Jacob, as today’s first reading begins, is an improbable hero. Born a twin, he has tricked his twin brother Esau out of both his birthright (his father’s wealth) and his father’s blessing. Now, both obeying his father to find a wife from the family’s own kin and escaping Esau’s threats on his life, Jacob begins a journey to his mother’s brother, Laban.
With our 21st century values, it is easy to be scandalized by Jacob—by much of the book of Genesis. How could these characters be God’s choice? How could they be heroes?
Those questions, often asked by the “nones” who have given up faith, seem worth wrestling with. (The term “nones” is popularized by Bishop Robert Barron in his evangelism work. It refers to those who check “none of the above” on religious surveys.)
What is the Will of God?
I wrestled a lot with scripture last week—begun by reader responses to last Monday’s reflection. The topic last week was Abraham’s intercessory prayer for the people of Sodom and for his nephew Lot. Readers responded with a deep question, “How can we know the will of God?” Should we pray for what we perceive as good for others? What if our prayers go against God’s will? If God’s will is always good, should we pray at all for others? Doesn’t God know what he is going to do, anyway? Should we not just pray to know and do God’s will?
Those questions, asked directly or indirectly last week in reader responses, are often asked by those of us who live lives of faith. We probably all take refuge from time to time Isaiah 55: 8-9 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
We don’t understand what God is doing, so we just accept it.
And, indeed, that acceptance is often the difference in a life of faith or a life without faith. Those without faith cast stones at us, at God, at Scripture, and say some form of “There is no God” or “I am spiritual, but I am not religious” or, they follow that old Beatles song, “Imagine:” “Imagine there’s no heaven, its easy if you try, no hell below us, above us only sky.”
Jacob–A “None”?
Having read Genesis 25-28, I would say that Jacob would be considered a prime candidate for those young, millennial “nones.” He is off to find a wife, live as good of a life as he can, and “the God of Abraham and Isaac” is not yet the God of “Jacob.”
Yet, in today’s Scripture, God comes to Jacob in a dream. He is at a holy place and stops for the night. He takes one of the stones from the shrine for a pillow (not an overly religious thing to do), and goes to sleep. He has a dream in which God speaks to him: “I, the Lord, am the God of your forefather Abraham the God of Isaac.” God makes promises to him: “The land on which you are lying I will give you and your descendants. These shall be as plentiful as the dust of the earth…In you and your descendants all the nations of the earth shall find blessing. Know that I am with you; I will protect you wherever you go, and bring you back to this land. I will never leave you until I have done what I promised you.”
Jacob, like a good “none” is impressed—but not convinced. When he wakes up he says, “Truly, the Lord is in this spot, although I did not know it! How awesome is this shrine! This is nothing else but an abode of God, and that is the gateway to heaven!” Yet he also says “IF God remains with me, to protect me on this journey I am making and to give me enough bread to eat and clothing to wear, and I come back safe to my father’s house, the Lord shall be my God.”
It sounds like he is not yet entirely convinced. An improbable hero.
Improbable Heroes and the Will of God
Is he any more improbable than the rest of us, or than our friends and relatives who are among the practicing “nones”—who believe or not, but who do not regularly attend mass, examine their consciences with the 10 Commandments and the Beatitudes, and make God the center of their lives?
That is where my research in the catechism last week around the question, “What is the will of God and how can we know it?” can give us help and hope.
I looked up “will” and “will of God” in the index of the catechism. Paragraphs 51, 294-295, 541, 2059, and 2822 are referenced. In comments last week I quoted 2822, which is explaining what “Thy will be done” means in the Our Father.
Another, perhaps even clearer reference is in paragraph 51: “It pleased God, in his goodness and wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known the mystery of his will. His will was that men should have access to the Father, through Christ, the Word made flesh, in the Holy Spirit, and thus become sharers in the divine nature.” (CCC 51)
As I read all the references put together, God’s will is what that first question in the old Baltimore catechism said, “God made me to know him, to love him, to serve, and to be happy with him in this world and the next.”
God’s Will Is to Draw Us to Himself
God always seeks us. He finds and encounters us—sleeping at a shrine like Jacob, grieving like the synagogue official or yearning like the woman with a hemorrhage in today’s Gospel, seeking like us readers of A Catholic Moment, or journeying to create a good life like a contemporary millennial “none.”
When God encounters us, he gives us a taste of his Presence, of his will. He draws us to his goodness, his life of love, truth, fidelity, and relationship. He touches us in some way. His will is to draw us.
We have free will. We can respond with “My God and my All!” or “If you follow through on your promises” or “No thanks.”
We are all improbable heroes. Somewhere on the journey. God’s will is we take another step to get a little bit closer.
For me, this is a great relief, a piece of guidance that is very helpful. I’m an “all in” Christian, but I still struggle daily with what is God’s will. Should I spend my afternoon this way or that way? Does God want me to join this activity? What about what the author of this book says for my prayer? What about my friends opinions about what my politics should be?
A Guideline
A guideline I can use is: Does this activity or decision draw me and/or lead me to draw others closer to love, truth, fidelity, relationship, to “love the Lord, my God with all my heart, with all my mind, with all my strength, and my neighbor as myself.” (Matthew 22: 37-40).
And, as Jacob shows us today, that can also be applied to those who are still a distance from faith: what leads them a step closer to being loving, truthful, responsible, and in committed relationships? Jacob’s dream didn’t turn him into Israel (another dream did). But it renewed him on his journey.
Today Jacob is an improbable hero. Tomorrow, with another dream, he takes another step. Before the week is over, his 12 sons will be in Egypt.
Prayer:
Lord, as I look at my life, I am an improbable hero. Yet you have called me, pulled me, closer to you again and again and again. Thank you! And thank you for this insight I have in trying to figure out what is your will for me. Your will is what draws me toward you and toward being like you. Help me to keep this understanding before me as I make all kinds of large and small choices. Your will is never evil, though you don’t run from pain, suffering, and evil. Life may put me in the middle of all those things. But YOUR WILL is to draw me ever closer to you…and, by being your disciple, for me to draw others. Let me live your will today, Lord.
To read research on the “nones”
