Bootstrap
John Chapman

Thou Said, I Will Surely Do Thee Good

Genesis 32:1-12
John Chapman December, 13 2009 Audio
0 Comments

Sermon Transcript

Auto-generated transcript • May contain errors

100%
Back to Genesis chapter 32. You
can put for a title on this if you want, just Power and Prayer
to make it short. Jacob is now going back home. You remember back in chapter
31, he slipped out of town at night because he knew his uncle
Laban would do some underhanded thing again and try to keep him.
Jacob said to Rachel, he said, your father has changed my wages
ten times. So it's evident what kind of
man his uncle was. And of course, Laban chases him
down, upset, but they end up making a treaty between them,
a peace treaty, and they ratify it with a covenant and with a
sacrifice there in verse 31, which is a message in itself.
Then we come to this, verse 32, after they make this covenant
and they part in peace, you know, it says there in verse 55 and
31, And early in the morning Laban rose up, kissed his sons
and his daughters, and blessed them. And Laban departed and
returned to his place. And then now Jacob, he goes on
his way home. God told him to go home. And
Jacob's going to find himself faced with another problem. Another
problem. They're just in line. I can tell
you, they're just in line. But Jacob finds himself in this
problem and he prays, calls upon God. And we will find and see
that the strength and foundation of prayer is God's own words. It's His own promises. Never
forget this. If you really, for a believer
now, to have power with God, because that's what he said.
He said, your name's no more Jacob. Your name's Israel, for
as a prince, you have power with God. But this whole prayer has
to do with Jacob keeps saying, you said, you said, Lord, you
promised, you promised. The foundation of prayer is God's
own word. Have you not used this? If you
don't use this when you've argued, I'm going to use that word argue.
I could use the word pleading, but Jacob's arguing here with
God. I'm not going to let you go to
your blessing. Job said, oh, that I could come before him
and argue with him. Job uses that word. And that's
not an argument in a mean sense. I tell you what, if you ever
find yourself in a desperate situation, you'll argue with
God. I guarantee you will. You'll argue with him. You'll
take his word to him. And you'll do it in a manner
that's polite. You'll do it in a manner that's
right. But Jacob here is about to lose his life and his wives
and his children and everything. He hasn't forgotten what he did
and he hasn't forgotten what Esau said. And so he uses God's
word. He knows this. God is good for
his word. Or if you can count on anything,
it's this. God will keep his word. He'll
do just as He said. I tell you, there's no more comfort. There's no more comfort in going
to the throne of grace knowing He'll do exactly what He said.
Lord, You said where two or three are gathered together in Thy
name, You'd be in the midst. Now have we any other reason
to expect Christ to be here other than the fact He said He would?
He said He would. And He's good for His word. And
the greatest argument that we can use in prayer is you said,
thou saidest. I've used that before with people. You said you'd do this. Children
are the best at it. They're the best at it. Mom,
you said I could go. You said if I got this done,
if I cleaned this up, you said, I mean, that's all that needs
to be said is you said. You got them. I'm not saying
that. I'm trying to do this in a way that's reference. You know
what I'm saying. But we've used this. You said, and I could do this.
You said there's power in that now. There's power. You said
these are your promises. Lord, these are your promises.
Do you really believe that God will do as He said? Do you? I'll
tell you what, if you really believe that, you'll take these
promises and you'll go to Him and you'll say, Lord, You said.
You said. But now first I want us to notice
God's mercy to Jacob as he begins his journey home. You see, back
in chapter 29, God promised Jacob that he would bring him back
home. He'd bring him home safely and that he would multiply seed
and it would cover the earth. And he promised that. So now Jacob is going home. God said, Jacob, it's time for
you to go home. And as he begins to head home after meeting Laban
here and dealing with Laban, he sees, he meets, he meets a
host. And Jacob went on his way and
the angels of God met him. And when Jacob saw them, he said,
this is God's host. This is God's host. God gave
him mercy here. God gave him some encouragement
here. I told you that I was going to
bring you back to the land that you left, back to your father's
house. I was going to give you all this land. And now here he
gives him a host of angels to encourage him not to be afraid,
because he's going to meet his brother, not to be afraid. It's
going to be all right. What if you or I were going somewhere
and we literally met a host of angels? Would that not encourage you?
Would that not encourage you? And Jacob recognized him as God's
host. And he called the name of that
place Mahanaim. Now that means two hosts. Here's
what Jacob saw. Here's the encouragement God
gave him. There's a host of angels ahead of you, Jacob, and there's
a host of angels behind you. When God brought Israel out of
Egypt, There was a cloudy pillar by day and fire by night. They
were protected. And he's giving Jacob this on
his outset. Here's two hosts of angels, bands
of angels. And he greatly encourages Jacob. They were going before him and
behind him. God's people are never alone. They're never alone. There's always a heavenly host
accompanying his children on their way home. We may feel like
we're alone at times, but we're not. Never alone. Don't we have
a song that sings that? Never alone. Never alone. Now, Jacob has learned something
also about humility over the years. You know, he's been 20
years away from home. He's been 20 years down there
with Laban, cheated. I mean, Laban treated him like
a slave. He treated him like a servant, not like a son-in-law.
But he learned something about humility in this over the years. He's going to meet Esau. And
how does he meet Esau? When he sends these people out
to meet Esau, he says, You tell my Lord. He doesn't say, You
tell Esau that I have the birthright. You tell Esau I have the power
over him. The elder shall serve the younger.
He never exercised that. He says, You tell my Lord. And
he even called himself A servant. He said, you tell him, thy servant.
Jacob learned some true humility. God for 20 years taught this
man some humility. True humility. But here's the nature of flesh.
Verse 6 and 7. After seeing this heavenly host,
you would think that he would not be afraid, would you? After
seeing this band of angels? And he knew it. He said, these
are God's hosts. These are God's hosts. And after
seeing that, you would think that he would be encouraged and
he wouldn't be afraid, but in verses 6 through 7, he's afraid.
He's afraid. He's not afraid. He's distressed.
He's wringing his hands. What am I going to do here? This
is after being encouraged by seeing this host. Well, such
is flesh. We still have that old nature
with us. We have the Word of God. We have all the promises
of God in here. We have the Gospel and what Christ
has done for us. And still, still we wake up and
we're afraid. We find ourselves afraid. We
find ourselves anxious. But that's, you know, that's
what it is to be in His flesh. What it is. But it did bring
out this prayer. It did bring out this prayer.
The occasion for this prayer Jacob is about to meet Esau. As I said, he has not forgotten
what he did to his brother, and he has not forgotten what his
brother said. I'm going to kill you. As soon as our father dies,
I'm going to kill you. I'm going to take you out. So
he knew that. Jacob's earthly life was never
easy. The life of a believer is never
easy. Never. One trouble after another. Oh,
He gives us rest. We do find rest. We find rest
in Christ, and we find some rest here from time to time, but trouble's
on the way. But Jacob prays to God, and he
prays to God for mercy and help. And his prayer is truly, truly
a model prayer. Any prayer, now listen, this
is why you give real attention to this. Any prayer that brings
God from heaven, down. We will see a pre-incarnation
of Christ the next time we finish out this chapter. But any prayer
that brings God Almighty from heaven to wrestle with me, that's
a model prayer. That's a prayer I want to pay
attention to. So we have before us here a model
prayer that Jacob prays. Now I want you to notice first
of all in his prayer here, Jacob's prayer It was very simple. It was very simple. We need not
to speak to God Almighty like we're theologians. We need to
speak to Him as a child. Speak to His Father. I wouldn't
want my son to speak to me like some theologian, but speak to
me. I'm their Father. Speak to Him as the Father. And
Jacob uses no flowery words. He just uses plain heart Felt
words. Just plain. It doesn't matter
if his grammar is right or wrong. He uses plain heartfelt words.
He says, deliver me. Deliver me. From the hand of
my brother. From the hand of Esau. The one
who wants to kill me. Strive to keep it simple. Strive
to keep it simple. God knows our hearts. That's
the reason I read over to you there in Romans chapter 8. The
Holy Spirit, He groans for us. He intercedes for us. He makes
intercession for us. It says, with groanings. It's
the first time that really ever jumped out to me. He doesn't
just make intercession. He makes intercession with groanings. This is the Holy Spirit doing
this. Which cannot be uttered. You and I can't put it into words.
You and I can't find the words. But He does. And he does it with
groanings according to the will of God. He knows the heart. He knows the situation. And then
Jacob expresses his humility in this prayer by saying, I am
not worthy. I'm not worthy of all thy mercies
and of all thy truth. God revealed the gospel to him.
God revealed the truth to him. He said, I'm not worthy to even
know the truth. I'm not worthy to even be sitting in here listening
to the truth. My, it's a mercy. It is a real
mercy that God has allowed us to come into this room, open
his book, sing his praises, and read his word. That's a mercy. That's a mercy, unspeakable mercy. Jacob said, I'm not worthy of
all thy mercies, everything I have. God's given me. Did he not say,
Jacob said, I came across this Jordan with what? A staff. When he was sent out from home,
when he was told to leave, he did not have anything. He didn't
have anything but the clothes on his back. That's all Jacob
had. He said, I'm not worthy of any
of your mercies. Not one of them. We are never worthy of what we're
asking for. I'm never worthy of what I'm
asking for. Not from God. Not from God Almighty. Never.
I brought a message here a couple of weeks ago for Christ's sake.
There's our worthiness. Christ. Jesus Christ is my worthiness. He's my worthiness. And then
Jacob used God's own words to argue with him. He used his own
words. Can you think of anything better
to use when you go before the throne of grace than this, thou
saddest? Can you think of anything better? Thou saddest. I want you to get
this. I thought about this two or three
days. For every situation that we find
ourselves in, there's a promise that fits it. For every situation,
there is a promise that fits it. And I believe that the key
to the power in prayer is knowing and laying hold of that promise
that fits my situation and taking it before the throne of grace
and saying, Thou saddest. Thou saddest. Oh, Lord, after
this prayer, You said, Call upon me in the day of trouble and
I'll deliver you. Lord, you said you'd do that. Come unto me,
all you that labor and heavy laden, I'll give you rest. Lord,
you said you'd do that. That's not just for sinners.
That's for, I mean, just sinners coming for the first time. That's
for his people every time they are heavy and heavy laden. He
said, you come to me and I'll give you rest. Lord, you said
you'd do that. Whosoever shall call on the name
of the Lord shall be saved. Lord, you said you'd do that.
You said you'd save everyone who called upon your name. Oh,
learn that. Learn that. And you'll learn
power with God. God the Father is glorified when
He fulfills His promise that He has said, that He has given. And when He fulfills it for Christ's
sake. Lord, you say it. And notice here the arguments
also that Jacob uses in his prayer. And I'll say this, and then he
uses his covenant relationship. He uses his covenant relationship
to God. He says in verse 9, O God of
my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac. He's using covenant
relationships here. God is a covenant God. God, you
made a covenant with my father Abraham. You made a covenant
with my father Isaac. You made a covenant with me concerning
these things. You said I'll do thee good. Listen,
God the Father has truly made a covenant with His Son Jesus
Christ concerning every one of His people. It's a covenant of
grace. It's a covenant of peace. It's a covenant of reconciliation.
Lord, fulfill that. Fulfill that covenant. Oh, fulfill
that covenant to me for Christ's sake. I have a covenant relationship
to God in Christ. I have a covenant relationship
with Him. That's what Abraham said, I have a covenant relationship
with you. And I tell you this, God never
breaks His covenant. He never breaks His covenant. I have a
covenant relationship with Him in Christ. In it, He has promised
to keep all the sheep. The Father has given him a people.
The Father gave him the sheep. He said, the Father gave them
to me and none of them have I lost. That's a promise. That's a promise. Oh, fulfill that promise. In
that covenant, he's promised to be my surety. Lord, be my
surety. Keep me. Keep me. Jacob argues the promise. Now
listen to this. Here's the power. The Lord, he
said to God of my father Abraham, the God of my father Isaac, the
Lord, the Lord, which said unto me, return unto thy country.
Lord, you said, you're the one who said to return. Lord, you're
the one who said to come. You said come. The Spirit and
the bride say come. Lord, you said. Oh, power. Jacob laid hold of God's promise
to bring him home safely. And I mean, he was using this
before the throne of God's grace. He was using this argument. Lord,
you said, you said. He laid hold of the promise that
fit his situation. He was headed home. God said,
Jacob, return to your father's house. And he said, Lord, you
said, you said. Are you under temptation? Trials? Lord, you said, listen, you said
that there would be no temptation, no trial that would overtake
me, but that you would, with the trial, make a way out. Lord,
you said it. You said it. If he said it, then argue it
with him. I mean reverently. You know what I mean, reverently.
Wrestle. This is what Jacob is doing.
We'll see this the next time. Jacob wrestles now. Jacob wrestles
with God Almighty. He's wrestling with the king
of glory. He's wrestling with the incarnate God. And he's wrestling
with him with his own words. It's not a physical thing. No,
he says, I'm not. No, I'm not. Let you go until
you bless me because you said. Lord, you say it. Learn to wrestle with God before
the throne of grace using his own word. Using his word. Then Jacob argued God's past
dealings with him. I'm not worthy of the least of
all thy mercies. Oh, he can look back on his life.
You say, but his life was so full of trouble and it was so
full of mercies. It was so full of mercies. Look
where all those troubles brought him. Bethel, and now it's taking
him back to Bethel. Our troubles keep bringing us,
they keep bringing us home. They keep bringing us to Him.
He knows how to do it. I know if you were living in
that day, if you looked at these two boys, Esau and Jacob, which
one would you think was God's? Which one would you think that
God loved? Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated. But outwardly,
you would not believe that if you didn't know it was written
down. Because Esau had all this power. Esau had all this wealth. Esau came with 400 men. It looked
like Esau was the one blessed. Jacob left home with nothing
but a staff. Jacob was taken advantage of
for 20 years. And Jacob was walking back home
and he's got to face his brother who hates him. You would think
the opposite, but it's not. Jacob have I loved. God's love brings us along a
path that we know not. He brings us along a path that
weans us from this world. Always, always. He does the wisest
things for his children, just as you would. Just as you and
I would. So Jacob argues his past mercies. He says, I came here with only
a staff, now look what I have. Look what I have. And he speaks
of God's past mercy and God's truth. He argues his past mercy. I'm telling you this, God never
changes. God never changes. He never changes.
As He is, so He will be. As He has done, so will He do.
Every one of us can look back and see where the Lord has delivered
us time and time again. And I promise you this, he never
changes. He'll do it time and time again. He never changes. He never changes. And then he
gives a definite request. He says, deliver me, I pray thee,
from the hand of my brother from Esau. Lord, deliver me from Esau. He gives a definite request. I brought this message, what
was it, last Wednesday? No, I think it was last Sunday
night out of 1 Peter. He saw. He saw. And then he quotes this promise
in verse 12. And this is the message right
here. And thou saidest, I will surely
do thee good. Lord, you said you would do me
good. And he quotes this promise right
back to the Lord. And I'll make thy seed as the
sand of the sea. And Jacob knows that if he dies
and his wives die and his sons, his eleven sons die, there's
not going to be a seed. This promise is not going to
be fulfilled. Thy seed as the sand of the sea,
which cannot be numbered for multitude. Oh, thou saidest,
this is the strongest argument that you can use at the throne
of grace. Thou saidest. Thou saidest. We are to come to the throne
of grace boldly. That's what it says in Hebrews
chapter 4. Look over in Hebrews chapter
4. In Hebrews chapter 4, look in
verse 16. Let us therefore come boldly,
not arrogantly, but boldly expecting. If God said to do something,
or if He said to come, then to do so is just being obedient. I mean, it's obedience. And I'm
to do so expecting God to do just as He said He would. to expect Him to do just as He
said He would. That's not arrogance. That's not presumption. That's
taking God at His word. Let us therefore come boldly
unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find
grace to help in time of need. Now, He says come, and come boldly.
Come boldly. That's how we are to come, expecting. William Jay wrote this outline. I just jotted these down. God
has the ability to do you good. Come boldly. He has all power. He has all wisdom. All dominion. Come boldly. Come boldly. He has the ability to do you
good. Jacob said, Jacob said, thou saidest I will do thee good.
Well, he has the ability to do that. And then secondly, God
has the inclination to do thee good. He has the inclination to do
thee good. And then thirdly, God is under engagement to do
thee good. Did he not tell Jacob, I will
do thee good? Well, he's just engaged himself
to do so. He promised in the covenant of
grace to do us good. And then fourthly, God has already
done thee good. He's already done thee good. Has He not promised that all
things shall work together for our good? Do you know that every
little thing that's ever come into our lives or everything
that has come our way, every minute thing has been for our
good? He's already done thee good.
Look at Calvary. Look at what He's done for you
in Christ. He has made Him to be unto us wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, redemption. In Him you are complete. I have
in Christ everything. Has he not already done me good?
Well, he will continue that good. Then notice last of all, after
Jacob prayed, after he finished praying at the throne of grace, he got up and he went about seeking
reconciliation. I said, Jacob, why don't you
just sit down and just wait and see what happens? No, he went about seeking reconciliation. There's nothing wrong, and it's
right, but there's surely nothing wrong with doing what we know
to do and depending upon God for the outcome. If I am out
of a job, and I've been there a few times, if I'm out of a
job and I pray, Lord, provide me a job, provide me a job, now
you know what I'm going to do after that? I'm going to get
in my car and I'm going to go look for a job. Depending on
Him to provide it. Depending on Him. And this is
what Jacob does. Jacob lays out this prayer before
God. He takes God's own words to the
throne of grace. And then after this, he gets
up and he seeks reconciliation from Esau. Lord, thou saddest. Learn that. I need to learn. I'm just saying
we all need to learn this. We all need to learn to take
God's promises, God's own word to the throne of grace. Lord,
you say it. You say it. Okay, Mike.
John Chapman
About John Chapman
John Chapman is pastor of Bethel Baptist Church located at 1972 Bethel Baptist Rd, Spring Lake, NC 28390. Pastor Chapman may be contacted by e-mail at john76chapman@gmail.com or by phone at 606-585-2229.

Comments

0 / 2000 characters
Comments are moderated before appearing.

Be the first to comment!

Joshua

Joshua

Shall we play a game? Ask me about articles, sermons, or theology from our library. I can also help you navigate the site.