GENESIS 32 YOU NEED TO WRESTLE WITH GOD2018 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Genesis 32 You Need To Wrestle With God

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 2018. As we look at Genesis chapter 32 this morning, I would begin by asking you to consider if you have ever wrestled with God.

Have you ever had any kind of wrestling match, any kind of conflict or confliction or difficulty and you've wrestled with God about, well, perhaps some events that are happening in your life or perhaps some things that you're experiencing within internally or some events that are happening around you externally that perhaps in your life you've experienced this kind of wrestling with God?

And I would encourage you to consider this morning that the idea of wrestling with God is not necessarily, it doesn't come with a negative connotation. It's not an automatically negative thing to wrestle with God. In fact, this morning, I want to encourage you that you need to wrestle with God. I want to encourage you to wrestle with God, that this is a necessary part of

of our life and our walk with God and our growth in knowing God and walking with God is going to require some wrestling matches with God. We're going to have to get into the ring and really grapple with the truths of God, the character of God, the nature of God, and many times what we wrestle with the most, the plan and the purposes of

And so it's not necessarily a negative thing. In fact, I would encourage you to consider how important it is to wrestle with fear.

God. I could share with you that I have been wrestling with God, and there's been things going on that I've been wrestling with, and it's not necessarily that you're wrestling with God because you want to rebel against God and live a life of sin, and that's the only way to wrestle with God. No, actually, there is lots of ways that we wrestle with God.

Sometimes there is that case where people wrestle with God because they want to do what God has forbidden. And that's, you know, a kind of wrestling with God that I wouldn't recommend. You know, trying to get God to allow you to live a life of sin, it's not going to end well for you. Sometimes we wrestle with God because we don't want to do what He has commanded. And of course, that's not a good route to take either because what God has commanded is for our good, it's for our benefit.

But sometimes we're wrestling, we're struggling, there's battles that are happening, and we don't even recognize that we are wrestling with God at the time. Sometimes we're going through things and engaged in a wrestling match in such a way that we're not even conscious and aware that it is a wrestling match with the Lord that we're involved with. And that's what we see happening with Jacob here. It's just this guy who shows up, and Jacob is wrestling with this guy, and

And later on, he discovers that it is God that he's wrestling with. And Jacob is processing some things at this time. He's at a point of crisis in his life. It's at this point that he is on his way back to his homeland, to the land of Israel. Not called that yet, but he's on his way back to his homeland. And Esau, his brother, is there. Now, last time...

Jacob and Esau were together. Jacob had stolen his birthright, stolen his blessing. Esau had vowed to kill him. And so Jacob fled to that area in the north and has spent about 20 years there. And so it's been some time, but he's on his way back and he's really nervous about it. He's really stressed out. There's a lot of fear and anxiety in that.

You can see this develop a little bit if you'll go back here in Genesis chapter 32 to verse 9 as Jacob cries out to the Lord and in his prayer, he gives us some insight about where he's at. In Genesis 32 verse 9, it says, Then Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac, the Lord who said to me, return to your country and to your family and I will deal well with you.

He says,

For you said, I will surely treat you well and make your descendants as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered in multitude. As Jacob is on his way back, he is...

fearful. There is a lot of anxiety in his heart over this upcoming meeting with Esau. And he has heard at this point that Esau is on his way to meet him with 400 men. And so it's kind of a time of crisis as Jacob is calling out to the Lord, as he is wrestling with God and trying to figure out how to navigate this situation. And this guy shows up.

And he wrestles with him. Now, again, I want to encourage you to consider that this morning, that this is part of our growth. And it's not a one-time experience where, you know, one time I wrestled with God, but I don't wrestle with God anymore. But in fact, I would encourage you that this is to be an ongoing part of our relationship with God, that there's going to be some wrestling matches that have to take place.

It's part of the way that the work happens within our hearts that we need to wrestle. We need to grapple. We need to struggle with God because there are some things that God wants to do in our hearts and in our lives. And so I want to encourage you this morning to wrestle with God. Not try to fight against God or try to run away from God in that sense, but let me give you an example. For a long time, I wrestled over the call to be a pastor.

And I had the sense of the call. I had the sense that God wanted to do the work. I had the sense that that was what God was leading me to, but I didn't want that. I didn't want to go that direction. I didn't want to, you know, head that way. And so I wrestled with that. I resisted that. I tried other things instead. I tried to go a different path. And there was a long wrestling match one night in a hospital room. And at the end of that match,

I walked away being able to say out loud, the Lord has called me to be a pastor. And it was a transformation. It was a turning point in my life where I finally stopped wrestling against what God wanted, but in that wrestling match found that I need to accept what it is that God has said and what God has wanted.

This last week for myself personally, I've felt like I've been in a very similar kind of wrestling match. And I don't know exactly what the Lord's doing and all of the direction that's involved. And so, but I'm seeing a change. I'm seeing something different that God has shifted things a bit and things that I hadn't wanted to do. I'm speaking about my external work and doing websites and stuff like that. And I really resisted

I guess I'll just talk about it. I've really resisted establishing myself as my own separate business. I've been working independently, but for somebody else. And I've resisted, you know, kind of doing something more separate and more independent. And this week...

I didn't want to. It wasn't what I planned or intended, but there was some situations that unfolded this week, not even necessarily that bad, but for me, they were intense. And this week was one of those really incredibly difficult weeks and a wrestling match, an all-night-long wrestling match like we see happen with Jacob. And I've walked away from it, and there's a change. I don't know exactly what God has in store, but I sense that there's a new thing that God is doing.

And this is something I share with you because it's something that we all need to experience, to wrestle with God, that there's work that God wants to do in us and change us and transform us. And it comes from getting into the ring with God.

Now, I want to learn a couple things from Jacob as we talk about wrestling with God. So there's four points we'll look at as we work our way through this passage here in Genesis chapter 32. And the first thing, as we talk about wrestling with God, here's how we begin in verses 22 through 24. We need to get alone with God.

We need to get alone with God. Let me read again verses 22 through 24. It says, And he arose that night and took his two wives, his two female servants, and his eleven sons and crossed over the ford of Jabbok. He took them, sent them over the brook, and sent over what he had. Then Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of day."

The first thing that we notice as we begin to look at this experience that Jacob had and this wrestling with God that he encountered is that Jacob is all alone. Again, he is on his way back to meet his brother Esau. And he's heard that Esau is coming back to meet him with 400 men. And so he's been making preparations and sending messengers and dividing his party. And he's been doing practically everything that he can do

But here on the night before he's about to meet with Esau, he takes his family. He sends them ahead of him over the brook. Now it's not a huge river. You know, it's just a brook. He's not casting them off or going off all by himself alone in the wilderness. Like, but just he's putting a little bit of distance. And it says in verse 24 that Jacob was left alone. So put a little bit of distance. I kind of relate it to how Jesus, when he went to the garden of Gethsemane,

He took his disciples with him, but he's going to have this intense wrestling match. The Lord is there in the Garden of Gethsemane. And he brings his disciples, but he leaves them at the gate. He takes a few a little bit farther, Peter, James, and John, but he says, okay, you guys stay here. And then it says, Jesus goes a stone throw further. And there, Jesus, alone with the Father, cries out to him and wrestles with the Lord.

In a similar way, you and I need to get alone with God, to have these times, to have these occasions where we are alone, where it's just the Lord and us. And it doesn't mean we get rid of people in our lives. It doesn't mean, you know, we walk away completely alone.

But we put a little bit of space. We put a little bit of distance. Now, in this occasion, as Jacob is there, it's kind of a mysterious encounter where this guy just shows up. It says in verse 24, then Jacob was left alone and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of day.

And one of the things I love about scripture sometimes is what's not said, you know, and it kind of leaves a lot to our imagination. And you can kind of imagine some interesting scenarios where, you know, Jacob is just sitting there next to the fire and some guy just like pounces on him, you know, from behind the bushes, you know, just jumps on him. And now Jacob's in this wrestling match. And is that how God did it? I don't know. Maybe he didn't do it.

Jacob saw this guy walking by and said, oh, I'm going to take that guy out. And just, you know, he just needed to get out some aggression. You know, sometimes you got to put that anxiety to work. And so he needed to expend some energy. You know, I don't know how it happened, but suddenly we find there's this man. We're not told who he is, but later we find out this is actually God.

that this is an encounter that Jacob has with the Lord. It's likely an appearance of Jesus Christ before he was born of a virgin. He appeared throughout the Old Testament to various men and women of God. And this seems to be one of those occasions where the Lord has shown up and he is here in this wrestling match and it's all night long. They're wrestling all night, it says, until the breaking of day.

And through this wrestling match, God is going to speak to Jacob to teach him some important lessons and to help him go forward the way that he needs to. But it's interesting that God used the wrestling match on this occasion. It's particularly interesting because if you go back to verse 1 and 2 here in chapter 32, you see that Jacob saw angels of God right there with them. In verse 1, it says, Jacob went on his way and the angels of God met him.

And so he has this experience with angels that's so real. It's not just kind of like a weird, like he had a vision or something, but it's so real. He names the place. In verse 2, it says, And the name, the word mahanim means two camps. Jacob's like,

I'm camped here and God's camped here. Like there's two camps here that he's recognizing God is with me, that I am here with the Lord. I've seen there's angels right here, you know, that he recognizes he's where he needs to be and that God is with him. But it's interesting, isn't it? So the angels are right there. Jacob can see the angels. So why doesn't an angel just deliver the message that Jacob needs to hear? Why does the Lord show up later and wrestle with Jacob all night long? Why?

And I would suggest to you that it's because there are some things that we need to deal with in our hearts that are deep, that we hold on to tightly, that maybe we don't even realize we're holding on to them. But it requires more than just a simple message from an angel or a message from someone around us or a message on a Sunday morning that you hear a good teaching or sermon. That

That there's some depth to the work that God wants to do that requires that you get into the ring with God and hear from God and wrestle with God sometimes all night long. You think about wrestling just as a sport. It's really a personal type of battle. It's a personal type of event, right?

It's not like a team sport. There are teams, right? But when you're in the ring, it's you and your opponent. It's not a team sport. It's not like, well, some of you guys are going to watch some sports ball later today, right? And it's going to be a team sport, you know, different players on the field shooting baskets and stuff. And just being silly. But, you know, and there's some team dynamics that are really important for us as Christians. And we learn from that. There's valuable truths about how God wants us to relate to one another as believers and

And there is that aspect of our walk with God that many things in part of our walk with God require the people around us. And God makes it very clear. You cannot be the Christian that God wants you to be without other Christians around you. The body of Christ that he's made you a part of, we need one another. We're interdependent and designed that way by God. And that togetherness is needed. But there's also many aspects of our walk with God that require us.

alone time with God. We need both in our lives. We cannot survive just in our fellowship together, but we need to have our own encounters and our own wrestlings with the Lord. You need to wrestle with God. There's some aspects of your life that God cannot deal with until he gets you alone and

And you work with him. And it's another thing about wrestling. It's a pretty intimate type of thing, right? It's not you're doing something from a distance, but it's like, you know, we're like grappling and wrestling. And sometimes there are issues in your life and in your heart. And you got to be like right there with the Lord. Lord, look at this situation. Lord, I'm dealing with this. And it's very intimate, this wrestling that you have with God. It's an important part of our experience, right?

You need to get into the ring with God. You need to have some time where you can get alone and work with God, talk with God, wrestle with God, challenge God, you know, and exert all of your energy and all of your strength to find out what it is that God wants of you. Pastor David Guzik puts it this way. He says, God had to get Jacob alone before he dealt with him. While all the hustle and bustle of the huge entourage was with Jacob,

He could busy himself with a thousand different tasks, but once he was alone, God could command his attention. This is really important to understand. Many times we're our own worst enemy, and in wrestling with God, the reason why we're wrestling often has to do with some things that are fairly deep within our own hearts and issues in our lives, and we would rather not deal with those things.

One of the reasons why we need to have this exhortation to wrestle with God is because there are many times where we would prefer to distract ourselves with busyness. And Jacob, if he had been with his family, he, you know, had kids to take care of and things to do and ways to plan. And we sometimes allow and invite those kinds of distractions to alleviate the need to wrestle.

to alleviate the pain that would cause us to wrestle, the difficulty or the tension that we're feeling within to distract us from those things. And sometimes we don't like to get alone with God because we don't want to deal with what's really going on. Sometimes we don't want to actually hear from God and what he says. Sometimes we try to escape and we allow those distractions to be there because it's easier than spending time alone with God.

I want to encourage you this morning. You need to wrestle with God. And you can distract yourself and everybody's busy. We all have a lot of things to do. We all have a lot of demands on our time. We all have that. But you need to get alone with God and have an opportunity to wrestle through the things that are on your mind, the things that are on your heart, and the things that you don't even know about but that God wants to work with and God wants to deal with and God wants to reveal. You need to wrestle with God.

Whether it's in regards to you wanting to do what he has forbidden or not wanting to do what he has commanded or whether you're resisting a change that he's been kind of leading you towards but you don't want or maybe there is a struggle, there's a battle and you don't even know why. You have no sense of what God wants to do. You need to get in the ring. Spend some time wrestling with God, calling out to God, talking through the issues.

And allowing God to do the work that he wants to do. And what is that work? Well, that brings us now to point number two as we move on to verses 24 through 26. And that is, let God break you. You know what work God wants to do? He wants to bring a brokenness into your life and in your heart. Looking again at verses 24 through 26, it says, Then Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of day.

Now, when he saw that he did not prevail against him, he touched the socket of his hip. And the socket of Jacob's hip was out of joint as he wrestled with him. And he said, let me go for the day breaks. But he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. I won't let you go, Jacob says, unless you bless me. And we want God's blessing. But as we see this play out, we need to recognize that

In order for us to experience the blessing of God, that blessing is preceded by a brokenness. And this may not be something that we get super excited about, but this is a reality that we need to accept. I need to be broken.

You need to be brokenness. Brokenness is something to be broken, rather. And brokenness is something that every single one of us needs. In fact, if you could, in your mind right now, just think of like the sweetest old Christian lady you've ever known. She needs to be broken. And not that it's your job to break her, okay? I'm not suggesting that. But you know, the Christian life and what God calls us to is to die to ourself.

Jesus said, if you want to come after me, deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. There is a death to the flesh. There is a brokenness that's required, a turning away from ourselves. And again, it's not a one-time thing. We did that a long time ago and we never do that again. But these wrestling matches and this dying to self and denying self, this is a work that is going to be ongoing in our lives. And sometimes we're resistant to that and we don't want, brokenness is not fun.

But it is necessary. It is needed. I need to be broken. And so do you. Jacob here, he's left alone. And this man wrestles with him all night long. And it tells us in verse 25, now when he saw that he did not prevail. So here's the Lord wrestling with Jacob, right? And the Lord at the morning time is like, okay, well, Jacob's still wrestling. I haven't defeated him. He hasn't surrendered. So what does the Lord do? He touches the socket of his hip, just like this.

I tried to make a popping sound, but it didn't come out very well. But, you know, pop, whatever. You can make the sound. You get the point though, right? It's just like, he just touches it. Thank you. He just touches it. The Lord is wrestling with Jacob all night long, not because it's difficult for the Lord to wrestle with Jacob. Why did it take all night for the Lord to beat Jacob? It's not for, you know, the Lord had a hard time because Jacob was really strong. No, the Lord could take Jacob. It's kind of like if you were to wrestle a four-year-old.

right? If you were to wrestle a four-year-old, now look, if you really wanted to beat the four-year-old, I mean, it's over. But you wrestle with them, right? You go along, and you let it last, and you let it carry out. And that's what the Lord was doing with Jacob. It was for Jacob's sake. But he gets to the end of the night, right?

And the Lord says, look, Jacob here, he's still insisting on relying upon his strength and his methods. He's still insisting that, you know, he can handle things. So I need to take it to another level. And he just touches the socket of his hip, just boom. And his hip is now out of joint. Because Jacob...

did not accept defeat before. Because he was not broken before, the Lord now steps up the game and brings a new level of wrestling. So now Jacob has to wrestle with a hip out of joint because he needed to come to a place of brokenness. This is what it was all about. This was not Jacob's idea. He didn't seek out God and find him on some mountain to wrestle with him. Jacob was approached by God.

Thomas Constable, the commentator, puts it this way. He says, note that God took the initiative in wrestling with Jacob, not vice versa. God was bringing Jacob to the end of himself. He was leading him to a settled conviction that God was superior to him and that he must submit to God's leadership in his life. This was God's design. This was God's plan. He showed up that day to have this encounter with Jacob, to bring Jacob together,

to the end of himself. That's brokenness, to bring Jacob to the end of himself so he wouldn't trust in himself, so he wouldn't rest in himself, but that he would submit to God's leadership in his life. And as Jacob refused, refused, no, I'm not going to give in. I'm not going to cry uncle. I'm not going to throw in the towel. I'm not going to tap out. No, no, I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. God says,

I'm going to touch your hip then. There's going to be a new level of pain because you refuse to acknowledge how much you need me. You're refusing to be broken. And so I'm going to break your hip. I'm going to pull your hip out of socket. And it just took a little touch. God knows how to break us. Again, he wrestles us for our sake, not for his. And it's not hard for him to win. He knows exactly where we're at.

And he uses as little force as possible to bring us to the point of brokenness. But it's our option. It's our choice. We can continue to resist and resist and resist like Jacob and fight all night long. Or we can surrender and submit to what God is saying and what God wants to do. We can be broken. And that's why the point is let God break you.

God can break you. God will break you. But will you let God break you? Will you let him? Will you allow this brokenness to be part of your life? Consider what the Lord says through the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 57 verse 15. Thus says the high and lofty one who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy. I dwell in the high and holy place with him who has a contrite and humble spirit.

to revive the spirit of the humble and to revive the heart of the contrite ones. God says, I'm high and lofty. I inhabit eternity. I'm the king of kings, the creator of the heavens and the earth. But notice who I dwell with. Who do I dwell with? The contrite, the broken, the humble. This is who God pays attention to. This is who God is with, he says.

Later on in Isaiah 66, verse 2, God says again, for all these things my hand has made and all those things exist, says the Lord, but on this one I look, on him who is poor and of a contrite spirit and who trembles at my word. Someone who is looking to me, the Lord says, someone who is humble and trembling at what I say, that you're receptive to the word of God, you're receptive to what he has to say. God says, I pay attention to that person.

I look on that person because they're broken and they're looking to me for healing and for strength and for everything that they need. And Jacob had to be brought to this point

Up to this point, you know, you see all throughout his life when he's getting the blessing, when he's getting the birthright, when he's getting the flocks with Laban, when he's getting his family. Like, it's all scheming and conniving and tactics and, you know, and there's some indication that the Lord was, you know, helping him along the way and leading him in some of the things. But the thread, the dominant thread of his life was he was accomplishing things in his strength, with his techniques, with his methods, right?

And he had to come to the place of brokenness where he would let God do the work and be the strength that he needed at that time. And so the Lord touches his hip. And now finally, he's at this point of brokenness. The Lord tells him in verse 26, let me go for the day breaks. But he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. Now, it's interesting to consider this.

I will not let you go unless you bless me. I've always read this as kind of like, okay, here's Jacob being stubborn again, right? More stubbornness in Jacob. No, I'm not going to let you go unless you bless me. But you know, Hosea provides some interesting commentary on this encounter. And he gives us a different picture.

In Hosea chapter 12, verse 3 and 4, Hosea tells us this. He, talking about Jacob, took his brother by the heel in the womb, and in his strength he struggled with God, talking about this passage. Yes, he struggled with the angel and prevailed. Notice, he wept and sought favor from him. He found him in Bethel, and there he spoke to us. Notice what Hosea reveals about this request for blessing.

It's not a demand. It's not a stubbornness. No, Jacob has come to a place of brokenness and now he's weeping. It's not, don't picture in your mind, you know, Jacob has this awesome, like, you know, four point pressure hold on the Lord and all right, now you got to bless me or I won't let you up. That's not what he's doing. No, Jacob's like holding on to the Lord's leg, like, no, please don't go. I need your blessing. Please. I can't let go. I need you. I need you.

He's come to the place of desperation where he's always needed God, but he didn't recognize it. But now he recognizes, I need God. I need God more than I ever knew that I needed God. God, I need your blessing. I need you to work in my life. Jacob is now broken and pleading for God's blessing, pleading for God to work. This is the place that you and I need to come to. We're trying to be

strong, you know, and do things well and do things in our way and do things that we think need to be done. We're trying to live according to the thoughts and the ideas of our own mind and our own heart and using our strategies and our tactics and, you know, things that we've seen other people do perhaps or things that we've been taught or whatever. And so many times we miss out on this brokenness piece where we are desperately crying out to God, God, I need you.

to be my strength. I need you to do a work. I need you. I don't need me. I need you. So many times we look at God and we think, God, you need me. You know, it's, it is so backwards because we're not broken. Let God break you. When you want to do what he has forbidden and you're just like, why won't you let me do it? God, let God break you. When God's given you instruction and put things on your heart and you're resisting, you don't want to do it. Let God break you.

Let God bring you to the end of yourself and you can resist as much as you want, but it's, well, it's to your own detriment that you resist what God wants because God wants what's best for you. The psalmist in Psalm 32 says,

reveals some of the nature of God. He says, I will instruct you and teach you in the way that you should go. I will guide you with my eye. And I don't know about you, but I want God to guide me with his eye. I mean, that is like the gentlest leading possible, right? I don't want God to grab me by the neck and like push me where, you know, I need to be. Like that's much more difficult. But if God would just like look there and I go, oh, okay, you want me there? Okay, I'll go there. God says, that's how I want to lead you.

But then he goes on in Psalm 32, 9 to say, don't be like the horse or like the mule, which have no understanding, which must be harnessed with bit and bridle, or else they will not come near to you. Now, this wrestling match that Jacob experienced, I suggest it's a wrestling match where God was putting the harness on him and putting the bit in his mouth and say, you need to understand you need me. You need to come to a place of brokenness to let me lead you. And so I'm going to put this bit in your mouth because you're so resistant to me.

You could maybe also think about Jonah. Man, Jonah is one who wrestled with God, right? God said, I want you to go to Nineveh. And he said, I want to go the opposite direction. And so he runs, but he doesn't escape God. God just wrestles him a little bit with a big fish, with some seaweed, pins him. And finally, Jonah says, okay, okay, you're right. I'm broken. What do you want, God? I'll do what you want. Every single one of us needs to have these kinds of experiences.

where we let God break us, where we come to that place of willing submission. Okay, Lord, whatever you want, wherever you lead, however you want to work, that we fully surrender and submit ourselves to him. You need to wrestle with God, but not so that you can fight and win and get your way, so that you can be broken and that you can accept God.

God's will and God's plan for your life. I like what G. Campbell Morgan says about this. He says, this is certainly a story of Jacob's victory, but it was a victory won when conscious of superior power, he yielded and with strong crying and tears of weakness, he was made strong. As we cry out to the Lord from our weakness, the Lord says in our weakness, he is made strong. In our weakness, his power is made complete.

comes from that place of brokenness, of surrender to God. Well, moving on now to point number three, we find it in verses 27 and 28. Here, as we wrestle with the Lord, we need to let God identify us. Let God identify you. Check out verse 27 and 28. It says, so he said to him, what is your name? He said, Jacob. And he said, your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel.

for you have struggled with God and with men and have prevailed. The Lord, as he's wrestling with Jacob, says, you know, in all this action and activity, you know, we've been tossing around to and fro for all night long, I've kind of forgotten, who are you again? Is that what the Lord's saying? No. Listen, the Lord never asks questions for his own sake. He never needs to have more information. He has all the information. He knows exactly who he's wrestling with. He hasn't forgotten.

So why does he ask the question? He always asks questions for our sake. In the Garden of Eden, when he asked Eve, or asked Adam, you know, what, did you eat of the fruit that was forbidden? God knew, but it was for their sake. And here he asked Jacob, what's your name again? Jacob says, my name is Jacob. Now the Hebrew for the name Jacob, it literally means heel catcher.

It speaks of that idea of supplanting or taking what is rightfully somebody else's. And all of his life has really reflected this name that he was given at birth. Stealing birthrights, conniving and bargaining, you know, for Esau's position as the firstborn, dealing with Laban and the wages and the daughters. And, you know, his whole life,

has been lived in this kind of way of scheming and it's been his identity. He is Jacob. It wasn't just his name, but that's how he lived. What the Lord does here is he asks him to confess. Jacob, I know who you are, but I need you to admit where you have been, where your heart's at, where your mind's at. I need you to confess that. It's confession that the Lord is asking for here and inviting Jacob to do.

And that's what Jacob's name meant and his life reflected it. I would ask you to consider, what if your name accurately summarized your nature? So you have to introduce yourself. Hi, I'm Bitter Old Man. Nice to meet you. Hi, yeah, I'm Discouraged and Distressed. You know, it's very good to meet you. I'm Rebellious. I've developed a new nickname over the past few months. In the wilderness experience that I've been describing to you, I've attributed or received the nickname Dark Jerry. And I've been describing to you

My wife has been sharing, you know, there's a darker side of Jerry that she hasn't seen before, a cynicism and, you know, that she's not familiar with. And so you can call me DJ instead of PJ if you want to, that's fine. Dark Jerry. But the Lord says to Jacob in verse 28, your name shall no longer be called Jacob. Good job. You've come to the point of confession. And you know what the Lord does? When we confess, John tells us in 1 John, he is faithful and just to cleanse us and to wash us

You're no longer Jacob. That used to be your name. That used to be your manner of life. But now I'm going to give you a new name. We're going to call you Israel. This is how God is going to bless Jacob. He's going to change his identity. You used to identify yourself as Jacob, and that's how you lived. But you're going to identify yourself differently now. You're not that anymore. Instead, we're going to call you Israel.

The name Israel means governed by God, or it could also be translated God rules or God reigns. Whichever version you want to pick, you get the point, right? It's God's in charge. He's on the throne and I'm submitted to God. Finally, Jacob, at the end of this wrestling match, as he's begging and pleading for God to bless him, God says, now you're at the right spot. He confesses, I'm Jacob. I've lived a life.

of supplanting, scheming, manipulating, trying to work out things in my strength with my resources. And as he confesses before the Lord, God says, okay, now you're at a place where I can bless you. So we're going to wipe that slate clean. Just as Paul says in 2 Corinthians, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. I'm going to give you a new identity. What's your name? What's your identity? You have something new in Christ.

You know, we can be told all our lives that we are a certain way, that we, you know, have this nature, have this character, or you can take one of those, you know, personality tests and find out, well, I'm this type of person, and then just live under that identity for the rest of your life. But perhaps the Lord wants to say, you know, that's how you used to be. That's how you were. But you don't have to continue to live under that identity, under that mantle, under that title, right?

And many times I would suggest that the things that we wrestle with the most, like the most intense wrestling things that we have out with God really relate to deep within us, our identity. And it's things that we want and we hoped and dreamed for ourselves or we planned for ourselves or we never wanted. And it deals with things that are deep within us that God says, that's what I want to deal with. That's what needs to be addressed. God says, I want to bless you.

But you need to be willing to confess your ways are not sufficient. And the way that you've been living, it doesn't work. And your identity, that's not to be your identity. But now I'm going to call you to something different.

I'm going to call you to live differently. God wants to bless you, and it may involve him asking you to do something different than you've ever done before. It may involve him calling you out of your comfortable place, your desires, your plans, your will. Again, submitting to his plans and his purposes for you. We need to come to the place where we let God identify us. Remember Jesus when he was with his disciples at Caesarea Philippi? He says...

Who do men say that I am? And the disciples offered all kinds of things that people were saying. The crowds were saying things. The religious leaders were saying things. Some people say you're this. Some people say you're that. And then Jesus looked at his disciples and said, well, who do you say that I am? And Peter, with great boldness, speaks up and says, oh, you're the Christ, the son of the living God. Remember what Jesus told Peter? He said, Peter, really good job. He said, flesh and blood hasn't revealed that to you, but the Father in heaven has revealed that to you.

Jesus says, that's who I am. Not because crowds say that I'm that. Not because my disciples say that I am. That is who I am because that's who the Father says that I am. And that is the place that we need to come to. That we let God identify us. I'm not who you say I am. I'm not who Kim says I am. I'm not who my mom and dad say I am. I'm not even who I say I am. I am who God says I am. And I may not feel like God's child, but if God says I'm his child, I'm his child.

We need to come to the place where we let God say, this is who you are. No, you're not grumpy old man. You are delivered and forgiven and joyful old man. No, you're not reluctant prophet. You are willing, joyful prophet, you know, like Jonah. Like, no, you're not that. And you might tell yourself, you know, well, I'm not this or I am that. And God might have a different perspective.

You can listen to who people say you are. You can live according to what you think you are, but who does God say that you are? What does he have to say about you? When you accept that, boy, you are on the path to God's blessing. You're in a place to be able to receive all the amazing things that God has in store for you. You need to wrestle with God to get to this point.

And so get alone with God. Have those times that it's just you and him. This work can't be done in the crowd. It can't be done other people telling you what God is saying. You have to get the up close and personal, hand to hand encounter with God, letting him bring you to that place of brokenness and letting him tell you, this is who you are. After you confess, this is who I am. God says, okay, you were that. Admit that confession. That's good.

But now let me tell you who you're going to be. Paul tells us in the book of Romans that we are being conformed into the image of Jesus Christ. And that brings me to the final point, point number four found in verses 29 through 32, and that is that God will change you. When you come to that place of brokenness and you let God tell you who you are, God is going to do a work

of transformation. Verse 29, then Jacob asked saying, tell me your name, I pray. And he said, why is it that you ask about my name? And he blessed him there. So Jacob called the name of the place Penuel, for I have seen God face to face and my life is preserved. Just as he crossed over Penuel, the sun rose on him and he limped on his hip. Therefore, to this day, the children of Israel do not eat the muscle that shrank, which is on the hip socket because he touched the socket of Jacob's hip and the muscle that shrank.

We see Jacob walk away from this a changed man. He walks away and there's a lasting impact from this encounter, this wrestling match with the Lord. From there on out, he has a new name. That's part of the lasting impact.

From there on out, this place where he had this encounter, it has a new name. From there on out, his walk has changed and he walks with a limp for the rest of his life. And from there on out, Jacob and his family and the children of Israel have a new diet. And they do not partake of that piece of the animal because that's where God touched Jacob's hip. He has a new name. It means governed by God. And he doesn't always live that out.

He falls back. In fact, we see in Genesis, sometimes he's called Jacob and sometimes he's called Israel. It does seem to kind of correlate between when Jacob is living up to his name and letting God lead him and when he's back to his old scheming, conniving ways. We will experience that. God will do a work in us. I would caution, you know, sometimes we like to give that pronouncement. Boy, I've met with God and I will never do that ever again.

And we like those pronouncements. And sometimes we think that if we make the pronouncement, then that'll add the extra oomph that we need to really live it out. If I make that, then now I'm bound to it, you know? But that's like creating laws and getting into legalism. And it doesn't work. It's not effective. I wouldn't worry so much about the, I will never do that again, but I'm not going to do that today. That's where I would encourage you to focus. Today, just worry about today. That's enough.

I'm going to seek to live according to this new life. You don't have to make a big, bold, sweeping forever and ever statement. But his name was changed, and he began to live that out. The name of the place was changed. It was called Peniel, which means face of God or facing God. Jacob says, I was face to face with God, and my life was preserved. I would have expected to come face to face with God and be struck down completely, especially living in a conniving manner and being a heel catcher. But

But here's the thing with getting alone with God and being face-to-face with God. Here's what you need to understand. When you feel like hiding from God is the safest thing to do, you need to understand your feelings are lying to you. And the safest thing for you to do is not to hide from God, but to get face-to-face with God. When you feel like running from God, and that feels so much safer than getting alone with God. And I know sometimes it could be absolutely terrifying sometimes.

to be alone with the Lord, to seek the Lord, to call out to the Lord. I know that, but your feelings can't be trusted. Those are lying to you. No, the safest place for you to be, the best place for you to be is face to face with God. Be facing God, be living in Peniel. It tells us in verse 31 that he walked now with a limp. And so every step he now had a reminder of

oh, that's right, I'm supposed to be governed by God. That's right, the Lord spoke this to me. Here's what God showed me. And he had this reminder. And then the children of Israel changed their diet. They're not gonna eat that piece. In fact, it's still part of their culture to some degree, those who follow it, that there is still that, they don't take that piece. They refrain from that because it's so well known. Jacob had this encounter with God. God will change you. And there's gonna be a lasting impact.

There's going to be a change that takes place. You don't have to announce it and declare it, but it'll be visible in the life that is lived out. Some events change our lives forever, and we walk with a limp, but we walk with a new name. We walk with the blessing of God and then the leading of God. Now, I can look at turning points in my life, and I have these limps that

go along with it many times. I remember, man, when I came to the point, and it didn't look dramatic from the outside, but internally, I was in a hotel room in New York for work. I was reading through a book on finances, and I came to the point where, God, I need to start honoring you with my money, and my finances were just an absolute disaster. I was way over my head. I had no hope at all, but I wrestled.

And God broke me, and I came to the place. Again, from the outside, it didn't look dramatic, but I came to the place where I said, okay, God, I'm just going to honor you and start doing what you've told me to do. And in doing that, I went through a season of hunger, like literal. Like I ate crackers. I would allow myself one package of the saltines every day, and for dinner, I would just add tuna to it. And so I would have tuna and crackers every day with water, and that was it. Every once in a while, I'd scrape some change together. I'd get a jumbo jack with cheese.

99 cents, and that would be treating myself. And later on, I kind of got more established, and so I could have Easy Mac with tuna, and it was like, oh, it's like 25 cents a dinner, you know? It's like, it's a good deal. And so now when I'm hungry, it's my limp. I go back, I remember. Remember what God showed me? Remember what God said? Remember what God did? Every time I'm hungry, literally, I'm back there. You know, I'm reliving that moment when the Lord spoke those things. Sometimes we walk away with a limp.

but it's with God's blessing, God's leading, and this new name, this new identity that we have in Christ. You need to wrestle with God. You need to receive your new identity. You need to hear from him about who you are and get in the ring and experience that brokenness that he desires so that he can bring about the change and the transformation that you so desperately need. We're going to close our time together this morning with a time of communion, so I'll invite the worship team to come up and get ready and

As they do, I would encourage you to consider Jesus there in the Garden of Gethsemane. He had his wrestling match with the Father. And he said, Lord, if there's any other way for my people, these people, to be changed, to be transformed, to receive the blessings that I have in store, if there's any other way, then let's do that instead. But there was no other way. Jesus went to the cross because the only way for us to be able to get alone with God is

have brokenness and have a new identity and have the transformation that God wants. The only way possible was for Christ to die upon the cross for our sins, that we might, by faith, because of God's grace, receive the work that he has done for us. And so he gave us the elements of communion as a reminder of that. He gave us the bread and the cup to remember that his body was broken and his blood was shed.

And as they pass out the bread and the cup and they lead us in worship, I would encourage you, between you and the Lord, because you need to get alone with God, you have a discussion with the Lord. Maybe have a little mini wrestling match. And whatever God wants to do in your life, let it be a time of you receiving what God has done for you and of you surrendering yourself to what God wants to do for you.

And so I would encourage you to partake of communion. Wherever you're at, you can confess, you can repent, you can turn, you can do whatever. It doesn't matter what's been happening leading up to this moment. But right now, you can receive all that God has for you. And I would encourage you to do that by faith in Jesus Christ as you partake.

of what he gave us as reminders of his sacrifice for our sins. And so let's worship the Lord, the pasta, the bread, and the cup, and you can partake any time during the song, and Kim will give you an opportunity at the end if you haven't partaken, but let's worship the Lord and have some alone time with him. We pray you have been blessed by this Bible teaching. The power of God to change a life is found in the daily reading of his word. Visit ferventword.com to find more teachings and Bible study resources.