Good evening to you. Turn in your Bibles with me to Genesis 32. Genesis 32 and verse 22. We'll be looking at verses 22 to 32 tonight, finishing out the chapter that we started looking at last week. I want to say while you're turning there, I'm thankful that you're here tonight. Of course, this is the night, if you're familiar with American culture, where millions of our fellow countrymen are consumed with a football game, and yet you are here worshiping the true God, and there's no better place for you to be. It may not be flashy tonight. We may be missing some people for various reasons, but you're in the house of the living God, and that is vastly superior than watching a mere football game. So Genesis 32 verses 22 to 32, let's give our attention to God's holy word. And he arose that night and took his two wives, his two female servants, and his eleven sons, and crossed over the fort of Jabbok. He took them and 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. 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. 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. 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 Peniel, for I have seen God face to face and my life is preserved. Just as he crossed over, Penuel the son 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 in the muscle that shrank." May God bless His word as we think of it tonight. Last week you'll remember we started talking about the subject of fear and I want to begin tonight by asking you to think more particularly about yourself and what are you afraid of? What are you afraid of? Are you afraid of uncertainty? Are you afraid of the unknown? Are you afraid of loss, losing someone, losing something? Maybe you're afraid of a tragedy happening to you or that you'll become sick. Of course, there's a lot of hype right now with the flu and with the coronavirus. These are things that are always being talked about. Perhaps you're afraid that you'll commit a certain sin. There are many things, and it will change over time as we go throughout our lives, that we can be afraid of while we live here in this world. And sometimes those fears are rational, and we have an actual good reason to be afraid in some sense, but at other times they are irrational. But there's no question about it. We all, in some ways and at some times, struggle with the experience of fear. And if we're honest with ourselves, our natural reaction is to let our fears control us and to take over. We let them start affect our thinking and affect our actions. We let them affect our relationships and our work. We become slaves to our fear. And that's really the curious thing about fear. If you think about it, it can take on a power over us like very few things can. But what we're gonna see tonight as we look at these closing verses in Genesis 32 is that God does not want his people to live in fear. He does not want to control your life, but rather he wants you to face your fears, whatever those fears may be. He wants you to confront them. He wants you to overcome them. And the reason he wants you to do that is because he gives you the confidence you need to face them and to overcome them. And it's a confidence that delivers you from your fears. And we'll see tonight that that confidence has been given to you through the covenant blessing of God through the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's exactly what we see being brought out for us here in this passage. And so the main point of application tonight to see is that having God's blessing in Christ face your fears with the confidence you've been given. Having God's covenant blessing in Christ, that's the key, that's the main thing, having that as a believer, face your fears with the confidence that that blessing gives you. And that's what we're gonna see tonight. So let's see first then on the outline that God's word speaks to your experience of fear. Last week we said that Jacob was starting to head back to Canaan. Of course, he's been away with Laban and the family for quite some time. And as he was making his way back to Canaan, he reached out to his brother Esau, not because he had to pass through Esau's land, but because he was now repentant of his sin and wanted to make reconciliation with his brother. But also we saw last week that when he reached out, instead of hearing a report like, Esau's so glad you reached out to him, Esau's coming to meet you, instead he was told, Esau's coming, yes, but Esau has 400 men with him. And I said last time, this is the size of a militia. And so this was overwhelming for Jacob. He didn't know what exactly was going on with his brother. Was his brother angry? But if you remember, the reason he left Canaan in the first place was because his brother wanted to kill him. And now that he's coming back into Canaan, he's told that his brother's coming with 400 men. Of course, you could come to some conclusions and have a good reason to do so. greatly afraid, greatly distressed. We saw this back in verse seven of the chapter. And I think as we come into our passage tonight, we see that Jacob continued struggling with his fear. Look at verses 22 to 24. And he arose that night and took his two wives, his two female servants and his 11 sons and crossed over the fort of Jabbok. He took them, sent them over the brook and sent over what he had. Then Jacob was left alone. So if you remember, he sent ahead of him droves of animals that would be gifts to his brother. And the droves would come successively one after another. That was his way of softening the heart of his brother, trying to appease the wrath of his brother. But we're told, we were told rather back in verse 21, that as the animals were going ahead, Jacob and his family stayed the night where they were. But now, as we get into our passage, it's the middle of that night, and Jacob's awake. And Jacob's awake, and he decides, I'm gonna move my family. So he moves his family across the fort of Jabbok, but he stays behind. We're not told exactly what was going on in Jacob's mind, why was he doing this, but I think what he was doing is, knowing that Esau was on his way with the 400 men, Jacob wanted, for one, his family to be in a safer spot, so he moved them, and he wanted to be alone for the evening. And we're not told why he wanted to be alone that night, but it seems that he was still terrified of what Esau was going to do to him. Most likely, Jacob wanted to keep praying for deliverance as he had done before. Most likely, Jacob wanted to strategize and think more clearly of what he could do to protect himself and his family. Most likely, Jacob was too afraid to fall asleep that night. But notice that as he stayed behind, he couldn't do any of those things. Why? Because a man suddenly and unexpectedly started wrestling with him in the middle of the night. Verse 24 again, And you could imagine, just put yourself in Jacob's shoes for instance, you're out in the wilderness, you're by yourself now, it's the middle of the night, pitch black, and here all of a sudden, someone tackles you. Someone takes you down to the ground, someone starts fighting with you. I think this would have been an absolutely frightening experience for Jacob here, as this man came out of nowhere and grabbed him. Was this his brother coming to kill him? I want us to know three things about this wrestling match. First, it was not a dream. It was not a dream. There is no evidence here that says that this was just a dream or a vision that he has, but rather this was a real, physical wrestling match between two men. We know this, for one, because there was a real injury that happened as a result of this wrestling match. If you go down and look at verse 31, we're told that afterwards Jacob limped on his hip. Commentator R. Kent Hughes says, bleeding, bruised man in tattered clothes, dark with soil and sweat, dragging a leg and grimacing with each step. And I think that's probably a pretty accurate description of what happened here. This was a real fight with a real injury, physical injury that took place as a result. Now second, I want you to see that it was a long fight. We don't know exactly when it started, it was in the middle of the night, but Moses says in verse 24 that Jacob and this man wrestled until the breaking of day. So unlike wrestlers today where they're on the mat for a little bit of time, then the bell rings and they're done, this was a match that went on for hours and hours, and this was a match that you could only endure if you knew that this was a fight to the death, a fight to survive and to stay alive. And then third, and perhaps most surprisingly, it was a fight with God himself. In verse 24, the new King James capitalizes the word man to help us see this. And at first, Jacob didn't know the identity of the attacker. As I said, he was probably thinking, was this Esau? Was this someone from Laban's family who finally caught up again and changed his mind to come back after him? But by the end of the fight, it had become clear to Jacob that he was wrestling with the Lord. It was said to him in verse 28 that he had struggled with God. In verse 30, once the fight was over, he said, for I have seen God face to face. What's more, Hosea 12 verse 3 says that Jacob struggled with God and then goes on to speak of the God he struggled with as being the Angel, Angel with a capital A. So, putting that together, this nighttime attacker was no mere human being. He was God himself. He was the angel of the Lord. And if you study the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament, who is he but the Lord Jesus Christ pre-incarnation. So Jacob, as he's alone in the night, waiting for Esau to attack, as he's doing that, the Lord Jesus took him to the ground in a real wrestling match that lasted until the next morning. And what I want you to see is that the reason he did this was to minister to Jacob in his fear. To minister to Jacob in his fear. Now you might be thinking, that's not what I was expecting. Or, Lord, this is a pretty unusual way to go about ministering to someone in fear. in their fear, but we'll see in the rest of the passage. The purpose of this whole thing was to address his experience of fear by giving him teaching, and by giving him teaching to subsequently give him comfort. We'll come back to say more about that, but really this entire ordeal is an answer to Jacob's prayer for deliverance that we saw last week in verse 11. Because, and we'll come back to this, having seen God face-to-face, Jacob says here in v. 30 that his life had been preserved. And that word translated preserved in the New King James is the same one used back in v. 11 where Jacob prayed, deliver me from the hand of my father. So in other words, having wrestled with God, Jacob had been delivered from his fear just as he had prayed. And you see, the reason Moses included this in the book of Genesis was to remind Israel, his original readers, that as they were facing their fears in the wilderness, God would minister to them in the same ways. That he would give them teaching, he would give them comfort as they needed it. And by extension, that's what we are to learn from this passage tonight as well. I've told you before, I know that there are times when my kids do not want to go down to the basement. I think they're just like me when I was a kid. I think going to the basement was about one of the scariest things you could do. And I would never want to go down there. And if I did, I would run back up as fast as I could looking over my shoulder the entire time. And yet a lot of the toys we keep in the basement. And compared to the basement I had in my house where I grew up, mine is not that scary by any means. But one of the things I'll do if I don't want to go down the steps with them is that I'll stand at the top of the steps. And I'll talk to them. And so as they go down, I'll say, it's okay. I know it's dark, but you know where the switches are. Turn the lights on. There are no bad guys down there. We have no windows in our basement. We have no doors in our basement. So no one snuck into the basement overnight. It's okay. And I'm here at the top waiting for you when you get back up here. And surprisingly, it works. Because I'm telling them what they need to know in their moment of fear. And as I tell them what they need to know in their moment of fear, it gives them the comfort that they're longing to have. And that's what God is doing here with Jacob. We'll see. And that's what God does with us. He gives you what you need to face your fears with confidence by telling you what you need to know. And it's the telling you what you need to know that will give you the comfort. And he does that not by wrestling with you in the middle of the night, it's not his way anymore, but he does that through the ministry of his word, including this passage that we're looking at here tonight. So that's the first thing to see from these verses. God's word speaks to your experience of fear, just as God wrestled with Jacob on the banks of the Jabbok. And so then what are we to learn from God's word as it pertains to our fears? And this is what brings us to our second point, which is according to God, He is what you need most when you are afraid. He is what you need most when you are afraid. So that is the teaching, remember I said teaching and comfort, this is the teaching that He wants you to learn. And so let's go back and look at verse 25. 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. So having wrestled all night long now, the Lord was not prevailing over Jacob. Moses tells us Jacob, in other words, was putting up a good fight. After all, he was under the impression that this was someone who was trying to kill him and he had to fight to stay alive. But of course, boys and girls, we have to be careful with this because this does not mean that Jacob had more power than God and Jacob was able to manhandle God in some way. But on the contrary, we know that this was God condescending and coming down to Jacob on his level. Having three boys in my home, we like to wrestle. This is something we've done recently. Get on the floor and wrestle with one another. And I always make sure they lose, so I don't condescend that much. But at the same time, I do come down to their level. I'm not using all the strength I have slamming them against the wall or smashing them on the ground. I wrestle them as if I was a 10-year-old or a 6-year-old or a 4-year-old. And that's what God is doing here in this wrestling match. He's not being manhandled, he's condescending in grace and wrestling at Jacob's level. And so when the fight needed to end, the sun's coming up, it has to come to an end at this point, because if Jacob saw God in the daylight, Jacob would have to die for that. So God brought the fight to an end, and what did he do? He used his power to bring it to an end. Moses tells us in verse 25, he touched the socket of Jacob's hip, and he put it out of joint. And as soon as the Lord did that, Jacob started to realize that he was not wrestling with an ordinary man, but was wrestling with someone supernatural. Because that word translated touched is the same one used in Isaiah 6 for when the seraphim touched the lips of the prophet with a coal from the altar. In other words, we may think this is just a word to say that the Lord went over and slammed him in the side or gave him a good punch in the side, but no, this was a, Gentle touch, a soft touch, not a forceful hit. So here's Jacob wrestling with God, gentle touch on the hip, and excruciating pain, excruciating pain that follows it. That gets him thinking. Who am I wrestling with all of a sudden? No man can do that, certainly not. this must be someone different. And so as he's realizing this someone different is actually the Lord that he's dealing with now, now he's not gonna let go. Now he knows this is the one I need. This is the one I want. And so he responds in verse 26. He says, I will not let you go unless you bless me. And this is not Jacob being prideful. This is Jacob in pain. This is Jacob in desperation. Hosea 12 verse 4 says about this instance, it says, Yes, he, Jacob, struggled with the angel and prevailed. He wept and sought favor from him. And you see, this is exactly what God wanted to happen in this whole thing. This is one of the reasons why he was wrestling with Jacob in the middle of the night. God wanted Jacob to go from being strong to weak and vulnerable. Because in doing so, then Jacob would see his ultimate need in the situation, which was the Lord to bless him and deal with his fears. Now, if you remember from last week, Jacob was already aware of his need for God, at least to some degree. He was praying for deliverance, and we looked at that prayer. We said last week that that was a model prayer, one of the greatest prayers we read about in the Bible. He was appealing to the promises of God and so forth, but there does seem to be some kind of disconnect here in Jacob's life. Because he prayed the promises of God, but it doesn't seem that he quite applied the promises of God quite to the extent that he should have. He's sleepless at this time. I think he's still terrified at this time. He's not resting confidently in the Lord, and perhaps he thought it was up to him to deliver his family from the hand of his brother. And so God is still working on Jacob. God is working in his life to teach him that, Jacob, you cannot face Esau on your own. You can't do what is needed to protect your family. There is nothing you can do here. No, you need Me. and you need my blessing. And that would have become quite clear to Jacob because he may have thought he was strong before, but now Jacob's got a dislocated hip. So now Jacob's not as strong as he was. Jacob's not able to go into the fight with Esau as he maybe thought he could. And so if he was going to survive, if he was going to make it back to the promised land, Jacob now knew, I need God. in the midst of this. I need him to intervene and take care of him. And I think he knows it now in a much clearer and stronger and experiential way. This went from something he knew to something he felt and experienced in the deepest part of his being. And again, that is why God came and broke him and wrestled with him, to show him this need, that he needed God more than anything else. And of course, that's what God wanted Israel to know, as they were marching through the wilderness, dealing with their trials, the anticipated battle with the occupying nations. They weren't to go into it trusting in themselves, but trusting in the Lord, that the Lord would intervene and come to the rescue. And that is what God wants you to know as well. A few years ago, one of the pastors in our denomination had a son born with severe heart defects. So severe, in fact, they didn't know if he would make it a day past birth. Now, thankfully, I think it's been three years later, the boy's still alive, but he still has many problems. He's gone through many surgeries already, but he still has many problems. He's in need of more surgeries and his future is still uncertain. And so you can imagine now that his family, they're trusting in the Lord incredibly, but you can imagine the temptation his parents must be feeling to think that if my kid is gonna make it, what do I need more than anything else? I need doctors. I need doctors who will somehow figure out what is going on here. I need expertise to solve these problems. I need some kind of medical advancements to take place to save the life of my kid. And don't get me wrong, they need doctors. And they have doctors. But what the text teaches us is that even in situations like that one, it's not doctors you need most. It's God you need most. And that's what we need to know when we're afraid. Because if you're like most people, you start thinking in that direction first. What do I need? I need money. I need a doctor. I need certainty. I need something other than God. And yet Genesis 32 puts it into perspective. It says, no, it's not doctors we need most. It's not good planning and hard work we need most. It's not bravery we need most. We need those things. It's God we need most. And if you don't believe that, just wait until God breaks you down to impress it upon you, as He does at times, to show us what we need is Him more than anything else. And so when you're afraid, cling to God. Be like Jacob. Wrestle with Him in prayer. Hold on to His promises. Don't let Him go until you have the blessing, because He and His blessing is what you need. So this brings us to our third point on the outline. Why do you need God more than anything else? Because thirdly, God's covenant blessing is what will deliver you from all of your fears. So this is the comfort that God wants us to receive from this passage. So we just saw, even when Jacob had been crippled by the man, he would not let go until he was blessed by him. And as we continue looking at the text, we see that Jacob prevailed and he received the intended blessing. Verses 27 and 29. 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. 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. Well, we'll talk about the name change in the fourth point, but here we're told that Jacob got what he wanted. The blessing that he came to believe he needed more than anything else was, in the end, given to him. And again, this doesn't mean that Jacob strong-armed the Lord. This was the Lord's intention all along. It was to show him his need for God because it was the blessing that would deliver him from his fears. John Currid puts it this way. He says, in this encounter, God is first and foremost attempting to assure and encourage Jacob. And you see the blessing here that he got, that was to be the means of assurance and encouragement. Because the blessing, what is the blessing? It's no human earthly blessing, it's the blessing we've been talking about since the beginning of the book of Genesis. What is the blessing that he got? It's the blessing that was given to Abraham. It's the blessing that was given to Isaac. It's the blessing that's now being given to Jacob. That God would be their God and that they would be his people. that God would be with them and protect them, that God would give them innumerable descendants and bring them to the promised land, and that all the nations of the world would be blessed through their seed. That was the blessing given to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob, and that was the blessing that was reiterated to Jacob here on this dark night. And as I've said, the reason it was so important for Jacob to get this blessing is because the blessing is the deliverance from his fears. Verse 30, so Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. Most people, given this translation, think that Jacob's now talking about how his life has been saved. He had seen God's face, but he's still alive. How does this happen? How can you still be alive? But when did Jacob see God's face? The sun had not come up. It was the darkness in the middle of the night. And so in other words, Jacob saw God's face in a way that you would not have to die. If you remember when Moses asked to see the glory of the Lord in Exodus 33, God said that he could not see his face as no man can and live. But once he passed in front of him, he was allowed to look at his back. And in a similar way, that's how Jacob saw the face of God, not in the brightness of day, but in the darkness of night. What's more, and I talked about this earlier, the word translated preserved is the same Hebrew word translated deliver back in verse 11. Because there's a connection we are to see here between the prayer for deliverance from his fears and the blessing given to him by the Lord. The blessing is the answer. The blessing is the deliverance. Alan Ross says of this, meeting God face to face meant that he could now look Esau directly in the eye. Esau's no longer afraid, or sorry, Jacob's no longer afraid of Esau. He's been reminded, he's been assured by the Lord. Jacob now has confidence. Jacob now knows that he's gonna be delivered from the hand of his brother. And this is why he needed to learn that God was his greatest need, because again, the blessing is what would deliver him, and it's the blessing that comes from God. As Israel was fearing their future enemies, it was the blessing that would calm their hearts that said, I will give you this land as I've promised to do so, that I am with you. And for us today, it's the blessing that will calm our hearts. Because it's the blessing that we don't have the exact fulfillments that Israel had at the time. God has not promised us earthly deliverance as He did to Jacob and Israel long ago. But the blessing is still our source of peace, is it not? In our troublesome circumstances. As believers in Christ, He is also our Lord. We are also His people. Which means He is also with us all the time to bless us, to protect us, to provide for us, to do good to us. Even in death, that is what God promises to us in the covenant blessing. And so as you face the wrath of many enemies out to destroy you, the Lord promises to spiritually protect you at all times. And He's not giving you the earthly promised land, but He is giving you the heavenly promised land. And you see, it's important that we don't forget this blessing. We have God who cares for us and is with us and is bringing us successfully to heaven because that is what will deliver us. I know in my own life, whenever I've been afraid of something or dealing with some kind of fear, there's a great temptation to cope by doing things like watch TV, or sleep more, or work more. Because when you're doing those things, your mind isn't always on your fears. You're distracted. Your mind is elsewhere. But in my experience, it never really takes the fear away. Now, it distracts you for a while, but as soon as you turn the TV off, what happens? There's the fear again, right back in you. You go to bed, you forget about the fear, but when you wake up, what happens? There's the fear to welcome you into the new day. And that, I think, is helpful for us to see that there are many things we can do to try to cope with the fear. But it only helps us to cope, it never really deals with the fear. Because nothing can deliver us from our fears like the covenant blessing of God, which is why we need to believe it and appropriate it to our lives and especially to our fears. And so that brings us to our fourth and final point, which is having God's blessing in Christ, you and I need to face our fears with the confidence that the blessing gives us. And so let's go back and look at verses 26 to 28. And the Lord said, let me go, for the day breaks. But he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. 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. So Jacob, in essence, won the match. And God says, I'm going to give you a new name since you won the match. Now you are Israel. And that's a name that most likely means God fought. Because as Moses tells us, he was given the name as a result of prevailing over the Lord. And we see that here in verse 28. But you see, the reason the name is given to Jacob, this new name of Israel, was so that he would always remember this day. This day that he wrestled with God and got the blessing of God. It was so that he would recall the blessing that delivered him from all of his fears. So put it another way, Here was God saying, no longer are you Jacob. No longer are you the one who is the deceiver and the supplanter, the one who takes matters into his own hands. No, you are now Israel, and what that means is that you are the one who has been blessed by God and can rest confidently in God at all times. And so as Jacob went on to face Esau and any other scary situation he dealt with in the future, he was to do so in light of his new name. That's the point here. He was to face his fears, not with deceit, not with despair, but with confidence in God, having been given the blessing of God. And of course, the same was true with Israel in Moses' day. This was their name. They were Israel. What was their name to remind them of? The day that Jacob wrestled with God and got the blessing of the covenant that was also given to them so that they would face their fears as they marched into the promised land. In fact, Moses includes two other details here that would have had the same purpose for his original readers. If you look at verse 30, he recounts how Jacob named the place Peniel, meaning face of God. That was a place that his original audience would have known. I know where Peniel is. Verse 32, he explains that this is why the children of Israel do not eat the muscle of the socket that shrank. That was a custom that his original readers would have known. Why does he mention those things? Because even those things point back to this day. And so as they came in contact with Peniel throughout their lives, as they continued to follow this practice of not eating the muscle of the socket that shrank, it was designed to remind them of this day. of the blessing that delivered Jacob from his fears, which is the blessing that delivers us from our fears as well. And brothers and sisters, you are the Israel of God today in the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't often refer to ourselves by that name, but that is how the Bible refers to us. You are Israel, and your name is also designed to remind you of this great night. because you also have that same blessing. And that blessing is what gives you the confidence to go out and face your fears. And the great thing for us as believers today is that we do not need to go fight God to get the blessing, but we have already graciously been given the blessing. Because in the fullness of time, Jesus Christ came down to earth as he did here in our passage, humbled himself and became a man, So that though we deserve anything but the blessing, we would be given it instead. And so as you go into this week, as you go into the rest of your life, don't let your fears control you. But know what you have, which is God is your, the Lord is your God. He is with you, He cares, He is protecting, He is providing, He is bringing you safely to the promised land. And as you have that blessing, you can go out and face whatever scares you with great confidence, because this is what will deliver you from all of it. Let's pray. Lord, tonight we do ask that you would write your word on our hearts. We do pray that you would help us to understand this passage. I think in a lot of ways this is one of the hardest passages to truly understand in all of the book of Genesis. It's a familiar one. We can clearly understand what happened, but how does it apply to us? How did it apply to Israel? What really was the point of all of this? It is a struggle for us and yet Lord, our prayer is that we have interpreted it accurately tonight and we pray that insofar as we've done that, that your word would bear much fruit in our lives and that we would be changed by it. We thank you that you are a very present help for us in our time of danger and when we are full of fears, which we often are dealing with fears of one sort or another, we thank you that we have all that we need. to be delivered from it. It may not be all that we want or all that we think we need, but your covenant blessing is sufficient because you, you are the one we need more than anything else. And you alone are the one who can truly give us peace in the midst of a scary situation. And so Lord, we thank you for that blessing. And Lord, may we face all our fears with the confidence we have as a result of that blessing. Lord, give us your grace and work in us for that, we pray. Amen.