Trusting God for what lies ahead

Genesis 32 verses 22 – 32

Trusting God for what lies ahead

Not anyone of us knows what lies ahead.  From these verses we can learn something for our spiritual walk.  These verses are here for our learning and gleaning.  We can take from them the spiritual meaning God would have for us.  We come to the story of Jacob at Peniel, the place where he met face to face with God and his life was preserved.  What sort of illustrations can we take from that?  That you and I might have a meeting with God today.  20 years previously Jacob had met with God at Bethel.  Now God is bringing him back into his own land to meet with him again.  There was much going through his mind at this time.  He left his home in the first place because he had deceived his brother and connived his father.  Look at the lessons he learned as a result of meeting this stranger who he wrestled with.

The strategy Jacob had.  You would have thought by now he would have learned from mistakes in his life.  Jacob was one of those who was going to make his own strategy in life.  Jacob is in the very centre of God’s plan and will.  It is God’s plan to bring him back to this land yet he is not trusting in God, only in his own ability.  His lips said yes to God but his heart is far from God.  He was meeting Esau on his terms.  Maybe there is something in our lives. you know the way God would have you to go but you are saying “I am doing this my own way.”  He had been living in his uncle’s house and was making his way home again but it depended on his own ability.  In verse 13 he told his servants to take all these animals ahead of him so that Esau might be impressed at this gift.  He had married, had sons but things began to change for him.  He is in the house of Laban – chapter 31 verses 1 and 2.  The family of Laban turned against Jacob.  Laban’s own countenance changed and he was beginning to doubt this young man.  Verse 3 God was allowing this in the home of Laban to bring his servant into the situation he wanted.  He was bringing him into the centre of his will.  Maybe that is what God is doing in your life today?  Here is Jacob not resting on God to do that.  He is here going in his own ability.  God had that situation in his control.  Remember in Elijah’s day when God told him to go to the brook Cherith.  God promised him food from the ravens morning and evening and he would have water from the book.  We read in 1 Kings 17 verse 7 “it came to pass the brook dried up.”  God will not let you down, nor fail you.  The ravens came every day.  The water was there to sustain him but one day the brook began to dry up.  His circumstances changed.  Then the bible says “and the word of the Lord came unto him Arise.”  The Lord told him to move onto a widow woman who would sustain him.  God was changing his direction.  Is God changing your direction in life?  Do not be afraid.  It may seem dark but God will step in and show you the next step like he did or Elijah.  Be careful you do not do as Jacob does here.  He begins to take the matter into his own hand.  20 years ago he had robbed Esau now he is going to manipulate the situation for his own good rather than leaving it with God.  Genesis 32 verses 3 – 9.  He is beginning to pray.  Before he had been devising his own plan then he comes to prayer.  If there is one thing to take away from this incident it is this – wait on God.

Jacob’s solitary moment – verse 24.  Jacob was left alone.  He had a great company with him but now he is left alone.  He has sent everyone across to meet Esau and he is left alone.  He divided the family and devised a plan.  It is good to make plans but it is good to keep God in those plans.  Now God is fulfilling his promise to Jacob made some 20 years previously.  Every one of us needs a solitary moment to hear from God.  We may not hear from him in the meeting but we need to make time for God in some part of the day.  Remember the Bereans in Paul’s day – they went home to search the scriptures for themselves to see if what Paul said was true.  Joshua standing before the great walls of Jericho had that one solitary moment before God – Joshua chapter 5 “I have given this land into your hand do not fear.”  Gideon watched the enemy invading his land and went out to thresh some wheat.  In that moment God came to him and assured him of the victory that lay before him.  Moses was in the desert minding the sheep when God came to him.  A solitary moment to speak to him.  Do we have that solitary moment with God?  We need time to let God have his own way in our lives.  A solitary moment to meet with God.  The motivation that should be in our heart – to hear God speaking directly to us.

The struggle Jacob has here.  Genesis 32 verse 24.  This man Jacob identifies in verse 25 as God himself.  The man wrestled with Jacob not the other way around.  This speaks of Jacob’s stubborn will.  A mind of his own and God wants to take him out of that. He was depending on his old nature.  He has made plans and plotted for his family to be safe.  God comes and wants to break that nature in the darkness of the night.  It would be hard to break the mould of the will and nature of Jacob.  Maybe God has to break our will today.  Maybe we are stubbornly still in sin, going our own way.  We believe we are on our way to heaven, we do the best we can, read our bibles but God has to come and break that will of yours.  He has to show you the cross of Calvary, the gift he gives of eternal life through the death of his son.  Maybe that will of yours is saying I don’t want to be saved, I will get to heaven my own way.  He extends his love to you once again.  Is God speaking to you once again?  Does he have to break that will of yours today?  Remember Peter on the rooftop one day.  God came and showed him how he would be used to speak to the Gentile nation.  This was really strange, he had never had any communication with the Gentiles before.  God told him to kill and eat the animals he could see on the sheet before him but Peter said “not so Lord.”

The submission Jacob gives.  Jacob found here that God was bigger than his own problems.  God brings this man down, touches his thigh.  The thigh was the strongest part of man.  He uses the thigh to lift, exert.  That is where God touches.  What is your strongest part?  That God would have to touch, to mould us into the people he would want us to be.  God spoke to the religious man Saul of Tarsus, brought him to the dust and said “it is hard to kick against the pricks.”  The ploughman would go out to plough and would have with him a long rod.  As the oxen stepped out of the furrow he would use the stick to kick them back into the correct way.  God told him ‘I am moulding you into the way you have to go.”  It is sore and painful some times.  God takes us in the direction we don’t want to go.  We say we have always done it this way and do not want to go God’s way.  All God wants is your submission and surrender.  As Jacob arose that morning the light of another day arose.  Now Jacob walked with a limp, the result of a night spent with God.  A stamp on his life.  That is what we need – that stamp on our lives.  It might be hurtful but we need it.  God will not stamp us without a battle or pain.  It will take pain and effort to go through with God.