Genesis 32. The beautiful Word of God. We come to it respectfully and with great anticipation because this is not just the words written by Moses, but they are inspired by the Holy Spirit. This is God's breath. Amazing. So let's pay attention to it. I'll read out a good clip, you know, God's word here.
Jacob went on his way. The angels of God met him. When Jacob saw them, he said, "This is God's camp." So he called the name of that place Mahanaim. Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau, his brother, in the land of Seir, in the country of Edom, instructing them: "Okay, thus shall you say to my lord Esau: thus says your servant Jacob, you know, I have sojourned with Laban and stayed until now. I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, male servants, female servants. I have sent to tell my Lord in order that I might find favor in your sight, Esau.
Okay, the messengers returned to Jacob saying, "Well, we came to your brother Esau, and he is coming to meet you, and there are 400 men with him." And Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. And he divided the people who were with him, and the flocks and the herds and the camels, into two camps, thinking, "Well, if Esau comes to the one camp and attacks it, then the camp that is left will escape."
And Jacob said, "O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac, O Lord, who said to me, Return to your country and to your kindred that I may do you good. I am not worthy of the least of all of these deeds of steadfast love and of the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant. For with only my staff I crossed this Jordan, and now I have become two camps. Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him that he may come and attack me, the mothers with the children. But you said, but you said, I will surely do you good and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude."
And so he stayed there that night, and from what he had with him, he took a present for his brother Esau: 200 female goats and 20 male goats, and 200 ewes and 20 rams, 30 milking camels and their calves, 40 cows, 10 bulls, 20 female donkeys, 10 male donkeys. And these he handed over to his servants, every drove by itself. And he said to his servants, "Pass on ahead of me and put a space between drove and drove."
And so he instructed the first one: "Esau, my brother, meet you. And he asks, to whom do you belong? Where are you going? And whose are these ahead of you then you shall say, They belong to your servant Jacob they are a present sent to my lord Esau. And moreover, he is behind us
And he likewise instructed the second and the third and all who follow the droves. "You shall say the same thing to Esau when you find him, and you shall say, you know, moreover, your servant Jacob is behind us For he thought, "I may appease him with the present that goes ahead of me, and afterward I shall see his face. Perhaps he will accept me."
So the present passed on ahead of him, and he himself stayed that night in the camp.
Now the same night Jacob arose and took his two wives, his two female servants, his eleven children, and he crossed the fort of the Jabbok. And he took them and sent them across the stream and everything else that he had. And Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day.
Now when the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob's hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. And then he said, "Let me go, for the day has broken."
But Jacob said, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."
And he said to him, "What is your name?"
He said, "Jacob."
And then he said, "Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, but have prevailed."
Then Jacob asked him, "Well, please tell me your name."
And he says, "Well, why is it you ask my name?" And he blessed him.
And so Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, saying, "For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered."
The sun rose up as he passed Peniel, limping, limping because of his hip. Therefore, to this day, the people of Israel do not eat the sinew of the thigh that is on the hip socket, because he touched the socket of Jacob's hip on the sinew of the thigh.
So far, the reading of God's holy and inspired Word. Amen. May He bless it to our hearing. Please be seated.
I don't know, this Jacob, you know, this guy, he's a okay, you want to say it nicely. He's a planner. He's a planner. he thinks it through. and you know, he dots all the I's and crosses the T's. That's the good part about him. Now, you could also say he's a manipulator and a deceiver. You know, so whether or not he's just planning sometimes, or, you know, whether or not he's twisting and deceiving and manipulating, it's like a control issue with this guy. It's always been this way with Jacob.
You know, he came out of the womb like this, grabbing the heel. Esau's heel, He's trying to one-up him, take the preeminence, secure his own. Of course, he steals the inheritance. You know, he fools the old man in his infirmity and weakness, takes advantage of the folly and idolatry and worldliness of his brother. And, you know, later, he gets sent up north. He's, you know, paying the consequences partly of what he did to Esau. And, you know, he's a mama's boy. Mama's trying to protect me. She said, "All right, go get yourself a woman. Go way up north. Get away from Esau. Let things cool down." And he gets there, you know, falls in love with Rachel. Probably a shallow guy. Leah didn't look so, you know, she wasn't so easy on the eyes evidently. Oh, but Rachel, she was beautiful, you know. All right, so go for Rachel. Fine. So he's going to do what he always does. He's going to lock it down.
Laban says, "What are you going to do?"
He says, "All right, I'll control this situation. I'll get my girl. Seven years, I'll work for you."
How'd that work out for her? Well, he met his match with his uncle Laban, though, didn't he? So he's tussling with him. And, you know, he's going through life. We all go through life. You know, things happen. Things come up. "Oh, can't have children with Rachel. All right. So now they've got fertility problems. Then they've got this competition between Leigh and Rachel. So, you know, how does he do it? I mean, the guy's exasperated. So, you know, he does what he does. He takes control of the situation. He takes control by capitulating to his wives in a bad plan in this case. You know, he's giving the servants. Well, I don't know. One servant to another: Bring it in. Have relations with the servant. Produce these children.
He gets in the middle of this child contest. Things are spiraling out of control. It's funny, you know, in that story, when the women are getting after him and complaining they can't have kids, and he's just doing the absolute wrong thing instead of trusting the Lord and pleading with the Lord, he's, you know, just doing, taking the servant women and producing all these children, and it's crazy. And there's mandrakes, like fertility drugs involved, it's ridiculous.
Anyway, you know what he said? He goes, he complains to Rachel: "Am I in the place of God? This is not my. I didn't close your womb. Why are you mad at me?" But it's ironic. I mean, this is a guy who plans and who manipulates and deceives. He's always acting like he's in the place of God. He can't control this situation. Well, okay, then he has a challenge that he's got to separate from Laban. So they got to, you know, got to figure out how to do that. So he decides this weird thing of sorting out the flock and deceiving Laban, marking the sheep and the goats, the ones that he wants, so that it breaks the right way. Crazy. I mean, this is his issue. It's control.
And here's what happens in 32. Right now, Esau, he's going to, you know, he's going to catch up to him now. You can't avoid it any longer. There's going to be the reunion. He's terrified about what's going to happen as he's headed back down south. And so look at what he's doing. He splits the camp.
And that's obvious why he splits the camp: he's expecting defeat, so at least let him sacrifice half of the camp, you know, and he'll be able to keep the other half. I don't know how you feel about that plan. Um, I don't know how you feel about the other part of the plan, which is the four tiers. Which is this is a weird one. So what's he, what's he thinking? He's like, "All right, so I'm going to split up all the presents the bride, basically. I'm gonna give Esau so he doesn't kill me and take all my stuff, and I'm going to split it up. Whatever I'm going to give him, into four parts. And I'm going to send some of the servants first, and I'm going to give him the four things. And if like he, he, he takes that gift and he's still angry, or he rejects the gift, or he doesn't care, or he just plunders it and moves on still with murderous intent, um, at least some word will get back to me, and there'll be time between the, the first present and then the second drove of presents, you know, and maybe, maybe he'll cool off, you know?
I don't know, so maybe at least there'll be more time. Uh, maybe he'll be persuaded. Maybe by the time he gets four sets of gifts, like, he won't want to kill me anymore."
So what I'm trying to say is with splitting the camp in two or setting this for them by the way this is what I use against my wife, Lena. She's here by the way, Lena and John. So make sure you say it. And this is what I, I like, so there's some wisdom in this. Let me just this is free. So Pastor Gordon said, "Please preach on something related to, you know, male leadership in the church." So here you go. I'm going to tell you how it goes.
So when your wife is mad at you, we were telling Chris and Darcy: "So she's been mad at me. I bought this big, old, beautiful car. It's a big car, though. And she doesn't like it because I park it at an angle in the driveway, which is fine. I leave plenty of space for her car, but she doesn't think so. But you know how they are. So she says, okay. So every day she comes home, she yells at me. Okay, fine. So I said, I'm going to give her four tiers of gifts and leave space in between.
So the first gift, it's Christmas is coming up. I'm going to spoil the surprise, Lena. Forgive me. Christmas is coming up. I'm going to give her a first gift three, four weeks before. I'm going to give her a vacuum cleaner. Leave a few days. Next week, those special dishwashing sponges that you like, the ones with, the you know, the SOS pad underneath. Another week goes by. I'm going to give her tickets to the basketball game that she loves to go to with me. And by then she doesn't calm down, I'll bring the heavy: Two passes to the new Chinese buffet in town. Special date. Four tiers. I got a good plan. Jacob's got a good plan. See how it works?
You can look at it as a good plan, or you could look at it again: there's a control issue, you know? It's manipulating and deceiving, you know? It's weird.
It's like interspersed. Between he splits the camps and then he does the four tiers, what's between that in chapter 32? Well, it's this beautiful prayer. It's this beautiful prayer of saying, "You know what, I can't control this situation. I'm scared. I don't know what to do. Esau is definitely going to kill me. Can you help? You know, you're the one that promised, and I'm exposed. So will you help?"
I think that's what God wants from him. I know that's what God wants from him.
You know, God attacks him. The end of the chapter, we're wrestling with this man. What is this man? This man is, evidently, this man is God. I mean, you know, first of all, Jacob, verse 24: Jacob is all alone. And all of a sudden, a man wrestles with him until the break. What man? There is no man. He's in the middle of nowhere, isolating himself on purpose. So whatever, God takes a human form and attacks him, and engages with him, basically, by my calculation, like a six hours. It has to be like at least six hour tussle with Jacob.
By the end, Jacob knows who he's interacting with: "I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered."
God attacks him. Why is God attacking him? Well, first of all, think about this. God takes human form and attacks Jacob. What kind of a contest is that? That's not a contest. I mean, so I already know if God comes down and he really decides, "I'm going to use my full force on Jacob," Jacob is dead immediately. Obviously. So then he's kind of... So you know he's throwing the match.
What does it say? He says, "Let me go, for the day has broken." God doesn't need to tell him, "Let me go." He can smite him dead. "Let me go the day has broken." So he throws the match. God throws the match.
It's like before John got a little bit older, and I don't want to wrestle him anymore. It causes injuries for me. But before when he was young, I liked to wrestle him. And you know how it is as a dad? You wrestle with a boy. What are you doing? I mean, obviously, you're not using your full strength. But you throw the match a little bit. You let him stay in it for a while. For the six hours, you know, you go at it a little bit. You let him feel like they're strong, you know, they're in control. They could plan. They could use their moves on you. And then you get a little bit tired It's not like you can't handle it But when you get a little bit tired, you give them one to put an end to it. Put their hip out of joint. That's what's going on here.
You want to remind them a little bit. So what am I saying? What I'm saying is God is attacking Jacob. He wants to condescend to him. He wants to show him: "No, no, no. You're not in control. You're not in control of anything. I don't want you to forget that. God is the one putting the screws to Jacob."
What is he trying to do? He's trying to show him that behind all of life's challenges and all of life's pains and all the times that he's stretched, God is behind it. I mean, there's proximate causes. You know, of course, Laban. Laban has his reasons what he's doing with Jacob. Esau has his reasons what he's doing with Jacob. Everybody has their reasons what they're doing with Jacob. All these situations Jacob finds himself in. Behind all of them, God is the one putting the screws to him, causing his discomfort. He's trying to show Jacob's dependence on God, trying to humble Jacob, trying to help him: "Hey, Jacob, you're a planner. Sometimes you're a deceiver and a manipulator. And what you're missing, Jacob, is that humility and recognition of life, that whatever challenges are before you and whatever pains you have and scars, what's behind it is I'm attacking you, I'm engaging you, I'm aggressing you, because I want to show you your dependence on me."
I'm going to tell you, this is a hard lesson for the planners, especially, and the manipulators and the deceivers. But, I mean, in a sense, we're all that, you know, people of control. that you know, the situations that you're facing in your life where. I mean, it might be a question of thinking: "Am I, you know, I believe in God, am I, what can I do to make God accept me?" And when we think like that, God wrestles with us. He's attack us. Tell us: "Hey, there's nothing you could do. Okay? You're dependent on me. You are morally, you were born corrupt. You're from the ancestor of death, Adam. And And from that fount come sins of your past and still struggle with sin and temptation every day. So I want you to see your dependence on me for any goodness or standing before me in the first place, okay?
What about happiness? What about I just want to get through life? I don't know, trivial ways, but you know, we're like everybody else. You just want to be happy, you just want to be all right. I just want to be okay. You know, health, fine. Uh, problems, relationships, all of it. I just i just want to get through it. Um, how things going to turn out for me in the future I, okay, there's an approach in life which says i am in control Now, see, planning is good. Planning is not a bad thing. But you could plan in a way planning is productive. We need the planners. The thing about planning is though, if you can get tempted to thinking that you're in control and that you have the resources and the power to make the process and the end how you want it, and for you to be okay. God is here to tell us, and to tell Jacob: You don't have that power. you don't have that. control. Let alone if you manipulate and you deceive. You keep trying that. it makes you tired
And it doesn't work. Not really. And, so he's wrestling with Jacob. And, you know, I'm going to tell you, that's the point, one of the points, obviously, here. You know, he's wrestling with you. In your, you know, in your trials and in your pains and in your challenges, like he's wrestling Jacob to give us a perspective on what's really going on, okay? You're, God has an issue with us. What he's always trying to teach us is our moral inability and our life inability to control it, to make it okay.
But why? Well, thanks a lot. You know, he comes down, wrestles Jacob. Does he kill him? Because that, you know, I mean, that would be fair. I mean, we could kill him. You can say, yeah, for all the times you deceived and manipulated, and even in your planning, you know, we're trying to take control of the situation. You have no control. All this time I've been making these promises to you. You don't listen to me. You take it into your own hands. And you know what? You're done. I smite you. No, he didn't do that. He let him win.
The man, I'll read it again, you know, he wrestles with him till the breaking of day. By the way, the length of the match, this is what life is, man. It doesn't stop in this age that you have the challenges and the pains and the scars. It's just how it is. And it's a lifelong lesson that we're learning again and again: our dependence, our inability, our lack of control.
Yeah, so by the way, get that message, pastors, elders, deacons, husbands, fathers. You know, we have challenges always in our lives, in our ministries, in our relationships, in our work, in our service for the Lord and His church. The church faces obstacles. You know, okay, listen to Him. We don't have that strength. We don't have that control. When we plan and when we labor, let's do it humbly, but we trust the Lord with the results and what's good. And we give Him the glory, and we don't have a higher view of ourselves than we ought to have. Okay, so that happens. Lifelong lesson. Why? "Let me go." Oh, but Jacob is learning. All right, though, no, you know what? "I'm not going to let you go unless you bless me."
I thought Jacob had the upper hand. Oh, but Jacob had the upper hand, but he gets the message by now. Oh, no, you're teaching me that I'm dependent, but that you come to engage me because you do, you want to provide where I am weak and where I fail, right? This is what God wants from him. God wants him to more consistently grow and act like the prayer, the beautiful prayer that he prayed.
And you know, Jacob's story, like, he really changed it. When you first read this prayer in chapter 32: "O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, O Lord, who said to me, Return to your country and your kindred that I may do you good. Listen, I am not worthy of the least of all these deeds of steadfast love and of the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant. Please, you deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him that he may come and attack me with the mothers and children. I'm afraid. I can't do it. But you had said your promise: I will surely do good. Make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered from multitude.
That prayer there was never a prayer like that on Jacob's heart, from his heart and on his lips before this. Nothing like that. beautiful and mature. Christian prayer like that. Person who recognizes his dependence, but not just his dependence, but recognizes the power and the promise of God.
So this is what God wants out of you. When He brings you to the point of recognition through your pains, through your challenges, through your scars, through the things that you don't choose, but here you are struggling along through your confusion: "How can this ever be okay in my life? I don't know. But I know you don't have the resources. I know I don't have the resources, but God is telling you, I do, "I do. And here's the thing. I have promised to recreate you as part of the new humanity and take you into the new heavens and the new earth. And if I love you that way so much that I am with you every single day and moment of your life through all your challenges and pains. In fact, I'm behind them, not only to teach you your inability and your dependence, but let me tell you something: You know that thing about wondering about if you ever can be good enough for me? I got you. Of course you can't ever be good enough for me. I love you. I give you my beloved gift of my beloved Son, my only one. He comes and does obedience for you. He suffers his whole life, especially on the cross, to take your judgment away. I am not your enemy. I'm not your enemy. I'm your friend. I love you. I receive you. I care for you. I always accept you. I began a good work in you. I'll be faithful to complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.
I know that thing we have, the more mature we become as Christians, probably what happens, the more aware of the distance that we have, right? That irony of the Christian, life, oh, the more mature I become as a Christian, the more humble I become as a Christian, what am I thinking? Well, now I just look in the mirror, I really see what's there. I'm like, oh, come on. Still, you know, that's what he wants because he says, I take care of it. I take care of it. And I want you to keep asking me for grace and for forgiveness and for compassion because that's what I'm all about. I'm slow to anger. I'm abounding in love to all those who fear me.
So, you know, he produces in him the faith: "I will not let you go, Lord, until you bless me. You know what? I'm a sinful man. But I will not let you go unless you forgive me Like completely and always. Cover me in the righteousness of Jesus Christ and apply His precious blood for the forgiveness of all of my sins. Yeah. And you know, everything I need in this life and the next."
You know how I think about it? know, your life is, but I, you know, the thing is: Why does God put his beloved people through trials? Sometimes we know from the scriptures these general reasons why we go through trials. Other times we don't know. Or the really bad things that you go through in life. It's like you wonder, "How possibly could that be okay?" And "As long as I'm alive, that's not going to feel okay and be okay." Well, here's the thing: I don't know, and God a lot of times doesn't tell us. Of course. But I'll tell you this: He tells us, "You don't have to know how it's going to be okay, but it will be because I am with you and I have made promises to you. And everybody else may feel their promises, and you may have weakness in your plans, but I don't have weakness in my plans, and I will accomplish your peace, your satisfaction, your life, and I will take care of you until I send my Son to take you home."
You know, but I mean, Peter he says things like, you know, one of the reasons you go through trials, actually, is so that you know it results more in praise for God. So, for example, God wrestles with you right now. You have some scars you bear in your life. They may be with you until you die, until the Lord Jesus returns. It's fine. Peter says, "You know what? Here's one reason why. Let me give you a little perspective. Because at the end, when it's okay, people are going to say, you know what's amazing is that God's love and power and grace preserved even that guy through what he went through, through what she went through and what is going to demonstrate all the more is the amazing love and saving power of God that would have been less visible and less celebrated and less amazing to behold if you had it easy."
Now I'm going to say something to you, brothers and sisters, respectfully, as more serious, you know, Christians. Escondido URC, important church, godly church, sanctified people of God that I've learned from, that I continue to learn from. Let me tell you something for mature Christians to understand: You know, I think that you, honestly, if you're honest in your heart, you would accept that exchange. You will you know what? I will take it. I will take a hard life and I will take scars and I will take God coming at me through the circumstances of my life if what it means is if he could assure me that the reason for it is that he will be more praised later because everybody will know that there was no way that I could have withstood that spiritually and stayed with him, but because he's gonna preserve me and he's going to persevere with me in His love and grace and devotion to me all the way until the end in my brokenness. Then people are going to give Him more glory than they otherwise would have. So, right? So nobody would boast about me, but everybody boasting Him. Would you take that deal? I know you would.
What's the best way our life can be used? Go through challenges, pains, bear scars. Why? So that Jesus Christ may be praised.
So he produces in Jacob this increasing confidence: "I will not let you go unless you bless me. I got nothing to stand before you, and I got nothing to make it all okay. So I'm doubling down on trusting in Your promises, O Lord, to me."
So on the one hand, God wants to humble you and make you dependent on Him morally and for everything in life and for everything to be okay in this life and the next. And secondly, He wants to renew your confidence that He absolutely will forgive you, preserve you, bless you, and make everything okay through this life and on into the next stage.
Tell Him, "Don't let me go. I won't let you go until you bless me. I won't let you go until you bless me."
This is what God wants from godly male leaders. This is what God wants from godly Christians. He wants you to go through life walking with a limp because you recognize your dependence on Him. But your confidence is not in yourself. Your confidence is in God, your faithful Savior.
Amen. Amen. Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, thank you for that you love us so much that you, that you will tangle with us through the circumstances in our lives and the scars that you place on us to build our, you know, to humble us, but to build our confidence and trust in you. And thank you that you never crush a bruised reed or you never quench a smoking flax. But in our weakness, you are strong, and you are always sufficient. Help us to renew our confidence in you. And then as we walk with a limp, that it be an encouragement to others who will put to death their own self-confidence and turn away from themselves to Christ who loved them and gave himself for them as well. And in Him reign in glory forever and ever. We desire, Lord, that you would be the most exalted as you restore and heal us and raise us from the dead someday and make us happy. Come, Lord Jesus. We pray in His name. Amen.