We come to the third week of our message series “Liars, Cheaters, Cowards & Other Bible Heroes.” So far we looked at Adam, the father of all the living, and Abraham, our father in faith. In doing so we have seen how God used them despite their failures and foibles, and accomplished great things. Likewise, God wants to use all of us, despite our failures and foibles, to help build His kingdom.
Now we know that Abraham finally had that long waited for son, who was named Isaac. We are not going to talk about Isaac, however, this week. Rather, we are going to take a look at his son Jacob. Jacob is one of the most important figures in the Old Testament because his 12 sons will make the 12 tribes of Israel, who will eventually become the nation of Israel. Throughout the Old Testament, God is constantly associating Himself with Jacob, because it is through Jacob that God is forming His family and building the nation of Israel from which His only-begotten Son will come into the world.
Jacob’s name means “to supplant, to scheme, and to cheat,” and that pretty well describes Jacob. His basic attitude towards life was “I got to get mine.” And if we are honest, there is a little bit of Jacob in all of us. Whether is cutting in front of the line by riding on the shoulder because “I don’t have to wait like everyone else,” or maybe it is putting everything on social media to show just how much we are accomplishing, we often try to make sure we get our due.
It is also important to know that Jacob had a twin brother named Esau. These two were fighting right from the beginning. Even in the womb of their mother Rebecca, they were wrestling. When Rebecca called out to God to find out what was going on in her womb, God says, “There are two nations in your womb. And one will be stronger than the other. And the older will serve the younger.”
Esau was the older brother, and the best way to describe him was that he was a “man’s man.” He was very athletic, large and strong, and very hairy. Esau was his father’s favorite. Jacob on the other hand was smooth skin and something of a “mama’s boy.”
As the oldest, Esau would receive “the blessing.” I put that in quotes because that was a really big deal, but it does not translate well into our culture today. The blessing was passed on, kind of like a will, but passed on from the father before he died to the firstborn son. It brought spiritual, political, and moral authority over the rest of the family.
It is regarding the blessing that we see the cheater in Jacob come out. His father Isaac is very old and pretty much completely blind. He knows that he is going to die soon, so he calls Esau to him and tells him to go out and hunt some game for him, and make his favorite stew. He tells Esau that when he has done that, he will give him the blessing.
Rebecca overhears, and tells Jacob that now is his chance. He puts sheep skin on his hands and his neck so that he will feel as hairy as Esau. Then he takes some stew that his mother has made, and takes it to Isaac. Jacob fools his father into thinking he is Esau, so Isaac gives him the blessing saying, “May God give to you of the dew of the heavens And of the fertility of the earth abundance of grain and wine. May peoples serve you, and nations bow down to you; Be master of your brothers, and may your mother’s sons bow down to you. Cursed be those who curse you, and blessed be those who bless you” (Gen 27:28–29).
Needless to say, Esau was not happy when he found out that he was cheated out of his birthright. He was so angry that he planned to kill Jacob, but their mother found out and sent Jacob to go live with her brother Laban in a distant country until Esau cools off.
Jacob lives with Laban for 21 years. There is more cheating and scheming during that time. Jacob marries two of Laban’s daughters, Leah and Rachel, and between them and their maids he has 12 sons. Jacob has been very successful working for his uncle Laban; so successful that they start to fight over what belongs to Jacob and what belongs to Laban. When he discovers that Laban plans to kill him, Jacob decides it is time to go home, so he packs up his large family and their stuff and head back to his home.
Now, it has been 21 years, and he never heard from his mother that it was safe to go home. He really does not know how his brother Esau is going to react. To pave the way, he sends some servants to Esau with a bunch of gifts basically saying, “I’m coming home big brother.” The servants return and tells Jacob that Esau is coming with 400 men to meet him the next day. Not the “let bygones be bygones” Jacob was hoping for.
Jacob puts his affairs in order, organizing his family and putting them safely in one place, and then he steps out alone to meet his brother Esau the next morning. It is late at night and Jacob is feeling at his wits end. He has done everything he can think of to make life work out in his favor, and now he is alone.
Then something strange happens; some guy shows up and starts wrestling with Jacob. They wrestle all night long. It turns out the the guy is really God. So Jacob is fighting God the whole night long, and he will not give up fighting God. So God strikes Jacob on the hip and throws it out of joint, forcing Jacob to give up. This is how God saves him. Sometimes God has to do the same with us. God will wound our pride, our ego, perhaps even so we experience physical pain so that we will stop fighting Him and His will, so that He can save us.
Even after having his hip thrown out of the socket, Jacob will not let go of God, saying that he will only let go if God agrees to bless him. Now we are are the heart of the matter; all these years Jacob has had a stolen blessing. He has never been blessed as Jacob. He received his blessing by pretending to be someone else. Jacob is still looking for God’s blessing. He asks the stranger, who we know is God, “What is your name?” God will not answer him, but He says, “before I bless you, tell me your name.” Jacob tells him his name, and God says, “You shall no longer be named Jacob, but Israel, because you have contended with divine and human beings and have prevailed” (Gen. 32:29).
Like Jacob, in order to receive God’s blessings, we need to get rid of that “I got to get mine” attitude. There is a big difference between working and planning, versus striving and scheming. We need to have the humility to let God’s will rule our lives. All our working and planning on our own will not produce life. It will not produce the life that we all so desperately desire, because we are not meant to arrange for life on our own. We are meant to receive it as a blessing from our heavenly Father.
This week, take some time to think about how you have wrestled with God, or may be still wrestling with Him. When will you let God prevail in your life?