Genesis, chapter 32. Tonight
we'll be looking mainly at verses 24 through 31, but I want to
give us our context of this. And the title of the message
this evening is, Jacob Conquered. Jacob Conquered. Verse 24 says,
And Jacob was left alone, and there wrestled a man with him
unto the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed
not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh, and the
hollow of Jacob's thigh was put out of joint as he wrestled with
him. And he said, Let me go, for the
day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee
go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is
thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be
called no more Jacob, but Israel. For as a prince hast thou power
with God and with men, and hast prevailed. Now, the context of
this verse. You remember how Jacob had stole
the birthright. How Jacob had tricked his brother
Esau and caused him to sell his birthright for a bowl of porridge. And how he disguised himself
as Esau and he took his father's blessing in his brother's stead. And when all of this was done,
Jacob left in exile, running from Esau. He spent 20 years
with Laban, his uncle. And then that 20 years he was
laboring and working for this man Laban. And now the Lord gives
him a command. And he says, return to your father's
house and all will go well with you. Return to your father's
house." Jacob returning here, if you go back to verse 1 and
you see this, "...and Jacob went his way, and the angels of God
met him. And when Jacob saw them, he said,
This is God's host. And he called the name of that
place Mahanaim." And that word means two camps. So Jacob, in
our text, is returning to Paddanarene, the city of his father Isaac,
from which he was exiled 20 years ago. And as he went his way back
home, God commanded that two hosts of angels meet him on his
way. And the Lord sent these two hosts
Obviously for an encouragement to him. He was heading back to
his brother Esau, who had vowed to kill him. Vowed to kill him. And God said, you go back home.
And so he sent these angels as an encouragement. And we can
see this by the name that he gave Mahanaren, which means two
hosts. We can see God's divine promise
of protection in these two hosts of angels. He has now separated
Himself from Laban. And the Lord has put a host of
angels behind Him to protect Him from Laban, His uncle. And now then you see the host
of angels that goes before Him. as though God is saying, I will
bless thee, I will protect you from your brother Esau. Is this not true of the church
of Christ? Is this not meant for the church
of Christ? of which Jacob is a picture believer in Christ,
let us be reminded by this verse, reminded of God's faithfulness
to go before us and behind us. To go before us and behind us,
and He will fulfill all His promises to us. As I said before the service
tonight, say you to the righteous, It shall be well with him. That is a promise of God. That
is a promise of God. And no doubt God will go before
and go behind us to fulfill His promises. In Zechariah 2 and
verse 5, God says this to His church. He said, I will be a
wall of fire about thee. and will be the glory in the
midst of her. Behold, believer in Christ, that
our Savior, in whom we glory and boast, whose righteousness
covers us from all, and whose blood atones and cleanses us
from all our sins, is always in our midst. He is a wall of
fire about thee, And nothing shall touch God's people except
God allow it. Except God allow it. Nothing
shall touch His people. Psalm 121 says this, Behold,
he that keepeth Israel. Now, who's Israel? Well, that's
Jacob, as we'll see in just a minute. Israel is Jacob's other name. The name given to him is Israel.
He says, Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber
nor sleep. The Lord is the keeper, thy keeper,
the Lord is the shade on thy right hand. Listen, the sun shall
not smite thee by day. nor the moon by night." What
does that mean? Not unless God gives it permission.
The sun won't even come on you in the midday, except God give
it permission to. And the moon will not shine on
you at night, except God allow it. Believer, the scripture says,
the Lord shall preserve thee from all evil. He shall preserve thy soul. Let
this be our comfort and peace then, so that we should rest
upon the strength and faithfulness of God. Trust in the Lord with how much
of your heart? How much should you trust in
God? With all your heart. And lean
not to what? Your own understanding. in all thy ways acknowledge him,
and he shall direct thy paths. This is God's promise to Israel,
to Jacob. And so then Jacob being encouraged,
he sets out with new confidence. And in verses 3 through 5, he
sends ambassadages out to Esau, his brother. Look it, he sent
messengers before him to Esau, his brother, in the land of Sheol,
the country of Edom, and he commanded them, saying, Thus you shall
speak unto my lord Esau. Thy servant Jacob saith thus,
I have sojourned with Laban, and stayed there until now. And
I have oxen, and asses, and flocks, and manservants, and womanservants,
and I have sent to tell my lord that I may find grace in thy
sight. Let us see then Jacob returning
to his subtle nature. Jacob, after being encouraged
by the Lord, sends out messengers to Esau. You see, Jacob is returning
to his reliance upon scheming in order to find favor with his
brother. He believes God's promises and
then sends messengers. And notice the subtlety of these
messengers by his words. He says, You speak to my Lord,
Esau. You tell him, Thy servant, Jacob. And he sends them out to show
all of his riches. Jacob is both doing this. He's
trying to elevate himself and also show false humility to Esau. These are words of false humility.
Jacob says, yes, I'll obey God and I'll go back, but I need
to do something to cushion the blow. I need to do something
to settle this between me and Esau. Believers in Christ, let
us learn from this, that God will not share His glory with
us. God will not share His glory. We are too often trying to please
others by our fair speech and false humility. Is that not so? We say we believe God, but then
we go about trying to do it our own way. Our own way. And I'll tell you, God shows
us here He will not have it. He will not have us mixing faith
with our own schemes. God will not have it if we should
scheme and plan and try to please men. Our Lord will at once turn
our efforts against us. And that's exactly what happened.
Look what happened in verse 6. And the messengers returned to
Jacob, saying, We come to thy brother Esau, and he also cometh
to meet thee, and four hundred men with him. Jacob finds out
that Esau that he was only not going to Esau, but Esau was coming
to him with 400 men of war. These were men of war. Esau was
a manly man. Jacob was a sissy man. Jacob
was a weakling man. And his little flocks and herds,
he didn't have soldiers among his, but Edom, Esau was a warrior
and he had 400 men coming to meet him. Believer, how many times do we
hear of God's great grace in Christ and feel confident and
emboldened and feel like Peter? And we say, Lord, though all
forsake you, I'll die with you. And then when the winds of change
come, We become like Jacob. Look what happened to Jacob. His confidence was turned to
what? Fear. Verse 7, Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. Isn't that always the way when
we start to scheme and plan and our schemes and our plans blow
up in our face? We become fearful. We become
distressed. Listen to what my brother Frank
Hall wrote. This hit me right in the nose. This is a true reflection of
how I felt. He said this, I have secretly
boasted to myself that I am a brave, skilled, confident Christian
sailor, while my feet were firmly planted on the land. But when
at sea, when the land was no longer in sight, when the sun
hit his face behind the clouds, when the dark storm surged and
the mighty waves swelled, when the lightning flashed and the
thunder clapped, when the winds howled and beat against my little
ship, reality slapped me in the face and the heart of this brave,
skilled sailor was forced to confess that he sails better
on land than at sea. Believer, you and I are we not
like Jacob many times afraid? Are we not easily startled? I am easily startled. It doesn't take much for us when
this little boat rocks for us to confess that we don't know
what in the world we're doing. Are you afraid like Jacob? Are
you distressed? Then you should learn to turn
again like Jacob did to the Lord in prayer. In verses 9 through
verse 12, the Lord Jacob then in distress, he turns and he
cries out to God. He says, O God of my father Abraham
and God of my father Isaac, the Lord which settest unto me, return
unto thy country and to thy kindred, and I will deal well with thee.
I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies and of all
the truth that thou hast showed unto thy servant. For with my
staff I passed over this Jordan, and now I am become two bands. Deliver me, I pray thee, from
the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau. For I fear
him, lest he will come and smite me and the mother of my children. And thou saidest, I will surely
do thee good. and make thy seed as the sand
of the sea, which cannot be numbered for the multitude." See, Jacob's
prayer here is excellent. There is, if you want to model
prayer, Jacob's prayer here is a good one to read. It's a good
one to study after. We don't have much time to study
after it tonight, but I want you to, later on, you can look
at this prayer. It is an excellent prayer. He
confesses his sin. He cries out to God. He needs
His deliverance. He prays God's Word. If you need
something to pray, you can always pray God's Word, can't you? You
can pray His promises. And Jacob does that real well. Jacob knew God. He knew that through His seed Christ should
come. And he trusted the Word of Lord. And yet, as soon as
he gets up off of his knees, from verse 13 all the way down
to verse 23, Jacob starts scheming again. He starts scheming again. As soon as he turns from his
prayer, he turns from his knees and does what is unthinkable.
He turns from faith to unbelief. from the power of God to the
power of his own devices. Is Jacob not a mirror image of
us? How many times have you turned
to God and begged for deliverance, confessing your sin, confessing
God to be your only hope, and then getting up off of your knees
and turning and trying to work it out yourself? This is nothing
but scheming. This is not waiting on the Lord.
This is scheming. He turns back. Jacob is a mirror
of us. When we are afraid and distressed,
we are soon turned to our knees, we cry out to God, and then we
turn back to our flesh as soon as we get up. Notice how good Jacob is at scheming. I'll summarize this for time's
sake. What Jacob does here is he takes
his gifts. He says, I'm going to give Esau
some gifts. And this way I can appease him. I can appease him. So he set
out his gifts into three different droves. He sets out His camels
and His cows and all of these things. That's the commodity
of their day. All of these things. And He puts them out into three
different companies. He divides them into three different
areas and spaces them out just right. And He sends them out
before Esau as gifts. When I saw this, I was reminded
of Christmas when I was a child. Now, as a child, you want the
biggest, best gift you can possibly get. You want the best and the
brightest of whatever it is that you can get. But I'll tell you
this, I remember sometimes getting the best and the brightest, and
I only had one package. And then when I opened it up,
that was it. It was over. There was nothing
else for me to open. And then I saw these other kids
and they had 20 smaller gifts and they were opening and opening
and opening and I envied them because they had more to open.
You see, Jacob understood human nature. He understood that if
he sent just one gift, Esau might not be happy. But if he sent
them in waves, wave after wave after wave of gifts, he said,
surely, surely I will appease him with this. That's what he
says in verse 20. He says that. He says, Behold,
thy servant Jacob is behind. For he said, I will appease him
with the present that goeth before me. And afterward I will see
his face. Listen. Peradventure, he will
accept me. Peradventure. This scheming only got Jacob
a chance to appease Him. Instead of trusting the Lord
to go before Him as He promised, Jacob undertook the work himself,
and all his planning, all of his nice words and scheming,
could only get him a chance at appeasement. It did not guarantee
anything. Learn this. Our scheming, our planning guarantees
absolutely nothing. Nothing. The best laid plans of mice and
man, they all are only a chance. Peradventure, he will be appeased. Believer, may God teach us that
there is no confidence to be gotten in fleshly efforts. We
must ask, how could Jacob, a man who loved God, a man chosen of
God, who was given such divine revelations of Christ, how could
he easily be turned from faith to scheming? Is it that he could be saved
and lost? Well, we know that's not true.
We know that Jacob was a man saved, a man who is redeemed
of Christ, called of the Father by grace. We know this, our new
birth is not because of our merit, but because of the will of God.
And therefore, our sins are no grounds of forfeit for our loss
of salvation. How precious is our salvation?
How precious is this truth that salvation is by the free and
sovereign grace of God alone? Isn't that a precious thing?
Isn't that a precious truth? It was God that chose us. He
elected us. He loved us of His free grace,
not according to any good in us. Christ obtained our righteousness. Christ suffered for our sins
on the cross out of His own free grace. For the Scripture tells
us, for when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ
died for the ungodly. I'm thankful salvation is not
dependent upon my works. I'm thankful that salvation is
not dependent upon my merits, but upon the merits and righteousness
of Jesus Christ alone. Therefore, believer, as we see
ourselves in Jacob, We are as chosen, redeemed, and saved by
the grace of God and cannot be removed from Christ. And this
should cause us to be not less careful, but more careful. This should cause us to be more
careful and have a greater hatred for sin. Isn't that what the
Apostle Paul tells us? Shall we sin that grace may abound?
God forbid. God forbid. Let us see that Jacob's
example here is what we should refrain from doing. Jacob here
is an example of what not to do in this situation. That we
should refrain from our fleshly devices. We know Jacob did sin
because of his old nature that is in him. Even so, believer,
are we not prone to sin? We who are saved by the grace
of God, is it not true of us as it is Him that we have two
distinct natures in us? The nature created by God in
righteousness and true holiness and the old nature of sin. We
still have these two natures that are constantly at warfare
with one another in our own flesh. And so, as we see Jacob, we may
also know ourselves that we are capable of doing such things
as Jacob. Believer, remember our fleshly
nature of sin that we were born with, of Adam, is still just
as vile and full of unbelief as it ever was. I know this. The more I grow
in grace and knowledge of Christ, I tell you, the more sinful I
see, the more sinfulness I see in my old nature. I see more. It doesn't seem to be getting
better. It seems to be getting worse. Actually, it's just as
vile as it was before. I'm just now being able to see
things that I couldn't see before. Jesus said, that which is born
of flesh is flesh. Paul reminds us, for in his flesh
dwelleth no good thing. Therefore behold in Jacob a clear
demonstration of the two natures of every believer. Thus it was
written for our warning, believer, that we should put off the old
man and his deeds and put on the new man. which is created
in God in true righteousness. O my soul, is this you? Do you kneel to God in prayer
and faith only to rise up in unbelief to devise your own sinful
plans? Then let us cry out to the Lord,
I believe. Lord, help thou my unbelief. Now in verses in our text, verse
21, I'm sorry, verse 24. Notice this, after all the presence,
after all the scheming, after all this was done, notice what
God did. And Jacob was left alone. After all of that, now then Jacob
had nothing else. had nothing else. He kissed his
wife, he kissed his children, he sent them over to be to safety
and he said, I've got nothing else. I can do nothing else.
And he was left alone. It is in our darkest times in
our times of fear and distress, and when we are out of plans
and schemes and left alone, it is then, and only then, the Lord
comes and wrestles with us." It was only when Jacob was out
of options that the Lord came to him. And notice this, Jacob
was left alone, and there wrestled a man with him unto the breaking
of the day. This man we know is the Lord
Jesus Christ, as we'll see in just a minute. But notice that
this man wrestled with Jacob. This man wrestled with Jacob
only after he was left alone. Do you know that you really can't
know yourself until you're left alone? You really can't see and
know ourselves truly until we are alone with God. One man said,
to be left alone with God is the only way of arriving at a
just knowledge of ourselves. To be left alone with God. And
now the angel wrestles with Jacob, who was none other than Christ
himself. He appeared in human form and
wrestled with Jacob at this place. And notice it was Christ who
wrestled with Jacob and not Jacob wrestling with Christ. Do you
notice that? He said, when he was left alone,
there wrestled a man with him. It was not Jacob wrestling in
prayer, but rather the Lord initiates this struggle. Jacob was not
wrestling for a blessing, but rather Christ was wrestling with
Jacob to subdue him. To subdue him. You see, Jacob
needed to see something about himself. He needed to be exposed
and conquered. Exposed and conquered. Jacob
must be conquered so as to know and see his poor and helpless
and worthless condition before God. Jacob needed the experience
of this struggle to know his own weakness. O believer, we must too learn
this painful lesson. You and I are not as strong as
we think we are. We must be subdued. We must be conquered. The Lord must and will bring
His children to bow down at His feet as we truly are helpless
and weak. We are helpless. Notice how long the Lord struggled
with Him. The Scripture says until the
breaking of the day, all night. All night. He wrestled with him
unto the breaking of the day. Surely this could have been done
sooner. Isn't that right? Surely the Lord, who as all-powerful,
as we'll see in just a second, all the Lord did was touch his
hip. And he was down for the count.
What does it take for the Lord to conquer you? How much power
does He need to initiate to conquer you? A touch. a word. Why does He wrestle so
long with us? I tell you, it would surely probably
destroy us. If He touched us too soon, it
would destroy us. But this shows our long-suffering
Lord, doesn't it? Is He not long-suffering with
you? He is. He's very patient. He's very kind. He's very gentle
with us. How patient is our Lord that
He could bring us down in just a moment, but instead He allows
us to be drained. I remember wrestling. When I
was a young man, we used to wrestle a lot. And I'll tell you what,
that is a tiring exercise. That is tough. It doesn't take
long. I remember doing even some boxing.
And this guy came up and he said, you know, I want you to just
punch me. Just punch me. And I did. Boy, I gave it all I had. And
in about less than a minute, I was exhausted. I was exhausted. That guy hit me once and I fell
down to the ground. It didn't take him much to hit
me, knock me down. That's what the Lord was doing
as he struggles with Jacob in order to bring him low. And
in the moment he touched his hip and brought him down to the
end of his strength. See believer, the purpose of
our Savior is to cause us to fall prostrate
at His feet. You want to know why He struggles
with you? He struggles to make you submit. He struggles and wrestles with
you until a certain point and then He will bring you down.
He will bring us all prostrate at His feet Are you one who is
touched by the chastening hand of the Lord? Are you rendered
powerless before His feet? Are you at the end of yourself?
Listen, that is the best place to be. That is the best place
to be. This is the best place for any
believer to be in. Because it's only from the dust
you'll cry for mercy. It is only from the dust you'll
beg for mercy. Isn't that what Jacob did here?
He saw they prevailed not against him. He touched the hollow of
Jacob's thigh, and it went out of joint as he wrestled with
him. And he said, Let me go, for the
day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee
go, except you bless me. Jacob went from wrestling to
clinging. Can you imagine that? Can you
imagine him that was wrestling face-to-face, mano-a-mano, and
then all of a sudden touched the side of his hip? Now it's
not mano-a-mano. Now it's as you see the Lord
walking away, you see Jacob hanging on to his heel, dragging, clinging
for life. Instead of wrestling, struggling
with our Lord, Jacob is now clinging and begging for mercy. O my soul,
cast out this world, cast off thy sin and shame, rest completely
on Jesus Christ, all thy sin disdain. It is only from the ground before
Christ that we will really seek a blessing from Christ. and is only in this place a blessing
is received. Look at this. Here's the blessing. Verse 27. And he said unto him,
What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. Blessings
always come first by way of rebuke. The Lord was here rebuking Jacob. Jesus didn't need to know his
name. This wasn't for information. What was he doing? He was making
Jacob confess who he was. You know what the name Jacob
means? It means surplanter, trickster, listen, sinner. When the Lord brings His people
low, the first thing He does is make us confess who we are. Sinners. I am a great sinner, and I need
a great Savior. He casts us down to confess that
we are sinners. Listen to Proverbs. He that covereth
his sins shall not prosper, but whoso confesseth and forsaketh
his sins shall have mercy. Do you need mercy? Are you helpless? Have all your schemes failed
and the Lord broken your rebellion? Then confess your sins. Confess. And notice what happens when
he confessed, verse 28, and he said, Thy name shall be called
no more Jacob, but Israel. For as a prince thou hast power
with God, and with man, and hast prevailed. Herein is the blessing. You who believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ, you who are bowed at his feet, listen, here's the
blessing. If you confess your sins, He is faithful and just
to forgive you your sins. How many times? Forever? Forever? You shall no longer be called
Surplanter, but you shall be called Prince. This is the blessing you as believers
in Christ have. You who sought mercy at his feet,
you will find mercy and grace. As Jacob confessed his name,
the Lord confesses him to be a prince. Thou, O Christ, art
all I want. More than all in thee I find. Other refuge have I none. Hangs
my helpless soul on thee. Has the Lord brought you low? Has he broken your schemes? If
you're his, listen, he will. Isn't that a good promise? I'm so glad that he breaks my
schemes. I'm so glad He brings me low,
because only in the dust will we find mercy. And I tell you, it is at His
feet. Is there any other place that you'd rather be? You who
believe on Christ. Is there any other place you'd
rather be than at His feet? Oh Lord God, please, break us. conquer us, and cause us to be
blessed by thy name. I will not let you go until you
bless me. May that be our determination, to hold fast until he gives us
the blessing. And you know what? He has, in
his Son, Jesus Christ, he has given us all, listen, all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places. He has. He's given us an inheritance,
incorruptible, undefiled, that fadeth not away, reserved in
heaven for you. Now what should you do in your
time of trouble? Trust in the Lord with all your
heart. And don't lean to your own understanding.
You know Jacob, after he was touched here, he hobbled on that
all the rest of his life. Isn't that what we do with this
flesh? We hobble on it. You can't trust it. He could
never trust that hip again. And you know what? I can never
trust this flesh again. I can't. I only trust Christ. He's my Savior. And He's my Lord. May God bless this to your hearts.
We'll stand and be dismissed.