Chapter 4: Broken for Blessing (Who are the Israel of God?")

By Hazel Holland

The same covenant promise that had been given to Abraham and Isaac was then passed down from Isaac to his son Jacob. Although Jacob and Esau were full-bloodied, twin brothers of Isaac, God sovereignly chose the lineage of Jacob, the younger brother, to continue the line of salvation history before the twins were even born. Thus, God’s choice of Jacob had nothing to do with Jacob’s good works, but rather God’s sovereign purpose in preserving salvation history.

We already saw in the previous chapter that Abraham had to wait for twenty-five years before God fulfilled His promise to him in the birth of Isaac. Now we find out that Isaac’s wife, Rebekah, had a similar problem as Sarah. She was barren also.

“Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah as wife… Now Isaac pleaded with the LORD for his wife, because she was barren; and the LORD granted his plea, and Rebekah his wife conceived… So when her days were fulfilled for her to give birth, indeed there were twins in her womb… Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them” (Genesis 25:20-26).

I had never noticed until now that hidden away in the statement, “Isaac pleaded with the Lord ...and Rebekah conceived,” is the fact that Isaac prayed for twenty years before God answered his prayer for a son. Since Abraham was still alive at this time, I feel sure that he must have prayed too, because he knew what it was like to wait for the promised seed. I’m confident that Abraham encouraged Isaac to persist in prayer and not falter in his faith as he had done. Abraham would most certainly have discouraged Isaac for even thinking for a moment about “helping” God bring about the fulfillment of the promise through Rebekah’s maidservant.

The Nature of Faith

Both Abraham and Isaac prayed believing that God would fulfill His promise even though they both had to wait many years before they saw the fulfillment of the promise in their immediate offspring. In fact, the book of Hebrews reminds us that many of the Hebrew patriarchs never in their lifetime saw the fulfillment of what God had promised them. Nevertheless, they continued to believe right up to their dying day that God would fulfill His promise by someday sending a Deliverer. The promised Seed, Jesus Christ would come in the fullness of time—God’s time, NOT theirs.

Essentially, this is what faith is. “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). Walking by faith is taking hold of the promise of God and refusing to let go. Faith is persistently holding on to the promise while waiting for God to fulfill it in His timing. Although Abraham prayed for twenty-five years and Isaac for twenty for God to give them the promised son, they never saw the ultimate fulfillment of their offspring—the promised Seed that would eventfully come.

These men of faith, along with other men of faith in the Old Testament waited for the fulfillment of the promised Seed for hundreds of years. They never stopped believing that God would do what He had said He would do—send a Deliverer. And we already know the end of their story because we can look back and see that the Deliverer came in the fullness of time. But I’m getting ahead of the story…

Jacob’s Lack of Faith

Let’s pause for a moment and remember how Jacob’s life began in Rebekah’s womb. This child of destiny, who began his life by grabbing his twin brother by the heel, later gained the blessing of God by grabbing on to God and refusing to let go. This child, who had been chosen by God before he was born to carry the blessing of the promised Seed, later manipulated his older twin brother, Esau, and deceived his aging father, in order to gain both the birthright and the blessing that had already been promised him. Instead of trusting God to fulfill His promise, Jacob deviously worked behind the scenes to grasp what was already his by God’s sovereign choice.

Jacob’s name (means “supplanter, schemer, cheater, one who grabs from behind) accurately described his inclination to take things into his own hands and wrestle to get his own way in life. Ever since he deceived his father into thinking that he was Esau so that he could obtain the spiritual blessing reserved for the eldest son, Jacob had been on the run.

We all know the rest of the story. After Esau learned about what Jacob had done he was so angry he threatened to kill him. So Jacob was forced to leave his father’s house and flee for his life to his uncle Laban’s place. On the way to this unknown country Jacob had a dream in which God confirmed to him the covenant that He had made to both Abraham and his father Isaac (Genesis 28:10-15).

Furthermore, Jacob’s family struggle didn’t end once he got to Laban’s. For years Jacob continued to wrestle and struggle with his uncle over flocks and herds and Laban’s two daughters, Leah and Rachel, who eventually became his wives. In spite of the fact that Laban treated Jacob very poorly during this time, Jacob became extremely wealthy as a result of his effective management of the flocks.

Although Laban had been in agreement with Jacob’s ideas, it had cost Laban dearly, even to the point of bankrupting him. So again, twenty years later, Jacob was forced to flee, this time from his uncle, because Laban’s sons had become jealous of his wealth. So he headed back to his father’s house in Canaan, with his wives, children, and many flocks (Genesis 30:42-43; 31:14-16).

Wrestling with Fear

On his return journey he became fearful one night when he leaned that his brother Esau was coming to meet him with four hundred men the next day. Not knowing what Esau’s attitude toward him might be, he placed his wives, children, servants, and all his possessions on the other side of the river Jabbok* for safety. Then he withdrew into the darkness to spend the night by himself as he sat beside the Jabbok River, a frightened man, searching for answers.

Suddenly, he found himself wrestling with a “Man”. The Bible doesn’t tell us what went on during that wrestling match or how many hours it lasted. All we know is that everything that had happened in Jacob’s life so far had brought him to this crucial moment in time when the pre-incarnate Christ would change the direction of his life.

I believe that God in his grace and mercy allowed Jacob to grapple with his fleshly desires as he struggled to overpower this unseen Man. I feel sure that Jacob’s life must have passed before him many times during that crucial night. How he must have longed to be delivered from fear. Little did he know that the One with whom he wrestled was the promised Deliverer who would soon deliver him from fear.

Wrestling with God

As Jacob wrestled with God, he may have remembered his mother’s words as she described the wrestling match that had gone on within her womb before her boys had been born. It was true that this wrestling for dominance had plagued him throughout his life. He knew that he had depended on his own strength and resources to help God answer His promises that He had made to him.

Jacob remembered that God had repeated the same words to him at Bethel in a dream that he had made to Abraham and Isaac years earlier. Surely, in order for those promises to come to pass God needed Jacob to help Him by exercising his cunning mind so that all families on earth would be blessed through his offspring.

Jacob, like so many of us, continually struggled throughout his life to help God answer His promises by attempting to make them happen in the natural (flesh) instead of waiting for God to have them manifest in the spiritual realm. This promised blessing that Jacob had plotted to obtain for his offspring was the same blessing in “seed form” that had been given to Adam and Eve? Jacob could no more alter God’s sovereign plan than he could bring it about by his own conniving schemes.

While Jacob wrestled with his own tormenting thoughts, He must have struggled to understand how he was supposed to be heir to the promises of God if Esau was going to kill him. He must have fought to come to grips with the timing of God’s plan as he remembered the dream God had given him twenty years earlier at Bethel. Perhaps God had changed His mind about Jacob being an heir to the promises of God after all.

Now, failing to trust God once more with his destiny, Jacob had sent drove after drove of animals ahead of him as a gift for Esau in an effort to appease him and gain his acceptance. Jacob was obviously rich in the things of this world. But hadn’t so much of his material wealth been achieved by his own shrewd thinking and conniving ways? For that reason, how could he honestly trust God to deliver him from Esau when he had so wrongfully manipulated his brother in the past?

Perhaps he deserved to die and forfeit the coveted blessing after all. On the other hand, maybe if he addressed his brother as “my lord” and “your servant, Jacob”, and Esau saw all the gifts he had sent, Jacob might find favor in his brother’s sight (Genesis 28:3-20). I feel quite sure that as Jacob fought to win this wrestling match within his own mind he must have agonized over his checkered past. Possibly, a sense of hopelessness and despair filled his heart at times during the night’s struggle as he assessed the bumpy road he had chosen in life.

The Turning Point

Finally, a turning point came in Jacob’s struggle after the pre-incarnate Christ touched his hip, weakening and immobilizing him on the spot. Now Jacob had been broken for blessing. Although he had repeatedly tried to gain that blessing by his own devious ways, God allowed him to come to the end of himself so that he might see that it was God who was in control and not Jacob. Jacob suddenly stopped wrestling out of fear and started clinging to God in faith as he cried out in pain, “I will not let you go unless you bless me” (Genesis 32:26).

During that awful night, Jacob finally learned that the blessing of material wealth that he had gained by his shrewd business dealings was not the blessing that he really desired. He must know for sure that he hadn’t forfeited the privilege of being chosen by God to have the Promised Seed come through his offspring. He desired that blessing now more than anything else.

After that night of struggle Jacob knew that neither his good works nor his bad works caused God to withdraw his covenant promise from him. Seeing God’s goodness towards him changed him. Thus, in keeping with Jacob’s change of heart, God changed his name from Jacob to Israel. In spite of all his conniving schemes Jacob finally knew that God truly loved him. He was no longer a deceiver, but one who prevailed with God.

Jacob said of God after his night of wrestling, “For I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved” (Genesis 32:30). Not only did God preserve Jacob’s life and change his name to Israel (prince of God), but He preserved his seed, because it was through Jacob’s offspring that the Seed would come. Salvation history was being preserved that night so that in the fullness of time, the TRUE SEED, Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, would come.

Jacob-like People

That is why the Scriptures remind us that God is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and, yes, He’s the God of Jacob, too. God knows that deceitfulness is one of the characteristics that we all share in common as a result of our fallen nature. Although not one of us likes to admit it, we are all Jacob-like at times, yet God loves us anyway. God knows our hearts. He knows that “the heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly perverse and corrupt and severely, mortally sick! Who can know it [perceive, understand, be acquainted with his own heart and mind]?” Jeremiah 17:9 (Amplified Bible).

I’m weeping right now in the Spirit as I realize that God’s sovereign love that was poured out upon Jacob has also been poured out upon you and me. God chose us in Christ before we were ever born, just like He chose Jacob. In fact, God reminds us in Hebrews 11 that He is not ashamed to be identified with Jacob. This means that God is not ashamed to be identified with all Jacob-like people.

For that reason, when our hearts deceive us, God does not reject us when we become Jacob-like in our attitudes and desires. No. God not only knows our hearts, but He already knows those who are His. Just like Jacob, God chose us in Christ before we were even born. As we are confronted with this Good News, God’s amazing goodness leads us to repentance as it did Jacob.

Instead of resisting God, we are irresistibly drawn to the One who loved us first. We find out that God does not credit the deceitfulness of our hearts to our account, but instead credits our account with Christ’s truth-filled righteousness. All our deceitful ways and manipulative schemes have been credited to Jesus Christ account, not ours. He became sin for us so that we can be known by God as the righteousness of God in Christ.

I want to intimately know and love a God like that. I want to believe in the One who has a future and plan for my life just as He had for Jacob’s life. God wants to continually bless us with His presence while He assures us that He will never let us go, just like He blessed and assured Jacob. He has a new name for us, too—a new name that I feel sure will reflect not only our struggle here on earth, but how God sees us forever in Christ. He has a new name for all His beloved children that we will receive on that Day when we see God face to face (Revelation 2:17).

*Jabbok means "wrestling".

(Next: Chapter 5: Go here.