And I want to begin with Hosea
chapter 12. Hosea chapter 12. Keep your Bibles open. We're
going to make our way finally over to Genesis chapter 32. This
is concerning Jacob. We're going to study again this
afternoon on Jacob. We looked at him last week. We
want to look at him again this week. A different place 20 years
later, but this is the same Jacob. In Hosea chapter 12 and verses
3 through verse 5. This is concerning what we read
last week. You'll remember this. And it's
going to concern our subject this week. Hosea chapter 12 and
verse 3. Did you find it? A little bit
hard to find. Look in verse 3, talking about
Jacob. He took his brother by the heel
and the wound. That's what we looked at last
week. And by his strength, he had power with God. Yea, he had
power over the angel, and prevailed. He wept, and made supplication
unto him. He found him in Bethel, and there
he spake with us, even the Lord God of hosts." The Lord is his
memorial. Now look in Genesis chapter 48.
Genesis chapter 48. Here's what Jacob said about our subject
this evening, about him wrestling with this angel that we're going
to look at in a minute. He said here in verse 15, here's
where Jacob was ready to die, and he was blessing his children
and his grandchildren. In Genesis 48 in verse 15, Jacob
blessed Joseph and said, God, before whom my father Abraham,
Isaac, And Isaac did walk, the God which fed me all my life
long until this day. And the angel which redeemed
me from all evil blessed the lads, and let my name be named
on them in the name of my father Abraham and Isaac, and let them
grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth." Now look
at one more place over in Genesis chapter 47. Genesis chapter 47. Jacob's life
had been one filled with sorrow from the time that he began to
deceive his brother. He was so concerned about getting
the birthright, manipulating, lying and deceiving, so caught
up in all of that. Finally, he was found out. Even though he got the blessing,
he had to flee into Laban. future father-in-law's land,
Haram. And there's where he got his
wife. Stayed with his father-in-law for 20 years. His father-in-law
deceived him. Gave him a wife he didn't even
know, didn't even love. And he worked for 20 years. And
he leaves there. And he comes back here to meet
his brother in the land of promise. He lost his wife. By the time
that this passage here, he'd lost his wife that he loved.
He thought he had lost Joseph, was eaten by beasts, and his
life had been filled with sorrow and with heartache and with trial.
He just went through a drought, several years of drought, almost
starved, eating nuts, and here is what he says when Joseph brings
him down to Pharaoh in Egypt, and he meets Pharaoh in Genesis
chapter 47 and verse 9. Pharaoh asked him how old he
was and how he was doing and that. Verse 9, And Jacob said
unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are nine
hundred and thirty years. A hundred and thirty years that
he had lived on this earth. And look what he said about him.
Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life. Few and evil. He had suffered
some trials, some heartaches. Now look over here in Genesis
chapter 31. Look in Genesis chapter 31. I want us to see some of the
things that happened to him. Just read them here for you.
When he went in to Laban, his father-in-law. And look here
how he says it. Laban had deceived him and changed
his wages so many times. In Genesis chapter 31, he was
ready to come back home. He got his wife and his eleven
kids together, and got his servants together and all of his cattle,
and he slipped out from Laban, his father-in-law. Well, Laban
catches up with him now, and here's where they meet, and here's
what happens in verse 38. Jacob answers his father-in-law,
These twenty years have I been with thee, thy ewes and thy she-goats
have not cast their young, and the rams of thy flock have I
not eaten. That which was torn of beasts
I brought not unto thee, I bear the loss of it myself. Of my
hand didst thou require it, whether stolen by day or stolen by night. Thus I was. In the day drought
consumed me, and the frost by night, and my sleep departed
from mine eyes. Thus have I been twenty years
in your house. I served you fourteen years for
your two daughters, and six years I served you for your cattle,
and you have changed my wages ten times. Except the God of
my father, the God of Abraham, and the fear of Isaac, had been
with me, surely thou hast sent me away now empty. God hath seen
my afflictions and the labor of my hands, and rebuked thee
yesterday night." So he was in great afflictions all of his
life. evil. And here in chapter 31,
in verse 3, look at that right quickly. I could have wrote these
down, but I want you to see some of these. Here's where he was
in the land of Haran. He wanted to leave. He realized
that his father-in-law was mad at him. His brother-in-law was
mad at him. They said he's got everything that my dad owned.
And he prayed about it. And here's what he asked the
Lord in verse 3. He asked the Lord if he could go home, and
the Lord said unto Jacob, Return unto the land of thy father,
and to thy kindred, and I will be with thee. Now that's the Lord's promise.
He said, you go back home. It's been 20 years. You go back
home. I'll be with you. Remember last
week we looked at where the Lord said, wherever you go, I'll be
with you? And I'll keep you and I'll bring you again to this
place." Well, here he reassures him of his presence and that
promise. You go home and I'll be with
you. And that brings us to chapter 32 that we'll look at quickly
this afternoon. Look here in chapter 32. This
was the Lord's promise. You go home and I'll be with
you. But you know Jacob still has some of this in him that
we saw last week. Remember what we saw last week?
The promise was, the elder shall serve the younger. But boy, Jacob
did everything he could imagine to manage that, to bring that
to pass, he and his mother. And he does the same thing tonight. Jacob had this ingrained in him.
The Lord would give him a promise and he would try his best to
arrange things and manage things to get that promise to come to
pass. And he couldn't rest. He couldn't rest because of his
attitude towards it. Well, look here. Here he comes
back home in chapter 32. And look at him now, what he
does. The Lord said, I'll be with you. You go home. You don't
have to be afraid. Go home and I'll be with you.
But look what he does in chapter 32. And it's beginning in verse
3. And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau, his brother,
and to the land of Seir, the country of Esau, Edom. And he
commanded them, saying, Thus shall you speak unto my lord
Esau. Thy servant Jacob saith thus.
I have sojourned with Laban and stayed there until now. I have
oxen and ices and flocks and manservants and womenservants.
And I have sent to tell my Lord that I may find grace in thy
sight. And the messengers returned to
Jacob saying, We come to thy brother Esau, and also he comes
to meet us with four hundred men. And man, Jacob's heart fell. He's finally going to kill me.
He's finally going to kill them. Look what he says in verse 7.
Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed, and he divided
the people that was with him, and the flocks, and the herds,
and the camels into two bands. And he said, if Esau come to
the one company and smite it, then the other company which
is left shall escape. Still planted, wasn't it? Still
planted. But Jacob, the Lord said, go
home. I'm with you. I'm with you. But
what does Jacob do? Boy, he starts plotting again.
You know, it wasn't that he didn't believe the Lord. He did. He
believed His promises. Look in verse 9. And Jacob said,
he went to the Lord in prayer, and he said, O Lord, O God of
my father Abraham and the God of my father Isaac, the Lord
which said unto me, Return unto thy country and to thy kindred,
and I will deal well with thee. Oh, he didn't think highly of
himself. Look in verse 10. I am not worthy the least of
all your mercies, and of all the truth which you have shown
unto your servant. For with my staff I passed over this Jordan,
and now I am become to them. Deliver me, I pray thee, from
the hand of my brother, and from the hand of Esau, for I fear
him, lest he will come and smite me and the mother with the children. Boy, he believed the promise
didn't he? Well, sure he did. And he prayed about it. And said,
I'm not worthy of all these mercies that you promised me. But I want
you to notice on in verse 13 and following, even after he
confesses, Lord, this is the promise you made to me. And after
he prays for the Lord to deliver him from Esau, he goes right
back to conniving again. Look what he says in verse 13.
And he lodged there that night, and he took that which came to
his hand, a present for Esau his brother, two hundred she-goats. Man, look at this. This was a
present. Two hundred goats, twenty he-goats,
two hundred oaves, and twenty rams, thirty milk camels with
their colts, forty keen and ten bulls, Twenty she-ashes and tenfold. Man, that's a bunch, ain't it?
He just kept giving, giving, giving. And he delivered them
into the hand of his servant. Ever drove by themselves and
said unto his servants, Pass over before me and put a space
between. Drove and drove. And he commanded
the foremost, saying, When Esau, my brother, meet you, and asked
you, saying, Whose are these? And where do they goest thou?
Who art thou? Where are you going? And whose are these before thee?
Then shalt thou say, You shall say, They be thy servant Jacob's.
It is a present sent unto my Lord Esau, and behold, also he
is behind us. And so commandeth he the second
and the third, and all that follow the drove, saying, On this manner
shall ye speak unto Esau, when ye shall find him. And look in
verse twenty, And he said, Yea, moreover, and say, Yea, moreover,
Behold, our servant Jacob is behind us. For Jacob said, I
will appease him with a present that goeth before me. And afterward
I will see his face. Preadventure, he will accept
me." Boy, he's still at it. He believes the promise, but
he just can't rest in it. He's still got to be manipulative. He's still got to manage his
own affairs. Try to deliver himself from this
awful distress that he's found himself in. You know children
of God can fall into all kinds of doubts and fears. It's not
that they don't believe the Lord. It's not that they don't believe
His promises. They do. They do. But the fear usually
arises from within themselves. And it's their own fault. It's
not that they don't believe the promises of the Lord. They do
believe them. It's not that they don't pray
about it. They do. But there's something within
them that they try to relieve themselves of their fears and
their doubts by managing everything, by straightening everything out.
They try many, many things. There's many devices in a man's
heart. And to get a better rest, to
get more assurance, We go about doing all of these things, don't
we, to try to relieve ourselves from some distress or some fear
that we're entertaining. We're just like Jacob, aren't
we? Sometimes, I've seen some of the Lord's children, and I
feel for them because I've been there in a sense myself, sometimes
it's physical illness or it's some mental distress. that throw
the Lord's children into distress. I know Sue's mother. I don't
know how she feels about her assurance with the Lord, but
sometimes mental illness can take its toll on faith. And it can lead to all sorts
of distress. You remember William Cowper. He was in John Newton's
day. He wrote so many good songs.
There is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins.
He wrote that. And he wrote about the mystery
of God's providence. God moves in mysterious ways. His wonders do perform. But this
man, when he was born, he was a very sickly person, mentally
and physically. His mother died when he was six
years old. When he got old enough to marry, he fell in love with
this woman, but his dad forbid him to marry her. He tried to
kill himself. They put him in a mental institution.
There the Lord saved him. But all of his Christian life,
up until just a few hours before William Kelper died, he had this
awful distress and fear that he's going to be rejected at
last. He lived in that agonizing fear. You think Esau, you think
Jacob was afraid and distressed to face Esau? How would you like
it to live day after day with a distress and fear when you
come down to die? You're just going to be rejected.
And he continued there until just a few hours before he died.
And they said Mr. Capra lifted up both hands and
said, Oh, I'm accepted. I'm accepted. Wouldn't that be
wonderful? Old Jacob said when he saw Esau,
I've seen you as an angel of God. And I bet you William Capra
thought the same thing. Oh my. And this is what he wrote. You find this kind of language
in so many of his songs. William Capra. Ye fearful saints,
he wrote a lot about things like this, ye fearful saints, fresh
courage take. The clouds you so much dread
are big with mercy and shall break with blessings on your
head. Judge not the Lord by feeble
sense. Trust Him for His grace. Behind
the frowning providence, he knew something about that. Behind
the frowning providence, he hides a smiling face. What was it that
caused William Cowper to face such distress and fear and dread?
Well, it was his mental problems. It was his physical problems.
What was it that caused Jacob such distress? Trying to manipulate. Trying to manage. Trying to work
things out. Instead of simply trying to get
a deep-seated faith in the promises of God, I'll be with you. Return,
and I'll be with you. So he got himself in trouble,
hadn't he? Jacob's fears and doubts rose out of his trying
to fix his own problems and manage his own affairs and bring everything
to pass. One time he was pleading the
promises and asking the Lord to deliver him from his brother.
Then immediately after that, he was trusting in his own ability
to deliver himself. I'll appease him by this prayer.
I'll appease him by this presence. So much of our doubt, even the
fear sometime we have of our salvation, and the fears of God's
providence when he brings us into some dark places, it's not
so much out of our weakness, is it? It's out of our perceived
strength. We fall into doubts and fears
because we lean upon our abilities to manage our own fears. relieving ourselves of our own
fears. That's where we get into trouble.
So this brings us here then to verse 24. Let's look at this
right quickly now. Look in verse 24. Here's where
he came to. Remember last week when we saw
Jacob? He's manipulated, manipulated,
and finally the Lord comes to him and he lays helpless in his
sleep upon his back. And there's the perfect opportunity
for the Lord to reveal his free grace and the free promise. Well,
here he comes to him again. And here he finds him in a perfect
place because verse 24 says, Jacob was left alone. Jacob was left alone. Well, that's a good place to
be. Did you know it? That's a good place to be. Alone. Alone. But you know he wasn't alone.
And this is the wonderful thing about it. There was nobody else
around him. that the Lord was pleased to
condescend. And he said there in verse 24,
"...there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the
day." Who was this angel? This man? Well, he tells us over
here in verse 30, look what he said, "...Jacob called the place
Penel, for I have seen God face to face." And the first text
I read to you in Hosea 12, he said, "...the angel which redeemed
me." or Genesis 47, the angel which redeemed me. So this was
the Son of God. And he had taken to himself a
farm. And there he wrestled with Jacob.
This had happened before. Remember Abraham? The Lord appeared
to Abraham. He appeared to Manoah, Samson's
dad and mom. So the Lord Jesus took this body
for a time just to condescend and wrestle with Jacob. This
was God. This was the triune God wrestling
with Jacob. And they were alone. They were
alone. Brothers and sisters, it's just a wonderful thing when
we get alone with the Lord. Did you know that? It really
may not be alone physically, but it's alone in the heart.
There may be company around, but just you and the Lord. You're
shut up to Him, and He's shut up to you. And in your heart,
you're praying to Him. In your heart, you're wrestling
with Him, and He's wrestling with you. Remember that Canaanite
woman that came to the Lord Jesus? There was a bunch of people around
them there. But it was just her and Him. Her saying, Lord, be
merciful to me. And Him saying, woman, I'm not
sent to you. And her wrestling with Him, and
Him wrestling with her. That's a wonderful thing when
that happens. It doesn't matter if you're at home in your closet,
if you're driving down the road in your vehicle, but it's just
you and the Lord. It may be short. It may be a
short wrestling match. Or it may be a long one. This
one lasted most of the night. But the thing is getting along
with Him and Him being pleased to condescend to wrestle with
us. It does us no good if we're just
alone, does it? But oh, when He condescends and
He's there with us, And we wrestled, and he wrestled with us. And
it says here in verse 25, this is a very amazing thing. And
when he saw, when the angel saw, when the Lord saw that he prevailed
not against him, he touched the hollow of Jacob's thigh, and
the hollow of Jacob's thigh, his hip joint, was out of joint
as he wrestled with him. Ain't this amazing? He prevailed
not. Jacob was getting the best of
it. Ain't that amazing? When you realize this was the
Lord, and he was getting the best of it. Hosea said he prevailed against
the angel. He had power over the angel. Ain't that amazing? And he wept. Somebody said he wrestled like
a champion and wept like a baby. And they were wrestling. He was
just throwing the Lord around. I remember I had a brother, an
older brother, and I never knew it at the time. But he was tough. Man, he was stout. He was twice
the fellow I was. And he'd let me get a hold of
him and just throw him around. And I thought, man, I'm stout.
And I had no idea until a few years later. He was just letting
me do it that way. But here Jacob was. He was throwing
him around, wrestling with him. And he was getting the best of
this angel. He prevailed not against him. Somebody made this statement,
several people have made this statement about this. They said
God was wrestling in Jacob with his right hand. And he was wrestling
against Jacob with his left hand. And since God's right hand is
stronger than his left hand, he was prevailing against himself.
That had to be the way it is, isn't it? He prevailed against
the angel. But I want you to notice this.
And finally, we see this. It wasn't Jacob's strength in
wrestling. That wasn't what got him the
blessing. It was his strength in cleaving. It was his strength
in cleaving. Here in verse 26, and he said,
let me go. In verse 25, he touched the hollow
of Jacob's thigh and threw his hip bone out. He threw it out
of socket. Now, if you've ever seen wrestling
matches, my son used to wrestle. They wrestled mainly with their
legs. And can you imagine when the Lord touched him and threw
that hip joint out? He couldn't wrestle anymore.
What was he doing then? He was hanging on. He was hanging
on. He wrestled and he was a champion
in wrestling. He's even out wrestling the angel.
But finally, the angel touched. I don't know if he touched. That
word means everything from laying your hand on to a violent stroke.
I don't know if he just touched his hip and it threw it out,
or if he got him right in there. And man, can you imagine that.
Immediately he went down and he couldn't wrestle anymore.
So what did he do? He grabbed hold of it. Have you
ever seen boxers matching? matching boxers boxing each other
and one of them gets the war out and hurt him so bad he just
grabs up and hangs on to it. That's what Jacob did. He got
him. He got him up here. And the Lord
said, let me go. Let me go. And he grabbed him
around the waist. Let me go. Can you just see the Lord doing
that? And he got him around the legs and he couldn't get away
from him. He said, let me go. He wasn't a champion in wrestling
anymore because he'd been disabled. But I tell you something, he
was. He was a champion in Cleveland. He didn't get the blessing by
the strength and the skill and the ability of wrestling, but
he got the blessing because he's a champion in Cleveland. He said,
I'm not going to let you go. Isn't that what the old songwriter
said? Hangs my helpless soul on thee. That's what he said, wasn't it?
I'm just hanging on Him. I'm cleaving to Him. Cleaving
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Other refuge have I none. Hangs
my helpless soul on Thee. Jacob, what about your trying
to manage your fears now? What about your trying to manipulate?
What about your present? He's not thinking any of that
now. He's not thinking about how to pacify Esau. He's thinking
about one thing. He's cleaving to the Lord and
says, I'm not going to let you go if you arrest me. Jacob's
cleaving did more to prevail than his wrestling. But he never
cleaved. He never grabbed hold until his
hip was out of joints and he had no more power or skill to
wrestle. You know that's when, brothers
and sisters, we're in our best shape, when we're utterly weak. That's when the power of Christ
rests upon us. Jacob may have thought, he may
have thought, he may have thought, man, I've lost it now. I can't
wrestle anymore. He's gotten me so weak. I can't
wrestle. I can't even stand up. But he
was in his best shape then, wasn't he? That's when we're in our
best shape, when we don't trust in our own strength, our manipulation,
but when all we can do is plead to the Lord, get a hold of Him
in our spirits, and say, I ain't going to let you go until you
bless me. Boy, that's when grace shows
itself, ain't it? I don't know if we'd have been
standing there looking at this wrestling match, we'd have probably
thought, man, that Jacob, man, he is strong. Look what moves
he's got. But I tell you one thing, when the Lord touched
his hip, you know what would have said about him then? Man,
he's a goner. He's whipped. He's whipped. But
all he could do then was cleave, wouldn't he? Cleave. That's where the Lord wants us,
isn't it? That's where He wants us. Cleaving. Cleaving to Him. Cleaving to the Lord Jesus Christ
and our utter weakness. is our strength. The power and
grace of Christ rest upon us as we fill our utter infirmities. Look in verse 27. Look at this. He said in verse 26, I won't
let you go. The daybreak hath let me go.
I will not let you go until you bless me. And the angel said
unto him, What is your name? Uh-oh. Uh-oh. This is an issue that hasn't
been faced yet, has it? What is your name? I heard that
you were Esau. Are you Esau? What's your name? I wonder. I wonder what Jacob
thought when the Lord asked him his name. I wonder if his mind
went back quickly. I wonder if he wasn't filled
with humiliation and maybe even some guilt. What is your name? Is your name? Yes, it's Jacob. Yes, I'm that supplanter. I'm
that deceiver. I'm the plotter. I'm the liar.
That's me. My name is Jacob. He knew what
that meant, didn't he? He knew why they gave him that
name. What is your name? What's your name? What's your
name? Here's something Brother Fortner
confronted us with, wasn't it? What's your name? I'm a sinner.
I'm a sinner. I'm a sinner. Well, I heard you
say one time, you was a good fella. Did you say that? Didn't I hear you say one time
you wasn't a sinner anymore? Or you wasn't any worse than
anybody else? Didn't I hear you say, Lord,
I'm sorry, I'm a sinner. I'm a real sinner. I'm a hell-deserving
sinner. I don't deserve anything. Lord,
I know what I said, but I know what I'm telling you now. I'm
a sinner. I'm a plotter. I've been a liar myself, a deceiver
of my own soul and others, and tried to deceive God. I'm a sinner. That's what I am. It's not just in our initial
conversion we face this, but we face this often, don't we?
We do. We face this often. I'm a sinner. Oh, I've proved it. I've proved
it. And look in verse 28. Oh, here's
a blessing. And he said, the angel said,
the Lord 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. A prince. You're Israel. Your name is Israel. He went
to the Lord just to obtain and dispel his fears. He wanted these
fears dispelled. My brother's coming and he's
going to kill me. Lord, please help. But he got much more than
that, didn't he? A new name. A prince. A prince with God. You know what
a prince is. He's the son of the king, ain't
he? Ain't that what a prince is?
I looked up the definition today of a prince. It said the son
of the king. He's royalty. And you ain't got his name changed.
The Son of the King. You're a prince. The Son of God. The Son of God. Man alive. No wonder He said you have power
with God. If you're a son of God, you've
got power with God, haven't you? You've got influence. You've
got access. If you're a prince, and all the sons of Jacob are
princes. They're sons of a king. You're
the son of a king. I've heard you say that. You're the son
of a king. You're a prince. your son of
Jacob. Oh, your names shall not be any
more called Jacob." But you know they did call him Jacob. As you
read through all the Old Testament, and even sometimes in the New
Testament, sometimes they called him Jacob, and other times they
called him Israel, didn't they? They just interchanged these
names. Isn't it the same with us? Sometimes they call us a
sinner. Sometimes they call us a saint.
But we're both, aren't we? We're a child of Adam and we're
a child of God. They call us that too. Israel,
a prince with God. And here in verse 29, look at
this. Jacob asked him and said, Tell me your name. I pray you
tell me your name. And he said, Wherefore is it
that you ask after my name? And he blessed them there. And
Jacob called the name of the place Peniel. where I have seen
God face to face, and my life is preserved." Jacob confessed
his name. And in his name, what he was
doing, he was confessing his depravity. That's what he was
doing. His ruin. His inability to do anything. To manage his affairs and to
work things out. He was just confessing everything
he was. And he got the blessing, didn't he? He got the blessing.
But there's something he didn't get. Something he didn't get. He wanted to know the Lord's
human name. What's your name? What's your
name? Don't you and I feel the same
way? The Lord has brought us. He's taught us what we are. And
He's blessed us by His grace. He's blessed us in spite of ourselves.
He's given us new names. He's made us new creatures. We
have life eternal. But you know we don't know very
much about Him, do we? Don't you long to know things
about Christ that He's just not been pleased to tell you about
it? Don't your soul sometimes thirst for Him as the heart does
for the water brook? But you find out you know so
little of the Lord Jesus Christ. And He's not teaching you too
much about it. You know who He is. But don't you long to know
Him better? You know what He's done, but
don't you want to see that more? You know where He's at? What
He's doing there? What He's going to do? What He's
promised? But you're like the Apostle Paul. Oh, that I may
know Him. But just like poor Jacob. He
says, No. No. I'm going to teach you about
Myself just a little here. I'm going to teach you about
Myself just a little over here. And you're not really going to
know Me fully until you're with Me in glory." That's the way
it is, isn't it? We know ourselves pretty well,
don't we? He just keeps teaching us of Ourselves to keep us down,
to keep us low. But He just reveals enough of
Himself through His Word to keep us looking to Him and to keep
us groaning and longing to know Him better. It was like Paul
Jacob. No, don't ask that because I
ain't going to show you. I ain't going to tell you. I
ain't going to tell you. My name. Why do you ask after
my name? It ain't just been Jacob that
wanted to know his name. There's been others who wanted
to know it too. Remember Manoah and his wife? Samson's mom and
dad? When the angel came down? This
same angel. And they saw him. And they offered
a sacrifice, and the sacrifice was consumed, and this angel
went up in the sacrifice. It was Christ again. It was the
Son of God again. And Manoah said, What's your
name? And you know what he told Manoah? He told him the same
thing he told Jacob. He said, While you're asking
after my name, sin, it is wonderful. It's secret. It's wonderful.
Well, that's his name, isn't it? Look over here at one more
place. Look over here concerning His name. Look in Proverbs chapter
30. They knew the Son of God was
coming. They knew He was going to have a name. They didn't know
what it was. And some of them was trying to
pry into it, and the Lord wouldn't reveal it to them. And look here
in Proverbs chapter 30, and look here in verse 4. Look in verse 4, Proverbs chapter
30 verse 4. Who hath ascended up into heaven? Or who's descended? Who hath gathered the wind in
his fist? Who hath bound the waters in
a garment? Who hath established the ends
of the earth? We know, don't we? What is his
name? Well, he's the sovereign God.
Okay, let's see if you can answer this. What is his son's name? Ephraochenes. Well, they couldn't
tell because they didn't know. And nobody knew until Matthew
chapter 1 and verse 21, where God dispatched His angel and
said, His name shall be called Jesus, for He shall save His
people. They longed to know it, but they
didn't know it. Because God kept it secret until
that day. He was such a sweet name. It
was such a sharing name, such a redeeming name, that God kept
it secret until He was ready to send His Son and then said,
Call His name Jesus. Call His name Savior. How sweet the name of Jesus sounds
in a believer's ears. It bids his heavy sorrows cease
and dispels his greatest fears. What is your name? What is your
name? Oh, we know it now, don't we?
And there's no other name under heaven whereby men can be saved. And that's the greatest name.
It's been exalted in the very heaven itself. And God has done
so. What is your name? Well, Jacob
made this life statement. He said this life statement.
He called the place Peniel, and he said, I have seen thee face
to face, and my life is preserved. My life is preserved. And he
went out limping to face his brother. He went out limping. He limped the rest of his life.
But you know something? He never feared to meet his brother. My life is preserved. I ain't
afraid anymore. I don't have to manipulate. I
don't have to manage my own affairs. I'm not going to send another
present to pacify my brother. My life is preserved. I have
seen God face to face. Brothers and sisters, when we
see God in the face of Jesus Christ, we don't have to fear
our enemies. We don't have to fear death.
We don't have to fear dying. We don't have to fear eternity.
If you've seen God in the face of Jesus Christ, your life is
preserved. And I tell you, that's when you'll
be the weakest. You'll limp the rest of your life. And you won't
feel like trying to manipulate and struggle and do things yourself.
You're just too weak. You don't feel like it. But I
tell you, you'll have more assurance and the fears will be dispelled
and the distresses will be gone when you see God in the face
of Jesus Christ. My life is preserved. Any questions?