We could corrupt  political journalist Noel Parmentel Jr famous line and apply it to Jacob: ‘would you buy a used camel or donkey off this man?’  Given Jacob’s track record my gut feeling would be “not likely”

Jacob has used every trick in the book, to get the upper hand over his brother Esau.  We get an insight into this in Genesis 27 where Jacob, aided by his mother Rebekah, takes advantage of his aged father’s culinary tastes and failing eyesight and shockingly invokes the Lord’s name in his deception, leaving Esau minus one fatherly blessing (27:1-40).  Therefore, Esau holds a considerable grudge,  vowing to kill   Jacob when his father Isaac dies.  So Jacob takes off for Paddan Aram to stay with his mother’s brother Laban (27:42-46).  But here the story takes an unexpected twist.  During a night’s rest Jacob has a dream in which God tells him the promises he made to Abraham and Isaac will be applied to him! Jacob is not unaffected by this and makes a vow to the Lord which will be with fulfilled if he ever gets back to his father’s house (28:10-22).

However, the next part of Jacob’s story isn’t without its humorous side.  After working for seven years for the hand of Laban’s daughter Rachel, Jacob gets a nasty shock when, the morning after the wedding, he discovers he’s married the older daughter Leah!  You can imagine Laban saying “O did I forgot to tell you about our quaint little custom, the older daughter always marries first. I’ll tell you what, work another seven years and you can marry Rachel.”  Jacob has met an even bigger trickster than himself!  Jacob eventually gets the upper hand in his dealings with Laban, but then receives word from the Lord that it’s time for him to go back: ‘to the land of your fathers and to your relatives’ (31:3).  So Jacob does a runner!  There’s just one problem, his wife Rachel has stolen her father’s idols and Laban isn’t too impressed with Jacob taking off without saying goodbye!  To cut a long story short, Laban never gets his Idols back and Jacob gets a few things off his chest concerning Laban’s treatment of him and things are peacefully resolved.  But now Jacob faces a bigger threat.  There’s no way he can avoid a meeting with Esau and, when they parted, brotherly affection was not high on his list of character traits that Esau wished to work on!

So in chapter 32 Jacob is heading for a showdown!  This raises the question, when we find ourselves in tough times, how do we conduct ourselves and can any good come out of them?  So let’s take a look at this extraordinary encounter Jacob has with God.

 Jacob sends a very respectful message to Esau. But the news his servants bring back is far from encouraging.  Esau is coming with a contingent of 400 men, as the Hebrew expression that is used here is sometimes used to express hostile intent,[1]  Jacob reckons this is too big to just be a welcoming committee and: ‘was greatly afraid and distressed’ (vs6-7)!

So Jacob turns to God.  Verses 9-12 are a great example of how we are to approach God in prayer.  Firstly, Jacob remembers who he is addressing.  This is the covenant God, the one who has made promises to his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac.  Jacob invokes this as well as the promises that God has made to him in the recent past (31:3).  Secondly, Jacob remembers he is totally unworthy of the Lord’s favour towards him and yet the Lord has made him prosperous.  The phrase he uses is: ‘I am not worth of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant’ (v10).  The word for ‘steadfast love and faithfulness’ in Hebrew is ‘hesed’. Bruce Waltke points out that this word: ‘relates to a superior who out of kind character, meets the needs of a covenant partner who cannot help him or herself.’[2]  Lastly, he prays for God’s protection for himself and his family and relates this to God’s promises for him.  How can they be fulfilled if the Lord doesn’t protect him?  The question is how often do we pray prayers like this when we’re in trouble.  I’m sure we’re very good at asking for God to get us out of the situation we find ourselves in, but do we, like Jacob, remember God’s faithfulness in the past?  Do we realise our complete unworthiness of any flavour he shows us?  In other words do we understand his ‘hesed’, his ‘steadfast love and faithfulness’.

Having prayed Jacob moves his family across the Jabbok River.  The Jabbok River may be significant as it is mentioned a number of times in scripture as a boundary line during the Israelite occupation of the East Jordan.[3]  One can’t help thinking that something fairly major has got to happen before Jacob enters the Promised Land.[4]

In verse 24: ‘Jacob was left alone’.  If he was still apprehensive about meeting Esau he now gets a shock as he is ‘jumped’ by an unidentified assailant and finds himself fighting for his life!  And it must have been some fight as it continued to daybreak!  Jacob had always lived by his wits, but his best tricks aren’t working here!  On the other hand his assailant isn’t making any headway either, but in a nifty move, Jacob’s assailant manages to dislocate his hip (v25)!  At this point Jacob’s assailant makes the request that Jacob let him go, which would seem to be a reasonable as Jacob is properly in unbearable agony.  But Jacob says: “I will not let you go unless you bless me” (v26).  Something has been dawning on Jacob; his assailant is no ordinary man!  The extraordinary thing is he actually gets his blessing!

It might seem extraordinary that his assailant asks Jacob his name.  But names have meanings and Jacob is admitting to years of lying, scheming and cheating where his family and relatives are concerned when he gives it.  It reinforces the unworthiness he expressed in his prayer (v10).  He has confronted his sinful past and realised he is totally undeserving of any blessing (v27).But what a blessing he gets!  When someone confered a name change on someone it was firstly asserting authority over them and secondly giving them new description of who they are.[5]  Jacob no longer has a name that describes him as a grasping deceiver!  With the name ‘Israel’ the description of him is: ‘he struggles with God’[6] in contrast to his deceitful struggling with family and relatives!  Jacob practically has a conversion experience!  He’s been given a new start.  This is a major blessing as it is totally undeserved!

Jacob concludes that this remarkable event is none other than a meeting with God!  When asking the stranger’s name, Jacob receives an ambiguous answer (v29) which could be paraphrased: “Why do you ask my name? You have a very good idea who I am.”  So Jacob draws an incredible conclusion, he has: ‘striven (struggled)’ with none other than God and yet he has been spared!  The blessing that Jacob was given was not easily won, but there’s no doubt that this blessing was instrumental in shaping Jacob’s character and relationship with God.  There may be times we have to involve ourselves in the continual struggle of prayer, but these are the kind of prayers that will shape our character as God seeks to change us and deepen our relationship with him just as he did Jacob.

A key theme is Jacob remembering who he is in relation to God.  Back in verse 10 Jacob realised that he was totally unworthy of any flavour from God. This theme reached a conclusion in verse 30: ‘So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, saying, “For I have seen God face-to-face and yet my life has been delivered.”’  Commentators are divided on which person of the Trinity Jacob contested with.  But the text is explicit, Jacob saw God: ‘face-to-face’ yet his life was spared!  Why?  Because we have an intercessor in the Lord Jesus Christ.  Jacob’s experience is just a taste of the Lord’s remarkable intervention and Christ’s work being foreshadowed in the events of the Old Testament.

But can I draw your attention the most remarkable aspect of this.  God started a fight!  John Calvin states: ‘it is not said that Satan, or any mortal man wrestle with Jacob, but God himself.’[7]  So why did God instigate such a contest?  I think the answer is fairly simple, Jacob was going through a change brought on by the extreme events that he’s facing.  But he needed to confront who he was, and that took the Lord’s intervention!  Derek Kidner makes this observation: ‘Jacob emerged broken, named and blessed.’[8]  That is not a combination that we ourselves can manufacture, or would want to!  Only the Lord can bring about such a remarkable change in a person’s life.  John Calvin comments that: ‘adversity is either rod with which he corrects our sins, or the test of our faith and patience.’[9]  Either way, times of testing are a way that the Lord can drive us to our knees and to a greater dependence on him.  But it is God who initiates this!  And, would you know it, this bruising encounter has turned out to be the answer to the prayer that Jacob has prayed back in verses 9-12.  Think about it, he has contended with someone who’s very presence should’ve meant death!  If he has wrestled with the Lord and received a blessing rather than death, then he can be reassured that the meeting Esau will turn out okay.  This is a major turning point for Jacob spiritually as the intervention by God is welcomed as he has ‘prevailed’ (v28) in his struggles with men, as we see in the next chapter! Bruce Waltke comments in relation to Jacob’s struggles that: ‘The man who was prayerless and cause so much trouble, sorrow, and anguish is now transformed as he commits himself to God in prayer.[10]  Let me stress when troubles come it won’t necessarily be easier for Christians.  We may seriously wonder the point of it!  It may be that the trial has changed us in some way so we are of greater use in the Lord’s service.  But whatever the outcome we need to adopt the attitude that Jacob has here so that when the tough times come we too can hold on for the blessing that the Lord can surely bring about!  The trial shaped Jacob in a way that may never have happen in years of peaceful walking with the Lord.  The overwhelming question it leaves us with is, are we prepared for the Lord to use difficult times and trials to fast track our growth and trust in him?  Because if we are we, like Jacob, can have a new understanding of the Lord’s love and care towards us, even in the midst of the storms of life!

[1]Bruce K. Waltke with Cathi J. Fredricks, Genesis, A Commentary, (Grand Rapids, Zondervan, in 2001) 442.

[2]Waltke, Genesis, 443.

[3] Numbers 21:24, Deuteronomy 2:37, 3:16, Joshua 12:2 and Judges 11:13 and 22.

[4] Andrew Reid, Salvation Begins, Reading Genesis Today, (Sydney South, Aquila Press, 2000) 221.

[5] John Currid notes this and the fact that it: ‘it is an assertion of the adversary’s authority and power to impart new status to Jacob (cf. 2 Kings 23:34; 24:17).  This is no mere ordinary man.’  John D. Currid, Genesis, Volume 2, An EP Study Commentary, (Darlington, Evangelical Press, 2003), 137.

[6]NIV footnote.

[7] John Calvin, Genesis, Geneva Series of Commentaries, (Edinburgh, The Banner of Truth Trust, 1965), 195.

[8] Derek Kidner, Genesis, An Introduction and Commentary, Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries, (Nottingham, Inter-Varsity Press, 1967), 180.

[9] Calvin, Genesis, 195.

[10]Waltke, Genesis, 449.