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He was alone at night…
And a man showed up…
There was a battle…
An epic wrestling match as the man tried to leave and the other just wouldn’t let him go…
“Just let me go…the Sun is coming up…”
“No…”
“I won’t let you go…till you bless me.”
Jacob got that blessing that day as recorded in the book of Genesis chapter 32…
He got blessed…but he was changed…
The record says that Jacob was limping after this interaction…
An interaction with supernatural power caused a change in Jacob…He was both blessed…and he was forced to limp…
You ever go to the scripture…
And have to wrestle with it?
You read something that just don’t make sense to you…so you have to wrestle with it…
I know…I Know…your piety won’t allow you to ask really hard questions of the text…
But somebody told me once not to be scared to asked the hard questions of God…God is big enough to handle them…
So you read a text that seems to imply that God is calling for genocide: “…kill men, women, and children…”..Yep its in the book…
Do you just ignore it or skip over it without fully considering? Or do you condemn those who wonder about the text…or do you struggle with the text?
Do you wrestle with it?
Do you have the audacity to ask God questions that aren’t easy?
Do you hold on TO THAT TEXT and say “I don’t know how long it takes…I may not be ready to preach it yet…But I won’t let go of this text till God blesses me…”
Sermons that are the product of such wrestling show….
It may be daybreak…it may be a month from now…it may even be a lifetime…But if you “wrestle” with the text like that…you will be changed…
And…
You may walk around with a limp…But you will have a blessing that other more shallow readers can only dream of…
Keep on preaching yall…
Brother Sherman
P.S. – Here is my method of deep reading of the text: https://gumroad.com/products/okfy
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