Morning. If you will, let's turn
to Genesis 32. Genesis 32. Scribble down real fast while
I was waiting for the service to start. You know, a message.
that's preached is not to be debated. If they speak as the
oracles of God, it's not open for discussion. It's a declaration.
If it's open for discussion or debate or consideration, there's
a consideration it could be wrong. Lord ain't wrong. That's what
he says. It's his word. That's it. That's
him. But a message that's preached is not to be debated or analyzed.
It's to be applied to the heart. Get that? And I hope the Lord
will apply this to our hearts, apply this to our hearts. And
this isn't also, when we eat things, I eat through the week,
and sometimes I, most of the time I don't eat in the mornings,
but I eat in the evenings. And some days I'll have a whole lot
of protein. And then some days I'll have
salad. And I don't have dessert every meal. You understand that? And so what the Lord gives us
in this paddock for his sheep, for this hour, for this generation,
for this decade, is for us. Somebody else may be blessed
by that salad or that dessert or that steak, but they ain't
getting the whole meal. You understand? You get that
analogy? Wednesday night, we had milk. That was needed. You
had to have that first before we can get to this. You had to
have Wednesday nights before you can get to this. We had milk
Wednesday night. Right now, Lord willing, we'll
get some vegetables and some potatoes. Maybe some baby food,
puree or something like that. Pate. Next hour, I'm just gonna
speak to God's people. We've established these things.
Now we're gonna get some meat. He has pork chop or something.
It's going to be good. You understand that? I hope the Lord will be
with us. Let's look here and see what happened to Jacob. Genesis
32, verse 22. Genesis 32, 22. And he rose up
that night and took his two wives and his two women servants and
his 11 sons and passed over the Ford Jabbok. And he took them
and sent them over the brook and sent over that he had. And Jacob was left alone. Jacob
was left alone and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking
of day. Come on, we're in Genesis 32. Verse 24, Jacob was left alone
and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of day.
And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, against Jacob,
he touched the hollow of his thigh and the hollow of Jacob's
thigh was out of joint. He was unhinged. and he wrestled
with him. And that strong man, he said,
let me go for the day breaketh. And Jacob said, I will not let
thee go except thou bless me. And he said unto him, what is
thy name? You want blessed? What's your
name? He said, Jacob. My name's Jacob. And he said,
thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel, for as a prince,
As a prince, hast thou power with God and with men, and hast
prevailed. And Jacob asked him, verse 29,
and said, tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, wherefore
is it that thou dost ask after my name? How long have I been
with you? You know what our Lord told Thomas?
How long have I been with you? Show us the Father. How long have
I been with you? You gonna ask my name? Wherefore
dost thou ask after my name? And he blessed him there, and
Jacob called the name of that place Penuel, for I have seen
God face to face, and my life is preserved. And he passed over
Penuel, the sun rose up upon him, and he halted upon his thigh. Therefore the children of Israel
eat not of the sinew which shrank, which is upon the hollow of the
thigh unto this day, because he touched the hollow of Jacob's
thigh, in the sinew that shrank. Wouldn't that be something if
every time we got us a big old roast with a bone in, bone in roast,
and we saw that tendon, those ligaments and stuff, that sinew,
and we said, you know what? Lord unhens Jacob. Every time we had a Passover,
we thought, you know what? The Lord's blood was shed for
us. That's what those things are for. That's what Jesus told
us, didn't he? Every time they eat it, you know
what? We eat that part. Why, daddy? Why don't we eat
that? Because the Lord popped Jacob's hip out of socket. That's
why. Well, why'd he do that? Oh, sit
down, I'll tell you. Sit down, I'll tell you. This
story of Jacob, this is a true story. This happened, and this
is a story not of everybody. This ain't the story of everybody.
Not of all the children born of Adam. This is the story of
every son and daughter of Jacob. If you're his, this is your story.
If I'm his, this is my story. The living God, a real man, lays
a hold of his people. He gets a hold of them. And he
works in and he works on them until the man is the victor. The strong man's the victor.
And we confess. We confess who we are. We confess
what we are. I'm Jacob. Ain't nothing else. And we're giving a new name.
Ain't your name no more. She shall be called the Lord
our righteousness, right? And we praise the Lord for full
salvation, because he has always been, is right now, and shall
forevermore be on his throne. Now, when this happens, you gonna
limp. There's gonna be some pain from
all that fighting God. There's gonna be some pain in
that for the rest of our time on this earth, but he grabs a
hold of them. He grabs a hold of his people and his people
grab back. They grab back. Where does this
take place? Look there in verse 24 and Jacob
was left alone. He was left alone and there wrestled
a man with him until the break of day. We're in Genesis 32 verse
24. Jacob was left alone. Who's Jacob? That's who was left alone. This
is the one that the Lord chose to come wrestle with. This is
not Esau. Is the Lord down there fist to
cuffs with Esau? No, he came to Jacob. Jacob, this one, he
said, Jacob have I loved. This one he knew before. He loved
before time was. That's who he came to. The others
left alone. They're by themselves. Jacob
was alone, but God came to him. There's one-on-one wrestling.
This is when I grew up, I had the Royal Rumble. I can't say
wrestling. I do my best. Pen and a pen. You know, read that article.
That's a good article. You need to take heed to it. I can't say wrestling. I said
wrasslin' my whole life. Other hillbillies made fun of
me. But when I watched wrasslin' as a kid, that Royal Rumble,
and there'd be 50 men in one ring just fightin' each other,
masks and all that stuff and all that, that ain't wrasslin'.
Wrestling's one-on-one, isn't it? I about called this sports,
spiritual sports. Paul talked, he was a sportsman.
Some of us, you shouldn't be into football and baseball. Oh,
hogwash. Paul was, wasn't he? He said,
you gotta fight a good fight, he's into boxing, run a race,
finish your course, obstacle course, because there's ups and
downs, and I'm scared of heights, and I don't like swimming in
cold water. You gotta run a good race, all those things, wasn't
it? Well, here's some wrestling. The Lord wrestles one-on-one,
not tag team. and you'll wrestle in a man.
Salvation takes place in the arena when God Almighty comes
to a man or a woman personally. Not in a creed, not in a declaration,
not in grandma and grandpa went to church. When it comes to you,
when it comes to me, that's where salvation is gonna take place,
one-on-one. And everyone's gone, Jacob's alone, he's in darkness,
he's with his thoughts, he's with his fears, his sins, his
doubts, he's all alone. And this all begins when we're
brought to feel totally helpless, when you're brought to be afraid.
You ain't feared God yet when he's scared. Hopeless, no one
can help me, it's just me, I'm all alone. You that the Lord's dealt with,
you that the Lord's come and wrestled with, when he first
came to you, didn't you feel like you was the only person
in the room? One-on-one, face, you can catch
my words. He didn't mince his words. I'm gonna tell you what he said.
Face to face, you get that? That's my face looking at your
face, Bob. When a man preached the gospel face to face to you,
was you the only one in the room? Now let me ask you, if you've
had that experience, like I don't care who else is in this room,
it don't matter, I'm alone. Somebody's wrestling with me.
When that happens, has that ever stopped? Has that ever stopped? I remember
that preacher looking right at me and God was speaking through
him to my soul. That's what it was. And that
didn't stop happening. There are seasons that doesn't happen.
There's times I walk without a limp, but that doesn't stop
happening. I've heard some people say before,
you've said it, that message was just for me. Have you said
that? Have I? I've heard other people
say, that message was just for me. That was just for me. Good. Good. Because God saves
people individually. If he's going to save you, it's
going to be a message. It's just for you. He's going to wrestle with you.
He's gonna put his hands on you. You get that? That's why we should
never listen on behalf of others. We need blessed. You get that?
We need saved. I don't need to worry about so-and-so
hearing something. I need to hear something. I need
a word from the Lord. Verse 24 says they wrestled a
man with Jacob. A man wrestled with him. And
boy, you talk about manliness. Imagine how much of a man our
Lord was. He walked this earth. The God-man. And when this was over, Jacob
knew that one mightier than him had dealt with him, one stronger.
He's going to know, God touched me. God touched me. When sinners come in contact
with the Lord of Lords, King of kings, they know a man's wrestled
with them, not a weakling. Not a wimp, not somebody that
says, I just want to get a hold of you and you won't let me.
No, a mighty man. Not one that tries to knock on
your door with your heart and try to get in. One that breaks
a door down and breaks your heart. That's who we've dealt with,
a man. When this captain of our salvation comes to us and he
lays his hands on us, we know we are in his hands. A man's
come. That's what happened to Jacob,
right? The Lord changes not. The Lord don't change. He does
the same thing in our day. He lays a hold of his people
through what kind of wrestling? The preaching of the gospel,
the preaching of the truth, the preaching of Christ. And he wrestles
in the hearts of his people and he works in them. Side note,
y'all been told by people you respect, go to war with your
pastor. Have you been told that? That
book I gave y'all to read, y'all read it? Go to battle with your
pastor. Let me clarify that. Oh, Brother
Fortner might've not, he should put a comma and do a little explain.
Go to war on the same side of him, not against him, please.
Somebody else hears that? Go to war with your pastor. Yeah,
stand on the same side as him. Don't wrestle with him, against
him. Wrestle for him, right? Lord
wrestles in a heart of his people. And until the Lord lays a hold
on one of his children, people can listen to all the good gospel
messages they want to. They can read all the passages
they want to. They can read all the articles
they want to. Or you can look at the clock and go to sleep.
But when the God-man grabs a hold of you, you know you got a hold
of. That's what Peter slept in and
they smote him, didn't they? Angels smote him. Get up, wake
up, arise. I couldn't wait for them preachers
to stop talking when I was a kid. I mean, that half hour took two
and a half days. Come on now, I got stuff to do.
And when I was a teenager, I couldn't wait for them to stop talking.
So I could leave and I could go talk. I was reading Spurgeon every
day. I was reading Luther every day. I tell you all about Calvin,
all those good old fellas. And I was arguing with people
before the internet ever was a thing. And I was making good
sense. I was wrestling this people of this world. And we'll learn
about that next time. I can tell you all about the Senate of Dorton,
1618. Jacobus Arminius. Well, if he was a Jacob, he wouldn't
have been preaching that junk he's preaching. I can tell you
that. I can tell you all about those things. And then one day
God reached down his hand for me. He touched me. He got a hold of me. Do you get
that? I was steeped in religion. I
was a good Calvinist until God saved me. I was fighting doctrine
until I fought a man. Man came to me. All that other
stuff's still true. You don't get to Christ by the
doctrine, but if you've got Christ, your doctrine will get sorted
out. That's true. We need a person, don't we? He did it until it
accomplished what he meant to do. It says in verse 24, when
Jacob was left alone and there wrestled, A man with him until
the breaking of day. The God-man will not leave one
of his children until the day breaks, until light comes. You
get what I'm saying? If he comes, what he begins,
he will finish. If he's beginning a good work
in you, he's going to finish it. It's his work. The Lord wrestles
with his people and we wrestle back, don't we? Until glory. There's a war going on until
you die, if you're his. If the warfare stops, if the
struggle ever ends, you either died in the faith or you're dead
in your trespasses and sins. It's one or the other. All those
in Hebrews 11 said they died in the faith. It says they were
persuaded of those things that hadn't come yet. And you know
what they did? What's the verb? They embraced it. You get that? They
embraced, like Jacob, they laid a hold of it. I won't touch on
this next hour, but God is sovereign and he must do everything. Man's
responsible. We're told to repent. We're told
to lay a hold of, not forsake. He has to do that. He's going
to do it through you. They embraced it, didn't they?
This is a lifelong battle in the valley of the shadow of death.
And when Christ comes, when that day breaks, there's no more struggle.
That's our end. Verse 24 says, Jacob was left
alone, and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of
the day. That's the good news right there. That's the gospel
in one verse, isn't it? I was alone. He came to me. He
wrestled with me, and he did it all the way until light came. I was in darkness. Were you in
darkness? Is that where God found you? Well, no, I was doing pretty
good on my own. Well, he ain't come to you yet. That's a lie. You get it? It's a lie. You're
lying to yourself. You're flattering yourself. Look
at that last week. Verse 25, and when he saw that
he prevailed not against him, when that man saw that Jacob,
wouldn't make no progress with Jacob, he touched the hollow
of his thigh, and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint,
and he wrestled with it. People say, see, you can resist
God's will. No. What's happened here is the Lord's
proving Jacob, and the Lord speaks in a language you and I can understand. He has to talk to us. He said,
come, let us reason together. Were you going to talk him into
something else? No, he's speaking in a way we can understand. Jacob
was not winning at resisting the Lord. That's not what was
happening. No. Nothing was prevailed though.
We wouldn't make any movement, huh? He wasn't giving in on his
own. You weren't bowing on your own.
You didn't choose to bow to God. God made you bow. You bowed to
him. God was proving Jacob, and he
touched him. Do you get that? So he was fighting
against God. What does it say? Touched him. Boop. You get that? We need to understand the context
of what we're talking about. I can yell, scream, and punch
people, and grapple them, and put them in rear naked chokes,
and put you down, or whatever, do whatever I can. The Lord just
comes in and goes, boop. Just touched him. and dislocated
his hip, took a clean out a joint. I looked it up, the most common
cause of a femur being separated from a hip joint is a severe,
that's the word they used, severe car wreck. Now generally, there's
hip dysplasia and all, don't hand pick me, just hush, get
the point. A severe car wreck. That's what it takes, just from
a touch. The hollow of Jacob's thigh was out. A lot of force,
isn't it? A lot of power it took. Power
of a touch. Jacob's been fighting back, still
fighting back. And unless the Lord dislocates
his hip right in the middle of him, that'd just affect everything
in you, wouldn't it? Jacob will not surrender, he
will not bow. He was wrestling. I was a sophomore
in high school, John Chapman. Y'all know him from Spring Lake,
North Carolina. John taught me into trying out for the wrestling
team. And his son, Jeremy, was state
champ. He was just a, that fella's a walking muscle. He's strong.
And you weigh in and weigh out of practice. So I showed up to
practice, wrestling practice, and I weighed in. And then when
I weighed out that, after the practice was over, I weighed
10 pounds less. I lost 10 pounds at a practice. And it took, when
you wrestle, I don't know if any of y'all done or just kids
playing, it takes all of you. You can't do it with one hand
tied behind your back. That's an old saying. You wrestle
with your toes, with your knees, with your hips, with your thighs,
with your arms, your eyelashes, whatever it takes, your teeth.
It takes the whole of you. It takes the whole of you, doesn't
it? From my pinky toe to the hair of my head, this old man
fights against the Lord with everything in him. I fight his
wisdom. I fight his will. I fight his
good providence. Do you? Are you a son of Jacob? I would never do that. You better
be careful. God might pop your hip out of
socket if you were his. A believer would never do such things. Oh
yeah? My pastor used to say, don't go looking, get your nose
looking down on David just because your best sheep ain't showed
up yet. We haven't been given the opportunity to sin yet. In the Lord's good time and ability,
I get popped out of socket. Jacob was a believer. Don't forget
that. He already was a believer, wasn't he? I love this picture. Our legs are the strongest muscle
group in our bodies. That's our strength. And whenever
our legs go, it's over. The end's near it. I had a private
in Germany backtalking me. I was in the position of authority. You understand? I had to rule
over them. I was in charge. And that boy
would not stop backtalking me. He fought me at every turn. I
said, go do that. Why? Why? I need you to tell
me why. I don't need to tell you why. You do it. Just do what
I say. That's the job. What's wrong
with you? He kept talking. Now, I could
have just rode him up, did that, but that's a sign of my failure
of leadership. You remember them days, don't you Tim? I took that
fella out back and I made him start doing pushups. I made him
start doing jumping jacks. Made him start doing this and
that sit ups. Front back goes. One of my favorites. And that
boy wouldn't give. I could see it in his eyes. He
didn't say nothing. But I looked people in the eye and I met one
or two people in my life and I can kind of read folks and
he hadn't gave yet. And so I thought, you know what?
One of my friends, that Saturday morning, early, he's out, laid
out drunk or something, I can't remember what he did wrong that
time. And I told one of my friends, I was training up a corporal,
and I said, I'm gonna take his legs from him. He said, do what?
I said, watch. And I made that boy do squats
for about 30 minutes. And he finally started getting
a little winded. Finally started getting a little winded. And
I knew what was gonna happen. He didn't know what was gonna
happen. I've lived through this. And I said, well, Saturday morning,
you want the rest of your weekend? All you gotta do, when I say
go, you run to that light pole and touch it. If you can do it
in two minutes, you can leave. Your weekend's over, we'll never
have this problem again." He said, I'm gonna do it. He kept
doing that same motion, that same motion. I said, whenever
I tell you, you ready? I said, go. And he sprinted as
hard as he could. He took about two steps and he
just went face first right in the ground. I said, your weekend's
done, I'll see you Monday. I never had a problem with that
boy again, you know that? Other people, they start back-talking
me, I said, don't back-talk him, just hush and do what he says. We
have our legs taken from us. We have no soundness in us. You
understand that? We have no constitution. That's
what David wrote. He said, for thine arrow stick
fast in me, and thy hand presseth me sore. You got to hold, you
put your hand on me. You put your hand on me. And
there's no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger, neither
is any rest in my bones because of my sin. That hip gets popped
out. We're going to limp forever because
of sin. We're going to be reminded of that struggle that we had.
We'll remember that pain that we've caused ourselves fighting
against God. We limp the rest of our lives
with that. What that means is that out of joint literally means
unhinged. When the Lord wrestles us, we're
unhinged. We have no strength at all and we know it. We know
it. Verse 26 says, and he that man
The God-man said, let me go for the daybreaker. Judgment's coming.
Go away. Jacob said, I ain't going away.
I'm not gonna go hide from God. I'm gonna cleave to God. Accept
thou bless me. I will not let thee go except
thou bless me. What Jacob doesn't understand
yet, he doesn't know who he's dealing with just yet. He knows
he has to have whatever that fellow's got, right? And he doesn't
understand also, he's already been blessed. He's already been
blessed. That instinct in him is clinging
to God. You're still like a, like a baby
hugs into him. When we're shown the power, the
might and the holiness of our Lord and our complete unhinged
inability, we commit our way to the Lord. Lock, stock and
barrel, all of it. Everything all day. He's our
all, that's our life. We commit to him. We cleave to
him. Joshua said that, but cleave
unto the Lord your God, as ye have done unto this day. You
cleaved to him before, cleave to him now. What about tomorrow? Tomorrow don't matter. I'm only
lying. Do you know what time it is? I know we had a time change.
We sprung ahead an hour. Do you know what time it is?
It's right now. It's always right now, isn't it? Cleave to him
right now. You've done that before. Cleave unto the Lord your God.
I had a picture. I don't know if it's in my office
or not. Daily scared of heights like me, it's hereditary. And
we was at some national park, Yellowstone, I think. It was
by a big waterfall. We got close to it, and she grabbed
a hold of me, got her arms around my neck, looked like I had a
backpack on the front of me, and her legs around my waist,
and them ankles locked in, and those hands locked in, and I
just stuck my hands out. And she's holding on to me. Well,
she'd let go. I'd have snatched her, you know.
She claimed to me. Why? She trusted me. She was
afraid. We're gonna see what's next there.
I can't get into it. This meal's a couple different courses. It
just happens to be over a couple different days or hours, okay?
To tell someone, I've been called an antinomian because I've said,
believe Christ and do whatever you want. There's a new instinct
in you. You want to, this is relevant
in our day. Spurge can't tell you about this.
There's legalized marijuana in this state, right? Believe Christ,
smoke all the dope you want. I don't care. You'll quit smoking
that though. Because the Lord's got a new
person and you say, you know what? I can't listen to the word if I'm all
high and looped out of my head. I can't do that. I can't hear
a word from God. I need to be sober minded. Not
just sober in sobriety, but sober in seriousness. This is serious.
The Lord has me here. I'm his child. I know who I am.
He owns me. I'm not my own. He owns me. Believe
Christ, do what you want. He'll train his people. I've
been called an antinomian for that, and I've also been called
a legalist. And preaching works because I say if a man has new
faith, if God's put a new man in you that believes Christ,
you will act in obedience. You can't have faith without
obedience. It's our responsibility when we respond to his ability.
You get that? There will be faith and obedience.
It will happen if it's God's. To tell someone to cleave to
Christ, to attend worship, to hear the word preached, to trust
him, to grab ahold in and to let go, that's good. I won't
shy away from saying it. It's the right thing to do. He
says so. Doesn't he? That's right. Verse
26 says, he said, let me go for the daybreak. And he said, I
will not let thee go except thou bless me. Jacob was already blessed. Unbelievers don't wrestle with
sin like that. They fight God, but they don't know it. But they
don't wrestle internally with themselves, do they? They don't
have commitment to the Lord. They don't have a need for his
blessing. Well, I just, I sorted this out.
I found them tapes. I downloaded the right messages.
Is that lingering in the background? Get, get in the mirror and get
serious with yourself. Lord, probably the Lord wrestles with
you. Unbelievers don't struggle with this stuff. Believers do.
And he said unto them, what's thy name? He said, Jacob. That's
short and sweet, isn't it? Who are you? What are you? The
Lord knew his name. He was foreknown, wasn't he?
He was foreloved. He knew Jacob's frame, but now Jacob's gonna
know. What's your name? Who are you? I'm Jacob. Here's
the blessing. He wants blessed. Here's the
blessing. God comes to wretched sinners, and he wrestles with
them, and he unhinges them, and he asks what their name is, and
they say, I'm a wretched sinner. Not that that's, I'm totally
depraved. I'm sin. That's all I am. And he takes
those that think highly of themselves and he brings them low, all the
way down to his feet. And Christ came into the world
to save sinners. That's the blessing. It's not
to be picked up by your boots, it's to be lifted. Oh, we gotta
encourage folks. No, I need to be brought down. Mankind needs
to be brought down. We show what we are, because
Christ came into the world to save sinners, and I'm the chief
of them. I'm Jacob. I understand Paul
genuinely thought that. That's me. Paul also said, you
see your calling, brethren. You that have been wrestled with,
you see your calling. Not many wise after the flesh,
not many mighty, not many noble are called. He didn't say not
any, he said not many. But God's chosen the foolish
things of the world to confound the wise. Are you a fool? God's
chosen the weak things of the world to confound things. Where
am I, you weak? Well, now I can, nah, that ain't weakness. The
base things of the world, are you base? You ain't nothing but
sin and wickedness and evil and I'd cut everybody's throat in
that parking lot down at Albertsons if the Lord took his hand off
of me. Base things of the world, things
which are despised. hath God chosen." That's the
ones he'd come to wrestle with. Things which are not to bring
to naught the things that are that no flesh should glory in
his presence. Jacob said, well, I got a couple good holds in
on him. No, he had his hip popped out
of socket. He was screaming, crying unto God, didn't he? But
of him are ye in Christ Jesus. The Lord did all that. You take
those lepers, they had to be completely covered, white spots,
completely consumed in their leprosy. And there wasn't a speck
on them that wasn't nothing but leprosy and disease. And they
went to the priest and they said, you're clean. If you've got a
couple of good spots on you, the Lord's going to have to wrestle
that off of you. You have to be completely Jacob, don't we?
Verse 28 says, and he said, thy name shall be called no more
Jacob, but Israel. Israel. That's your name now. For as a prince hast thou power
with God and with men. How do you have power with God?
You can come to his throne of grace. Ask him. Did he say that? Come to me.
Ask me. We can go to his throne. You have power of God. And with
men. Like him, three Hebrew children. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
They looked that king in the face. Looked him face to face. And they said, you can throw
us in that fire, and if God don't want us to burn, we ain't gonna smell
like smoke. And if he wants us to burn, that's his business,
but we ain't bowing to your gods. That's power with men, because
he's our power, isn't it? How does a prince have power
of God in men? The Lord. How do you become a
prince? You can't marry into this one.
You can't marry into this one. Well, we are married into it.
Born, ain't we? Born into it. Life's been put
in us and you've prevailed. That new man in us, that Christ
in us. From that day on, you think Jacob
went and introduced himself as Israel? You pay attention to
me. Do you think Jacob went and introduced
himself as Israel while he's limping? The Lord's children
in this day, this is a rhetorical question, don't answer it. The
Lord's children in this day go to people and say, I'm a Christian.
I say, I'm a Jacob. I'm a sinner. Bob, do you know
what your rightful title is? You're Saint Robert, the Lord,
our righteousness. That's right, isn't it? You introduce
yourself that way. You. I wrote that about, I didn't
put St. Kevin, the Lord Our Righteousness in my note. I'll say it about
you, you won't say it about yourself. Jacob didn't say. Ain't nothing
changed. Two men went to the temple to
pray. There was a Pharisee and a tax collector, IRS agent. Crooked
one at that. And the Pharisee stood and prayed
with himself. You pray with yourself, you pray
to God. You cry it to yourself, you cry it to God. God, I thank
you. I'm not like other men, extortioners,
unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in
the week. I give tithes of all that I possess. And that publican
standing afar wouldn't even, so much as come into the temple,
wouldn't even lift up his eyes to heaven. He smoked on his breast
where the problem was. God be merciful to me, a sinner. Lord, should I tell you that
man went down to his house justified. He's probably still smiting his
chest the whole way down to his house. Doesn't say he went down
there clicking his heels and skipping and stuff, did he? That
didn't matter. Feelings don't matter. Lord before
us. That's the only thing that turns
us from rebels to regenerated children of God. Him before us. Verse 29, Jacob asked him and
said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, Wherefore
is it that thou dost ask after my name? Don't you know who you're
dealing with yet? Like other men, is he? And he blessed him
there. And Jacob called the name of
that place Peniel, for I have seen God face to face, and my
life is preserved. The last couple of years in this
nation, we haven't had in-person learning for our children in
these schools, have we? Cameron was doing a study for
a master's degree program, all the testing of the different
schools in the district. Test scores were low. It's hard to
learn math on the internet, ain't it? Hard to learn math on a computer.
It's hard to learn how to read. How do you even start to teach
somebody how to read? That's A, I guess, and B. You start
to shape letters and stuff. How do you even start to do that?
This nation will probably pay a great cost for not having our
children in person learning in school. The stats agree. The data agrees, right? I'm walking
you into something. how much more so the child of
God. People say, well, I can read at home, I can study at
home, I can listen to the message at home. Yes, and you ought to. God met somebody face to face.
That Ethiopian eunuch was reading, didn't he? And he didn't say,
Philip, how could I understand this unless somebody sends me
a letter or a telegram. He said, unless some man tell
me. Now get up here and show me Christ in this. Lord deals
with people face to face, face to face. I've seen God face to
face and he preserved my life. My life is preserved. And he
passed over a penny on him. I think he's on a high note.
That's pretty, that's pretty good news. If I don't turn your
frown upside down, I don't know what will. I ain't got nothing.
I ain't got no better news to tell you. If I don't bring a
tear to your eye, I don't know what, what I'll do. God came
to us, undeserving sinners and saved us. Whoo, that's something. Get your tamarind, do some cartwheels
or something. He passed over Penuel and the
sun rose upon him. Oh, man, that warmth of lightness
come to us. Oh, we see him. We know him now. We've seen God face to face.
And he hoffed upon his thigh. Oh! You ever took a few steps
feeling pretty good? Oh! Oh, my hip. My back goes
out sometimes, man, it gets so, you ever had that happen? Forget
all about it, and you, oh! Hurts so good, don't it? Lord wrestled with me, he bruised
me, and I'm glad. And I'm reminded of it often. Every few steps, I'm reminded
of it. That's a good thing. That pain's good, it's hurt good.
I pray he wrestles with somebody here today. He wakes us up, shakes
us up good, gets ahold of you, touches you, boop, touch your
thigh, and just unhinge you, get you unwound, like Lazarus. And he breaks your stony heart.
Wouldn't that be something? Jacob got, he'd met God before,
hadn't he? He'd bowed to God before. Yeah,
that was before us today. I mean, the Lord wrestled with
us today, though. That's pretty good. Father, as you see fit, as it
pleases you, come to your people, one-on-one. Lord, allow us to
see your face. Get a hold of us, touch us, let
us know who it is. Our times are in your hands. Whose hands it are, our times
are in. Lord, be with us as you promised you will. Don't leave
us to ourselves as you promised you won't. Our promises and our
words are so fickle, Lord, and so weak. Allow us to lean hard
on your promises. Allow us to trust Christ and
believe him. Put all of our ways into him,
commit ourselves to him, to latch a hold, to cleave to. Make that happen in us. Thank
you for this day, Lord. Thank you for the Lent. You've
given us that reminder who we are and whose we are. Forgive
us for ever doubting. Forgive us for wondering. It's
in Christ's name that we ask it. Amen. We'll meet back at
1030.