We're continuing our series in the book of Genesis this morning.
If this is your first time with us or first time in a while,
we've been walking through the book of Genesis,
and we've made our way here this morning to chapters 32 and 33.
You notice we're kind of taking some bigger chunks at a time now
as we get into the later portions of Genesis.
These narratives kind of expand a little bit.
And so it's our practice that as we read the Word of God,
we stand in honor and in reverence of the Word of the Lord.
If you are physically unable or hindered in any way from standing, that's okay.
You can take a seat.
But if you would, when you found Genesis 32 and chapter 33,
let's stand this morning in honor of the reading of God's Word.
Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him.
And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is God's camp.
So he called the name of that place Mahanaim.
And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau, his brother, in the land of Seir,
the country of Edom, instructing them, Thus you shall say to my lord Esau.
Thus says your servant Jacob, I have sojourned with Laban and stayed until now.
I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, male servants and female servants.
I have sent to tell my lord in order that I may find favor in your sight.
And the messengers returned to Jacob and said, We came to your brother Esau, and he is coming to meet you.
And there are 400 men with him.
Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed.
He divided the people who were with him and the flocks and the herds and the camels into two camps,
thinking, 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 the deeds of steadfast love and all 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, but the children.
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.
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 and 10 bulls,
20 female donkeys and 10 male donkeys.
These he handed over to his servants, every drove by itself, and said to his servants,
Pass on ahead of me and put a space between drove and drove.
He instructed the first,
When Esau my brother meets you and asks you,
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.
He likewise instructed the second and the third and all who followed the droves,
You shall say the same thing to Esau when you find him.
And you shall say, Moreover, your servant Jacob is behind us.
For he thought, I may appease him with a 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.
The same night he arose and took his two wives, his two female servants, and his eleven children,
And crossed the ford of the Jabbok.
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.
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.
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?
And he said, Jacob.
Then he said, Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel,
For you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.
Then Jacob asked him, Please tell me your name.
But he said, Why is it that you ask my name?
And there he blessed him.
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 upon him as he passed Peniel, 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.
And Jacob lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, Esau was coming, and four hundred men with him.
So he divided the children among Leah and Rachel into two female servants.
And he put the servants with their children in front, then Leah with her children,
and Rachel and Joseph last of all.
He himself went on before them, bowing himself to the ground seven times,
until he came near to his brother.
But Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him, and they wept.
And when Esau lifted up his eyes and saw the women and children, he said,
Who are these with you?
Jacob said, The children whom God has graciously given your servant.
Then the servants drew near, they and their children, and bowed down.
Likewise, Leah and her children drew near, and bowed down.
And last, Joseph and Rachel drew near, and they bowed down.
Esau said, What do you mean by all this company that I met?
Jacob answered, To find favor in the sight of my Lord.
But Esau said, I have enough, my brother.
Keep what you have for yourself.
Jacob said, No, please.
If I have found favor in your sight, then accept my present from my hand.
For I have seen your face, which is like seeing the face of God, and you have accepted me.
Please accept my blessing that is brought to you, because God has dealt graciously with me,
and because I have enough.
Thus he urged him, and he took it.
Then Esau said, Let us journey on our way, and I will go ahead of you.
But Jacob said to him, My Lord knows that the children are frail,
and that the nursing flocks and herds are a care to me.
If they are driven hard for one day, all the flocks will die.
Let my Lord pass on ahead of his servant, and I will lead on slowly,
at the pace of the livestock that are ahead of me,
and at the pace of the children, until I come to my Lord and see her.
So Esau said, Let me leave you with some of the people who are with me.
But he said, What need is there?
Let me find favor in the sight of my Lord.
So Esau returned that day on his way to Seir,
but Jacob journeyed to Succoth,
and built himself a house and made booths for his livestock.
Therefore the name of the place is called Succoth.
And Jacob came safely to the city of Shechem,
which is in the land of Canaan, on his way from Paddan Aram,
and he camped before the city.
And from the sons of Hamor, Shechem's father,
he bought for a hundred pieces of money
the piece of land on which he had pitched his tent.
There he erected an altar and called it El Elohe Israel.
The grass withers and the flower fades,
but the word of the Lord endures forever.
Father, we pray once more as we sit under the preaching of your word.
God, would you empower the preaching of your word
for the good of your people and the glory of your name.
We pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.
You may be seated.
Are you a confident Christian?
If so, what is the source of your confidence?
It's been a long time since I watched the movie The Lion King,
but I remember it well.
Maybe you do as well.
It was one of my favorite movies to watch as a kid,
and you probably remember that it follows the story of this young lion named Simba,
who is full of confidence.
He knows that one day soon he will inherit all of Pride Rock.
He's going to be king of the animal kingdom.
He has these promises ahead of him, so he's very confident.
But unfortunately, what we learn about Simba is that his confidence is misplaced,
and it makes him reckless.
He goes headstrong into the elephant graveyard,
and right before the hyenas come and they come for him,
he utters that famous line.
You remember what it is?
I laughed in the face of danger.
Ha, ha, ha.
Of course, what he didn't understand,
and what he realized quickly when the danger came,
was that he was not, in fact, prepared for the danger around him,
although he thought he was.
He was not, in fact, strong enough to handle it on his own,
although he thought he was.
The only reason why he was safe and secure out there up to this point
was that Mufasa, his father, had watched over him
and protected him and safeguarded him from the danger.
His confidence was sadly misplaced.
In our passage this morning here in Jacob's story,
what we see is that Jacob comes to a similar realization.
Jacob, up to this point, you remember, he has relied on his own strength.
And like many of us, Jacob wrestles with this problem of self-sufficiency.
He's wrestled, he's relied on his own tricks.
He's relied on his own effort to get him through.
But what we see here this morning is that God loves Jacob enough
to teach him a hard lesson.
God wants him and us this morning to understand that this is misplaced confidence.
When danger comes into the life of a believer,
we can be confident, not because we are strong,
but because God is strong on our behalf.
So the big idea for us here in our passage this morning is this.
The believer can face their fear of man by looking to the face of God.
So let's take a look here at our passage.
We'll see it in three parts this morning.
This is our outline.
If you're a note taker, this will help you follow along.
First, we see that the believer sometimes fears man.
The believer sometimes fears man.
Look there to verse 1 of chapter 32.
And let's just kind of recap here and remember where we've been up to this point
with Jacob and his story because we're kind of coming to an end of Jacob's story.
And we have followed him literally from the womb, haven't we?
We saw Jacob come out of the womb grasping his brother's heel.
We've seen him lie and cheat his way into the blessing.
And you remember how Esau felt about all of that?
Esau wanted his brother Jacob dead.
And so Rebekah, Jacob's mother, sends him away to family members off in Haran
to go and find a wife.
And on his way there, Jacob goes to sleep.
He lays his head on a rock and he takes a nap.
And what does he see?
He sees this miraculous vision of angels ascending and descending,
this stairway or this ladder up to heaven.
God met with Jacob there and reassured him of his plans and his promises for him.
Jacob makes his way over to Laban.
20 years go by.
We see the Lord has blessed Jacob tremendously.
He has wives.
He has 11 sons.
He has flocks.
He has herds.
God has delivered Jacob from all the family drama with his father-in-law Laban.
And now God has said, it is time, Jacob, for you to go back home.
But there's just one problem, isn't there?
What about Esau?
Jacob knows that that threat of Esau is still looming there in the background.
I mean, do you think that maybe he's forgotten about being tricked?
And maybe 20 years have gone by and Esau has kind of calmed down just a little bit.
I don't know.
Maybe Esau's dead.
Jacob has no way to know.
He can't pick up the phone and call.
He can't check social media and see how Esau's doing.
He has no way to know whether or not that threat has been resolved.
Maybe Esau has just forgotten about the whole thing.
Or maybe Esau has been waiting for 20 years for the chance to squash his little brother, Jacob.
And now Jacob is walking right into the path of danger.
Jacob's on his way.
But just as God did with Jacob on the way out of Canaan, so now on the way back into his homeland, verse 1,
it says the angels of God met with him.
And we don't have any more information on this meeting, do we?
But I think it's probably safe for us to assume that they have come yet again to assure Jacob and to remind Jacob,
yes, there's danger ahead, but Jacob, remember, God is with you.
Jacob, God is for you.
Jacob, God has called you to go into this place.
His word has compelled you to go.
Your circumstances have changed, but God's promises haven't changed.
The danger is there with you, but God is there with you.
These messengers come and they comfort Jacob.
They assure him of God's presence with them.
And so Jacob, he comes out of this meeting with these angelic messengers of God.
And then look what he does.
He sends his own messengers before him to go and meet with Esau.
And here's what he says.
He says, verse 4,
Tell my brother, I've been sojourning with Laban.
I've stayed there until now.
I have oxen.
I have donkeys.
I have flocks.
I have male servants.
I have female servants.
Translation, go tell my brother, I am rich beyond your wildest dreams.
And buddy, my checkbook is open.
I can give you anything you want.
Just please, please, please do not kill me.
The messengers come back to Jacob and they say, well, we've delivered the message.
Esau is coming to meet you.
And he has 400 men coming with him.
You can imagine how this seems to Jacob, right?
Jacob, he has the promises of God.
He knows God's plans for him.
And yet, look at this threat that's right there in front of his face.
Jacob knows intellectually what God has said.
But the reality that's right there in front of his eyes says something different, doesn't it?
That danger that he can see with his eyes is terrifying and it's overwhelming for Jacob.
I mean, you may have experienced something like this, Christian.
You know in your heart, you know in your mind the promises of God.
You know what God has said.
But of course we know just belonging to God, being a Christian, does not remove you from the dangers of this life, does it?
And sometimes when you come across something that's really overwhelming for you, we can be tempted and prone to be afraid.
How do you respond when fears arise?
Jacob, we've seen, he's sort of a mixed character, isn't he?
Jacob, he responds with this sort of mixture, this mixed trust.
It's partial dependence on himself and partial dependence on the Lord.
On the one hand, Jacob, he sees the threat coming and he immediately flips into survival mode.
Some of us, that's our reaction, isn't it?
And we start strategizing.
He splits up his people, he splits up his flocks, he splits up his herds and his camels.
He divides them into two camps.
He starts strategizing.
And this guy is never without a plan, is he?
This is the schemer, remember?
But then, here in verse 9, in the middle of all of this danger and worry, look what he does.
Jacob stops to pray.
This is the longest recorded prayer in the book of Genesis, here in verses 9 through 12.
And I want us to look here at this because Jacob gives us a model of how we can pray, believer,
in the moments of fear and danger.
Look what he says.
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.
You notice what he's doing?
Jacob is praying in light of who God is.
God, you are the God of my fathers.
You are the God of Abraham.
You are the covenant God of Isaac.
I've heard the stories.
You are faithful.
You're the faithful covenant God who's carried them through.
Jacob prays in light of what God has said.
He prays in light of the promises of God.
In fact, he prays God's word right back to him.
You see that?
God, you said go back home.
You said go home that I might do you good.
You said that, God.
He prays with a posture of confession and thanksgiving.
You see the humility here.
He says, I'm not worthy, verse 10.
I'm not worthy of the least of all of the deeds of steadfast love and all of the faithfulness that you've shown to your servant.
I only had a staff when I crossed the Jordan and now look what you've done.
And finally, verse 11.
After all of this, in light of all of this, he asks God to act.
Please deliver me from the hand of my brother Esau.
For I fear him.
God, I'm afraid.
I fear that he will attack me.
I fear that he will attack the mothers.
I fear that he will attack the children.
But you said, God.
You said, I will do you good.
You said.
You remember?
I will make your offspring as the sand of the sea which can't be numbered for multitude.
You said that, God.
And so, God, would you please do what you've promised to do?
Church, this is how we ought to pray.
When danger comes.
When, not if.
Right?
When danger comes.
And when, like Jacob, we experience this fear and this worry and this anxiety of what may or may not happen.
Here's what I want you to do.
I want you to go and find a place.
Take your Bible with you.
It's okay to pray with your Bible open.
That's good.
Right?
Pray God's word back to him.
Pray God's promises back to him.
God, you said.
Praise him for who he is.
God, you are good.
I know you're good.
You've shown yourself to be good.
God, you're faithful.
God, you're strong.
God, you're sovereign over this and every other circumstance.
Pray humbly.
Confess your sin to him.
Not from a position of you owe this to me.
But I am unworthy of all of this that you've done for me.
And then ask him.
Ask him to act on your behalf.
Jacob models for us how to pray in the face of danger.
But then look at this.
It's like as soon as he says amen and gets up off of his knees, he gets back to work.
It's like he can't help himself.
He can't let go of this sense of control.
Y'all ever struggle with that?
I know I do.
Verse 13 says he stays there that night.
He doesn't want to keep moving towards Esau.
And so he sends these gifts ahead of him.
He divides up all the flocks, all the camels, all the bulls.
He sends them in waves.
For he thought.
Now this is interesting.
Verse 20.
He thought I may appease him with the present that goes ahead of me.
And afterward I shall see his face.
And perhaps he will accept me.
You probably have a note in your Bibles if you look down at the bottom.
That gives you a little bit of a different way to translate that verse.
And I think that this emphasis is important.
The word face shows up four times in that verse.
If we were to translate it in kind of a wooden stiff way, it would say something like this.
That I may appease his face with the present that goes out from my face.
Afterward I shall see his face.
And perhaps he will lift my face.
Jacob is fearful of seeing the face of Esau.
He's fearful that his own face will be ashamed and even destroyed.
And see he's so worried about this that he can't even sleep.
You know how sometimes you lay down to sleep and you're so anxious.
You're so worried.
You have so much on your mind that you just can't get any sleep at all.
That ever happened to you?
You get up.
You make sure the oven's turned off.
You go check on the kids.
Make sure they're all still sleeping in their beds.
Make sure the doors are locked.
And maybe you know that you've got to have a hard conversation.
When you wake up tomorrow and you're worried about how that might go.
What you might say.
There's something ahead of you that's keeping you up.
You ever had that problem?
Verse 22.
It says,
That same night he gets up and he takes one last safety measure.
He takes his two wives and his two female servants and his 11 sons.
And he sends them up north across the ford of the Jabbok.
He's just got one last little scheme to pull off.
Jacob's kind of complicated, isn't he?
His flashes of dependence and then flashes of self-sufficiency.
It looks for a minute like he's depending on the Lord.
And then he's right back to scheming.
It's partial dependence on God and partial dependence on self.
I know God has promised I'll make it safely home.
I know that he'll bless me and I know that he'll multiply me.
But still, here am I stressing out.
I can't even sleep.
And here I am scheming on how to work all of this out in my own strength.
Aren't we just like this, church?
Think about whatever it is that you fear the most.
That could be sickness.
That could be death itself.
That could be the loss of a loved one, the loss of a relationship.
Maybe you're like Jacob.
You have some family issues that you just don't want to deal with.
You're afraid of seeing that person's face again.
We can all be prone to fear, whatever that is.
But friend, the question is,
How do you respond as a believer to the fears that are in your heart?
We see second.
Second, the believer looks to the face of God.
Look there to verse 24 with me.
Jacob is there in the middle of the night all alone, it says.
It makes that point.
He's all alone.
And then it says,
All of a sudden, a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day.
What in the world is going on?
It says they wrestle all night long until the breaking of the day.
And when the man sees that he didn't prevail against Jacob,
he just touches his hip socket,
and Jacob's hip is put out of joint as he wrestles with this man.
I mean, that's not exactly what you want to happen
the night before the biggest battle of your life, is it?
This is out of nowhere, right?
Who is this guy?
And where does he come from?
We have no introduction to him at all.
We just have Jacob by himself at night,
and then this dude jumps down from the top rope,
and he's wrestling Jacob all of a sudden.
You read the commentaries.
You hear what people say,
and some say that this is Jacob's guardian angel.
Others say that this is Esau, his brother.
I don't know how they reconcile that somehow.
Others, they kind of psychoanalyze this,
and they say this is just kind of a story.
Jacob's wrestling with his guilt.
He's wrestling with his fears.
He's wrestling with his emotions and his thoughts.
But Jacob comes out of this with a lip, right?
This is a physical altercation,
a physical wrestling match.
I mean, the best way to understand this, church,
is to say what the Bible says.
The prophet Hosea, in chapter 12,
he says about Jacob,
in the womb he took his brother by the heel,
and in his manhood he strove with God.
He strove with the angel and prevailed.
He wept and sought his favor.
And Jacob is wrestling here with the angel of the Lord.
This angel who is so closely identified with God himself
that to see him, Jacob says,
is to see the very face of God.
This is a physical manifestation of the presence of God.
Some even go so far as to say
that this is the pre-incarnate Christ,
the second person of the Trinity.
And I'm not totally certain enough to say to you, church,
that that is absolutely right,
but it's certainly within the realm of possibility.
It's all just, it's mysterious, isn't it?
Which means that if you still have some questions
about all this,
then I think that that's a good thing.
One thing that we don't want to do
when we come across a mystery like this in Scripture
is to try and over-explain it
and over-analyze it to the point
where it makes us very comfortable.
Because church, I don't know if you know this or not,
but we don't worship a God who fits nicely
and neatly and cleanly all the time
into our categories of thinking.
This is one of those times where it's okay,
it's better even to say,
I don't know exactly how this works.
But clearly what we can say,
because again, the text says it itself,
is that Jacob has engaged in a wrestling match
with God himself.
So I have another question.
Why is God wrestling with Jacob?
And apparently it looks like Jacob's holding his own, right?
What is going on here?
And here's where I want to get an image in your mind, okay?
I want you to picture this with me.
Have you ever seen a dad wrestling with his son?
You know dads and sons like to wrestle.
Drives moms crazy.
I have firsthand experience about this.
Part of that wrestling match
is the father is allowing his son
to test his strength against him, right?
He says, son, you can't wrestle anybody else like this.
You can't fight anybody else like this,
but dad can take it.
So come on, let's go.
And every now and then,
dad will even let his son pin him to the ground
and count to 10, won't he?
And what do you think that does for the son
when he gets dad to say uncle?
Now that is a confidence booster for that kid, isn't it?
He can leave dad and say,
man, if I can pin dad to the ground
and make him count to 10
and make him say uncle,
I can do anything at all, can't I?
But even more importantly than that,
is that son is shown in that engagement
with their father just how strong their dad is.
And that son knows deep down,
even if they don't want to admit it,
that my dad, he can end this fight anytime he wants.
And his confidence is strengthened in his dad
in that moment.
And he believes that if a threat actually comes,
if a threat actually comes against me,
I know my dad can step in,
come to my defense,
and protect me,
not because I'm strong,
but because he is strong.
And they can go to the playground
and face those playground bullies
and say, my dad is stronger than your dad.
And know that it's true.
The Lord jumps in the ring
and wrestles with Jacob
and Jacob is persistent as ever.
He fights all night long.
And when the Lord sees this guy's not giving up,
what does he do?
Pop!
Touches his hip.
Goes out of joint.
And he says,
all right, Jacob, it's time to go.
Let me go.
It's time to stop.
But look at what Jacob does.
He says,
I will not let you go
unless you bless me.
Dad says we're done.
And the son grips him a little bit tighter
and he says,
no, you got to give me some ice cream first, dad.
You see the picture here?
But here the Lord gets to the point.
He says,
son, what's your name?
And he says,
Jacob.
He says,
not anymore.
Your name shall no longer be called Jacob,
but Israel.
Why?
For you have striven with God and with man
and have prevailed.
You know,
in this culture,
in the ancient Near East,
to name somebody,
to name something,
that's a sign of authority over that person.
You think of man giving names
to all the animals in the Garden of Eden.
That's a symbol of authority.
But it's also a symbol of identity.
It's an indicator of who that person is
or who we hope they might become.
The Lord says to Jacob,
from this time forward,
you are no longer that old trickster Jacob.
You're no longer that cheat who grabs by the heel.
You're no longer the schemer.
Now you are Israel,
the one who strives with God.
He gives him a new identity here.
Even so,
Jacob,
still wrestling,
he says,
it's my turn.
You tell me your name.
He's still trying to get some authority over this man,
isn't he?
He's still wrestling with control,
but he says,
why do you ask my name?
He doesn't give in,
does he?
And there he blessed him.
So Jacob calls the place Peniel,
which means the face of God,
saying,
I have seen God face to face,
and yet my life has been delivered.
Do you see what God's just done for Jacob?
God has just shifted Jacob's confidence
off of himself
and where it rightly belongs,
back to the Lord.
He has just seen the Lord face to face
and lived to tell about it.
Sinners don't see the Holy God face to face
and lived to tell about it,
apart from the great mercy and grace of God.
He's seen and experienced firsthand.
Once again,
the Lord is for Jacob.
He's not willing to destroy him,
although certainly he's able.
Certainly he's powerful enough to destroy him.
Rather,
the Lord in all of his strength
is for Jacob
to bless him
and to protect him
and to guard him.
He leaves here with the blessing of the Lord.
He's just been humbled to see
all my strength
and all my craftiness
and all my ability,
all my effort.
I cannot match the power of the Lord.
But guess what?
If this God with all his strength
is in my corner,
what do I have to fear?
He is no longer Jacob,
no longer the trickster,
no longer the one who grabs by the heel.
He is now the one who strives with God.
Christian,
do you realize
that because you are in Christ by faith,
that you share that same confidence in the Lord?
greater even
than the confidence of Jacob.
To be a Christian
is to know
with absolute certainty
that God,
the most powerful being
in all the universe,
the one who spoke
all things into being
with just the words
out of his mouth,
that God
is for you
in Christ.
And to be a Christian
is to know
that when you stand
before the living God,
he will bless you
and not destroy you.
Why?
Because by his great mercy
and grace,
he has done everything needed
for sinners like us
to be made right with him
by the blood of his own son,
Jesus.
It's to know
that he has sent Christ
to live
and to die
and to rise
for us
so that any who simply
put their faith in him
will be washed
clean of our sin,
forgiven of our sin,
made new
in his sight,
given new identities
in him,
made a new creation
before him.
Whatever is in your past
before Christ,
that is no longer
who you are in Christ.
God has made you
a new creation
by his grace.
And to be a Christian
is to know
that what lies
ahead of you,
church,
the promises
that lie ahead of you.
God has promised you
such incredible blessings
in this life
and especially
in the age to come.
And if he's promised you
this by his word,
certainly
he's capable
of bringing you
safely home
through any danger
that this life
might bring.
Who is stronger
than your God?
Who is able
to stop
or derail
his plans
and his promises
for you
in Christ?
To be a Christian
is to have
the confidence
to know
that no threat
can stand
against you.
No threat
can ever remove
God's love
for you
in Christ.
No danger
in this world
or any other
can ever
derail
God's plans
and promises
for you
in Christ.
Do you see
the confidence
this ought to give us,
church?
And when you
realize this power
of the gospel,
you don't turn
and say,
man,
I'm worthy
of all that,
aren't I?
Man,
I'm strong.
Whatever danger
I have to fear,
I can't fear
because with a little
bit of help
from God,
I can overcome
anything, right?
God just gives me
a little boost,
makes me stronger.
That's not the message
of the gospel.
The message
of the gospel
is you cannot
do it,
but God
alone
has already
done it
in Christ.
God
is our confidence.
If you're in Him,
in Christ
by faith,
church,
you can face
anything in this life
with absolute
confidence
in Him.
And that's what
we see here
in our third
and final point
this morning.
I promise this
chapter will be
briefer.
Third,
we see the believer
faces their
fears
with confidence
in the Lord.
The believer
faces their fears
with confidence
in the Lord.
And Jacob
looks up
and what does
he see?
He sees Esau
coming and
he's got his
400 men
with him
and so what
does Jacob
do?
Again,
hot and cold,
right?
He goes right
back to strategizing.
Verse 1 says
Jacob divides up
the children
among Leah
and Rachel
and the two
female servants.
He arranges
them strategically
and look at this
y'all.
He's not even
hiding it,
is he?
We all know
that Jacob
loves Rachel
most,
right?
Sometimes you
think about
that question,
what would I
grab from the
house if the
fire comes
and what would
I grab first?
Jacob makes it
pretty clear he's
grabbing Rachel
and Joseph,
everybody else,
y'all on your
own.
So he puts the
servants out front
with their children
that is like
closest to where
Esau would come,
so they'd be the
first to go.
And then he's
got Leah with
her children,
so they'd go
next.
And then way
at the back
he's got finally
Rachel and
Joseph and the
idea again is
well if things
go south,
my favorite wife
and my favorite
son,
they might have a
chance to get
away.
Y'all are
expendable up
here.
No wonder
Joseph's brothers
hate him.
A little foretaste
of what's coming
next.
In verse 3 it
says that he
himself goes on
before them,
he bows himself
to the ground
seven times,
and that's about
six times more
than what's normal
and expected.
He is groveling
before Esau.
Please don't kill
me.
Please don't kill
me.
Please don't kill
me.
Please don't kill
me.
Look what happens.
Before he even
gets a chance to
speak, Esau runs
up to meet him,
and he hugs him,
and he falls on
his neck,
and they embrace,
and he kisses him,
and they together,
they wept.
This big,
burly man who
wanted his brother
dead is crying
at the sight of
him.
Now all of this
fear and all of
this worry, it
seems like it
was for nothing.
Why?
Because the Lord
has gone before
Jacob.
Didn't the Lord
tell Jacob to go
back home?
Didn't the Lord
tell Jacob,
go home so I
can do you good?
And didn't the
Lord tell Jacob
that he would be
with him,
and would bless
him,
and would
multiply him.
All of this
worry about the
danger that's out
there was for
nothing.
Why?
Because God has
already promised in
his word that he
would protect him.
Esau looks up,
and he sees all
these women and
children, and says,
who are all these
with you?
And now Jacob gets
to introduce them
to the family.
It's a big,
beautiful family
reunion after all
this time.
Twenty years has
gone by,
and Jacob clearly
was worried about
how he might be
received, and here's
Esau welcoming him
back with open arms.
It kind of reminds
you of the prodigal
son, doesn't it?
And before he even
has a chance to say
his peace, Esau runs
and greets him and
embraces him.
After they've all
met, Esau says,
what do you mean by
all this stuff that
you sent ahead of
me, all this company
that I'm at?
And Jacob says,
to find favor in the
sight of my Lord.
And they kind of
haggle over this for
a minute.
Esau says, I have
enough.
Keep what you have
for yourself.
Jacob insists and
says, I've seen
your face, which is
like seeing the face
of God.
He would know.
And you have
accepted me.
So he urges Esau,
and Esau takes it.
And everything here
is resolving to an
end, to about as
perfectly of an
ending for Jacob as
you could possibly
imagine, isn't it?
Look at verse 12,
chapter 33.
And Jacob has one
last trick up his
sleeve.
He can't help
himself, can he?
Esau is ready to
escort Jacob back to
Seir, and he says,
let us journey on our
way together.
Come on, bro.
I'll go ahead of you.
But Jacob says, no,
no, no, no, no, no,
no.
The kids are weak.
They're tired.
All these flocks and
sheep that they need
to be cared for.
They'll die if they're
pushed too hard.
You go on ahead, and
I'll go slowly behind
you.
I'll go at the pace
of the livestock and
at the children.
Until I go, I'll meet
you in Seir, okay?
You go on and wait
for me.
I'll be there soon,
but don't wait up too
long.
And so Esau says,
well, how about I leave
some of the people with
you?
And they'll escort you
there.
Jacob says, no, no,
no, no, brother.
You go on ahead.
We'll be fine.
I'll see you soon.
Of course, Jacob had no
intention of ever going
with Esau, did he?
He wasn't pushing his
luck here.
So verse 16 says,
Esau returned that day
to Seir, but Jacob, he
journeyed over to Succoth,
and there he built
himself a house and made
booths for his livestock,
and therefore the name
of that place is called
Succoth.
Moses ends this story by
telling us that Jacob
came safely to the city
of Shechem, which is in
the land of Canaan, on
his way from Paddan
Aram.
And he camped before the
city, and he bought
land from the sons of
Hamar and pitched his
tent and built an altar
and called it El Elohe
Israel, which means God,
the God of Israel.
Would you just look at
where Jacob has wound up
here to kind of bring
his story to an end?
And finally, after all of
this, but finally, at
long last, Jacob is
finally home.
His enemies are gone.
He is back in the
promised land.
He has set up booths.
He's built a home.
He's raised an altar there
for worship.
The promises are being
fulfilled.
His pilgrimage is over.
But most importantly, God
has proven himself faithful
yet again.
By his grace, he has
sustained Jacob through
many dangers, toils, and
snares.
He has already come.
Christian, I'll ask you
again, what do you fear?
We, like Jacob, are
pilgrims.
We are making our way
home.
Some of you are just
setting off on your
journey.
You're just beginning.
Others are rounding out
the final turn.
But we know that God has
promised us that eternity
with him is just ahead.
If you are in Christ by
faith, the true promised
land is waiting for us.
Soon and very soon, we
will no longer live in
these temporary shelters
and temporary places
and temporary societies.
We won't wrestle with
these tensions and these
enemies and these fears,
all these things that give
us worry.
If you're in Christ,
our certain futures that
you will live forever in
the new heavens and the new
earth where there will be
no sin and no death
and no enemy and no
temptation where all of
God's promises for us in
Christ will finally be
realized.
That's ahead of you,
Christian.
But until then, the
dangers around us are
very, very real, aren't
they?
There seem to be new
reasons to be fearful
every day while we still
journey onward here.
Fear and danger are in
every headline.
Fear and danger are around
every corner.
Here, the enemy still seeks
to destroy us.
Here, like Jacob, we can
seem hot and cold, off and
on, and we wonder how will
we make our way forward?
How will I overcome this
trial?
How will I face this enemy
that I fear?
How will I overcome?
Friend, you are not strong
enough to do it, but God
is.
We face every danger in the
confidence, church, that our
God is for us in Christ.
Our God will supply every need
of ours according to his
glorious riches in Christ
Jesus.
Our God will bless us, will
keep us, will make his face
shine upon us as we behold
the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ.
Father, we praise you for the
confidence that we have in you
and that we can only have in you,
and we acknowledge that there may
be some here who don't have that
confidence because they don't
know you, and so we pray, Lord,
would you give them the gift of
faith in Christ.
And for us, Lord, for the
church, we pray that we would
face the dangers that are around
us in our lives and in the world
with all the confidence of
knowing that our good and
faithful God will guide us
safely home.
We love you, Father.
We pray this in Jesus' name.
Amen.