July 8 - Tuesday of the 14th Week in Ordinary Time, Year I

(Gn.32:23-33;   Ps.17:1-3,6-8,15;   Mt.9:32-38)

 

“You test my heart, searching it in the night.”

 

“You have contended with divine and human beings,” the angel says of Jacob; and so he receives his new name, Israel: “he strives with God”.  Such striving with the Lord in this night which has set upon the earth is our lot in life.  May we prevail upon Him as has Jacob.

As he is about to reenter the Promised Land after fourteen years away, fearful for what awaits – particularly in the face of the potential anger of his brother Esau, whose birthright and blessing he has assumed – Jacob sets himself apart from all things and alone prepares to confront the Lord.  We are told he wrestles all the night with a “man,” for indeed as such does God appear to him through His messenger.  In contending with the Lord, Jacob remains strong and earns the blessing of his new name.  He is a worthy combatant in the struggle to know God in this life, and so, “on waking” the next morning, as he goes forth at dawn, he is “content” in God’s presence; he is prepared for any danger which lies before him.  And reconciliation with Esau he shall find.  And the father of the Israelites he has become.

How much easier it is for us to behold the face of God, to come to know Him whom our souls long to see, now that Christ has come.  And yet the struggle goes on; it is not over, but rather finds a certain intensification through clarification in the shadow of the cross.  We see in our gospel how Jesus Himself struggles.  His children are “like sheep without a shepherd,” “lying prostrate from exhaustion,” and He must become exhausted as they, as He tours their towns, constantly teaching and preaching and healing all their infirmities – and all this while being accused of doing the work of “the prince of demons” by those in the role of leaders.  The struggle Jesus undergoes is most evident in His entreaty to His disciples: “Beg the harvest master to send out laborers to gather His harvest.”  Jesus desperately needs assistance.

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