Now there’s a lot of great motivators in this world – achievement, rewards, guilt, etc. But one of the best motivators for some people is fear. Fear can really get your attention.
- fear of consequences
- fear of failure
- fear of pain
- fear of embarrassment
[Dave and I “ministry of shame” at Uhaul.]
But for the Christian fear should motivate us to pray. We know that God will never leave us or forsake us. We know He loves us and will provide for us. Yes, fear will come into our lives. But we need to face our fears with our faith.
In Genesis 32 Jacob is about to go through some serious fear. He’s finally on his way back home with all of his family and fortune. But the closer he gets to home the more the more he’s concerned about what was waiting for him. He starts to wonder if Esau was still mad at him for taking away his birthright and his blessing. Remember, Jacob left home mainly because Esau had vowed to kill him. Now it’s 20 years later and Jacob is headed back home. Was Esau waiting there to kill him?
What we’re going to see in the next couple of chapters is an amazing story of a man so gripped with fear that he literally wrestles with God in order to gain His protection. (Even though all he had to do was trust.)
I. Fear moves Jacob to pray and plan
[Read Genesis 32:1-2.]
As Jacob makes his way back home God sends angels to Jacob. Jacob knew they were angels because he names the place Mahanaim which means “two camps”, (his camp and God’s camp). And of course this wasn’t the first time that Jacob had seen angels. On His way away from home he saw the angels at Bethel – now on his was back home the angels appear again.
They were sent to encourage Jacob and to equip him for the journey. To equip Jacob spiritually for what lay ahead. God knew the fear that was welling up in Jacob so the angels are dispatched in an attempt to strengthen Jacob’s resolve to trust the Lord in this matter.
But the fear Jacob had of his brother was so intense that he made plans to appease his brother’s wrath.
[Read Genesis 32:3-8.]
Jacob finds himself in a heap of trouble here. He send out this kind message to his brother only to find out that Esau is coming to meet him with 400 men! Jacob must have thought the worst. (But you know, Esau might have thought the same thing!)
Anyway, Jacob is scared out of his mind, so he does what he should have done in the first place – pray!
[Read Genesis 32:9-12.]
What an amazing prayer. Several things we can point out here that model right praying for us when we go through fearful things.
- recites God’s promises
- shows humility
- praise to God for His faithfulness and His blessings
- requests, (safety for himself and his family)
- transparency, (fear)
Jacob shows a real trust in the Lord here. So he gets up the next morning and goes
ahead with his plans to appease Esau hoping the Lord would use those efforts for his good.
[Read Genesis 32:13-23.]
The plan has been put in motion. Jacob’s servants have gone ahead of him and his family to present these hundreds of animals to Esau hoping that he would accept the gifts and change his mind about killing Jacob.
I do believe Jacob was trusting God in this, but not as much as he should have. He was trusting God would use his efforts to accomplish His will. Now sometimes the Lord does this – but not because He has to! God doesn’t need our help. God exists independently of man which also means He can accomplish His will independent of man’s efforts. But out of His grace He chooses to use man to accomplish His will.
I think that’s why God shows up and visits Jacob the night before he met Esau.
[Read Genesis 32:24.]
Out of God’s grace He shows up to meet with Jacob. God knew Jacob was still trapped in his fears so He comes to earth and visits with Jacob. Now I believe that at first Jacob thought this was simply an angel of God like the others. But that was alright with him. After all, who gets to meet directly with God? So while he has the angel there he won’t let him go until he’s received his blessing, (or his assurance that he’ll be protected from Esau).
II. Fear moves Jacob to persist in prayer
[Read Genesis 32:24-32.]
Amazing. Jacob wrestles with the Angel, who obviously was the preincarnate Christ, until the Angel blesses him. It was a wrestling match that lasted all night. It only ended when the Angel used His supernatural powers to dislocate Jacob’s hip.
But just what kind of wrestling match was this? Persistent prayer! That’s what it was.
[Read Hosea 12:3-4.]
When Jacob realized an Angel had come to him he persisted in asking his blessing over him. We don’t know what the Angel’s immediate response was, but obviously it didn’t satisfy Jacob. So much so that he wouldn’t let the Angel leave.
Even after the Angel dislocated Jacob’s hip you see him hanging on for dear life to the Angel for His blessing.
[Read Genesis 32:26.]
The Angel then renamed Jacob Israel, which means “persists with God”, and then He blessed him.
Interestingly, Jacob asks the Angel His name, but the Angel doesn’t give it to him. But Jacob knew it was God because afterwards he said that he had seen God face to face. The Angel didn’t tell Jacob His name because He knew that Jacob knew just who He was.
What an incredible night of persistent prayer. Jacob knew he needed God’s blessing and wouldn’t let go until he got it!
I heard about a pastor who bumped into a crying woman in a stairwell after a baptismal service at his church. He thought this was a little odd since the service was so joyful. He asked her if she was all right. She said, ‘No, I’m struggling.’ She said, ‘My mom was baptized today. I prayed for her every day for almost 20 years. The reason I’m crying is because I came this close to giving up on her. At the 5-year mark I said, “Who needs this? God isn’t listening.” At the 10-year mark I said, “Why am I wasting my breath?” At the 15-year mark I said, “This is absurd.” At the 19-year mark I said, “I’m just a fool.” But I just kept trying, kept praying. Even with weak faith I kept praying. Then she gave here life to Christ, and she was baptized today. I will never doubt the power of prayer again.”
I’ll bet there’s some of you here tonight that can relate to that woman. You’ve been praying for someone or something for years and you sometimes wonder if you should keep on. But you keep wrestling with that Angel until the answer comes.
Well, the wrestling match is over, daybreak has come, and now it’s time to go out and meet Esau. Even though God’s sent angels to meet with Jacob at the beginning of this journey, and even though God Himself showed up and blessed Jacob, he’s still scared. But as we’re going to see:
III. God’s faithfulness shows Jacob that he has nothing to fear
[Read Genesis 33:1-3.]
Jacob is still scared for his life and the life of his family so you see him approaching Esau on his face as a commoner would approach a king. But God had already taken care of things!
[Read Genesis 33:4.]
God had worked in the hearts of those brothers over those 20 years they were apart. They were no longer enemies! And they had probably never been closer than they were at this moment in time. Look at how this great reunion continues.
[Read Genesis 33:5-7.]
These two men were no longer a couple of self-centered men who competed with each other for money and parental attention. They were hard-working family men who’s lives had changed over the years. Look at more evidence of how they had changed.
[Read Genesis 33:8-11.]
Both men are being incredibly gracious to one another. Jacob especially, for he knows that all he has is because of God’s faithfulness to him. So now instead of wanting to give Esau the herds to appease him, he simply wants to give it to him to bless him. I think that he had realized that the Lord was truly watching over him and that he had nothing to fear. It wasn’t his gifts to Esau that kept him safe, it was how the Lord had worked in Esau’s heart and had changed his attitude that kept Jacob safe.
Has that ever happened to you? Has the Lord ever provided for you in a way that you didn’t pray for, but was better than if He had answered your prayers?
[Ward and Andrew ‘roles’ story.]
God is so faithful to us. I love it when He shows us that without a doubt it’s He who’s in charge – not us! Jacob had learned this lesson as well. The Lord was faithful to him and he didn’t need to fear any more.
Well, Jacob and Esau’s reunion had been great, but it was now time for them to continue on their journeys. So in a very gracious manner they part company.
[Read Genesis 32:12-17.]
Both companies start on their journey to the region south of the Dead Sea called Seir, yet at different paces because of all of Jacob’s children. For some reason Jacob stops at Succoth and decides to live there for a while, (maybe up to ten years). But he didn’t live in fear of his brother any more. They were no longer enemies because God had shown Himself to be faithful.
The faithfulness of God is what should keep us praying people. I know that sometimes doubts and distractions and even fears can cause us to sometimes give up on persistent praying. But it shouldn’t. God has shown Himself faithful to us countless times and so we should just keep on praying!
[Pastor’s parrot - ”Let’s pray”, elder’s parrot – “Let’s kiss” joke.]
Persist in prayer. God is listening and God is faithful!
