Series: The Nobility of God's Nobodies

Jacob–Pride Goes Before 

"The Touch"

Genesis 32:22-32

PSBC  9/3/00

In a nutshell: Jacob is an example of God coming against human pride. And if you understand this example, you're going to understand the relentless process God is involved in to mold, shape and at times break you so that you will be blessed by Him and useful to Him in... "doing Great Commission work in the Coachella Valley and the world".

I. Introduction

A. God Loves You

Friends, last week I made a statement in the morning's message that is crucially important for each of you to understand. And I don't know if you fully grasped it, or remembered it. So, let me say it again. I said, "God loves you just the way you are, but He refuses to let you stay there. He wants you to be more and more like Jesus, so you can offer an alternative to the ungodly values, lifestyles and decisions that are permeating our pagan culture in Palm Springs and the rest of this valley."

Now, do you know what the number one thing that stands in the way of you becoming more like Jesus? It's your pride. Pride is nothing more than your lying to yourself, pretending you are God rather than acknowledging that you are His creation. As one author put it, "...it is the idolatrous worship of myself. And that is national religion of Hell." (Howard Butt, The Art of Being a Big Shot.)

B. Transition

And this morning I want to show you an example of how God deals with human pride in the life of someone He loved so much that He wouldn't let him stay in that prideful state. And I think if you understand this example, you're going to understand the relentless process God is involved in to mold, and shape and at times break you ...so that you will be more useful to Him in... "doing Great Commission work in the Coachella Valley and the world".

So, this morning, we are going to be looking at the life of Abraham's grandson–Isaac's second born son–a man by the name of Jacob. Please turn in your Bibles to Genesis 28.

II. Jacob's two evidences of trickery

A. The Birthright and Blessing

There can be no doubt that as Jacob reached adulthood, his parents, Isaac and Rebekah, told him of the message they received from God, that he-Jacob-not his older brother Esau-would be the recipient of the family blessing that was given by God, to his grandfather, Abraham; and his father Isaac, and now to him.

Add to that the fact that when Jacob was born, he came out of the womb holding onto his older brother's heel–in fact, that's why he was named, Jacob, which means "holding onto a heel". This guy had to know that he was destined to overtake his older brother someday.

So, Jacob knew these promises and plan of God. Yet, instead of trusting God to fulfill His purpose and His promise, Jacob chose to resort to the use of trickery to get these things for himself.

The first time we see this happening, was when he bought his brother, Esau's, birthright. You probably remember the story. Jacob took advantage of Esau's, physical weakness, impetuousness and stupidity and bought his older brother's birthright for a bowl of stew.

Then later in his life, he was a co-conspirator to stealing the firstborn's blessing from his father by going along with his mother, Rebekah's, trickery.

So, early in his life, Jacob is portrayed as a man who knew the promises of God, but instead of trusting God to work them out, he tried to engineer them by his own manipulations and deceit.

B. Pattern repeated in Mesopotamia

Let's move ahead a few years. In the country of Padan Aram, which is to the north of Canaan, Jacob went to find a wife for himself. On the way, in a place later called Bethel, he had a dream. It was a dream of a ladder or stairway connecting earth to heaven. And on this ladder, angels were ascending and descending. And God was there and spoke to Jacob in his dream and said, (look at your Bibles)

Genesis 28:13-15
13 ... "I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying.
14 Your descendants will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring.
15 I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you."

What could have been more clear than that? This promise was made personally by God to Jacob. Jacob was to inherit the family blessing and covenant made by God to his grandfather, Abraham and his father, Isaac.

So when he reached Mesopotamia, God immediately began fulfilling these promises.
-He led him, through remarkable providence, to find his uncle Laban, the brother of his mother Rebekah,
-He gave him Laban's daughter, the beautiful Rachel, as his wife,
-He blessed the entire time he lived with Laban, with sons and daughters.
-And He prospered him with large herds and flocks.

And then God told him in another dream... (on screen)

Genesis 31:3
3 Then the LORD said to Jacob, "Go back to the land of your fathers and to your relatives, and I will be with you."

But instead of telling his uncle Laban face to face, about dissolving their partnership, because of what God had said, Jacob used trickery to leave with his family, herds and tents under the cover of night.

C. The point

Now, the point I want you to see in these two stories about Jacob's life of deceit–first with his family; and then with his uncle Laban, is this.... Behind this deceit was the issue of PRIDE.

You see, Jacob really didn't believe God could keep His promises, without Jacob's help. This man was so full of himself that he resorted to trickery as a way of life, to try and manipulate God and persuade God to fulfill God's promises Jacob's way.

So, when Jacob traveled back to his homeland, and heard that Esau, his brother, whom he had tricked out of his birthright and family blessing, was coming to meet him with 400 fighting men, Jacob acted like he always had–he did things his own way–rather than God's way.

He sent his family ahead of him in two groups, so that if Esau attacked one of the groups, then the other group might escape. He sent opulent gifts and groveling messages to Esau, referring to him as "My lord, Esau", and to himself as "your servant, Jacob..." when God said that it would be the other way around –"the elder would serve the younger". But Jacob did it his way and groveled before his brother, hoping to pacify Esau.

III. Our story begins here!

A. The setting

Now, I've recapped all this about Jacob's life, so you understand the significance of the story that's told in chapter 32. Jacob so far has shown himself to be...
-more of a schemer, than a believer.
-more carnal, than spiritual.
-a man of the flesh, instead of the spirit.
-a person who trusted himself, more than he trusted God.
-and a person who used the weapons of trickery and deceit, rather than the spiritual weapons of faith and prayer.

And we come to the point in his life where his family and herds have gone over to the other side of the river, and Jacob remained on the opposite side. Then nightfall comes.

Genesis 32:24
24 So Jacob was left alone...,

At least that's what he thought! But we know, God refused to leave him alone! (Remember I said, "God loves you just the way you are, but He refuses to let you stay there?" Well, here's where that happened in Jacob's life.) God came to him in his aloneness. And that night an event took place that was to be the most decisive and the most transforming experience of his entire life.

For this encounter, God took on a human form and wrestled with Jacob. That is how Jacob understood what went on there, because he named the place Peniel,

Genesis 32:30
30 So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, "It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared."

B. Two stages in the encounter

As we look at this encounter that Jacob had with God, we are going to see two distinct struggles recorded in the story. I see these two struggles corresponding to the two struggles that everyone of us who battles pride are going to have with God, as well.

1. First struggle--God wrestled with Jacob.

Genesis 32:24b
24 ..., and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.

This phrase in this verse tells us something characteristic of Jacob, and every person who struggles with pride–up to this point, Jacob had never given in to God. That's why God had to wrestle with him, and bring him to a point of surrender.

We've seen his resistance to God in the stories of his unbelief and trickery. Jacob spoke as though he believed the promises of God. But in practice, he didn't. In Jacob's mind, God couldn't be trusted to carry out His own plans unless He had a little help from Jacob. So, Jacob kept interfering. He was hoping to gain by stealth, what God had promised. At the root of all this deceit was pride–Jacob had a whole lot more confidence in himself than he did in God.

If I could paraphrase Jacob's thoughts, it would be something like this, "God makes promises, but He doesn't know how to keep them." So, Jacob continued this thought, "I'll show Him how to do it. I'll take matters into my own hands and manipulate and engineer things so they turn out like God promised." Do you see what Jacob is doing? Jacob wanted to be God. And it's that underlying self-delusion that God had to break.

That's why God wrestled with him. He struggled with him, until day break. All through the night God struggled with this obstinate, prideful man. And all the time–for hours–Jacob refused to give in. So...

Genesis 32:25
25 When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob's hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man.

Now, don't misunderstand what happened here. When God began struggling with Jacob, he began struggling gently, patiently, and perseveringly through the dark hours of the night. God was pleading with Jacob. Matching His strength to Jacob's strength. But Jacob had no intention of giving in.

So, God did what He could have done at the beginning of the struggle–He used FORCE. He touched the socket of his hip. And the single touch of the finger of God, was enough to overcome all the power of Jacob's resistance. With a dislocated hip, Jacob had to give up the struggle. This dislocation left him with a permanent limp. The Bible tells us later that this was to remind him that God had overcome him.

Friends, do you know how serious God's love for you is? Do you understand the purpose of that love? We are told over and over in the New Testament–it is to make us like Jesus Christ.

Illustration: Let me explain it like this. If we view our lives as a painting in progress. Our lives are the canvas. Jesus is the model for the painting, and God is the artist who is painting and detailing the likeness of Jesus Christ onto that canvas of our lives.

What God is doing, is transforming each one of us into the image of His Son.

He begins this process very slowly. Using the wrestling metaphor, He grips each of us personally and gently at first. He wrestles with us as He wrestled with Jacob. The Divine Wrestler knows every hold, every grip, every lock and every move that was ever invented by human beings. And He matches His strength against ours.

Of course we all have the tendency to say, "Lord I can work things out. Why do you keep wanting to wrestle with me? Why can't you just leave me alone?"

(On the front of Bulletin) C. S. Lewis put it so beautifully in his book, The Problem of Pain "...We may wish indeed, that we were of so little account to God that He left us alone to follow our natural impulses and give up trying to train us into something so unlike our natural selves... But that is asking not for more love from God but for less."

When you are wrestling with God, and you want Him to leave you alone–He won't! He refuses to leave us alone. Because He loves us too much!

And if you and I don't give in, if we refuse and continue to resist God, He may have to resort to more drastic measures, like He did with Jacob. But I doubt if it will be our hip that He touches. He is going to touch something else: like your job, or your health, or your family, your prestige, your bank balance, your retirement plans, your marriage, or your reputation–something in your life is going to be dislocated if you don't give up your pride.

And friends, God's hatred of pride is so strong that He will stop at nothing to break us of it... for our good. God loves you and me just the way we are. But His love for us is so great that he refuses to let you and me stay where we are.

Look at these words from Romans 8:28-29 from the Message translation (on screen)...
[28] That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives is worked into something good.
[29] God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. ...We see the original and intended shape of our lives, there in him. His desire for us to be like Jesus operates out of His great love for us. It is the perseverance of His love that will do whatever is necessary to bring us to the point of complete surrender to Him.

Illustration: I don't know of any illustration regarding this work of God that is better than the illustration of the story in the book, A Severe Mercy. It was written by the American author, Sheldon Van Auckin about 25 years ago.

"Van", as he was known, and his wife, who was known by the nickname, "Davey", were determined to "become as close as two human beings could become." They had a truly all encompassing all consuming love affair before they became Christians. They set up what they called a "shining barrier" as a wall or fence to shield their love against intruders. They were so taken up with each other--exclusively preoccupied with each other--they wanted to keep everyone out of their relationship, including God. Nothing came between them--not possessions, not career, not even children. They decided not to have any children, lest their children should interfere with their love affair.

"More and more", Van Auckin wrote, "She was in me and I was in her. It was the co-inherence of lovers".

On a trip, they visited Oxford, and met C.S. Lewis. To make a long story short, they were both gave their lives to Jesus Christ. Then shortly afterward, Davey became sick, and died. And Van's grief was uncontrollable. C.S. Lewis had the courage to tell him the truth.

Lewis said to him, "You know, you have been so preoccupied with one another--it has been the most selfish love imaginable. And God had to break it. Your love for each other was an end in itself, instead of the means to a greater end like serving God and serving the world. You have been treated with a SEVERE MERCY. You've been brought to see that you were jealous of God. Jealous of God's interference with your own love affair."

Van Auckin had to agree. He wrote, "The suffering which still overwhelmed me had been a Severe Mercy. It brought me, as nothing else could do to know and to end my jealousy of God. It took her death to make me content that she should turn her gaze away from me, to God."

The Divine finger of God touched Van and Davey's marriage.

What is the Divine finger going to have to touch in your life to bring you to surrender your pride and overcome your resistance? I hope He never has to do it. But if that's what it takes, He will! God loves you so much that He will not leave you alone.

TRANSITION: Well, that's the first struggle. God struggling with us to rid us of pride, and if necessary, touching us in order to break us so we'll submit to Him.

But, there's a second struggle that Jacob went through...

2. Second struggle--Jacob wrestles with God

The encounter with God didn't end with Jacob conquered, broken, humiliated, and crushed. There was... and always should be... a second struggle. This second struggle is our struggle with God.

And in this second struggle, the role of the wrestlers are reversed. In Jacob's case, he now took the initiative. God had been wrestling with him, but now Jacob begins to wrestle with God.

Genesis 32:26
26 Then the man said, "Let me go, for it is daybreak." But Jacob replied, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."

Jacob clung to the Divine wrestler. You see, Jacob recognized that God had a purpose in wounding him, and he was determined to what that purpose was. So he hung on to God until God showed that purpose to him.

This is a radical departure for Jacob.
...In place of trickery is only faith.
...In place of deceit there is straight dealing with God.
...In place of manipulation there is perseverance through prayer.

And God responded to this new Jacob, just like He will respond to us...

Genesis 32:29
29 ...Then he blessed him there.

God gave him the blessing that he asked for as he clung to Him. God even changed his name, to symbolize something new–He changed it from, Jacob, "he clutches the heel"; To, Israel, "He struggles with God and prevails."

Do you understand this second struggle? God has a purpose in wanting to rid you of pride. He wants to reveal His plan to you for how you can best do "Great Commission work in the Coachella Valley and the world." God is longing to bless you by using you to advance His kingdom. In fact, He is much more anxious to bless you than you are even to receive that blessing. But He cannot and will not bless us, if we are people who are pretending to be God through our pride in ourselves and our accomplishments.

IV. Conclusion

Friends, don't forget this enormously important statement: "God loves you just the way you are, but He refuses to let you stay that way." If you understand that, then you'll understand that God will always be in the business of molding us, of shaping us, and at times breaking us, in order to transform us into the humble character of His Son, Jesus Christ.

And people reflecting the humble character of Jesus Christ are the people that can truly partner with God, and others, to do Great Commission work in the Coachella Valley and the world–and therefore receive a blessing!

Amen.