I invite your attention back
tonight to the 33rd chapter of Genesis, Genesis chapter 33. Jacob was a deceiver. He had deceived and tricked his
brother, actually tricked his father Isaac, into giving him
the blessing. of his brother Esau, the firstborn. And in this, Jacob had highly
offended his brother Esau. Jacob had sinned against Esau
and stolen from him. No doubt he had a right to be
upset. Esau sought to kill Jacob because of what he had done.
And Jacob fled. in order to escape Esau's wrath. Then we fast forward 20 years
later, and Jacob is commanded by God to return home. And he
said, I'll be with you. Go home. Don't be afraid. And
he returned home. And God had promised to bless
Jacob and his children. And as he's returning home, still
fearful, of his brother, he sends some servants ahead with gifts
so that he might appease his brother's wrath. And his servants
returned to tell him that Esau's coming to meet you with 400 men. And Jacob was sore afraid. Esau's coming to avenge himself
against Jacob. Esau is coming to destroy him.
Esau is angry with his wicked brother. And Jacob was afraid
and rightly so. Now does Jacob's story sound
familiar to you? Does this sound like your story?
Sure sounds a lot like mine. Has God shown you that by nature
you're a deceiver? Do you see that you are a Jacob? Has God revealed to you that
He is highly offended by your actions against Him? Are you
aware that in your sin and because of your sin, God seeks to destroy
you? Are you still fleeing and running
from God? Or has God divinely intervened
and commanded you to return home? Has God promised to be with you
and to never forsake you on your pilgrimage home? Are you still
struggling to believe his word and promises to you? Do you still
believe that he's angry because of your actions against him?
Do you still believe that the one whom you have offended is
coming to destroy you? If so, what are you going to
do? What are you going to do? Are you going to send ahead gifts
even though you have nothing to offer God that He will accept? Are you going to bow yourself
to Him as Lord and declare yourself to be His unprofitable servant
as Jacob did Esau? Are you going to put your trust
in something you have to give or something that you desire
to do to appease God? Or are you going to trust Christ? to do for you all that God requires
from you? Are you going to trust alone
in the sacrifice that voluntarily laid his life down upon the altar
of God for his people? Has God brought you to the brook
called Jabbok and left you there alone? Has God come to you? Has God wrestled with you? shown
you and convinced you that you have nothing to offer. You know, I found it interesting
as I was studying this past few days that the brook called Japok
here that we read about where Jacob was left alone and wrestled
with God. That brook, that name means to
be used up and poured out. And I was thinking how appropriate.
God is going to use you up and pour out of you any notion that
you can help yourself in the matter of salvation. Recently,
I heard someone say that they had decided not to worship Christ
with God's people because they were going to make a go of it
on their own. Only one big problem with that,
and it's a big problem. You can't make a go of it on
your own. You just can't. You'll perish
in your sin. If you think you can, then God
has yet to pour out that self-sufficient attitude in you. He's gone to
in every child of God. Those of you that know Christ
know what I'm talking about. God's going to bring you to the
end of yourself. He's going to wrestle with you
on this thing. He's going to win. And he's going to touch
you in the hollow of your thigh, and you're going to see how helpless
you are. You won't be able to fight anymore.
All you'll be able to do is cling to him. Oh, I'm so thankful that
God does that. to poor and wretched sinner. Truly Christ must increase and
we must decrease. Oh Lord, make it so. You see,
all that we have to offer God is the sacrifice that Christ
made for us upon the altar of God. That's it. Nothing else
to offer. Nothing else will God accept. How many mediators are there
between God and man? How many? One. Just one. The man, Christ Jesus. And as
we saw this past Sunday in our study, for by one offering. It's just one. You know the gospel
is a gospel of ones, isn't it? Only for by one offering he,
Christ, hath perfected forever them that are sanctified. And
now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away
sin by the sacrifice of himself, Hebrews 9.26. Don't we have a
beautiful picture here of how God and Christ comes to the chosen
sinner in mercy instead of wrath? Oh, Esau had every reason and
every right to be upset with Jacob. And God has every reason
and right to be angry with the wicked every day. You and I,
like Jacob, are certainly guilty of deception, aren't we? We're
certainly deserving of God's wrath, our sins against him and
him alone. We are most definitely worthy
of death. For the wages of sin is death
and the soul that's in it that shall surely die. Yet by divine
intervention, you know I like that term, divine intervention,
an intervention by God. Oh, our angry brother, the Lord
Jesus Christ in mercy and in grace, as Esau did in verse four,
runs to meet us, embrace us, fall on our neck and kiss us
as we weep tears of joy together. Child of God, we've been reconciled
by God's sovereign grace in Christ alone. And if God has revealed
that to you, blessed you are, blessed you are. Esau, by earthly
persuasion, receives the gift of Jacob. Jacob said, oh, take
it, take it. He said, I have enough. Take
it. Yet you and I, by divine persuasion, receive the gift
of Christ. So our story continues. And in verse 12, we see just
how the story of Jacob and Esau continues to picture our story
of redemption. Verse 12, and he, Esau, said,
let us take our journey, and let us go, and I will go before
thee. Now Esau here desires to make
up for lost time. He has truly forgiven Jacob. God has intervened. God, who
has the king's heart in his hand and turns it however he so pleases,
has taken Esau's heart and changed it and turned it. Esau suggests
that they resume their journey together. Esau wishes to spend
time with his brother. He wants to get reacquainted.
He wants to catch up on things. And here he offers himself as
a guide and a protector to Jacob. Esau proves to be a friend and
a brother and not a foe. Sound familiar? Our Lord Jesus
promises us that he'll never leave us nor forsake us on our
journey home. And he is that friend that sticketh
closer than a brother. How Esau here pictures Christ
in that way. He promises over and over in
his word, our Lord does, our God does, to be our guide, to
be our protector, to be our refuge and our surety. David said, for
thou art my rock and my fortress, therefore, for thy name's sake,
lead me and guide me. For this God is our God forever
and ever, and he will be our guide even unto death, Psalm
48, 14. Isaiah wrote, and the Lord shall
guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make
fat thy bones, and thou shall be like a watered garden, and
like a spring of water whose waters fail not, Isaiah 58, 11. Yet like Jacob, this is not what
we want by nature. Not by nature, it's not. Verse
13, look at it with me. And Jacob said unto him, unto
Esau, my Lord knoweth that the children are tender, and the
flocks and the herds with young are with me, and if men should
overdrive them one day, all the flock will die. Now this seemed
like a good excuse. Any excuse, though, not to follow
Christ is a bad one. We can justify so many things
in our minds, can't we? We can provide and we can produce
so many excuses, even ones that we think God will accept. Look at verse 14. Let my Lord,
I pray thee, Jacob says, pass over before his servant, and
I'll lead on softly according as the cattle that goeth before
me and the children be able to endure until I come unto my Lord,
unto seer. And yet here we see when it comes
to making excuses for not following our Lord, like Jacob, we say
all the right things, don't we? We do. Our motives and our intentions
seem good. We say things like, well, we're
just being responsible. We're just taking care of our
family. We're just taking care of business. Yet Esau, like our Lord, continues
to be gracious. Look at verse 15. And Esau said,
let me now leave with thee some of the folk that are with me.
If you won't go with me, if you insist on following behind, at
least let me leave some of my men for your protection and for
help. In other words, let me help you.
Let me lend you a hand. Let me take a load off your shoulders. Let me be a brother. That's what
he's saying, just let me be a brother. God sends and leaves his angels
with us. And Jacob said in this same verse,
what need is there for you to do these things? Let me find grace in the sight
of my Lord. And what Jacob is actually saying
there when he says, let me find grace in thy sight, he's saying,
Esau, just the fact that you forgive me is enough. Just the
fact that you have accepted my gift is plenty. There's no need
for you to do these other things. Just your willingness to do these
things means so much to me. And these things sound good.
We can make our excuses sound pretty reasonable and pretty
acceptable. At least we think we can. But
what we're really saying is, I'm going to make a go of it
on my own. Don't really need your help. Don't really want your help. Jacob almost seems suspect and
suspicious here of his brother's kindness, desiring to travel
alone. Are we suspicious of the things
that God has promised us in, by, and through Christ our substitute? Do we not often desire to travel
by ourselves? Don't we often wish to make a
go of it on our own? We want to have our own way.
We want to do our own thing. We want all the credit. By nature we do. We want all
the credit and the glory in what we do. And I find it not ironic at all that
on that day of judgment when those who profess to know Christ
stand and they say, Lord haven't we, haven't we, haven't we, What we have next is a sad and
humbling thing. I'm telling you, look at verse
16. It begins with that two-letter word, so. So, which means for
that reason or because of this. Esau returned that day on his
way unto Seir. And look at verse 17. And Jacob,
journeyed to Succoth, and built him a house, and made booths
for his cattle. And Jacob came to Shalom, a city
of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, where he came from
Padanaram and pitched his tent before the city." Now here's where we should consider
some sad, heartbreaking facts. And many of these things, it's
many of these same things that makes our story sad also. Here
we find, and I didn't think about this until just today, Here we
find the last and the only time the scriptures mention Jacob
and Esau having any communion or fellowship together again,
except in Genesis chapter 37, verse 29, when they both come
to bury their father Isaac. Esau heads on back to Seir. Jacob
said, I'll join you. I'm right behind you. I've got
to take care of the children. I can't overdrive the cattle.
I'm on my way. You just go on. Esau said, well,
at least let me leave some of my men to help you. No, no, you
go on. I'm all right. And then he heads
to a different place. He just flat out lied. Again,
lied to his brother. who had forgiven him of the great
sin and loved him in spite of his deception. And by the providence
of God, Esau became the father of the Edomites and Jacob the
father of Israel. And those two nations would struggle
with great conflict throughout the history of the Bible. Here
we find Jacob looking out for himself and his family and his
worldly material possessions. And I'm telling you, we live
in a day where religion has made Christianity, if I can use that
term, a health and wealth proposition, where sinners don't serve God
for nothing. They'll tell you, religion will
tell you that, oh, you don't have to serve God for nothing.
God gives great rewards to those who love and follow him. There's
believed to be a great reward for all who help Jesus to have
his way in this world. And then another sad result of
Jacob's actions here is this. As we'll see in the next chapter,
this is where his daughter Dinah, is defiled and raped by a prominent
resident whom the city that they're in is named after. Sad, sad, sad. I wonder how different, I wonder how different history
might have been if Jacob would have returned home with Esau
to seer. how different things might have
turned out for those who have walked with, trusted, and believed
in Christ Jesus, their sovereign guide, protector, friend, and
brother. But believe me when I tell you,
dear friends, that things have worked out just as God has ordained,
purposed, and caused them to. And this is a great comfort,
great comfort to the believing child of God. You know, there
are no what ifs, no what ifs in the lives of God's elect,
none. The child of God didn't talk
that way. What if this, what if that? No, they say, according
to thy will be done, O Lord. Not my will, but thine be done.
And He wrestles with us and He causes us to bow to His will,
way, and purpose. Well, I want to leave you tonight
with a positive note. I want to leave you with a comforting
thought. Though God's elect will never
in this life in this life of flesh, this body of death in
which is so plagued by sin. Though we'll never always do what we should
do, though we will never always be what we should be, though
we will not always act as we should act and always trust the
Lord as He should be trusted, you and I can be certain of one
thing, if we belong to Christ. And that is, he'll never, never
leave us, nor forsake us, his people. Now in verse 18, we saw
that Jacob's moving into a community called Shalom, which is the same
word translated Shalom. You've probably heard that word
in an Eastern It's a term used often, shalom. It means in peace
or in safety by diligence. When those in the eastern part
of this world greet others with shalom, it means go in peace,
go in safety. And it also means complete, whole,
perfection, fulfillment, contentment. May you be whole and content. fulfilled in all you do. Go in
peace and in safety. Yet I'm telling you this place
called Shalom proved to be anything and everything but a place of
peace and safety for this man whose name now was Israel. For
the most part it proved to be just the opposite. You see this
city was in the land of Canaan. Jacob again is among An idolatrous
nation and an idolatrous people. There's no peace or safety found
in this world of Canaan that we live in, friends. There's
no fulfillment or contentment here. Have you realized that
yet? Has the Lord shown you that?
Oh, for years I tried to find peace and contentment in this
life. There's none to be found. Not
for the child of God. This world of idolatry can provide
no rest. We're among idolaters. We're
among an idolatrous nation. There's no rest to be found.
There's no diligence a man can do to find this rest. No matter
what you do, you can't find it apart from Christ. There's no
fulfillment or contentment in this world of idolatry. Now look
at verse 19. And he, being Jacob, bought a
parcel of a field where he had spread his tent at the hand of
the children of Hamar, Shechem's father, for a hundred pieces
of money. Jacob buys a piece of land here. And what does he do with it?
By the sovereign grace and mercy of God, in verse 20, we're told
that he erected an altar and called it El Elohei Israel. And I'm telling you what grace
and mercy is found in that verse. Jacob being in the midst of this
idolatrous nation, right in the middle, right in the middle of
this community of idolaters, God gives him a place of worship. Friends, God's done the same
for you. God's done the same for you. Here in the midst of this idolatrous
and religious world, God has given you a place where you can
freely worship your Lord and Savior. Oh, may we never take
that for granted. I beg you, don't take that for
granted. Never take it for granted. What
a great grace given to us. Jacob erected an altar. Do you
know what an altar is? Sure you do. An altar is a place
of worship. An altar is a place where a substitute
is offered. An altar is a place where blood
is shed for the remission of sins. And it's whose blood that
was shed that makes our salvation effectual. The blood of the Lamb
of God who taketh away the sin of the world. You see, the true
worship of God can only be through a divine substitute. No other
way to worship God. That woman of Samaria, she said,
you know, we worship God in this mountain. And he said, you know
not what you worship. The true worshipers of God worship
in spirit and in truth. in the truth that God Himself
became that sacrifice, that offering for sin, and laid down His life
voluntarily for wretches like Jacob. That's the only way a sinner
can truly worship God in Christ, the divine substitute. Did you
notice what Jacob called this altar? He called it El Elohei
Israel. Now I don't know if I'm saying
that right. That's my best shot. But I'll tell you what it means. It means the mighty God is the
God of Israel. That's what it means. It means
the mighty God is the God of Israel the man. And it means
that God, the mighty God, is the God of all true spiritual
Israel. As you know, I'm not a Hebrew
or Greek scholar. I don't want to get hung up on
trying to explain in any detail the meaning of what this name
means. But I did do enough digging,
and I can use some of the resources that are available to tell you
this much. I can tell you that this name
El, Elohe, Israel, is a combination of many names. When you get to
looking at it, and what I gather from the Hebrew language is that
El, E-L, is a word, and E here is a word, and Elo, Lo, is another
word, He is a word, and when you put them all together, It
basically means one thing in three different ways. This was
such a blessing to me. It means that the mighty God
rules. That's the one thing that it
means. But it means that the mighty God rules in three ways. A careful study of the name there
means that the mighty God rules in Israel, The mighty God rules
for Israel, and the mighty God rules by Israel. In, for, and by. Our great and
sovereign God rules in Israel. We know that to be so because
He rules everywhere. He rules and He reigns everywhere.
David said our God's in the heavens. He's done whatsoever He's pleased,
Psalm 115.3. David said, whatsoever the Lord
pleased, that did He in heaven and in earth and in the seas
and in all deep places. God rules everywhere. Our mighty
God rules for Israel. He was made to be sin for us. He was made to be a curse for
us. He gave himself for us, the scripture
says, an offering and sacrifice to God. He's obtained eternal
redemption for us. If God be for us, who can be
against us? Romans 8.31. And thirdly, our
mighty God rules by Israel. And you say, well, how so? Well,
the scripture says, now then we are ambassadors for Christ. Child of God, you're an ambassador
for Christ. What an honor. You're an ambassador
for Christ. As though God did beseech you
by us, we pray you in Christ's stead be reconciled to God. And He's given to all of us the
ministry of reconciliation. He's commanded all of us to go
into the world and to all nations and preach the gospel of good
tidings and great joy for sinners. Christ came into the world to
save sinners. That's the message. Tell it. Shout it from the rooftops. You're an ambassador for Christ. God is made unto us. We're made unto God kings and
priests and we shall reign on the earth. Here in little old Madisonville,
Kentucky. Madisonville is pretty insignificant
in Kentucky. And Kentucky is pretty insignificant
in the rest of the world. Even less significant than Madisonville
is a little group of believers who love Christ and worship in
a little white brick building on Beulah Road. Insignificant. The world passes by, don't give
any notice. I had someone ask me long ago,
someone told me you were a pastor. Where do you pastor? And I told
them, I said, I've never heard of it. Insignificant. You'll pass by
many bigger, nicer, fuller churches on the way to this one. Buildings,
anyway. Maybe not churches. Maybe better
safe buildings. There are no tall steeple to
distinguish us from other buildings. There's no digital billboard
that displays all our programs and our advertisements and our
announcements. Insignificant! But I tell you what you'll find
here. There's a fountain. We preach Christ, the fountain
of life. There's a river. That river is Christ, filled
with love, mercy, and grace. There's an altar, and that altar
is Christ. There's an offering and a sacrifice
given to God as a sweet-smelling cipher unto God. Oh, sweet-smelling. It comes from this place in the
preaching of Christ and Him crucified. And we call it El Elohe Israel. Mighty God rules. He rules in,
for, and by. The mighty God in the person
of Jesus Christ will provide, I say this all the time, but
it's the gospel. He'll provide all that he requires
in order that no good, worthless, sinful, deceiving, lying Jacobs
might be saved. Oh, I forgot. Our name's been
changed. Been changed. We're no longer
Jacob, but Israel. God rules in me. God rules for
me. And God rules by me in Christ. And I tell you what, I tell you
what you can call, you can call me Kept. That's a good name.
I'm Kept by the power of God. Wish I'd have thought to name
one of my children that, Kept. Call me Kept. Alrighty, I appreciate
your attention. Paul, would you dismiss this
prayer, please?