From Bethel to Peniel

As we continue on our series on Isaiah 43:1-7 on Wednesday, we considered Christian responsibility and commitment to personal spiritual growth.

We discovered that Jacob fought almost everyone. He fought Esau in the womb (Genesis 25:22–26), Esau again over the birthright and blessing (Genesis 27), Laban over wages and flocks (Genesis 29–31), and even his own wives and children in the tangled loyalties of his household. But the one person he never fought was himself until Peniel (Genesis 32:22–32).

There is a shift from ‘God is here and i am not aware of it’ (recognition) in Bethel (Genesis 28:16) to Peniel to ‘God is personal, face-to-face’ and in between that are the wrestling and costly transformation. The wrestling is the bridge. Jacob fought with everyone but himself until he saw the glory of God and became undone. He was seeing advantage, bargaining, injustice and consequences until he had to face himself. I think the vision of him fighting with man and God was his journey of discovering himself.

He spent his life seeing advantage (the stew, the blessing), bargaining (Bethel’s vow, “if God will be with me…”), injustice (Laban cheating him), and consequences (fleeing from Esau, facing him again). He was always looking outward, calculating, scheming, or reacting.

But the wrestling at Peniel changed the direction of his gaze. The text says a “man” wrestled with him until daybreak. Who was Jacob fighting? He thought he was fighting an adversary, perhaps Esau’s angel or God. But in that long, dark struggle, he came to realise: the enemy he was clinging to and grappling with was also the one he needed to bless him. And in that grip, he had to face his own reflection.

When he demanded, “Bless me” (Genesis 32:26), and the stranger asked, “What is your name?” (Genesis 32:27), that was the moment of undoing. For the first time, Jacob spoke his own name aloud: “Jacob” (deceiver, heel-grabber). No more blaming Laban, no more fearing Esau, no more bargaining with God. Just honesty: I am Jacob. And God replied, “Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel” (Genesis 32:28).

He became “undone” because the wrestling stripped away every mask. The limp was the physical sign that his self-sufficiency had been broken. And when he said, “I have seen God face to face, yet my life has been been delivered”—that’s not just survival. It’s the wonder of a man who finally saw himself clearly in the light of God’s presence, and instead of being destroyed, was renamed.

Isaiah said when he experienced God’s glory he was undone. In Isaiah 6:5, he said, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” Mose face-to-face at cleft of rock was second encounter with God’s glory that gives meaning to the 40 years of running. Jacob’s wrestling was the picture of a journey of discovering himself under the reflection of glory.

What does this mean for us today? Like Jacob, we often spend our lives looking outward, at our struggles, our opponents, our unfair circumstances, our past failures. But transformation does not come by fighting everyone else. It comes when we stop running, turn toward God, and let his glory expose who we really are. That exposure is painful at first; it feels like undoing. But it is the very place where God renames us and gives us a new destiny.

So do not be afraid to draw close to Him. You can come closer to God. James says, ‘Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you’ (James 4:8). The closer we draw to Him, the more we see ourselves undone, and then the true image of God’s Son emerges (2 Corinthians 3:18). Don’t be put off by your struggles, challenges, or the past. Seek God’s glory, and your name will be changed; your destiny will emerge .

Kay Alli