Genesis 32-33
When we left Jacob and Esau, Esau was shouting death threats towards the running back of Jacob who was fearing for his life.. Now, after Jacob lived a life of deceit only to in turn be faced with the full deceit of Laban, receiving two sister wives living at odds with one another and too many children to count; Jacob hears God’s command to go back to the land of his father and obeys.
Jacob is stressed. Of course he is! Who wouldn’t be? He is returning to a brother he did dirty multiple times. Jacob must be tired from carrying the weight of his sin, the sin of Laban which resulted in two too many wives, and now facing the consequences of his own deceit by engineering his whole family.
But, as we see in verse 9 the weight of his sin leads to repentance and belief:
And Jacob said, “O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac, O LORD who said to me, ‘Return to your country and to your kindred, that I may do you good,’ I am not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant, for with only my staff I crossed this Jordan, and now I have become two camps. Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him, that he may come and attack me, the mothers with the children. But you said, ‘I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude” (Genesis 32:9-12).
Jacob’s prayer leads to preparing for the worst, and then he is alone. Go back and read 32:22-32 again.
Jacob was sitting there, preparing to see his brother after years of separation. Then God just comes and starts wrestling with him. What. God’s goodness is not always rainbows, smiles, sweet moments of love and affection. No, sometimes it looks like discipline. The writer of Hebrews reminds us that, “he disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness, to those who have been trained by it” (Hebrews 12:10b-11). God wrestles with us, just as He did with Jacob, when he wants us to transform us, discipline us, share his holiness with us. Jacob leaves with a limp but is renamed Israel meaning: you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed” (Genesis 32:28).
After God wrestles with Jacob we finally get to see restoration Esau joyfully embraces and forgives the very one who betrayed him.
Like Jacob, there is forgiveness, transformation and good in store for you. You are no longer who you used to be. Christ has hung up the name sinner and handed you the name saint. You have been claimed as a son or daughter of the One who breathed life into existence, placed each star in by hand in the sky, who commands the oceans to be still, who brought sin to the grave it deserved. Wrestle with God that you may come out of looking more like Jesus with worship on your lips; for you have seen your God.
