There are many journey stories in Scripture, illumining different facets of the spiritual journey. In Genesis (32:23-33), we read that Jacob was traveling home from a foreign land where he had acquired two wives, eleven children and a large herd of sheep and goats. His family had gone on ahead. He was alone. In the dark, he met a stranger and the two of them wrestled all night. The stranger could not prevail and Jacob refused to end the bout till he had received a blessing. The stranger, whom Jacob identified with God, did bless him. But before he left, he struck Jacob on the hip. From that day on Jacob limped.

This story makes it clear that a spiritual journey is not always smooth and uneventful. Much of what     happens on such a journey is cause for celebration: Jacob had acquired a family and great possessions. There are also obstacles on this journey, and a person has to struggle to overcome them, as Jacob did. A   person may be wounded on the journey, as Jacob was, but he or she can recover and discover that the wound was a blessing.

A person may try to deny that the obstacles exist or attribute them to some other person or to some other cause. A person may try to avoid the struggle to remove them by plunging into some kind of feverish activity or by procrastinating about taking action. But until a person acknowledges the obstacles and wrestles with them hand to hand there will be little growth in his or her relationship to God and neighbor. The person may not succeed in removing the obstacles completely. That is unimportant and of no significance. What is important is the commitment to the struggle to overcome them. It is similar to what we say about a journey. The destination is not important. The journey, and how we make the journey, is!

The journey of life is the same. Unfortunately too many people think that the destination is important (and they usually think heaven is the destination). What is important is how we make the journey – who we become on the journey! Since life is eternal, what makes us think that our journey will cease with one lifetime on earth? Wherever we will be after this lifetime, we will still be on a journey. We won’t just be stagnant, sitting on a cloud playing a harp! We will still have an opportunity to grow and develop as the spiritual children of our Creator-God. We will still be challenged to continue the journey of spiritual transformation!