GENESIS 28-352012 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Genesis 28-35

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2012. And we will continue our journey through the Bible in three years. Hopefully as you came in today, you got the reading schedule for the month of February.

If you didn't get one, they're on the back table and you can get those on your way out. But I want to encourage you once again, as we're going through the Bible in three years, to not give up, even if you've fallen behind, even if you already gave up or got discouraged or thought this is too impossible or you thought I'm a loser because I can't read every day. Whatever you thought, I want to encourage you, don't give up.

That's the enemy. That's discouragement. That is not of the Lord. Really, I want to encourage you to just pick up today with what God scheduled for us today. Let God minister to you and then just tomorrow, pick it up again and read what God has for you tomorrow and continue on. Don't go back and try to catch up if you are going to be discouraged because there's too much. So if you're more than a day behind, I would encourage you just forget those chapters.

it's okay. It's not a big deal. Just start today with what God's given you today. And if you never started with us, well, it's not too late for that either. Join with us. It's a new month. It's a great opportunity. Right now, you can start reading through the Bible in three years with us and let God work in your heart because his word truly is living and active and sharper than any double-edged sword. It's

powerful, and God will work in your heart as you spend time in his word. So make sure that you continue along with us, and we're going to continue on this evening looking at the chapters we read this past week, and that's Genesis chapters 28 through 35.

Now as we're talking about the book of Genesis, we're looking at the beginnings. That's what the word Genesis means, and we're seeing the beginnings of lots of things that we've seen throughout the chapters that we've read already. Moses writes this book during the time that the children of Israel are wandering in the wilderness around 1446 to 1406 B.C.

And the book of Genesis covers approximately the first 2,000 years of history. We've covered the majority of that already, and we've slowed down now looking at the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and then his sons will be studying this coming week as well as we continue on in the book of Genesis.

And so we're looking at the establishing of the Hebrew nation and how God chose Abraham and then Isaac and then Jacob and used them to establish the nation of Israel, the people of God, and through them to bring forth the Messiah.

Well, here we have the timeline. And again, if you don't have this timeline, there's handouts on the back. It's called the Books of Moses Bible Study Resource. And there's a timeline on there. You can get a better look at it. But this shows how much we've covered thus far in the book of Genesis.

And as you can see, it is quite a bit of time. We started with creation back in Genesis chapter 1. We saw the first man and woman. We saw the first marriage, the first sin, the first offerings and sacrifice, the first murder, the beginning of the Hebrew nation, the first prophecies of the Messiah. So many things have already happened. God has done quite a bit just here in this short time in the book of Genesis, but

We also, of course, looked at the flood and the Tower of Babel. We saw God call out Abraham in Genesis chapter 12 and give him some incredible promises and blessings and gave to him the promise of the land of Canaan, which is the nation of Israel today. Then we saw that promise passed on to Isaac, his son. And now we will see this week that promise be passed along to Jacob as well.

And so we pick it up this week with where we started last week on Thursday in Genesis chapter 28. And here in Genesis 28, the key verse is verse 15. He says, Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go and will bring you back to this land. For I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you.

Here in Genesis chapter 28, we have a couple things happening, and it's really the continuation of last week. If you remember what happened last week in chapter 27,

Isaac felt like he was getting pretty old, that he wasn't going to last much longer. So he decided, well, I need to pass on the blessing to one of my sons. And he decided he was going to bless Esau. So he sent out Esau. He said, hey, go hunt some game, prepare it the way I like it, and then bring it back and I'll eat it. And then I'll be really happy and I'll bless you. And then, of course, Rebecca overheard that conversation. And so she said,

Put her plan into action, which was substitute Jacob for Esau, pretend like he's Esau, cover him up, make him smell like Esau, make him feel like Esau, make the food taste like Esau prepared it, so that Jacob could get the blessing from Isaac instead of Esau.

And we saw the deception that was brought forth and really the damage that it brought. We learned the lesson from that, that when we try to do things in our own strength, according to our ways, when we plot and scheme things,

We really end up not achieving what we were looking for, but instead we bring upon ourselves hurt and heartache and sorrow. And that's something we'll continue to see in Jacob's life throughout our chapters this evening as well. And so we ended up last week in chapter 27 with Esau wanting to kill Jacob for this deception, for stealing away the blessing from his father.

And so Esau's plotting and planning, and it's found out. And so Rebekah once again puts another plan into action, and she says, well, we need to get Jacob out of here. And so she talks to Isaac and says...

Jacob can't marry one of these ladies around us. He needs to go back to our hometown and get married up there. And so Isaac agrees, and they send out Jacob. And that's what we pick up in chapter 28, where now Isaac sends Jacob away there in verses 1 through 6.

Now, whatever Isaac was thinking, we're not exactly sure in chapter 27 as he's trying to bless Esau instead of Jacob, even though God said that Jacob would be the one that would rule over his younger brother or his older brother. At this point, Isaac has realized that Jacob will be the one that God will fulfill his promises through. We can see that very clearly in verse 4.

As Isaac is speaking to Jacob, he says that God will give him the blessings of Abraham to him and to his descendants, that they would inherit the land and

which God gave to Abraham. And so Isaac has now come to terms. He's realized Jacob is the one that God has desired to carry on this promise through. And for you and I looking back at it, we know that Jacob is the one through whom the Messiah will come, the savior of the world, Jesus Christ. And so Isaac sends him away with this promise that God's gonna bring him back and give to him the promises and blessings that he had given and promised to Abraham.

Well, Esau watches this take place. He watches this unfold and they send Jacob away and he realizes his two wives, he married ladies from around them, the peoples around them. And he realized, oh, my parents weren't too happy about that. And so he tries to make amends by going to Ishmael and marrying one of Ishmael's daughters. And that's recorded there in verses six through nine.

that's taking place. Jacob is on his way up north to Haran to go find a wife, to go be with the family up there and really to escape Esau and his death threats. And on his way, he ends up at a place called Bethel. Now here's a map of the southern portion of Israel. You have the Dead Sea on the bottom there, the Jordan that feeds it.

And then you see Bethel right there, a little bit north of the Dead Sea. And so that's where Jacob is. He started out in Beersheba there at the bottom, and he worked his way up to Bethel. It's not that far. It's, I think, about 40 miles or so. And so he works his way up to Bethel, and there he...

He rests for the evening and God appears to him. God reveals himself to him, speaks to him in a dream. We have the famous dream there, Jacob's ladder take place. And Jacob realizes this is the house of God as God is speaking to him and revealing himself to him. In verse 13 and 14 here of Genesis 28, we have God give the same promises that we've been talking about to Jacob.

He said that in verse 13, and behold, the Lord stood above it and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham, your father, the God of Isaac, the land on which you lie, I will give to you and to your descendants. Your descendants shall be as the dust of the earth. You shall spread abroad to the west and the east and the north and the south. In you and in your seed, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

This is very important. So you see God, first of all, give this promise to Abraham. And then last week we saw how God gave that same promise to Isaac. And now God is speaking to Jacob and he's very clearly making the point that same promise about the land, about the many descendants and about the blessing coming from their seed to the whole earth.

So one of their descendants will be the Savior, the Messiah. And so God is very clear to pass that on and to make sure it's clear. In fact, we'll see that promise given again in our chapters this evening as God is making this promise that Jacob will carry on this promise that God originally gave to Abraham.

And so Jacob responds by making a vow there at the end of the chapter, verses 20 through 22. And he says, okay, God, if you do what you said and you bring me back and you bless me this way, then you'll be my God. Then I will serve you, I'll honor you, and you'll be my God. And this will be God's house forever.

And he also adds in, you know, kind of an extra bonus to God. He says, all right, God, I'll give you 10% too. Whatever you give me, I'll give you 10%. So I like what Wiersbe says about this. He says, Jacob's faith as yet was weak.

But he did lay hold of God's promises, even if there is a bit of the bargainer in his vow to give God the tithe. So he has faith and he grabs hold of the promise, but he also is bargaining. And so it's kind of a work in progress. We get to see him develop in his spiritual walk as we continue on in our chapters this evening.

Now, for me, things like this, the maps and things like that, they really help me to grasp hold of the scriptures. And so I hope it's helpful to you. Another thing that really helps me, which kind of gives some color, some context, is thinking about the timeline. And so here we have a... Oh, I'm a little bit ahead of myself. I put it in my notes, but I didn't put it in the PowerPoint. Okay. Okay.

Well, we'll get to that later. Then you can have the color and the extra context. Okay, so Genesis 29 verse 18. It says, Now Jacob loved Rachel, so he said, I will serve you seven years for Rachel your daughter.

And so what we have happening now in Genesis 29 is Jacob arrives in Haran. So he begins the journey, he gets to Bethel, he has the vision, and then he continues on the remainder of the journey, which is quite long, and he arrives there in Haran,

Which was, if you remember, back in Genesis 12, where Abraham originally was when he was with his father there and God called him out to the land of Canaan. That's where he was in Haran. Also in Genesis 24, that's where the servant went to go find the wife for Isaac.

because that's where Abraham's family was. And so that's where Jacob goes. And there, first of all, he meets Rachel. He falls in love with her. He agrees to work for Laban for seven years for her. But then you read the story, right? So then the last minute he swaps him out and he wakes up in the morning. He turns over and he goes, whoa, that's Leah. That's not Rachel. I married the wrong woman. What happened? And, uh,

We find that really Jacob meets his match in Laban. Laban is cunning and scheming just like Jacob.

In Genesis chapter 31, verse 7, a couple chapters later, Jacob will be talking to Leah and Rachel, and he says, your father has deceived me and changed my wages 10 times, but God did not allow him to hurt me. And so the deception that Jacob is used to giving and dishing out, he's now receiving through Laban. And so I'm sure he's learning some really important lessons there from God. But we see him get married to Leah as well as Rachel.

Now here we have a map of the area. Notice on the bottom there is Beersheba and Bethel. And then this would be somewhat approximation of the route that Jacob probably took. There's a major highway there that goes from the north to south that's referred to as the King's Highway. And so he would have probably traveled up that highway and then over to Haran.

All together, it's about 400 to 550 miles, depending on which route he took and those kinds of details. But you get the point that it's quite a big journey. It's not something that he would have done easily, as well as he didn't have any vehicles or transportation. He was really, it seems, on foot or possibly on camel or something like that. And so he takes this journey. It takes him probably...

close to a month to get from Beersheba all the way to Haran up the King's Highway. And so there in Haran, he meets Leah and Rachel. He gets married and he begins to have a family. We get to see the development of this. He has 12 sons and one daughter all together. And so here in chapter 29, we see the first four sons that are born to Jacob.

So here, as we continue to follow the line of the Messiah, the red is the line of the Messiah. So we start out with Abraham and then Isaac. Isaac wasn't the only son of Abraham, but that's the one that the line of the Messiah was promised to come through. And then Isaac had Jacob and Esau. Esau was the elder, but God said, I'm going to promise the blessing. The Messiah is going to come through Jacob.

And then now Jacob has four sons here in chapter 29. They're all from Leah. And so she has Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah.

Traditionally, the eldest son would be the one to pass on, you know, the family name and receive the promise of the Messiah. But in this case, Reuben, Simeon, and Levi are skipped over, and Judah is the one who carries on this promise of blessing to the whole earth that will be the Savior, the Messiah to come. And we'll explain that a little bit later. We'll see why as we go on later in our chapters this evening.

So here we get to see the beginnings of his family being established. Now these children are very important because up to this point God has been selecting one child, one son, and excluding the others. So Abraham had Ishmael and Isaac and Zimran and Jokshan and a few others after that. And

Abraham, or God said to Abraham, Isaac is the one I'm going to provide this promise through. Not the rest. You can send them away. It's Isaac that this promise is going to come through. And then Isaac has Jacob and Esau. And God says, nope, it's not Esau. I'm not going to give the promise through that. It's through Jacob. And so he's excluding Esau and saying it's Jacob. But now Jacob's children, that same thing is not happening.

All of Jacob's children, he has 12 sons. Those 12 sons become the 12 tribes of Israel. And so these things are very important. And what we're seeing established is the beginning of the nation of Israel as these sons become the heads of tribes and really establish the nation that becomes Israel later on. And so we're beginning to see the formation and the foundation of that nation.

Here in Genesis chapter 29. Here we go. That's what I was looking for. Jacob's age. So this is what helps me understand a little bit better, put some pictures together in context for what's happening. So this is a chart of Jacob's age

through different events of his life. So kind of, you know, from very young to his death. Some of these are calculations and somewhat guesstimations, but it gives you a picture of, you know, how old he might have been, which is very different than what I typically think of when I consider his story. So in Genesis 25, 7, we have the death of Abraham.

And doing the math, kind of working backwards, we find that Jacob would have been about 15 years old when Abraham died. That would be his grandfather.

Then Esau gets married in Genesis 26, 34. It tells us that Esau is 40 years old at that time. And of course, Jacob and Esau are twins. So they are both 40 when Esau gets married. So that happens at 40. And then in 28, 5, what we just read, Jacob flees to Haran.

And this is a number that's a little bit of a guesstimation calculation, but he was probably about 77 years old when he flees to Haran. I know you probably thought he was like 25, right? But 77 years old is how old he is when he flees to Haran.

And then Joseph is born. Now Joseph is the 11th son that's born. So there's a lot of other sons that are born in between. But Joseph is born when Jacob is about 91 years old after he has served with Laban for 14 years. So 91 there. And then in Genesis 31, when he finally leaves Haran and heads back to the land of Canaan, he would have been about 97 years old.

In Genesis 35, which we'll finish up with this evening, we see that Isaac dies. And at that time, Jacob would have been 120 years old. This week, as we continue on in the reading, we'll see him meet Pharaoh.

and that'll be at 130 years old, and then in Genesis 47, 28, when he finally kicks the bucket or dies, he'll be 147 years old and live a good long life. So that's kind of to give you a picture. So as you're looking at and considering this account that we're looking at this evening and reading this week, to give you a better understanding of

of how old he was and the type of life experience he had when he's going through these different things. Well, that brings us to Genesis chapter 30. Verse 43 is the key verse. It says,

Here we see God begin to pour out his blessings upon Jacob and he becomes prosperous and wealthy, much like God did with his father. Remember when he left his father, he left everything behind. He came with nothing to the region of Haran, but now God is beginning to bless him and prosper him and give him large herds and flocks.

We also see in Genesis chapter 30, the rest of his, well, eight more sons being born as well as one daughter being born. And so his family is extended.

And we see this happening through this competition, really, that's taking place between Leah and Rachel. And then they bring their concubines or their maidservants into it. And so you have Leah and Rachel and Bilhah and Zilpah. And they're all trying to work, you know, to have kids. And basically it's... Well, it was a shameful thing for Rachel, first of all, to not be able to have children. She...

despised as a result of it. It was a very shameful and difficult thing for a woman in those days to be barren. And so it was something that she was like, well, we need to figure out how to do this. And so she gave her maidservant to Jacob and said, have children through her and they'll be, you know, as my children and so on and so forth. And then Leah said, well, I've stopped bearing children. So

Well, here take my maidservant. And so you see this competition go on. So it was a difficult and shameful thing in that society. Also, if you consider the type of culture that they were living in, you know, today children are kind of like an expense, right? I mean, it's just like extra money. You got to pay for this. You got to pay for that. In those days, children were more laborers. So you could

send them to the field and work the field. You could, you know, have bigger fields because you had more hands to do the work and things like that. So it was a very different context than what we're living in today. Instead of being a drain or an expense, it would have been extra money coming in, extra provision. And so having children was considered such a great blessing. And then not having children in that culture, it was

It was something that was very shameful and the women would be despised greatly. We see that all throughout the scriptures. Well, Jacob finishes 14 years of service with Laban for Rachel and Leah.

And he comes to the conclusion of that. And he says, all right, Laban, send me off. I'm going to go home. And Laban says, no, no, no. I've been so blessed because you're here. So stick around. Stay tuned. You know, I want you to be here so that I can continue to be blessed. And so he says, well, let's make a deal. So what is the deal that they strike? Well, they decide, Jacob proposes, all of the sheep that are streaked and spotted, let those be my wages.

They decided, hey, that's a good deal. Laban agreed to that. And so what they did was they took all of the sheep that were already streaked and spotted, that were already part of the flock, and they separated them. And Laban takes them three days journey away.

So that Jacob can't be near them. So that, you know, there's no, you know, secret things happening, no shady deals. So they're far away. Jacob's over here three days away with the rest of the flock. And he's supposed to take care of them. And then from then on, any sheep that are speckled or spotted are Jacob's.

And that was a way, it was really not, these aren't blemishes that it's talking about. It was just a way of identification. It was a way to quickly identify, yep, that's Jacob's. Okay, that's Laban's. And they could easily discern between the two. And so they make this deal.

And God just blesses it abundantly. And through this, as the key verse says, he became exceedingly prosperous and had large flocks, female and male servants, camels and donkeys, as a result of God blessing him through these livestock that are being born. So here we have the...

of the family tree now as Jacob's family is extended in this chapter. So we go from Judah, then we have Dan and Naphtali that were born to Bilhah.

And then we have Gad and Asher, who is born to Zilpah, which was Leah's maidservant. And then finally at the end, we have Rachel giving birth to a son. She names him Joseph. And his name is really a prophecy of Rachel saying, God's going to give me one more son, which he does in another chapter. So this is Jacob's family continuing to be established.

So we have 11 sons, one daughter, there's one more son on the way. And again, these 12 sons become the 12 tribes of the nation of Israel. And we'll get to see that develop as we continue on in the book of Genesis. Chapter 31. The key verse is verse 20. Jacob stole away unknown to Laban the Syrian, in that he did not tell him that he intended to flee.

And so what we find happening here in Genesis chapter 31 is now Jacob has been there for 20 years. For 14, he served for Rachel and Leah. For another six, he served for the speckled and spotted sheep.

Now the time is up. The sons of Laban are beginning to grumble. The relationships are deteriorating. And so Jacob decides, I think it's probably time to go. At the same time, God is speaking to Jacob and he says, Jacob, it's time to go. And so Jacob calls a meeting with Leah and Rachel and they agree. Yes, it is time to

to go. It's interesting there in verse 15, we find that the daughters were really not too excited about their dad and the way that Laban was treating them. They say in Genesis 31 15, are we not considered strangers by him? For he has sold us and completely consumed our money. And so what we find happening is Laban, as Jacob was working for him for those 14 years and Laban was prospering,

The whole point was he was supposed to be reserving the money that was made as an inheritance for his daughters or as a dowry for his daughters. Right?

But instead, he just consumed it upon himself is what they're saying. That he's just counted them as strangers. He's like, hey, it's not important that they have provision. I'm just going to use it for myself. And so you can see the type of man that Laban was and how this relationship with his daughters really wasn't a good one. And now there's this tension in the family and they all agree it's time to get away. It's time to go back to the land of Canaan.

So Jacob, even though God is giving him some instruction and telling him to go, again, we see this conflict between Jacob's flesh and his spirit, really, because God's instructed him to go, but he decides, well, probably the best thing to do is just sneak away and, you know, just try to get out of here without Laban really realizing it.

I don't know if that was the best approach, but that's what he did. And so we see him sneaking away while Laban is three days journey out. Probably he's with that flock that he separated from Jacob. And so he's with this flock. He's three days journey away. And he says, now's my chance. And he packs up his family. They take everything they got, all of their herds and cattle and everything. And they take off and they head back to the land of Canaan.

Well, Laban hears about it there in verses 22 through 32. He hears that he's gone, that they split. And so he pursues them and finally catches up to them. It says in the mountains of Gilead.

And there he confronts Jacob. They have this kind of tense meeting there as he is accusing them of, you know, stealing away the way that they did, but then also stealing his household gods. I always crack up. And there's a couple other portions that we'll see as we journey through the Old Testament, you know, where people get all upset. Hey, you stole my gods. And again, if you've got gods that can be stolen...

Your gods are not very strong and probably not worthy of your worship or adoration. But he's all upset because they stole his gods, and so he searches for his gods. And they actually did have them, but Rachel hid them, and so he was not able to find them.

And then also what we see happening in this chapter is the covenant that takes place between Jacob and Laban. And we'll talk about that more in a couple minutes. But here's a map again. It's pretty much the same map of his journey home. So he's up there in Haran with Laban and

his family, and then he journeys down south, back down towards the land of Canaan. Now at the bottom there, you have the Dead Sea, the Jordan River on top of that, the Sea of Galilee. It's real small. You might not be able to see it, but that's, of course, you know, the land of Canaan.

You have Edom there at the very bottom. We'll talk about that in the next chapter. And then the mountains of Gilead with a question mark. Now the question mark is there because it's not exactly clear where it is that Laban catches up

to Jacob. It seems to indicate, based on the amount of time that it took for him to catch them, that it was farther north than what we normally consider to be the mountains of Gilead. And so that's why there's the question. So it could have been, you know, somewhere in that region, but we're not exactly sure yet.

It's not really known. But the northern mountain range makes more sense to me, again, because it took him seven days to pursue and catch up to Jacob. And Jacob had a three-day head start. So he couldn't have gotten too far, considering that they were, you know, had all kinds of flocks and herds and things to travel. And so it was probably farther north that he caught up with him.

And so he catches up with them. They have this confrontation. He says, hey, you stole my gods. And why did you steal away like that? I would have thrown a party for you, which by what we read of Laban, we know that's probably not true. God actually revealed himself to Laban and said, hey, don't you touch Jacob. He's my child. I'm going to protect him. So you can't speak good or evil against him. And so Laban is very careful in the way he handles it. But he's still upset. And he's searching for his gods. He can't find them.

And so finally, they make a deal. They don't agree. They don't really reconcile their relationship. They just make an agreement. They call a truce and say, look, I'm not going to harm you. You don't harm me. And let's just part our ways. Now, it's interesting because they make this covenant. And because of this covenant, they call the place Mizpah. And it always cracks me up because this portion here in Genesis 31 says,

often quoted completely out of context. And when you look at the context, it's quite funny. And so here I have, this is a necklace. There's lots of things like this, which is the quotation of what is happening here in Genesis chapter 31, Mizpah, there in Genesis 31 verse 49, because it says, may the Lord watch between you and me when we're absent from one another. And

And if you just take that little piece, you're like, oh, how sweet, you know, we're apart from each other and may the Lord watch over you. You know, what a blessing. You know, that's that. And so that's what it is. The Lord watched between me and you. But if you just read the context, just even if you just go one verse ahead and one verse after, it reads quite differently. Verse 48 of Genesis 31 says, And Laban said...

This heap is a witness between you and me this day. Therefore, its name is called Galid, also Mizpah, because he said, may the Lord watch between you and me when we're absent from one another. Verse 50, if you afflict my daughters or if you take other wives besides my daughters, although no man is with us, God is witness between you and me. Here's what Laban is saying. Here's the agreement, the covenant that they make. I don't trust you. So remember God's watching you.

while we're absent from one another. That's what's happening. He's saying, look, I can't be there with you to make sure you treat my daughters right. So just remember, God's watching you, buddy. He knows.

He also, they also make the agreement that, hey, this is the pillar. This is the covenant. You're not going to cross over this to do harm to me, and I'm not going to cross over it to do harm for you. So it's really not, you know, a beautiful, romantic, oh, how sweet type of blessing or anything like that. It's a, hey, I don't trust you. You're a scoundrel, and I can't watch you all the time, and that's unfortunate. So just remember God's watching you, and he's going to get you if you break this covenant.

And so that is the covenant of Mizpah, but it's often taken out of context. And so you'll see that around. All right, Genesis chapter 32, verse 30 is the key verse. It says, so Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for I have seen God face to face and my life is preserved. So now Jacob is continuing on his way back to the land of Canaan.

There in verses 1 through 12, we see him sending messengers ahead to Esau. So he's out of the frying pan into the fire, really, because he escapes from Laban. But now he's got to face Esau, who he, well, he originally fled to Haran because Esau wanted to kill him.

So now he's trying to get things ready. He's trying to prepare the way because he doesn't know what's going to happen if Esau is still going to be angry and seek to kill him.

And so he sends messengers to kind of prepare the way to test the waters and see what's going on. And then the messengers come back and they say, hey, Esau is coming. He's bringing 400 men with him. This is pretty scary. And so now Jacob sends gifts to Esau. Oh man, he's really upset. He's still mad. Oh, okay. Well, maybe if I give him some gifts, you know, then he won't be so angry with me.

Again, we see this kind of scheming and conniving side of Jacob as he's really not trusting God. We don't see him seeking the Lord in these things, but he's just trying to work out, you know, what he thinks or try to manipulate in some way so that things happen the way that he wants them to happen. But God's working in his heart. And we see that in the bottom part of the chapter in verses 22 through 32, as there Jacob wrestles with God.

And there's this wrestling match that takes place. Now, I think it's interesting. Verse 24 indicates that this wrestling match was really initiated by God. It wasn't that Jacob was, you know, just wanting to fight God, but that this man comes and he begins to wrestle with Jacob. And so Jacob is wrestling with this man. It says, all night long.

We later find out in Genesis 32.30, Jacob calls the place Peniel because he says, I've seen the face of God and my life is preserved. And so we understand that this wasn't just some, you know, homeless man that was walking through the camp. This was actually the Lord wrestling with him. We've already seen a couple times where Jesus has appeared in the Old Testament. You remember when he appeared to Abraham, he appeared to Hagar,

He appeared a couple times already. And so here we have another appearance of the Lord to Jacob this time in a wrestling match.

it's interesting. God kind of meets each person where they're at, right? I mean, Abraham, he met him as a guest and said, hey, yeah, come on. Yeah, make me a meal. That's great. Yeah, let's have some fellowship. Let's talk together. Abraham, you know, he was in a good place. He was right with the Lord. Jacob, on the other hand, he's got some hard work that needs to be done in his heart. And so the Lord comes to him with a wrestling match. And you know, the Lord is good at that. He works in us

according to what we need. And so for some of you, you know, God says, hey, let's kick back and have a meal together. I just want to encourage you and bless you and refresh you. And yeah, it's great. And then for some of us, you know, there's like, okay, I'm going to wrestle you. You know, I'm going to pin you down. I'm going to dislocate your hip and make you limp for a while. I mean, I'm really going to have to do some work. And it just depends on where our hearts are with the Lord. And so Jacob here, you can see him earning his name.

Last week we saw Esau accuse Jacob or save Jacob. You know, he really has earned his name, which his name means heel catcher or supplanter. It's the idea of taking stuff illegally that doesn't belong to you. And that's what Jacob was doing by deception. And here we see him still earning that. He's just manipulating and deceiving and trying to work it so that things happen the way that he wants to instead of really allowing God to do the work.

God did speak to him and God told him to go back, but still he's trying to work it out and trying to make things happen on his own. Another observation that Weersbe shares, he says, one minute Jacob prayed for God's help and the next minute he devised some new way to appease his angry brother. He reminded God of his great promises and then acted as though God had never spoken. This is the conduct of a believer who needed to be broken before God.

And we see this happen not only in Jacob's life, but I'm sure that you could think about situations in your own life where you remind God of his promises, but then you behave as that promise wasn't given. And we need to be obedient and responsive as God speaks to us. And so Jacob is behaving. He says, this is the conduct of a believer who needs to be broken. And so God comes to him with a wrestling match to break him, to finally get the message through.

that he needs to be broken, that he needs to rely upon the Lord. He's breaking Jacob of his own ways. The objective is that so Jacob would be governed by God. And so we see at the end of this wrestling match that Jacob gets a name change. There in verse 28, the man says to him, "'Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have struggled with God and with men and have prevailed.'"

Now again, Jacob means heel catcher or supplanter. Israel could be translated to mean governed by God or ruled by God. And so what God is trying to work in Jacob is that he would finally submit and surrender and let God rule, that he would truly be governed by God. And so he sends a wrestling match to Jacob. Well, here's a little bit of

context again for the visual part of it. So he's going down from Haran. He's there traveling from the mountains of Gilead, whichever location those might be. Laban's gone back, and now he sends his messengers to Esau. Now Edom is there down at the southern part of the Dead Sea, and so he sends messengers to Esau to prepare the way, and then he goes down

This is another map of the region, a little bit zoomed in. You see the Dead Sea at the bottom. Obviously, it extends beyond the screen there. And then the Sea of Galilee at the top. And it's the Jordan River that runs all the way from the top there to the bottom.

And so he's on the east side of the river at this point. He sends messengers to Esau down there. And then he comes down to a place known as Peniel. And that's where he, that's what he names this place after this wrestling match. And so he comes down to there. That's where God meets him. And that's where Jacob or Esau is going to meet him in just a few minutes.

Chapter 33, verse 4 is the key verse. But Esau ran to meet him and embraced him and fell on his neck and kissed him and they wept. And so here in verses 1 through 11, we have the reunion between Jacob and Esau. And Jacob was preparing for the worst, but God had already prepared the way. And so Esau was happy to see him. And it was a joyful reunion between Jacob and Esau.

But Jacob's still not convinced. And so there in verses 12 through 20, they go their separate ways. And really what we see happening is Jacob is misleading Esau. He's telling him,

Well, in verse 12, Esau's like, hey, let's go together. You know, join with us. We'll join together. We can catch up on the way. This will be wonderful. You know, he's inviting Jacob to go along with him. And Jacob said, oh, no, no, no, that's okay. You go ahead. You know, we've got lots of herds and stuff. It's going to take us a while. So I don't want to delay you or hold you back. So you go on ahead and I'll move along more slowly and follow you.

But then what ended up happening is Esau goes south. So here's back this picture again. There's Peniel. And now Esau goes south back down to Edom below the Dead Sea. And Jacob goes a completely different direction. So he kind of tells him, hey, I'm going to go with you. All right, just go ahead. I'll catch up. But then he turns around. He goes a different direction. So he heads over to Succoth there and then crosses over the Jordan River and then ends up in Shechem.

which is the location of the next chapter in chapter 34. So again, he's still kind of working. He's still, you know, not really letting God lead. He's not really being honest, being truthful. He's still deceiving and manipulating. And we continue to see that take place in Jacob's life. And now we end up in chapter 34. Verse two is the key verse. And when Shechem, the son of Hamor, the Hivite, prince of the country, saw her, that's Dinah,

He took her and lay with her and violated her. So here in chapter 4, we have really a shameful chapter from beginning to end. It's interesting to note that here in chapter 34, God is not mentioned once. And so here in chapter 34, we have a really good picture of

of what we are like without God. I mean, from the beginning all the way to the end of the chapter, it's just shameful, it's ugly, it's sinful, it's despicable, but that's what we are without God. And so, although we could look at it and go, oh, that's terrible, and those stupid guys, but realistically, that's how we are without the Lord. And so, that's why we need the Lord so desperately.

And so what we see happening here in verses 1 through 5 is this violation of Dinah by this man named Shechem, who is the son of the ruler of the region. And so they begin to negotiate. These two families get together.

Because Shechem really wanted Dinah for his wife. And Jacob's sons would have nothing of it. They weren't entertaining at all, except for they kind of followed the pattern of their father, Jacob. And they said, okay, well, let's make a deal. It's a deceitful deal. They never intended to keep the deal. But they said, okay, let's make a deal. We can coexist. We'll exchange sons and daughters for marriage and things like that.

On one condition, all of you, all of your men, everybody have to be circumcised just like we're circumcised.

And so, again, this wasn't genuine on their part, but it was something just to deceive and manipulate the situation with no plans to keep it so that a couple days later, when they finally, you know, get circumcised and they're all in incredible pain, then they go in and slaughter them all, which is, again, very shameful. And this chapter is just full of that.

It's interesting too, we see Jacob only rebuking his sons in this when he fears the people around them. He doesn't really rebuke them for the act itself or anything like that. He just is fearful now of the other inhabitants of the land and so he rebukes him for that. It's a dark chapter but it lightens up as we head on into chapter 35. Verse 10.

And God said to him, your name is Jacob. Your name shall not be called Jacob anymore, but Israel shall be your name. So he called his name Israel. Didn't we just see that in a couple chapters before? Yes, we did. God changed his name and it didn't stick. He kept on operating in the flesh. He kept on to his old ways.

Isn't that how we are sometimes? That God's done a work. He's transformed us. He set us free from sin. He delivers us. And yet we still go back and practice those things and live those things. And so we see God in his wonderful mercy and grace changing his name again. Reminding him, hey, I've changed your name. You're not Jacob anymore. You're Israel. You're to be governed by God. I haven't given up on you.

Even though there's that dark chapter and these despicable things happen, look, I still am promising these things to you. I want to work in your life. And so we see in verses 1 through 8, Jacob now returns to Bethel. He's really kind of motivated by fear because of the people of the land and the action of his sons. But he goes back to Bethel. It's kind of full circle now, back to where he started 20 years later.

He's back at Bethel where God first spoke to him and gave him those promises. And there God meets him again. God's so faithful. Even though Jacob had blown it and messed up, when he goes back to Bethel, God meets him again and says, yes, I'm changing your name. I'm working in your life. I have these promises for you. You're to be governed by God. And we see the promises that were given to Abraham are now passed on to Jacob.

Israel, not the nation, but the person who is formerly known as Jacob. And so these promises there in verses 11 and 12 are given now to Israel, the promise of many descendants, the promise of the land of Canaan, just as we saw God give those promises to him when he was going through Bethel on his way out to Haran.

Well, also in this chapter, we see Rachel dying in childbirth as she gives birth to the final son. She dies in that childbirth. We have an accounting of the 12 sons of Jacob, which we'll look at in a moment. And then finally, we end up the chapter with Isaac's death there in verses 27 through 29. So here's a little bit of insight into the region. So Shechem there is on the top, you see, kind of north of Bethel.

And so that's where he is in chapter 34 and all of that takes place. And so he heads back to Bethel and then from Bethel, he makes his way to Bethlehem. And as he's on the way to Bethlehem, that's when Rachel goes into labor and she gives birth to Benjamin, but she also dies in the process of that.

That's the completion of his sons. And so we have the accounting there in verses 23 through 26 of Jacob's sons. And so here they are once again. Now again, these are given to us because these are foundational for the nation of Israel. These become the 12 tribes of Israel. So you have Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun,

Dinah, which is the daughter, Joseph, and then finally Benjamin, the youngest. And that's in order of their ages. So Reuben was the oldest, Benjamin was the youngest. And again, we see the line of Christ. These are the red people. So going through Abraham, through Isaac, through Jacob, and then through Judah. Now, why is it going through Judah and not through Reuben? Well, we see here in verse 22 of Genesis 35,

Reuben really disqualifies himself. It says in verse 22, and it happened when Israel dwelt in that land that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah, his father's concubine, and Israel heard about it. Now the sons of Jacob were 12. So Reuben went and slept with Bilhah, who is Jacob's or Israel's concubine. And so in doing so, he...

disqualifies himself, or he kind of gives up his rights as firstborn, and we'll see that passed on. And then Simeon and Levi, those are the two brothers who take the swords and go slaughter all the people there in Shechem, and so they're disqualified, and that then passes on to Judah, who will bring forth the Messiah. He's the lion of the tribe of Judah, right? And we'll see this made more clear in Genesis chapter 49 in a couple weeks.

So those are the 12 sons of Jacob that become the 12 tribes of the nation of Israel. The foundation, the formation of the nation is being established right in front of our eyes.

Well, again, here they are. They went from Shechem down to Bethel, to Bethlehem, and then they go on to Mamre, which is also known as Hebron, which is where Isaac was, and this is where Isaac dies. So he does get to see his father once again. He gets a little bit of time with his father, and then his father dies at 180 years old. It's interesting. He

Remember, started to bless his sons, right? Back in a couple chapters earlier, chapter 27, because he thought, I don't have much time left, but you do the math. And this is about 43 years later. So he thought he was, you know, about to breathe his last breath. And then 43 years later is actually when he dies.

So again, a reminder of Jacob's age. At this time, Jacob, when Isaac dies, is about 120 years old. He's going to live for 27 more years. He's going to spend some time in Egypt, as we'll see. He's going to get to meet the Pharaoh. There's some more things that God has in store for him. But we've seen the beginning of this nation, the foundation being laid for what God is going to do next.

Now, as we finish up this evening, the worship team's gonna come up and close us in a song. And I wanna ask you to consider something because we started out in Bethel in chapter 28 and we ended up in Bethel again in chapter 35. This place where God met with Jacob, the house of God, and God spoke to him and met with him. And yet the question really I kind of end up with as we finish up our chapters this evening is, did Jacob ever really learn that

to be Israel. Did he ever really learn to be governed by God? We see something neat take place here in chapter 35, where he calls his family together. He says, hey guys, we're going to go back to Bethel, and we're going to get right with the Lord. And so here's what I want you to do. Get rid of all of your gods. They had, Rachel brought the household gods, remember, but they also had gods from these other nations around them. They were worshiping. They were

They were involved in idolatry. Even though God was working and giving them these promises, but still they had this idolatry that they were holding on to. And it's finally at this time Jacob says, enough, that's it. We're not going to do that anymore. Everybody, we're going to put those things away and we're going to give ourselves to the Lord. And so I want to encourage you this evening as we worship the Lord in this last song to learn

to be Israel instead of Jacob. You know, it's very easy for us to just look at life and live life and make decisions and go forward based on what we think, our opinions, our ideas, work in the situation, trying to accomplish what we want instead of really just surrendering to God and say, God, I'm going to put away my gods and I'm not going to pursue the material things. I'm not going to pursue those lustful things. I'm not going to pursue...

Those things that you've not called me to. I'm not going to try to force those things to take place. I'm not going to try to make it happen. I'm just going to worship you and surrender to you and let you do in my life what you want to do, what you want to accomplish. I want to encourage you this evening to let go of all the things that are not of God. Bury them. Get them out of your life. And commit yourself once again to the Lord. Learn to be Israel.

Learn to be governed by God. Are you fully surrendered to Him? Let's worship the Lord together and let God do that work in your heart this evening as we worship Him.