There is power in the story.
Jesus spoke into the Rabbinical tradition of teaching through the telling of challenging and difficult stories.
I heard an old Jewish story the other day that goes something like this…
A Rabbi stood with his son at the bottom of a set of high wooden stairs. Lifting him on to the first stair, the Rabbi urged his son to jump. It was not very high, and the boy trusted his father, so he jumped into his open arms.
Next the Rabbi placed his son on the second step. This was a little more scary, but still the boy trusted- so he jumped again- and landed safely in his father’s embrace.
And so it went on- each time climbing another step, then the jump, and the catch. “Well done my son” said the Rabbi.
Eventually, the son stood at a dizzying height, peering down at his father in trepidation. “Jump son, Jump” said the man. So, with shaking knees, he took to the air.
And his father watched the leap, and stood back.
The boy clawed himself to his feet, bleeding and crying.
“There, my son” said the Rabbi “That will teach you.”
What on earth is that all about then?
Something about the uncertainties of life, and the inevitability of suffering.
The failure of all authority figures, sooner or later.
And- most disturbingly of all- the unpredictability of God. The apparent injustice of God.
Or perhaps the deeper, mystery of God. God beyond the temporal. God the uncertain.
No tame God whose role is to grant our lifestyle wishes.
A God who calls us to leap- with no promise of featherbed landings.
But leap we must- sooner or later.
this fragile tent 
There are so many choices that we make in life when we close our eyes and hope for the best..this is a very good and apt post…because I think as we get older the hope that our faith will really be our destiny in the end sometimes becomes an uneasy one.
Hi Nik
I have been thinking a lot about this business of ‘wrestling with God’- and what it might mean. I think that under all the assumptions and layers of confusion there is something pure and unimaginably beautiful- something we catch little glimpses of now- and then it is gone. But so often, we try to define this thing in order to ‘stake a claim’- in the same way that an ancient people might raise up their totem against their neighbours. For me the experience is much more uneasy than this- but what is left is- wrestling!
Cheers
C