To wrestle with God

I assume that many of backslide because we end up fearful to wrestle with God, because maybe we know the pain of His reprove.  But it is necessary to get that blessing and growth. 

In accordance to Biblical context, Jacob/Israel literally had to wrestle with God in order to receive his blessing.  He supposedly wrestled with God for hours on end. 

When Jacob/Israel wrestled with God, Jacob got beat up; broken leg and everything.  When we sojourn with God and get His reprove we get beat up too; spiritually.  It all kind of hearkens back to the saying of Jesus Christ when He told everyone in Matthew 21:44  "Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; anyone on whom it falls will be crushed."  That stone is Jesus Christ and when you come to Him, that which is lacking in your gets refined.  However you have to go through that refinement or "breaking".  

Two wrestle with God is, despite the pain of reprove, despite the anxious feeling of having to forgo your personal pleasure, despite the discomfort of being told that God disapproves of something you do, despite even the shock of being told that you have to repent...that you still time after time go before the Lord and listen to whatever He wants.  Jacob/Israel did this until the morning time came and he did not let go of God, until the Lord blessed him.  We have to do our "wrestling" with God by going before Him, praying, reading His book, going to His congregations, fasting, and doing the works He set before us.  And we don't cease our "Wrestling"--our spiritual "wrestling" with God, until He blesses us.  That's how we'll achieve the blessing.  The pain of having a broken leg is nothing to gloss over.  It's pretty bad.  Yet Jacob did not cease holding onto God.  You're going to feel some pain when God proverbially breaks your leg by telling you to stop doing things that are evil in His eye, or to do something outside of your comfort zone.  But in the end you get the blessing.  

Many of us don't want to move forward outside of our comfort zone because we fear the risk far outweighs the benefits.  So we end up not growing or seeing a whole new world, because we we're so content and used to rolling around in mud with animals.  There are some brethren in Christ who literally stay in houses or neighborhoods that are falling apart.  Some of them will be squatting in houses without basic utilities, but because they grew up in that neighborhood or in that house, that's all they know.  They don't know about the stars above them or the lands far beyond their own.  They may be afraid of the change or the pain that comes with breaking out.  So they end up staying in their former billet just surviving, instead of thriving.  

Imagine how many Jews back in ancient times literally wanted to go back into the slavery of Egypt instead of ruling their own kingdom in Israel?  God never lied to the Hebrews He freed from slavery.  He led them all to eventually have their own Kingdom and a dynasty of Kings from David.  Before that they were in Egypt getting an Egyptian fist in their mouth.  But imagine how many of us want to stay in mediocrity, surviving barely in our own personal version of Egyptian slavery, instead holding onto the Lord and ruling our own Kingdom?  

Now like the time Jacob/Israel wrestled with God, Jacob got roughed up.  The Hebrews who left Egypt also got roughed up.  They had to move through the desert, deal with giants that could rip them up, and then fight neighboring pagans that didn't like their face.  But it all led to somewhere.  It all eventually led to a Kingdom, both earthly and heavenly, a name for history, and eventually a blood line that was allowed to link to the Son of God Himself.  If they didn't take that chance and just remained in their squalor, then they would be nothing but a passing mention in history.  

Don't let yourself become a passing mention.  Hold onto the Lord and rise to greatness.