Recap: (For Genesis chapters 1-18 see Genesis 18 recap).
So far in the second section of Genesis, we have looked at the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham’s move to the area between Gerar and Beersheba, the birth of Isaac and the driving out of Ishmael, the offering of Isaac, Esau’s attitude to his birthright and Isaac’s deceit in taking the blessing intended for Esau and Isaac’s swift departure to Paddan Aram. We have seen Isaac’s marriage to Leah and Rachel, the birth of his children and his growth in prosperity. Last time we saw his hurried departure and eventual escape from Laban.
Read Genesis 32:1-32
1 Jacob also went on his way, and the angels of God met him. 2 When Jacob saw them, he said, ‘This is the camp of God!’ So he named that place Mahanaim. (Two camps)
Although Jacob had reached Gilead, he was not home yet. Isaac and Rebekah (his parents) were still alive and presumably still living in the area of Beersheba (although they eventually were back at Mamre near Kiriath Arba). He starts the journey home, and it is only then that he is met by ‘the angels of God’. Why? Did they have a message for him? Was it to confirm to him that God was pleased with his obedience? Was it to remind Jacob that the Lord was watching over him?
Jacob was encouraged, and decided the time had come to face Esau as he didn’t want to start off on the wrong foot with him. He probably hoped that the past antagonism would have faded, although his mother had said (Genesis 27:45) ‘When your brother is no longer angry with you and forgets what you did to him, I’ll send word for you to come back from there’ – and he had heard nothing from her.
3 Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the country of Edom.
Where was this? To the south of Canaan, between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea, about 120 miles away.
4 He instructed them: ‘This is what you are to say to my lord Esau: “Your servant Jacob says, I have been staying with Laban and have remained there till now. 5 I have cattle and donkeys, sheep and goats, male and female servants. Now I am sending this message to my lord, that I may find favour in your eyes.”’
Jacob hoped for a favourable response, but
6 When the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, ‘We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.’
What would have been Jacob’s thoughts? What can he do?
7 In great fear and distress Jacob divided the people who were with him into two groups, and the flocks and herds and camels as well. 8 He thought, ‘If Esau comes and attacks one group, the group that is left may escape.’
9 Then Jacob prayed, ‘O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, Lord, you who said to me, “Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,” 10 I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps. 11 Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. 12 But you have said, “I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.”’
Jacob’s response was probably the best: do all you can yourself, and trust God to do the rest!
Or was it? Look at v7: ‘In great fear and distress’. Could he (and we) have trusted the Lord more? How can we know when we should do everything we can first? (We will come back to this in our next study!)
Does the more we possess cause us more worries that we may lose it?
13 He spent the night there, and from what he had with him he selected a gift for his brother Esau: 14 two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, 15 thirty female camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, and twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys. 16 He put them in the care of his servants, each herd by itself, and said to his servants, ‘Go ahead of me, and keep some space between the herds.’
17 He instructed the one in the lead: ‘When my brother Esau meets you and asks, “Who do you belong to, and where are you going, and who owns all these animals in front of you?” 18 then you are to say, “They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a gift sent to my lord Esau, and he is coming behind us.”’
19 He also instructed the second, the third and all the others who followed the herds: ‘You are to say the same thing to Esau when you meet him. 20 And be sure to say, “Your servant Jacob is coming behind us.”’ For he thought, ‘I will pacify him with these gifts I am sending on ahead; later, when I see him, perhaps he will receive me.’ 21 So Jacob’s gifts went on ahead of him, but he himself spent the night in the camp.
Jacob effectively put a day’s journey between his gifts and the rest of his party. He then sent his whole family but again put another day between them and him.
22 That night Jacob got up and took his two wives, his two female servants and his eleven sons and crossed the ford of the Jabbok.
(Remember that ‘his two female servants’ were the mothers of many of his children)
23 After he had sent them across the stream, he sent over all his possessions.
What would that have been?
The bulk of his livestock, his valuables and his remaining servants.
24 So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.
Why did Jacob stay behind? Hosea 12:4 says ‘he wept and begged for his favour’. It would seem that now Jacob is serious in prayer with God, ‘wrestling’ but seeming not to come to a conclusion. All night he wrestled and would not give up. (Again Hosea says that the man was ‘God’, and ‘the angel’ Hosea 12:3-4)
25 When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man.
What do you make of ‘he could not overpower him’ (v25)?
Of course God had the power to overcome Jacob, but that was not his intention. It seems that God needed to show Jacob that it was OK to wrestle in prayer, and not to give up until he had received the blessing he sought. But he also demonstrates that God has ultimate authority, and like Paul’s thorn (2 Corinthians 12:7), leaves Jacob with a permanent reminder of his own weakness, and his need to continually learn to trust the Lord more.
26 Then the man said, ‘Let me go, for it is daybreak.’
But Jacob replied, ‘I will not let you go unless you bless me.’
27 The man asked him, ‘What is your name?’
‘Jacob,’ he answered.
28 Then the man said, ‘Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.’
‘Jacob’ (Deceiver) was no name for God’s chosen people! (Although events throughout history would show how apt it was) So to introduce this new phase in the nation’s life Jacob is renamed, although his new name will also prove to be apt: Israel – ‘He Struggles With God’
29 Jacob said, ‘Please tell me your name.’
But he replied, ‘Why do you ask my name?’
Names in the Bible are very meaningful, but to ask the name of God or even one of his angels was not an appropriate thing for a mere mortal to do. (Judges 13:18 ‘Why do you ask my name? It is beyond understanding’)
Then he blessed him there.
30 So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, ‘It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.’
Peniel means ‘Face of God’. He knew very well who he had wrestled with – he didn’t need a name!
31 The sun rose above him as he passed Peniel, and he was limping because of his hip. 32 Therefore to this day the Israelites do not eat the tendon attached to the socket of the hip, because the socket of Jacob’s hip was touched near the tendon.
And so he too crossed the Jabbok river and went to meet Esau.
