There are sermons that give an exposition to try to exhaust a story and all the shades of meaning, but sometimes you remember more if someone takes one or two principles out of a passage of Scripture and relates it to you, where you are living. It helps to follow the example of some man of God who broke through in just such a situation as yours.
And he (Jacob) arose up that night, and took his two wives, and his two handmaids, and his eleven children, and passed over the ford of the Jabbok. And he took them, and sent them over the stream, and sent over that which he had. And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob’s thigh was strained, as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for thou has striven with God and with men, and hast prevailed. And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name? And he blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: (the face of God) for, said he, I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. And the sun rose upon him as he passed over Penuel, and he limped upon his thigh. Therefore the children of Israel eat not the sinew of the hip which is upon the hollow of the thigh, unto this day: because he touched the hollow of Jacob’s thigh in the sinew of the hip. Genesis 32:22–32.
Jacob was desperate. He had already sent his wives and his flocks and herds, which were considerable, across the stream and he stayed behind. There, a man wrestled with him. We have often said he wrestled with an angel, but the Scripture said there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. We know who it was. It was our Lord, Himself. Jacob called the place “The face of God,” for he knew that he had met God face to face.
In every meeting with God, there are certain things that trouble you. A meeting with God is a strange thing. Saul of Tarsus had a meeting with the Lord and it took a prophet, three days later, to heal him and give back his sight. It is not always like you think. Jacob had a meeting with the Lord and limped until the day he died. It is a good thing to carry those marks with you, for they point to something that happened to you in a meeting with the Lord.
Jacob impresses us as being a selfish man in the way he prays, doesn’t he? Do you sometimes think of that? When he first was fleeing from Esau, Jacob slept with a rock for a pillow in the wilderness place, and it was there he saw the ladder and the angels of God ascending and descending on it. There, as he set up a pile of rocks as a memorial, he made a deal with God. He said, “God, You look after me, bring me back here in peace and prosper me and I’ll give You ten percent.” That the tithe belongs to the Lord is certainly Scriptural, and certainly a practice that we follow, but Jacob somehow managed to convey a selfishness in what he had.
Jacob and Laban were trying to cheat each other all the time. They came from common stock, descendants of Heber, and they seemed to have the same conniving way, Laban cheated Jacob after he worked seven years by giving him the wrong woman. Then after seven years’ more labor, Jacob got the right woman. Then he gave another six years and his wages were changed ten times. If there were certain marks on the calves or the lambs that were born, they were to be Laban’s, but suddenly they did not have any of those marks! So Laban switched it around the other way and the animals were born with the marks. Genesis 30 tells the first case where Jacob had actually mastered the art of prenatal marking of the animal world.
Finally, when Jacob left, he had to leave in the night because Laban was not going to let him get away with it. Laban pursued him but God warned Laban in a dream, so Laban decided he had better be good to Jacob. Jacob returned home to face a brother whom he had robbed of his birthright. He knew that Esau had pledged to kill him. Jacob had such a basic selfishness in him, but it was an unselfish selfishness that brought him through. This was the thing that was really worthwhile.
You, also, have to face this. Instead of praying for your wife or husband, or for your children, one of the most unselfish things you can do is to pray for yourself. Jacob was able to do more for his children because God had blessed him. He laid his hands on them and marked them with blessings that lasted for centuries. When he was named Israel instead of Jacob, he was a prince of God; he prevailed. God kept blessing the man, and in spite of the way his sons pulled some dirty tricks in the land of Canaan, it was amazing how Jacob stood before God with a blessing that was transmitted on to them. That was a selfishness, I will agree, but in a way it was unselfish.
A man going to medical school does not think of anything else but giving himself to the years of schooling and internship. It looks as if he is a very selfish man; every cent he has is spent on his education. He is undistracted, and does not bother to help anybody. He is not even a good neighbor or friend or relative. For years he thinks of only one thing. He is being selfish in a way that really counts. But now he can save thousands of lives because he devoted himself (though it seemed selfish) to one goal.
There comes a time in seeking after God that you act selfishly. After Paul was converted, he could have said, “I had better spend these years trying to make it up to some of those poor Christians and their families whom I persecuted in those years of my ignorance,” but he did not do that. He headed for the deserts of Arabia and stayed there for years. When he came back he had a gospel to preach, which he had not received from man, but by revelation of Jesus Christ.
A lot of people are ready to do many things, but the important things come when you very undistractedly (that is a better word than selfish) attend to this one thing of getting something from God first, then you can give to someone else. It is again that principle of first being partaker of the fruits. If you do not have it, you do not give it.
Someone will have to break through until there is a divine visitation and moving of the Spirit of God in the earth in such force that it shall come to pass that whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. So there is an unselfish selfishness you must get in your mind. Do not condemn yourself when you get down and pray, “Bless me, Lord,” because that is what Jacob did: “I will not let You go until You bless me.” He had something in mind: he was going to bless many nations.
This raises another question in a meeting with the Lord that you must ask yourself: “How shall we act with God?” That has been a puzzle to people. What did Jacob do? He grabbed on to the Lord and fought Him. “I won’t let you go until You bless me.” You say, “That’s irreverent.” I think God honors hunger above reverence. When a man is hungry after Him, He does not count it to be an irreverent thing, and Jacob certainly wanted that blessing. He had gone to great length—deceiving his brother, deceiving his father with the skin of a kid on his arm—to get what he wanted, to be blessed of God. He wanted the money, too, but he wanted to be blessed of God and God blessed him.
We have the idea that God must be treated like a gentleman that He must be spoken to politely. But secretly, in the heart, everyone has a liking for someone who is open and direct. People build up a way of speaking until speech, in customs and manners, conceals rather than reveals the heart. Words were made to reveal and express things, not to conceal them. Prayers should reveal, not cover over. I do not like polite long prayers that never encounter God. They do not reach God at all. There is nothing of intensity pouring out of the heart.
Oh, we know God does not have to hear people shouting at Him all of the time, but there is an effectiveness in the earnest prayer of a righteous man. Even the prayers of Jesus should be studied. With strong cries did He make His intercession. There were times when Jesus stood in the temple and cried out above the bleat of the sheep and the noise of the money changers, and they were electrified and listened to what He had to say. There was a violence in His Spirit, and with whips He drove them out of the temple.
I would rather perish contending with God, than meet an Esau who would mow me down. Jacob had that in mind, too: If he was going to face Esau and perish, he would just as soon die at the hand of the Lord, and he went about it in that way. When David had sinned in taking the census, he was given different choices: the plague, pursuit by the enemy for a certain period of time, or come under the hand of God in judgment. What did he pick? He said, “Let God smite us, any day.”
I have prayed that way a lot of times and I think it is a right prayer: “Lord, if I ever get out of Your will so that I would be a reproach to the Gospel or if I would fall short, slay me by Your own hand. Don’t let me be a reproach to Your Word.” I would never want to pray as Hezekiah prayed after he had sinned greatly, and live beyond my years. I do not want to be here one day longer than I can honor and glorify God; I would rather this human existence would end right there. This is the way that God would have it. I would rather God be the one to either contend with me or bless me.
The world is full of preachers and other Christians who try one thing after another and do not know what to do next. But they are trying to use their human ingenuity to start something and ask God to please bless it. I have never tried to do anything unless I knew God had led me to do it. That does not mean all things succeeded; many of them did not, but when I did not succeed I had the comfort not to blame myself in the stupidity of my judgment, but to look up and say, “Lord, I did the best I could to follow Your leading and I’ll follow it again.” This thing of learning the voice of God and having the blessing of the Lord, even if you contend and contend and contend to come into it, is the best thing in the world. Never get discouraged on that. Never stop leaving the direction of your life in the hand of the Lord.
Another thing about a meeting with God: if God meets you, will you realize what is happening? I do not think Jacob really knew. I think he had a feeling it was a spiritual man who wrestled with him. When he realized who He was, he said, “I won’t let You go until You bless me.” He called the name of that place “The Face of God” because he realized it was God with whom he was contending. He was not aware he was having a meeting with God at first, but by the time it finished, he knew. Sometimes we have been in the midst of a meeting with God for several days but did not realize it, so we still went on praying and wrestling. But one of these days, one of these hours, maybe tonight, maybe tomorrow, it will suddenly dawn on you that you have been wrestling with the Lord and it is the Lord Who is dealing with you and working the thing in you.
Elijah knew a great deal about God. His credential was not a special little “Prophet’s Union” card to present, but he said, “I’m Elijah, who stands in the presence of the Lord.” Everyone trembled, because they knew that was exactly what he did. If a man could stand in the presence of the Lord and know God that well, could he ever mistake a meeting with the Lord? No, he would not. When he went the forty days’ fast and journey to Mount Horeb, he was up there by a cave and the whirlwind came, the earthquake came, the fire came, and he was not bothered by it at all. With phenomena like that, it would seem that that was the meeting. But then came the still small voice. He wrapped his face in his mantel, went out to the cave entrance and talked with the Lord, Who said, “What are you doing here Elijah?” He explained why he was disgusted with the whole situation. Then the Lord gave him his commission and he went about it (I Kings 19).
A meeting with the Lord can take place in a lot of ways. It can take place in the thunder; it can take place in the fire; it can take place in the whirlwind; it can take place in the still small voice. It is not the hows or the whys of the experience that matters, but the fact that God is in that meeting. The trouble with many people is that they have spiritual experiences without meeting God in the experience. They receive the Holy Spirit and speak in tongues but do not feel as though they encounter God in it. Some people count their walk with God by experiences rather than by knowing Him. Many people feel Him, witness Him, discern Him, but they still do not know Him. Without a meeting with the Lord, the experience is yet shallow.
You can read the Word and feel a blessing, feel a witness to it and be encouraged, but the thing that will change your life completely is to know Him. That is what Paul was striving for: that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection. Philippians 3:10. He wanted to know Him. Long after the other disciples were dead, John the Beloved talks about knowing Him. Knowing Him is not a matter of saying, “I’m a Christian; I’m a believer.” All that is true, but there are people who received an anointed word and met God in it and there are others who were given a word and felt, “Now I have a goal, something to strive for.” But this is a walk with God. You can begin to look for something and miss it—and yet you can be walking along and suddenly that awareness of Him comes and you know Him. All of the experiences in the world have fallen short if you do not really know Him. It is a meeting with the Lord that you want, not experiences: it is to come to know the Lord and to walk with Him and to love Him.
You may say that you love the Lord, but if you know Him, you may not like Him. It is possible to love someone and not like him (or be displeased with him would be a better way to word it). God is not easy to get along with. This sounds irreverent, but it is the truth: He is not easy to get along with. When David wanted to bring the presence of the Lord, the Ark with His glory, back to Jerusalem, he was going to do it his way. They were bringing it on the cart and Uzzah touched the cart and dropped dead. David said, “How will the Ark of God come to me?” and because he was displeased with the Lord, he commanded that it be left at the house of Obededom. It is hard to get used to God because we are accustomed to the deceit of people, not the forthrightness with which God deals.
Jacob seemed to know how to encounter the Lord. When he saw it was the Lord, he just hung on and said, “You’re going to bless me! I won’t let You go!” That forthright way, that earnestness of heart led to a meeting with God. God wants to meet you as much as you want to meet Him, but it cannot be in a deceitful way. People can say, “Oh, I want God to meet me,” yet they live in a way that is evasive. There is something in their spirits that is evasive. They want God, but are they living in the Word? Are they living in prayer? Are they earnestly seeking the Lord for these things; worshiping Him by the hour? Do they really want Him, if they can still find a lot of other things that they can be occupied with? But to love Him and to pursue after Him with all of your heart will bring you into a meeting with God.
I have heard people say, “Oh, I had a vision of Jesus, my sweet, darling Jesus.” He is not sweet darling Jesus. A meeting with the Lord is the most awesome experience in the world. If you ever see the Lord, you will understand why people fell at His feet as one dead. There is something awesome about it; the majesty, the exaltation of the Lord. Too many want that sentimental, sickly thing. When you face His love, you love Him so much—and yet He is Lord; you know it. You know He is Lord!
A meeting with the Lord is the greatest thing that can ever happen to a person. That is really what this is all about, and I am fearful lest all that God has set before us to do would be our main objective. It is not; it is incidental: it is a part of our obedience to the Lord. The real purpose is that we have a walk with God. That was made plain to me at the beginning, as the Lord began to reveal things to my heart. I asked, “What is going to be in this for me?” As the disciple said, “We left all to follow Thee: what will we get out of this?” The Lord said, “You will get just what you’ve cried to Me for: a walk with God.”
If you never get anything else but a walk with God, it is something no one can take from you. It does not make any difference whether you have money or have nothing; a home or no home, whether you are well thought of or you are hated, whether you are persecuted or men come to seek after your word. Those things are not important, because they do not affect a walk with God. Some of us have difficulty understanding that because we have a preconceived idea of spirituality. We think God has to meet us in a certain way, but look through the Scriptures at all the different ways that He appeared, the way He dealt, the way He spoke. He had His own unique way. Why did He not always do it the same way? Then everybody would get the idea, “This is the way God is to meet me.” They would have been so wrong.
God met His people once in a serpent of brass hanging on a pole, but we read in II Kings 18:4 that the brazen serpent had to be destroyed because people began to worship what at one time they had looked to and lived. You can have a wonderful experience and begin to magnify it and become guilty of a subtle form of idolatry: you begin to worship the experience more than looking to the Lord Who met you in that experience. But the most wonderful thing is to have an experience in the Holy Spirit and afterwards be overwhelmed with the Lord, with His presence. You have learned something of Him that is beyond any words to describe.
Let us press on and seek the Lord. This is the midnight hour at the Brook Jabbok. Keep wrestling, keep prevailing and God will give you the perception to see when the thing you are encountering is really the Lord meeting your heart. Then as you open up to it and take that blessing from the Lord, it will change your name, change you, change the course of your life and change history, because you have had a meeting with God. No matter what you are at the time you have that real meeting with Him, afterwards you will be a prince of God.