Justice That Listens, Wrestles, and Heals

10.19.2025

[Readings]

Genesis 32:22-31 Jacob’s struggle with the angel: I’ll not let go until you bless me

Psalm 121 My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. (Ps. 121:2)

2 Timothy 3:14—4:5 In the presence of Christ the judge, proclaim the message

Luke 18:1-8 The widow begs for justice; God grants justice to those who cry to him

Grace and peace to you from our awesome and loving God.

Today, we meet God through stories that listen, wrestle, and heal.

Jacob’s story shows us that struggle can birth blessing. The Psalmist lifts our gaze to God’s vastness. Paul reminds us of urgency. And Jesus centers us in persistent prayer, especially when justice feels far away.

Each story carries a shared gospel truth: God hears prayers. God grants justice. So today, I want to focus on two words: prayer and justice.

Most of us probably share a similar understanding of prayer, a time set apart to be in intimate relationship with God, whether through words, feelings, thoughts, or actions.

I invite you to sit with the word justice for a moment. What is justice? Whose justice? Yours? Mine?

Let’s look at the roles mentioned in Genesis 32 and Luke 18.

1. Jacob’s justice is through blessing and identity—he wrestles.

2. Esau’s justice is through reconciliation—he chooses forgiveness.

3. The widow’s justice is through persistence—she refuses to be silenced.

4. The judge’s justice is distorted by convenience—He responds to pressure.

What emotions stir in you when you hear the word justice in each context?

For Jacob and the widow, it might be longing and weariness. For Esau and the judge, maybe frustration and also weariness. That weariness seems to be shared by both sides. It’s the ache of an unresolved issue.

What emotions stir in you when you hear the word justice in each context?

It depends on whose shoes we’re standing in. And that same lens invites us to ask: Whose justice does God embody? Or perhaps more theologically, of those four, who has the kind of faith that embodies God’s justice through prayer, like Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane?

Even if we’re not lawyers or judges by profession, we all play the role of judge sometimes. Unlike Jesus, we often justify things, people, or choices based on our own values and context.

So what does a judge do? A judge listens, weighs evidence, and renders a verdict: declaring who’s guilty, who’s free, who wins, who loses.

How is the judge in Jesus’ parable? He justifies his decision not by empathy or love, but by convenience: “She keeps bothering me. I’ll grant her justice so she’ll leave me alone.” His reasoning is self-protective. He doesn’t act because it’s right. He acts because he’s tired.

And yet, Jesus uses this story to show us something deeper: God hears prayers. God grants justice. If even an unjust judge responds to persistence, how much more will God respond to those who cry out day and night?

There’s a cost to persistence, a good one. This is how God’s kingdom works.

Jacob’s story is a powerful example of a kingdom (divine) encounter. He wrestles all night with a mysterious figure, often interpreted as God or an angel. He refuses to let go until he receives a blessing and a new name: Israel, which gives birth to a nation, the Israelites, shaped by struggle and God's love.

His injury wasn’t punishment or shame; it was the imprint of a divine encounter. It’s transformational, a moment that redefines identity, relationship, and purpose.

How God’s kingdom works continually redefines and reshapes how we do church and be the church.

This is what we have learned about how God's kingdom works.

• Persistence in God’s kingdom is rarely painless.

• Justice and blessing often come through wrestling, not ease.

• And God does not take the wrestle lightly.

After our first preschool chapel last month, something happened that made me pause and reflect. Before I could evaluate how it went, something deeper surfaced: the need for shared purpose and values. Without them, even a Well-executed chapel can feel strangely hollow.

And that’s true beyond chapel, for instance, in equipping ministry leadership or, more recently, in our annual budget planning. If we don’t begin with shared values, then even our most thoughtful verdicts might still feel like injustice.

Why? Because verdicts without shared values can bring shame instead of trust, guilt instead of grace or even silence whoever is involved. When we justify decisions based on convenience or pressure rather than on values and purpose , we can easily miss the restored relationship in Christ, including the justice Jesus speaks of: the kind that listens, wrestles, and blesses.

As you’ve heard, over the past month the Church Council has spent many hours crafting a budget for the congregation to vote on next month. None of them are taking this lightly. You’ll receive a letter from the Church Council this coming week.

So, it’s the perfect time and opportunity for the congregation to pray, to pray for the Council, for the budget, and for the upcoming vote so that this church may strive with God and with our wider community in justice.

This week, may we ask: Where am I justifying by pressure, and where am I being called to justify by God’s love?

May we justify outcomes by a meaningful purpose that energizes and motivates us, and by God's love that shapes us.

Let this justice guide us forward:

It is a justice that

listens with presence,

wrestles with courage, and

heals by honoring the wound.

Amen.