The Struggle

Living in Haiti for eight years now has forced me to think a lot about what it means to struggle. Webster’s defines “struggle” as “to try very hard to do, achieve, or deal with something that is difficult or that causes problems.” This word best translated into Haitian Kreyòl is “loute” (pronounced “loo-tay”), which also means “wrestle”.

Haiti is a land of struggle, a land of wrestling. The greatest struggle in Haiti is the problem of poverty, which is linked to so many other struggles. This is attested to through the fact that when you are to greet someone in Haiti by asking “how are you?,” you will occasionally get the response, “m ap loute,” which means, “I’m struggling!” It’s not a complaint as much as it is a reality; it’s just the way things are.

The reality is that life is a struggle. This is evidenced especially in current events. People on all sides of all the issues are struggling, wrestling, fighting, trying to gain dominance. This life is struggle.

In the Bible, the best known example of this sort of thing is Jacob’s wrestling with God (Genesis 32). This is a weird story that interpreters of Scripture have no shortage of explanations for. Jacob, for his whole life, is a fighter, a struggler, a wrestler. Jacob even fights with his twin brother Esau when coming out of the womb. It is in Jacob’s DNA to fight to try to get on top. Jacob even manipulates his way into first place in the family tree (with the help of his mother). Jacob also fights with his father-in-law Laban for his daughters and his family. He loses the fight once when Laban gives him the wrong daughter on purpose. Jacob won’t be bested twice. Jacob wins the second time.

Jacob is the epitome of human struggle. He represents all of us. He represents the human fight for dominance and the struggle to get what we wants. He is all that it is to be human.

All of Jacob’s wrestling and struggling comes to a climax when he wrestles God himself. In this wrestling match, however, Jacob comes out of it transformed; this time around, Jacob receives blessing and another name. Not only this, but in this struggle with God himself, he officially receives the inheritance to be the hope of the world (as noted in his name “Israel”). This is the one through whom redemption would come to the world. The name “Israel” means “he strives with God”.

All of this indicates that struggle is instrumental in redemption. Salvation doesn’t come into the world, nor into the life of an individual without struggle. It is through struggle that God works, blesses, and makes his presence known. Struggle is where the Holy Spirit concentrates the power of God for salvation.

Is this not true of the cross itself? The cross is where humanity wrestles with God, God submits, yet wins the hearts of men.

This can help us consider the struggles in our lives in a new light. We can welcome them, invite God into them, ask God to transform and bless them. It is in our struggle that God’s work is most powerful. The God of the Bible desires to partake in our struggles with us. He wants us to wrestle with what it means to be with him, to walk with him, to be blessed by him. This is the stuff of relationship. Struggle is the fire of purification.

Struggle with me today and invite God into a broken world. With me, invite God in to redeem our struggles.