Missions Paul

Jacob’s entire life was defined by taking through deception: a birthright, a blessing, the best of Laban’s flock. He was a man who secured his own future with his own hands, at the expense of others. But he then had an encounter with God. He came away with a limp, a new name and a life that was changing. We are now reading as he meets Esau, the brother he wronged so badly, and he is receiving grace, not punishment. This encounter is full of the experience and effects of an encounter with God.

“Then Esau looked up and saw the women and children. “Who are these with you?” he asked. Jacob answered, “They are the children God has graciously given your servant.” ⁶ Then the female servants and their children approached and bowed down. ⁷ Next, Leah and her children came and bowed down. Last of all came Joseph and Rachel, and they too bowed down. ⁸ Esau asked, “What’s the meaning of all these flocks and herds I met?” “To find favour in your eyes, my lord,” he said. ⁹ But Esau said, “I already have plenty, my brother. Keep what you have for yourself.” ¹⁰ “No, please!” said Jacob. “If I have found favour in your eyes, accept this gift from me. For to see your face is like seeing the face of God, now that you have received me favourably. ¹¹ Please accept the present that was brought to you, for God has been gracious to me and I have all I need.” And because Jacob insisted, Esau accepted it. ¹² Then Esau said, “Let us be on our way; I’ll accompany you.” ¹³ But Jacob said to him, “My lord knows that the children are tender and that I must care for the ewes and cows that are nursing their young. If they are driven hard just one day, all the animals will die. ¹⁴ So let my lord go on ahead of his servant, while I move along slowly at the pace of the flocks and herds before me and the pace of the children, until I come to my lord in Seir.” ¹⁵ Esau said, “Then let me leave some of my men with you.” “But why do that?” Jacob asked. “Just let me find favour in the eyes of my lord.” ¹⁶ So that day Esau started on his way back to Seir. ¹⁷ Jacob, however, went to Sukkoth, where he built a place for himself and made shelters for his livestock. That is why the place is called Sukkoth.” (Genesis 33 v 5-17)

You know this is a God-moment because of the generosity (v8-10).

Jesus said, “he who has been forgiven little, loves little” (Luke 7:47). The one who has been forgiven much loves much. It’s spoken over the woman who washed his feet with her tears while the self-righteous Pharisee looked on unmoved.

Jacob is not a man who has been forgiven little.

God and now Esau have shown lavish generosity to him, and now Jacob, knowing he has been forgiven much, offers enormous generosity.

The depth of the giving mirrors the depth of the debt he knew he owed.

You know this is a God-moment because of the forgiveness that is flowing (v10-11).

Jacob uses the same language he used in his meeting with Esau as he did in his encounter with God at Peniel. In both encounters, he receives unearned mercy and forgiveness. Forgiveness from another human being, freely given when it wasn’t owed, can be one of the clearest glimpses of God we ever receive.

You know this is a God-moment when the most vulnerable become important (v13-15).

Jacob sends Esau’s escort home and travels slowly, pacing himself by what the weakest among them can bear. The man who spent his life grasping for advantage now organises his entire journey around those who cannot keep up. This is what a changed life looks like – the speed of life as slowed down to accommodate the most vulnerable.

You’ll know it’s God at work in a life, including yours, when taking gives way to giving, when enemies become glimpses of grace, and when the vulnerable finally get to set the pace.

Is there someone who would need to crawl back towards you before you forgave them? This next verse should be read as a standalone sentence. It has been twenty years since the two brothers were together. Jacob had cheated his brother out of his inheritance and then fled. Now they were to meet. How would that be?

 ^“But Esau ran to meet Jacob and embraced him; he threw his arms around his neck and kissed him. And they wept.” (Genesis 33 v 4)

Jacob was not expecting this. He had anticipated his brother’s anger. Who is the initiator? Who is running? It is the brother who was wronged.

When forgiveness is real, it doesn’t wait to be asked; it always moves first.

We are surely reminded of the story of the lost son that Jesus tells.

There’s no list of wrongs. There’s no clearing the air. Esau does not carry the covenant promises of God as his brother does. Yet it is Esau who is demonstrating not only that he was the one truly free but that his heart was like God’s. The one who runs towards the person who hurt them is truly free.

Even if you have had a Peniel experience, a divine encounter, you still have to face difficult conversations the next day, if they are to be had.

But every confrontation is better when we have to limp towards it.

“Jacob looked up and there was Esau, coming with his four hundred men; so he divided the children among Leah, Rachel and the two female servants. ² He put the female servants and their children in front, Leah and her children next, and Rachel and Joseph in the rear. ³ He himself went on ahead and bowed down to the ground seven times as he approached his brother.” (Genesis 33 v 1-3)

The last time Jacob had seen Esau, he had stolen his birthright. Now four hundred men, all belonging to Esau, were waiting for him. The night before, he had wrestled with God and walked away with a limp and a new name. 

Even if you have encountered God, you still have to face the reality of your situation the next day. Jacob, fearing the worst, arranges his family in order with a young Joseph at the back of the pack. Jacob himself limps ahead and bows to his brother seven times. This act, done seven times, is the perfect act of submission.

Esau runs and throws his arms around his brother.

Do you have an Esau in your life? Is there someone you wronged? It’s happening all the time, isn’t it? I know two people right now who are having a stand-off; who will bow? Who will take the initiative for reconciliation?

Is there someone you hurt or who hurt you?

Are you in need of a reunion scene?

The ground is never too low for you to bow and humble yourself.

The ground is never too low.

Even if you have had a Peniel experience, a divine encounter, you still have to face difficult conversations the next day, if they are to be had.

But every confrontation is better when we have to limp towards it.

“Jacob looked up and there was Esau, coming with his four hundred men; so he divided the children among Leah, Rachel and the two female servants. ² He put the female servants and their children in front, Leah and her children next, and Rachel and Joseph in the rear. ³ He himself went on ahead and bowed down to the ground seven times as he approached his brother.” (Genesis 33 v 1-3)

The last time Jacob had seen Esau, he had stolen his birthright. Now four hundred men, all belonging to Esau, were waiting for him. The night before, he had wrestled with God and walked away with a limp and a new name. 

Even if you have encountered God, you still have to face the reality of your situation the next day. Jacob, fearing the worst, arranges his family in order with a young Joseph at the back of the pack. Jacob himself limps ahead and bows to his brother seven times. This act, done seven times, is the perfect act of submission.

Esau runs and throws his arms around his brother.

Do you have an Esau in your life? Is there someone you wronged? It’s happening all the time, isn’t it? I know two people right now who are having a stand-off; who will bow? Who will take the initiative for reconciliation?

Is there someone you hurt or who hurt you?

Are you in need of a reunion scene?

The ground is never too low for you to bow and humble yourself.

Some encounters with God don’t leave you stronger. They leave you limping. And that is exactly the point. Jacob crossed the Jabbok with everything he owned. He crossed back with nothing but a new name and a broken hip. This is the story of what it costs to meet God face-to-face and why it’s worth it.

“That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two female servants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. ²³ After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions. ²⁴ So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. 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. 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.” ²⁷ The man asked him, “What is your name?” “Jacob,” he answered. ²⁸ Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel,because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.”²⁹ Jacob said, “Please tell me your name.” But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there. ³⁰ So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.” ³¹ The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel,and he was limping because of his hip. ³² Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip, because the socket of Jacob’s hip was touched near the tendon.” (Genesis 32 v 22-32)

The struggle for the Presence cost Jacob everything he thought defined him. It cost him his name; he became Israel, and it cost him his power; he became lame.

It was there alone at the Jabbok, that he wrestled with God through the night. It was there that God touched him in such a way that he would walk with a limp for the rest of his life. And there he was given a new name. Jacob the supplanter, the one who grasps and schemes, became Israel, the one whom God will strive for. In the morning, this man started a new life, changed and walking awkwardly, the limp a living reminder that God had touched his soul.

He named that place Peniel, the face of God, for that is what he had experienced and survived.

To know that God has looked into our souls and, in His love, has spared us, this is true brokenness.

There is nothing stronger than someone who has been made lame by God. Some Church communities are never the same again because of a message, a worship moment, a weeping, a salvation, a healing, a restoration, a relationship made whole. They have seen and been, and they can never return.

They have nothing left to prove and nothing more to fear. The old fight has gone. The old fire has been put out. The old aggression has been laid to rest. Within there is an emptiness now that only God can fill, an emptiness reserved for His Presence alone.

Nowhere is this transformation more visible, or more tested, than in our relationships. We may start out as a deceiver, holding onto the heel of a brother. But it doesn’t have to end that way.

The Church today must know a Jabbok experience, the place of surrender, leading to a Peniel experience, the face of God. In the Jabbok, we start wrestling until He touches us. In the Peniel, we stop looking at what is in His hands, and we pursue His face to know Him intimately.

We can let go of deceptive ways and channel the same fierce strength to hold on to God instead. He will touch us. He will break us. He will reshape our lives. Broken for Jesus.

Over twenty years previously, Jacob wronged his brother Esau. Now he is about to meet him again, and he is panicking. He prays, and then he prepares to meet his brother whom he wronged all that time ago. He wants God to help him, but he thinks expensive gifts will pacify him. How often do we pray and then meddle? If we do, then we carry a Jacob characteristic.

^“ Then Jacob prayed, “O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, Lord, you who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,’ ¹⁰ I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps. ¹¹ Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. ¹² But you have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’” ¹³ He spent the night there, and from what he had with him he selected a gift for his brother Esau: ¹⁴ two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, ¹⁵ thirty female camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys. ¹⁶ He put them in the care of his servants, each herd by itself, and said to his servants, “Go ahead of me, and keep some space between the herds.” ¹⁷ He instructed the one in the lead: “When my brother Esau meets you and asks, ‘Who do you belong to, and where are you going, and who owns all these animals in front of you?’ ¹⁸ then you are to say, ‘They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a gift sent to my lord Esau, and he is coming behind us.’” ¹⁹ He also instructed the second, the third and all the others who followed the herds: “You are to say the same thing to Esau when you meet him. ²⁰ And be sure to say, ‘Your servant Jacob is coming behind us.’” For he thought, “I will pacify him with these gifts I am sending on ahead; later, when I see him, perhaps he will receive me.” ²¹ So Jacob’s gifts went on ahead of him, but he himself spent the night in the camp.” (Genesis 32 v 9-21)

His prayer is worthy for us to copy.

• He opens with God’s reputation – He was the God of his ancestors. A relationship with God that has stood the test of time, v9.
• He reminds God (and mainly himself) that he has been carrying promises from Him; He remembers what God has said to him, v. 10.
• He is thankful for what God has given to him, v 10.
• He asks for protection and, in so doing, reveals his fear, v 11.
• He recounts the promise of God for his life, v 12.

He prays, and then he acts. Or is this meddling?

He has a plan. He counts out the animals and arranges them into successive waves of gifts. He stays behind and hopes his plan works. The gifts for Esau are extraordinarily generous. Was this manipulation or generosity? Jacob has not yet been transformed; Peniel will come very soon. Was this another plan from the plotter?

It is an important question to ask: Are you trusting God, after leaving the issues with Him, or are you meddling, coming up with cunning plans?

Do you know the feeling when the past catches up with you? Maybe a name appears on your phone, and it makes your hand shake? In a crowd, you spot that familiar face, and the memories come flooding back. The past suddenly is unavoidable.

Jacob knew these feelings.

“Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the country of Edom. ⁴ He instructed them: “This is what you are to say to my lord Esau: ‘Your servant Jacob says, I have been staying with Laban and have remained there till now. ⁵ I have cattle and donkeys, sheep and goats, male and female servants. Now I am sending this message to my lord, that I may find favour in your eyes.’” ⁶ When the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, “We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.” ⁷ In great fear and distress Jacob divided the people who were with him into two groups,and the flocks and herds and camels as well. ⁸ He thought, “If Esau comes and attacks one group,the groupthat is left may escape.” (Genesis 32 v 3-8)

Why was Jacob in great fear and distress? It was because four hundred men were with Esau, his brother, whom he had defrauded out of his birthright twenty years ago. Do you remember? He deceived his dying father and stole Esau’s birthright and then fled before Esau could kill him. He hasn’t forgotten, and he knows Esau wouldn’t have either.

We all know the feelings when something we wish were buried resurfaces. We could have avoided a conversation for twenty years. We may have damaged a relationship that has never had a chance to be repaired. It can feel like four hundred soldiers are going to be hammering down your door any moment.

Faith is not the absence of fear. It is moving forward despite fear.

What does four hundred soldiers look like in your life today?

What needs resolving? Perhaps the four hundred soldiers are a phone call you have to make, but you keep putting off.

What is not going away?

You don’t know how the other person will respond. You can’t control that. But you can control whether you take the first step.

What are your four hundred soldiers?

And what would it look like, this week, to finally walk toward them?

Jacob is between chapters. Between parting company with Laban and agreeing on terms, they never saw each other again (well, the Bible never records it anyway) and right before he picks up again with his estranged brother, Esau. Between these two events is a tremendous moment of the experience of angels.

“Jacob also went on his way, and the angels of God met him. ² When Jacob saw them, he said, “This is the camp of God!” So he named that place Mahanaim.” (Genesis 32 v1-2)

Jacob, his two wives and children and the whole entourage of family, servants and animals, etc., are on their way, and they meet the angels of God. Jacob names the place ‘two camps’, Mahanaim, meaning there are two companies present, His and God’s.

Maybe today you are in the in-between place; you have left, but you have not arrived. You may have anxiety as to what will happen next. Jacob knew he would meet Esau, but he didn’t know what the reception would be like.

Perhaps today you don’t know what will happen, or what will happen tomorrow, but God wants you to know that He is with you, He has assigned angels to be with you, and you are not travelling the road alone.

Maybe today is a Mahanaim day. In the place of uncertainty, you know you are moving between chapters in your life. Your enemy wants to limit your vision, but God wants to extend it. He wants you to see what Jacob saw. The camp of God. That He is present and He is travelling with you. There are angels on this road marked out for you. Look out for them. They travel with you. You may be able to see the people and things around you. Make sure you have eyes to see the army of God surrounding you as well.

Most of us know friendships that we once had will never be restored. We love certain people, but we know we cannot fully trust them anymore. The goodbyes are happier occasions than the reunions we once had. This meeting between Jacob and his uncle, Laban, reveals that we can be honest in a relationship. We can name the distance honestly.

Jacob and Laban are about to part, but not as friends. That is broken, and it cannot be repaired. They will part as deceivers, having cheated on each other. Laban through Jacob’s wages and Jacob through deserting with his wives and children without saying goodbye. However, they do so by agreeing to at least build an understanding of boundaries.

“So Jacob took a stone and set it up as a pillar. ⁴⁶ He said to his relatives, “Gather some stones.” So they took stones and piled them in a heap, and they ate there by the heap. ⁴⁷ Laban called it Jegar Sahadutha, and Jacob called it Galeed. ⁴⁸ Laban said, “This heap is a witness between you and me today.” That is why it was called Galeed. ⁴⁹ It was also called Mizpah,because he said, “May the Lord keep watch between you and me when we are away from each other. ⁵⁰ If you mistreat my daughters or if you take any wives besides my daughters, even though no one is with us, remember that God is a witness between you and me.” ⁵¹ Laban also said to Jacob, “Here is this heap, and here is this pillar I have set up between you and me. ⁵² This heap is a witness, and this pillar is a witness, that I will not go past this heap to your side to harm you and that you will not go past this heap and pillar to my side to harm me. ⁵³ May the God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge between us.” So Jacob took an oath in the name of the Fear of his father Isaac. ⁵⁴ He offered a sacrifice there in the hill country and invited his relatives to a meal. After they had eaten, they spent the night there. ⁵⁵ Early the next morning Laban kissed his grandchildren and his daughters and blessed them. Then he left and returned home.” (Genesis 31: 45-55)

They cannot even agree on what to call their ‘agreement of understanding’. They call the place of their agreement the same thing, but in their different languages. They seal their oath differently. Laban uses the common ancestor, Abraham, but Jacob uses that of his father, Isaac. At this point, Jacob hasn’t made God truly his own; that will come later.

When they part after a meal and a night’s sleep, there are no speeches, just Laban kissing his grandchildren and daughters; there is no sentimental goodbye.

Just two people who cannot fully reconcile. They still need boundaries, and with them in place, they agree to separate. This is not a neat-and-tidy Bible story. It is a story of two people who cannot fully reconcile but agree, in the sight of God, to separate for good. They do it as decently as they possibly can. The man who dominated twenty years of Jacob’s life is never heard of again. He kisses his grandchildren and walks away. The wall of stones was in effect a message that said: this is where your world ends, and mine begins.

Some people are not with us throughout our lives. For some people, we have to draw a line in the sand equivalent to a heap of stones. We have to keep our distance to move into the next chapter.

Waking up this morning and thinking about this title, “God has seen,” is comforting to us all, especially with all that is happening in the Middle East right now. We might not know how this will end, but God does.

We are reading through the story of Jacob fleeing from Laban, his uncle.

Have you ever done the right thing, and no one noticed?

You served quietly. You gave generously. You stayed faithful when it would have been easier to walk away. But there was no thank you. No recognition. Just the silence of being unseen.

Most of us know that feeling. And for some of us, it has gone on not for days, but for years.

“So Laban went into Jacob’s tent and into Leah’s tent and into the tent of the two female servants, but he found nothing. After he came out of Leah’s tent, he entered Rachel’s tent. ³⁴ Now Rachel had taken the household gods and put them inside her camel’s saddle and was sitting on them. Laban searched through everything in the tent but found nothing. ³⁵ Rachel said to her father, “Don’t be angry, my lord, that I cannot stand up in your presence; I’m having my period.” So he searched but could not find the household gods. ³⁶ Jacob was angry and took Laban to task. “What is my crime?” he asked Laban. “How have I wronged you that you hunt me down? ³⁷ Now that you have searched through all my goods, what have you found that belongs to your household? Put it here in front of your relatives and mine, and let them judge between the two of us. ³⁸ “I have been with you for twenty years now. Your sheep and goats have not miscarried, nor have I eaten rams from your flocks. ³⁹ I did not bring you animals torn by wild beasts; I bore the loss myself. And you demanded payment from me for whatever was stolen by day or night. ⁴⁰ This was my situation: The heat consumed me in the daytime and the cold at night, and sleep fled from my eyes. ⁴¹ It was like this for the twenty years I was in your household. I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times. ⁴² If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.” ⁴³ Laban answered Jacob, “The women are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks. All you see is mine. Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine, or about the children they have borne? ⁴⁴ Come now, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it serve as a witness between us.” (Genesis 31 v 33-44)

The scene before us is of Laban tearing through tent after tent looking for his household gods that have been stolen by his own daughter, Rachel. She is sitting on them, and she lies about not being able to stand up.

Comical that may be, but what follows is the twenty-year frustration of Jacob spilling over before his uncle.

He knows the number of years for Leah and Rachel.

He knows the number of years for the sheep.

He knows how many times his wages were changed.

He recalls having to pay for any losses out of his wages.

He has been faithful to his uncle, but it cost him. The cost of being faithful spills out of him. The hurt of Laban not noticing what he has paid is heard in this sentence: “But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands.”  v. 42

Perhaps for you, this one thing has brought more comfort than anything – God has seen.

The good and faithful work that you have done has not gone unnoticed. Helping people that no one has seen. Enduring moments that were simply unfair. Yet you have carried on.

Through it all, there has been One who has seen it all. He has seen your faithfulness. He has never turned away. He sees even the household gods underneath Rachel!

“God has seen.” Not Laban. Not the relatives gathered around. Not anyone who could have made it easier or fairer along the way. But God. The God who sees even what is hidden underneath a camel’s saddle has seen your life, too.

God has seen what the news channels haven’t shown us. He has seen it all unfolding in the Middle East. This is who we worship today and it instils great confidence that the world may seem out of control but God knows it all.

The night before anything could go wrong, God appears. Call it the eleventh hour, God steps in, to a man’s dream who doesn’t even worship Him, with a command – “Don’t touch him”.

God does not shout. He does not send fire. He restrains.

Not all our confrontations will end as neatly as the story we are about to read. There were still words said, and it was still complicated between uncle and nephew, but Jacob would not be harmed.

God still specialises in night-time deliverances. He is working more in our lives than we realise. Conversations are happening about you that you will never hear. There are restraints placed on others that you will never see. Heaven is not passive while you sleep.

^“ On the third day Laban was told that Jacob had fled. ²³ Taking his relatives with him, he pursued Jacob for seven days and caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead. ²⁴ Then God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream at night and said to him, “Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.” ²⁵ Jacob had pitched his tent in the hill country of Gilead when Laban overtook him, and Laban and his relatives camped there too. ²⁶ Then Laban said to Jacob, “What have you done? You’ve deceived me, and you’ve carried off my daughters like captives in war. ²⁷ Why did you run off secretly and deceive me? Why didn’t you tell me, so I could send you away with joy and singing to the music of timbrels and harps? ²⁸ You didn’t even let me kiss my grandchildren and my daughters goodbye. You have done a foolish thing. ²⁹ I have the power to harm you; but last night the God of your father said to me, ‘Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.’ ³⁰ Now you have gone off because you longed to return to your father’s household. But why did you steal my gods?” ³¹ Jacob answered Laban, “I was afraid, because I thought you would take your daughters away from me by force. ³² But if you find anyone who has your gods, that person shall not live. In the presence of our relatives, see for yourself whether there is anything of yours here with me; and if so, take it.” Now Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen the gods.” (Genesis 31 v 22-32)

This story shows us that:-

• God has protected you even when you didn’t know it.

Jacob didn’t know about the dream Laban had. He didn’t know that his arch-enemy at that time, out to kill him, had been reined in. There are conversations we have not been party to and interventions that we have never witnessed in our lives, for God is watching over us. How many times has God gone ahead of you? How many conversations has He already entered before you arrived?

There are interventions we have never witnessed. There are disasters we will never know we were spared from. God is watching over us — not only in the visible moments, but in the unseen ones.

• Unresolved relationships generate long-running damage.

Rachel was sitting on a secret, the stolen idols, which would become the main issue and the fact that she had not said goodbye to her father, though it was the reason. A covenant was made in Gilead, but between an uncle and a nephew who do not trust each other. Not every covenant is reconciliation.

God’s nighttime interventions do not just preserve our lives; they preserve His purposes in us. He restrains what would undo us. He exposes what would corrupt us. Where has God protected you without your knowledge?
What “idols” are you quietly carrying into your future?
Is the peace in your life reconciliation or simply distance?

The night before anything could go wrong, God stepped in.

And He still does.