing.'"(1)
Life lived in God overflows with blessing, but are we asking God to bless our lives as we desire them or are we asking that we might find the life that God desires to bless? Jacob wrestled for years and finally, on one long night, when he was on his way back to make peace with his estranged family, he discovered how blessed he was.
The disciples followed Jesus for months, but still tried to live by their own wits, rather than by Christ's blessing. Wondering how to feed the hungry crowd they were flumoxed. Jesus, in his compassion, gently suggested, "Start by offering whatever it is you have to offer and watch how I can bless it."
We may feel that what we have to offer is not enough -- not enough to help our struggling families, not enough to feed a hungry world, not enough to make a difference. Jesus says to us, "Start by offering whatever it is you have to offer and see how I can bless it."
When we struggle to do it our way, we find ourselves wounded and frustrated and lost. But when we find ourselves walking with God, our wounds become our blessings and the healing of the world begins. May we learn to pray together, "Lord, help us to do what you are blessing."
(1) Warren, Rick. The Purpose Driven Church (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995). p.15. (Back to text)
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