How God Uses Our Struggle

Jacob wasn't someone who endured very well. We could label him as someone who struggled.

Have you ever pulled up to your house with a trunk full of groceries and turned what should’ve been a multi-trip task into a single-trip balancing act, struggling to get everything in the house at the same time?

That’s essentially life. Whether you’re carrying groceries, kids, jobs, or relationships, we all struggle in different ways. The groceries scenario is something we could avoid, but sometimes, with struggles in our lives, we can't avoid it.

But the good news is that God doesn’t avoid those moments either.

We’re not surprised that life is hard. Struggle is part of the deal, and on some level, we expect it. What we don’t expect is that God would want anything to do with us in it.

The narrative we carry is that if we struggle, it means we’re doing something wrong.

We think that because things are hard, difficult, or challenging, that’s proof that something’s wrong. We confuse God’s presence with the ease of the situation.

But what if that’s not the story God is writing? What if we have it backwards?

What if He doesn’t meet you after the breakthrough? What if He meets you in the breakdown?

When discomfort or struggle shows up in our lives, we usually try to get out of it.
 
Our first instinct isn’t to embrace it – it’s to escape it.

• A job that feels impossible
• A relationship that’s cracked and crumbling
• An internal battle no one sees, but you’re exhausted from fighting

Struggle comes in all shapes and sizes, and when it does, we start to tell ourselves that the uncomfortable feeling means it must be wrong. We think God can’t possibly be in this, so we must’ve done something wrong.

Eventually, we reach a point in our lives where we can't outrun our struggle, and we have no choice but to deal with it head-on.

And Jacob does this too:
Birth – Even before he took his first breath, Jacob was already struggling to get ahead. He was born grabbing his twin brother Esau’s heel, trying to be the first twin to emerge.
Birthright – In that culture, the older son was entitled to position and inheritance. Jacob schemed his way into trading that birthright with Esau for a bowl of soup.
Blessing – And if that wasn’t enough with his brother, Jacob lies and deceives his father into giving him the blessing that was meant for Esau by pretending to be him, taking advantage of the situation.

His deception fractures his family and forces him into years of hiding, living on the run because Esau is going to kill him for what he’s done.

Genesis 32
22 That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two female servants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. 23 After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. 24 So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.

Endurance Begins When You Stop Running

It’s when Jacob’s alone that it says a ‘man wrestled with him until daybreak.’ This is what scholars call a “theophany” or an appearance of God in human form. So, it’s God revealing Himself to us. It’s like a Biblical Easter Egg.

But it’s only when Jacob is finally still and alone that God shows up to wrestle him.

God often does His deepest work when we’re alone.

We spend a lot of time and energy trying to outrun the things that make us uncomfortable. Sometimes it’s not outright running away, but it’s running to things to distract ourselves, anything that helps us avoid the tension of our struggle.

• We bury ourselves in digital distractions
• We pour ourselves into our jobs
• We throw ourselves into good things, like causes
  
  

But some of the deepest, most life-changing work God does in us doesn’t happen in the noise, crowd, or even the Sunday morning service. It happens when we’re finally alone. No distractions. Just us and Him.

This moment with Jacob highlights something in us – often, we think that a solution to our struggle means relief from what we're wrestling with.

We want God to provide relief, but God wants to provide transformation.

We want the quick way out, the fast fix, but God wants transformation. A transformation that lasts, that builds something in us. The work God’s doing in our lives is a slow, sustaining, transforming work. God wants to develop endurance in us through the struggle that transforms and builds us.

God Wrestles Not to Defeat You, but to Define You

Genesis 32
25 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. 26 Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”

Struggle has a unique ability to provide perspective for us. It’s not until you’re struggling that you realize your vulnerability, and it’s in those moments of struggle that we have a choice – we can hold on to our abilities or we can hold on to something else.

Some battles aren’t about dominance, they’re about dependence.

Some battles aren’t about winning, they are about clinging. Our default thinking is fight mode. We think we need to defeat what we’re dealing with. There’s a version of this in our culture, politics, and social commentary that we need to fight and win. It’s a winning culture that idolizes dominance, platform, being right, and showing our strength.

But what if some struggles in life can’t prove your strength, but reveal your need?

That’s the problem with struggle. It doesn’t show how strong we are, it shows how strong we aren’t. Jacob wrestles with God and decides not to let go. We have that same invitation.

Genesis 32
26 Then the man said, “Let me go, for it is daybreak.”
But Jacob replied, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”
27 The man asked him, “What is your name?”
“Jacob,” he answered.
28 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 isn’t condemned, he’s redefined.

God doesn’t beat him down or defeat him. God rewards him for wrestling with Him, for struggling.

You are not the sum of your struggle.

Because of Jesus's work on the Cross and the Resurrection 3 days later, we are now reconciled to God. God doesn't hold our sins against us anymore.

So, we do struggle, but we also carry a new name. God doesn’t see us as our struggles, but sees us as someone who’s been through it, wrestled with it, and clung to Him through the night – and is still standing. Not because you’re strong, but because you belong to the One who is, because of who you clung to.

You May Walk Away Limping, but You’ll Walk Away Changed

Genesis 32
29 Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.”
But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there.
30 So Jacob called the place Peniel,[g] saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.”
31 The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel,[h] and he was limping because of his hip. 32 Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip, because the socket of Jacob’s hip was touched near the tendon.

Jacob calls that place Peniel, which means “Face to face with God” – I wrestled with God and I’m still here.

But then Scripture says something incredible. The first time the sun rises on this new man, Israel, this new identity, he’s limping. He actually limps for the rest of his life. He has a scar.

Sometimes, the scar is the blessing.

The thing that leaves a mark on you and in you is the blessing. Not because the pain was good, not because what happened to you was right or fair, but because that’s where God met you. The scar can be physical, emotional, or spiritual, and is a living testimony that your story isn’t over. It proves that God is still using you and isn’t finished with you. The suffering and fragility of life don't define you.

The scar is the thing that God uses in our lives to build endurance, and because it brings us face-to-face with God, it’s the moment He chooses to step in and reveal Himself. God isn’t just with us in our victories, He’s with us in our struggles.

Look at the struggles in your life as the places where you encounter God, where He meets you, and continues to meet you. Name the pain, the place, and what God is renaming you.

This is the purpose of our struggle – to get alone with God and bring Him our struggle, to wrestle with Him, but to walk away blessed. You may not walk away the same, but you will be still standing, even if it’s with a limp.

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