I appreciate that announcement, brother. That was, boy, you're talking about a word fitly spoken and, boy, right on time. I'm feeling kind of mean tonight anyway. I ain't got a mean bone in my body. I used to. I got old and all them mean bones melted into whatever. Yeah, I'm just an old sweetie now, but all right. Well, it's good to be back at Fundamental again. Thank goodness. I tell you, I can't believe it's been a year. I'll tell you, it seemed like it's been a year, but whatever. So I see that offended somebody, I guarantee you. I mean, if you say something that makes people laugh, that'll offend some people. So you just need to buckle up. I don't even have to say nothing, and I make people laugh. Look at him. Made us laugh. Well, amen. It's good to be here. I love this church. Thank God it's a very unique and very special meeting in a thousand different ways. And I've told people about it everywhere, and I'm just honored. I'm really honored. I'm humbled to be here in this pulpit because I look across the building. I see scores of great preachers that I know have a word from God to us. And so I am honored to be here and humbled. And I am blessed and happy that when he announced me a while ago, you didn't get up and march out. There could have been a mass movement, but they didn't. So thank you very much. God bless you so much. And so I'm glad to get in here. time for a bite of supper and a little fellowship beforehand. And I could just name scores of preachers here that I know tonight. I'd leave some of you out, so I don't want to do that. But thank you. I appreciate your friendship. I really do. And he mentioned Dr. McAbee. Didn't call him by name, but Dr. Ed McAbee was his pastor. And I did love Brother Ed. I still love him. And every once in a while, and I was thinking about something actually coming down today. the different branch of theology out there from what you and I would believe. And I thought, man, there's no way Brother Joe and I could ever get into that. Ed McAbee would rise from the dead and come and get us, snatch a knot in our necks, and then go from there. So you'd say, well, what are you talking about? Well, he told me I couldn't say nothing about it. So anyway, all right. God bless you. Amen. I do need to ask this, because I'm going to deal with something here in just a moment. So I need to ask. And young people, I think you'll be honest with me. We got enough preachers here tonight that we don't expect a lot of honesty out of them, Brother Josh. And I didn't mean to single you out. No, no. But just ask you two questions, and we're going to get into the message. And this will help me tonight to know. How many? How many? Just be honest. Let's just be honest. Let's just be transparent tonight. How many of you tonight have ever told a lie? Just raise your hand. Okay. How many of you have ever stolen anything? Raise your hand. All right. So that helps me in my message. I'm preaching to a bunch of liars and thieves tonight. So that helps me. Okay, you going to preach a camp meeting message? No, not with a bunch of liars and thieves sitting here. Good night. Okay, turn to Genesis, somewhere in Genesis. Let's see, Genesis 25. We'll start with Genesis 25. I bring you greetings from the Unity Baptist Church in Ripley, Mississippi. Some of you have been there. Some of you know right where it is. And we have camp meeting every November. And some have already approached me. Some of your folks, Brother Joey, said, we want to come back. And I said, yeah, bring your preacher, will you? And that's always the second Sunday in November. And we would be thrilled for you to come. And that's Sunday through Wednesday. And we'll try to treat you right. So put that on your calendar. If you've got questions about it later, I will be glad to answer them. Could I mention I'm going to Israel in February the 26th. And I've done said something to y'all's pastor. I'd love for him and his wife to go with us. That would be great. So church, if y'all want to get together after the service and send him to Israel next February. That'd be a blessing. God bless you. All right. I should have put that under public service announcement. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Okay. All right. Liars and thieves, listen to me. Genesis 25. I am going to be talking about Jacob tonight. Where's Brother Tracy a while ago? I saw him here, Tracy Mooneyhan. I saw him. Yeah, there he is. Okay, just pretend you hadn't heard this before, Brother Tracy, and you were in the meeting while I preached it. Now, you may not have heard it, but anyway, you were there. So, okay. Genesis 25, and verse 20, Isaac was 40 years old when he took Rebekah the wife, the daughter of Bethuel, the Syrian of Pandanaram, the sister to Laban the Syrian. And Isaac entreated the Lord for his wife, because she was barren. And the Lord was entreated of him, and Rebekah, his wife, conceived. And the children struggled to gather within her. And she said, if it be so, why am I thus? And she went to inquire of the Lord. Well, that's, you know, you got a question, that's a good place to go. And she got an answer, got a pretty good answer. Verse 23, the Lord said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb. Two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels, and the one people shall be stronger than the other people, and the elder shall serve the younger. And when her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her womb. And the first came out red all over like an hairy garment, and they called his name Esau. And after that came his brother out, and his hand took hold on Esau's heel. And as a result of that, he gets his name. His name was called Jacob, which means heel catcher or heel grabber or heel holder. And Isaac was three score years old when she bare them. Okay. Then Genesis 28 and verse 19. And he called the name of that place Bethel. but the name of that city was called Luz at the first. And Jacob vowed a vow saying, if God will be with me, if and will help me in this way that I go, and if will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on, I added a couple of ifs in there, you caught that. So that I come again to my father's house in peace, then shall the Lord be my God. And this stone which I have set for a pillar shall be God's house, and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee. And then in Genesis 32, Genesis 32. And verse 23, Genesis 32 and verse 23, And he took them, talking about his family, sent them over the brook, and sent over that he had. That's his cattle, his camels, all of that. Verse 24, 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 out of joint 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 no more Jacob, but Israel. For as a prince hast thou power 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 that place Peniel, for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. Now if you need to know who the man was he is wrestling with, There is your commentary. There is your answer. All he knows in verse 24 is that there is a man wrestling with him. But we come to find out that that man was none other than the Lord Himself, probably a pre-incarnate manifestation of the Lord Jesus Himself. So he said, I have seen God face to face in my life and preserved. And as he passed over Penuel the sun rose upon him and he halted upon his thigh. I want to preach tonight on the subject of breakthrough. I want to preach on a breakthrough. Maybe a play on words here. If you'll notice in verse 24, he said there, Jacob was left alone and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day. He said again there in verse number 26, and he said, let me go for the day breaketh. And then in verse number 31, he said, and as he passed over Penuel, the sun rose up on him. There surely was a breakthrough. I want to talk to you about that tonight. I want to talk to you as a, you know, as a pastor would to his people. And that's, that's what I am. And probably not much of that, but I have been at it a long time. In fact, if the Lord lets me stay where I'm at in July, I'll be 45 years. there at Unity, and then if he lets me live till August, we'll have been in the ministry. I celebrate my 50th year in the ministry in August. Now, I don't say that necessarily to impress you, but it is pretty impressive. Brother Feeney, that's pretty impressive. You know, I don't get any more money or any less money by impressing anybody, I'm just telling you. That's the way it is. I don't care if you drive a taxi 45 years. That's pretty impressive. I don't care if you raise cattle 45 years. That's pretty impressive. I don't care if you've been eating raw oysters 45 years. And that ain't bad. On the half shell. Well, I lost some then. I've offended some more people now, I'm sure. Have you ever in your life used that term and just said, you know, I'll tell you what we need, we need a breakthrough. We need some kind of breakthrough. And I'll tell you as a pastor I have said that and I have seen that. When I think about these scriptures I think about what the Lord said in Matthew 17 when they came down from the transfiguration and that man was there with that lunatic son. And he runs up to the Lord and he says, your disciples could not deliver him, could not help him. And the Lord said, oh, you faithless, perverse generation. He said, bring him here. Bring him here. And they brought the boy to him. The Lord cast out the evil spirit. And then the disciples even admitted. And they didn't say, Lord, why would we not do that? They said, Lord, why could we not do that? like it was an impossible situation, and the word impossible is used in the text. And the Lord made some statements to them and talked about if you have faith, the size of a grain, of a mustard seed, and all of that. But then He went on to say, but you know what, this kind, and probably some of you preachers here have preached on that and took those two words, this kind, cometh not out but by prayer and fasting. So there are some things in ministry that we all run into as preachers, as pastors, and as people in the Church. And you know Dr. McAbee used to say, look, all these situations, a guy's got a problem at his church, he wants to run to another church, and he said, I tell him, I said, look, it's new faces, but it's the same old problems. New faces, but the same old problems. That's what Brother Ed used to say, so if it's wrong take it up with him. But I think he's right. I think he's right. So there are situations, all of us, all of us have been, you know, I tell you, boy, I had a deacon one time. Oh, yeah, I had one like it. Man, we had a lady in our church. You know what she did? I had one just like it. You know, and a lot of stuff is just common. And in there are situations you're going to run into as pastors, and your situation is going to be kind of unique. Now, there's nothing new under the sun. I get all of that. But just go with me on this. You're a bunch of liars and thieves anyway, so just go with me. with me on this. But we do get into some unique situations sometimes. And sometimes it's not where you can pick a phone up and call a preacher and say, Preacher, have you been through this? No, I ain't never been through that. And I'll tell you what, I'm almost 70 years old, been there all these years, and I've run into two or three situations in the last year that I've never run into in my life. I'm talking about some pretty serious situations. Some pretty serious situations. And things that I didn't know who to pick the phone up and call and say, have you been through this? And so we probably might as well get ready for some of that. I mean we are living in the last days. He didn't say perilous times would come. He did say that these latter days these people are going to give heed to seducing spirits, evil men and seducers, he said, will wax worse and worse. So we might as well buckle up. Enjoy good meetings like this. Soak up the preaching and the singing. Get everything you can get out of this. And then, because you're probably going to need it. You may need it next week. If you don't, you'll need it next month. You'll need it before the year is over. And you're going to run into some things. I promise you that. And so I feel for these young preachers. I mean, I really do. Some of us have been around a few years, and so we've kind of processed into these years. We have progressed into these years, and we see things, and we may have said, well, I hadn't seen it like that before. But we've been brought along through the years. And now these young preachers are thrown into a world, a religious world, that is plum crazy. Everything is turned upside down, religiously, politically, and every other way you can say, I feel for them. I feel for them. And so there are going to be some things along the way. We're going to need some breakthroughs. We really are. And whether you want to call it this kind and preach this out of Matthew 17 or hang with me here for a little while tonight as we, and I know we've got another speaker so I'm going to try to be very, very mindful of that. But I want to talk about that breakthrough. Now I've been pastoring long enough to know that we, Boy, you get in some situations that if you don't, if you don't, and it's kind of what we call impossible situations, impossible situations. And if you don't have a real divine breakthrough, if you don't have a real intervention of God, it's not going to get fixed and it can make or break a person. It can make or break a family. It can make or break a church. And so we've got to, we've got to, I mean I'm just seeking help from this book. And I've come to the conclusion, even the new things of this world and this life, there's an answer right here. There is an answer. There is nothing the devil is gonna throw at us that there's not a response or an answer for it in this book. And I may not have seen the answer yet because I haven't needed it. But I've seen some things this past year that I scratch my head and I say, where in the world did this come from? How in the world could this happen? I'm not talking about from a demonic world, I'm talking about stuff going on inside the four walls of the house of God. And you know, so breakthrough, a breakthrough. So using those thoughts there kind of as a play. So I went back tonight to even Jacob's birth. So what I want to do is give you a little atmosphere tonight from the scripture that will help us to understand this chapter 32 where it says Jacob was left alone, where the breakthrough took place. And so we won't get to that tonight. I will get to that later. So let me give you just a little bit of pre-chapter 32 thoughts that maybe will help us see why this breakthrough was so necessary and why it was so urgent. And I'll just say this to you, man, if you're pastoring a church or you're in a church and everything is so lovely and you don't need any breakthroughs, then, you know, I will excuse you. You don't have to leave, but if you want to get a nap, just go ahead. Just don't snore. If you got your CPAP with you, put it on. And, well, you can tell what generation I'm from. So, anyway, but they say, well, I don't have anything like that. Well, and then I would say, well, hang around. Stick around. It won't be long, and some of you have already done this, but if you haven't, it won't be long, you'll be picking your phone up and calling your pastor, and saying, you know, Pastor, I don't know exactly how to handle this. And it might be a situation where the pastor says, well, I've never been through anything quite like that. Well, then you're going to have to get with God. I mean, when it comes to that, we're in serious trouble. But thank God, He's there. He's there. He'll help us. So in getting to chapter 32 where we see the breakthrough emphasized, let me just go back to chapter 23, chapter 25 to get where it all begins with Jacob and really the whole breakthrough. It really all comes down to Jacob. It's really not about Laban. His father-in-law, it's really not about Esau, and he's scared to death to face Esau. That's what he said in Chapter 32. He told the Lord. He said, Lord, you promised. You're going to do me good. You're going to be with me. But he said, I've got to face Esau, and I fear him. I fear him. That's in Chapter 32. And so he's needing a breakthrough. He really is. So really, it's not about Esau. And it's not about Laban. And so who is it then? Who is this man he's wrestling with? Well, we find out that it's the Lord. But this is all going back to Jacob. Now, I know this is really applicable tonight because I'm preaching to a bunch of... Okay. So you get it. Just kind of giving you an outline here of this and then try to do some exposition. So bear with me, bear with me. Give me a little room here to work with this. I'm under a compulsion. I'm under a compulsion. You ever been under a compulsion, pastor? Preacher, you ever been under a compulsion where you know you've got to preach something? And you've been invited by the pastor to preach, so I'm under a compulsion of his authority and leadership. And by the way, the only thing I would say about what you said a while ago about the Charismatics and the Pentecostals and calling you, I told Brother Cody Ladin, I said, they never call me Charismatic. I said, now a bunch of them call me Pentecostal. But I said, most of my critics didn't know what a charismatic was, really. They just called me a Pentecostal. So anyway, so I'm in that old generation, you know. What is this about Jacob? Have you ever recognized any Jacob in yourself? Have you done that? You ever done that? We've all got some Jacob in us. In fact, I'll confess to you tonight, I've got more Jacob in me, I'm afraid, than I do Jesus. When it comes to practical, some practical things. I see when I look in the mirror, I see way too much Jacob. I don't see near enough Jesus. Now I'm working on it. And more important than that, the Lord's working on it. The Lord's working on it. I'll be 70 in September, and I promise you the Lord has not let up on me. You would think by this age I should have it all behind me. I should have all my carnality behind me. All my Jacob ways ought to be behind me. All of that, but I promise you it's not. It's not. And so God's still, as the songwriter said, working on me. Look here at Jacob. Look at him a minute. I want to talk about a purpose here. could talk about this purpose. What is Jacob's purpose? Well, the Lord said to his mother, said in verse 23 of chapter 25, two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels, and the one people shall be stronger than the other, and the elder shall serve the younger. So what we have here is a purpose. And so this is going to be God's dealings with Jacob. And what they were were to bring him to the place of fulfilling the divine will in his life. To bring Jacob to the place of fulfilling the divine will in his life. Now what was it? Well, the divine will was for the elder to serve the younger. And so Esau, the elder, is, by all purposes of God, to somewhat switch places with Jacob, and he's to serve Jacob. And the thing about it is, Jacob is all in favor of that. But where's the problem? The problem is, Jacob wants to work it out his way. Now I can't explain to you how in the world in the womb, Jacob, they are already wrestling. Him and Esau are already in a fight. Already struggling. That's right there in your Bible. So much so that when they are born and Esau is first. And I mean this is strange stuff. But the Bible said that after that his brother came out in verse 26, his hand took hold on Esau's heel. Thus the heel catcher. He is already trying to fulfill God's will and is not even completely born yet. But the problem is, Jacob is saying, we're going to do this my way. We're going to do this my way. Now brethren, this will get you in more trouble. It'll get you in more trouble. You say, well, I just want to do God's will. Yeah, but how do you want to do it? I mean, David wanted to move the ark. But, you know, even Mr. Schofield says in his notes, you can do the right thing in the wrong way. And so, was David doing the right thing? Well, yeah, it was a right and a worthy thing, but he's doing it the wrong way. He put it on a cart, did he not? Where did he get the idea for that cart? The Philistines. Read it, it's in your Bible. The Philistines got hold of the ark and they moved it on a cart. So David thinks, well this will work. Look, what will work for the world will work for us. We need in the church to quit adapting the methods and means of the world and trying to be spiritual with it. You can't make that stuff spiritual. You can't do the right thing in the wrong way and expect the blessings of God. Well, he's just trying to do right. Well, is he trying to do right according to God's way of doing it? So that's his whole life. That's his whole life. He's in perfect agreement with God. Yeah, he still needs to be behind me. Yeah, but he's doing it the wrong way. He'll catch you. You know what that is? I mean, this is the guy that will grab your heel because he wants where you are. He wants your place. If it's not geographically, it may be positionally. Spiritually, he may be jealous of you and to the rank that God has raised you. You're getting the meetings that he's not. You've got the church that he doesn't have. And that applies not only among us preachers, but it applies within the church. It applies with people out there in the working world. And they wonder why the couple down the road gets a new house and we don't. Wonder why they got the new car and we don't. And that's okay to a degree, but then when you begin to reach out, you're grabbing people by the heel. And you're trying to pull them down. to put yourself up front, then God's not in that. God's not in that. That couple down the road's got that new house, that's not your house. That guy that's got the new truck, that guy that's got that big nice pastoral of a church, that's not your church. In other words, that's not your blessing. That's not your blessing. Brother Don Sable used to tell the story about a picture. And in this picture, this painting, shows a man, and it is almost like the painting is in 3D. And there stands a man and he is looking in the distance. And the painter and the artist was good enough to paint it to where it looked like the fields were in a great distance away. And rain was falling. And he is standing there beside his field and it is burning up. And the caption of the picture and the idea of the picture is this gentleman stares into the distance. He's wanting that man's rain. He's wanting that man's rain on his field. Now there's nothing wrong with a farmer wanting a rain on his crop when it's droughty conditions. But that's not his rain, that's that man's rain. And when our compulsion is, well I want his standing. I want his recognition. I want him. And if I get around the right people, I know enough, I can tell enough bad stuff on him. And then you think, Brother Martin, you think that by tearing that guy down, that's going to elevate you? No, but we think that, I guess. So, but hey, brother, no, no, you can't. I mean, he's in agreement with God. Yeah, I want to be out front. Esau ought to be submitting to me. Yeah. How you going to do that? You going to grab him by the heel? Pull him back? Then later we know about the birthright, and he cheated his brother. He said, well, Esau didn't care. Maybe he didn't care. Doesn't matter if he cares or not. It's not Jacob's place to take the birthright. God in essence had done told him, it's yours, it's yours. Let's just do it my way, do it in my time. And well Esau don't care, he don't want it anyway. Hebrews says he was a profane man. He didn't care for spiritual things. But that doesn't release Jacob to act as profane as Esau. And so lest I don't get all this in the order I want to get it, I'll just say this, it's amazing, you don't find the Bible giving a lot of attention to Laban, little attention to Esau, not much, but He's giving a whole lot of attention to Jacob. Jacob. And God has taken on a monumental task, humanly speaking, of changing Jacob. So, if I could say that tonight. So, what is the purpose? The purpose. Well, the elder shall serve the younger. And so Jacob is all in agreement with that. So no problem, I'm with you on this. Yeah, we need to do that. But then the problem is, as we said, Jacob seeks out to achieve this by human means. Doing God's will, man's ways, as we said a while ago. Moving the ark on a cart, doing it man's way. We need to somehow come to that place as Paul in our Christian walking life in Galatians 2.20, don't we? Where, man, man, it's not me. I mean, I live. I live, but yet not I. It's Christ. It's Christ that liveth in me. In me. In me. This is not easy preaching, Brother Joey. You know what I'm saying? It's tough. It's tough on the flesh. Brother David prayed a while ago, and as he prayed he said something about, Lord help us get away from the flesh. Help us stay away from the flesh. I caught that when you prayed that, brother. I caught that. I thought, boy, that's exactly right. So this problem. But there's a plan. There's a plan. And so it begins to unfold as we see in Jacob's life where he's the heel catcher. He's going to supplant. He's going to cheat. He's going to deceive. He's going to use all these carnal means and methods to achieve God's divine will in his life. Instead of just letting God do it, just let God do it. Just let God do it. And so he cheats his brother. Then of course we know that he deceived his old daddy, Isaac. Then he winds up on the run, has to go down to Laban. But you know what? Goes around, comes around. So he ran into a deceiver. He ran into a cheater with old Laban. And so you'd think, man, you'd think by now he's going to learn a lesson. But you know, we learn these lessons hard sometimes. We learn them hard. So it took him 14 years to get two wives. And so, boy, that first one, he really got cheated on that, man. Whoa! Hello! Labor! You're not Rachel. No, I'm not. But I'm your wife. Oh, me. So more cheating and more cheating and So now it's caught up with him. He's got to go back. God said, you need to go back home. Oh, Lord. I don't know if I want to do that. Yeah, you got to go back home. So on the way, he talks to the Lord. We get to that later. We'll talk about that. But he says, Lord, you know, by the way, Lord, you promised me, you promised me you're going to take care of me. You're going to take care of me. And but I'm afraid of Esau. I'm afraid of him. So he's going to to to deal with all of this. Let me let me make. Let me make some, I'm trying to intertwine some New Testament application of this. And so the purpose of the problem, but there is a plan. And so what we see is God is actually working on Jacob here in all these years. Now it's going to be 21 years I believe from Bethel in chapter number 28 until you get to chapter 32, that's about 21 years. He hasn't learned a whole lot. He hasn't learned a whole lot, but he's fixing to There's fixing to be a breakthrough. There's fixing to be a breakthrough. And it's going to have to be. Seems like that's the only way God is going to be able to fulfill His divine will in Jacob's life. Because Jacob has done got calloused in his heart about these things. He's living up to his nature. He's just what he is. He's who he is. And that's what you are. That's what I am. But, you know, the old saying now, they say, well, it is what it is. Well, let me just say, it is what it is, but is shouldn't be. And sometimes we'll run into a situation, we'll just say, well, it is what it is. And I won't say, but wait a minute, it doesn't have to be that way. Let's back up. And that's a cop out sometimes just for accepting, just for accepting. Well, it is what it is. I can't help it. Yeah, there are some things can be helped. I mean, I can't help it. Just because it is what it is doesn't mean it has to stay that way. And so, well, but God's got a plan. So let me take a little New Testament right here and just interject it in this to Jacob so that we can see Jacob in our lives. There's an impartation. Now expository I'm not going to be able to bring that right out right here, but theologically and truthfully I can. and say there's an impartation. Now, what about in your life and my life? Well, the moment you got saved, you got an impartation. I'm telling you, the Holy Spirit of God was imparted to you the moment you got saved. Now, that's true. That is true. And so, thank God we've had that impartation. Now, what does that mean? Well, God wants to lead us to a transformation. So in the process of that, there's this formation going on right now in your life and my life. And that's what's going on in Jacob's life. And it's not going to be really fully seen until chapter 32. But there's formation. Really, if I could just say it this way, God is forming Christ in us. That's what he's doing. I believe Galatians chapter number 4 and verse 19 testifies to that. until Christ be formed in you. I believe Romans 12 too. Be not conformed to the world, but be ye transformed. So the impartation, that's the Holy Spirit, who will take the word of God and even the circumstances of life and create a formation and a transformation in your life. Young people, please hear me tonight. Please hear me tonight. That right now and the earlier you can begin to yield yourself to this and see this, the much better off you will be and the more powerful and influential. And by the way, that's what God said to Jacob when he changed his name. You have power with God and with men. So that formation, so he's forming Christ in us. So this impartation that leads to a formation. I'll just say it this way. God is not interested in improving any of us. I hope I didn't offend you, but it is the truth. In fact, he's more interested in weakening us. He's not interested in improving our flesh, my ability, my personality, my ways, my influence, my talents, my plans, my schemes, my goals. wrong pronoun, wrong pronoun. If it's not his ability, his personality, his ways, his influence, his talents, his plans, his scheme, his goals, God's not interested in improving my plans, my ability, my goals. How do you know? He told me that yesterday morning. And I'm going to tell you that when I close in just a moment, I'm going to tell you what the Lord impressed on me yesterday. It was, oh, good night. So, no, he's not interested in improving. I'll just say this, and I know this is probably going to confuse, and I don't want to confuse anybody. God knows my heart, man. I've been in this thing too long to leave people confused. I don't want to confuse anybody. But I want to tell you, God doesn't even want your best. I mean preacher. What? I quoted that verse when I preached that to my people and that is what he said in Isaiah. Our best, our best is filthy rags. You are going to offer God filthy rags. I have read different commentaries about what those filthy rags were. Some say it is where they take the rags and wipe the pus of the leper. Others have used it in different ways. It's nasty. It's filthy. It's not something you would offer that you would offer to a homeless person. The scum of the earth or something out there, much less offer it to God. Really? Your best? I know we've been told that. And we try that. And you're honorable for trying. I'm honorable for trying. Lord, I want you to have my best. But the Lord says, son, you haven't got it. Then he reminds me, why do you think Jesus died for you, son? Your best ain't enough. Your best ain't even close. Your best, Brother Curtis, won't get it done. And if all you've got to offer God when it comes time to get to heaven is your best. Now if that's true in salvation, it's true in sanctification. Well, I'm doing my best. Well, I gave up cigarettes. Ain't that enough? I mean, is that not the way we are about some stuff? So, improving, no. God doesn't really want your best. He wants Christ for me. He wants Christ for me. So, let me close. Let me close. So, here's the promises, chapter 28. We'll at least get that far and we're going to close. Genesis 28. So, after the experience there with the Lord that night, he's on the run. And of course he saw the ladder, the angels descending and ascending. And the Lord spoke and But here's what's interesting to me, the Lord finally told him in verse 19, so he called the name of that place Bethel. In verse 20, and so Jacob vowed a vow, saying if, so I added something else a while ago. If God'll be with me, if God'll keep me in the way, if God'll give me bread to eat, if God'll give me some raiment to put on, and if God'll let me come again to my father's house in peace, Lord, if you'll just do all of that, then the Lord will be my God. Is God through with Jacob now? Oh, no. No, Jacob, you got a ways to go yet. And I'm not being critical. I got way too much of Jacob in me. Way too much. Way too much. Genesis 32 is necessary. And now it's come so far we've got to have a breakthrough. We've got to have a breakthrough. So he told him, but God had already told him this in 28, and look back in verse 13, right at the beginning. And in 28 verse 13, behold the Lord stood above it, that ladder. I am the Lord God of Abraham, thy father, and the God of Isaac. The land whereon thou liest, to thee I will give it, and to thy seed. And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, to the east, to the north, to the south, and in thee and in all thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed." So what God promised to Abraham and to Isaac now He promises to Jacob. But Jacob is a long way off. from being where he needed to be. Now get this, we live in the realm of God's promises. That's where we live. Everything I am, have, hope, all goes back to the promises of God. I mean, from the moment I got saved, God promised me, if you'll come to me, and he was drawing He was drawing me. If you'll come to me, I will save you. He promised me, and I believed that. I put my trust in him, and by George, he saved my soul. And I've been living off of his promises ever since. So he makes this providential promise to him that God is carrying right down from Abraham, Isaac, now to Jacob. But then he makes a personal Look in chapter 28 and verse 15. After giving him that providential promise that he'd given to Abraham and Isaac, he said, now let's get personal. And verse 15, and behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land, for I'll not leave thee, and then get this, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of. What's God doing in your life? Jacob didn't get it all, but he's fixing to get it. Might take a few more years. But right here from the onset, God is making promises to Jacob. Somebody says it's not risky business. No, no, no. Because God is ultimately not dependent on Jacob. to fulfill all of this. God's expectation is in himself and what he can do in Jacob's life. And so he's going to form Christ in Jacob. I was praying yesterday morning before I went into the services to preach as I do and have done for years I slip into that little office there before I go out to face the Giants. And so as I was praying and thought I was being pretty spiritual and at some point in my prayer I said, Lord, less of me and more of you. Well that is what I thought. I mean, is that not enough? And I'm telling you, with my hand raised, standing here, and all 198 pounds of my body right here. I am telling you, I know it was the Lord. I know it was the Lord. I didn't know more than get that out of my, the thoughts of my mind. I didn't even say the words. I was just on my knees in my little office there and I was praying. And in my mind I wasn't even saying a word. I wasn't even verbalizing. And so I said, Lord, today less of me and more of you. And if I'm standing here I am telling you the Lord, I know the Lord did this. Would you let me say this? I know the Lord impressed in my heart. I didn't hear it here. I didn't hear it, but he impressed on my heart and here's what come to me. It's like he said, how about none of you and all of me? Now, if that helped me in any way, and it did, it helped me to know the Lord is listening to my feeble prayers. and he knew how to answer me and respond.