55 Early the next morning Laban kissed his grandchildren and his daughters and blessed them (eventually parted on good terms). Then he left and returned home.
Jacob Prepares to Meet Esau
32 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.
No sooner had Jacob left Laban than he had to prepare to CROSS OVER and meet his brother Esau. Jacob had left with ‘only his staff in his hand’ and now returned with a large family and many herds of livestock – God had truly prospered him.
Jacob had a dream with angels when he left Canaan and now he had another angelic encounter as he approached the border to return again. He had another far more significant experience as he waited alone at night. There are definitely things of the Kingdom life which are strictly personal and God will only reveal them to us alone. This was such a time, Jacob had sent everyone else across the ford at Jabbok, while he waited alone.
24 So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. 25 When the man saw that he could not overpower him, he touched the socket of Jacob’s hip so that his hip was wrenched as he wrestled with the man. Genesis 32
Jacob wrestled alone all night with this man until daybreak and wouldn’t let Him go until He blessed him.
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 MEN AND HAVE OVERCOME.”
Jacob fled from Laban to return to Canaan, but was overtaken on the way. God intervened in a warning dream to Laban and so they eventually parted peacefully. Jacob was about to meet his brother Esau once again as he crossed back into Canaan. But God met Jacob alone in the night between these two meetings and disabled his natural strength. Jacob had to meet his brother in pain and weakness, with a dislocated hip. He still used all his shrewdness to prepare for the meeting, but his strength had gone.
Some of us may have situations where we appear to be the weaker party and we must go through with them, perhaps with some humiliation. God allows us to experience something which humbles us in the course of our lives to make us more dependent on Him. Jacob, with his large family/families and possessions came through the two meetings unscathed, though he was the much weaker party. God can and will bring us through our own trials as we lean on Him.
Immanuel, God is with us!
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38 Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” Luke 6
THE LORD IS NO ONE’S DEBTOR, HALLELUJAH.