(Genesis) - Part 25 — Zac Poonen

Jealousy Revealed in the Face

Genesis, chapter thirty -one, beginning at verse one. Now Jacob heard the words of Laban's son, saying, Jacob has taken away all that was our father's, and from what belonged to our father he has made all this wealth.

And Jacob saw the attitude of Laban, behold, it was not friendly toward him as formerly. Jacob had increased in wealth, and that naturally, as it usually brings with all worldly people, it brought jealousy on the part of Laban's son.

Of course, Laban's sons are ungodly, heathen, it's a very sad thing when such jealousy is found among those who call themselves believers, when there is a jealousy in seeing God prospering like somebody else.

And Jacob saw the face of Laban, it was not friendly toward him as formerly. We've seen that before in Genesis, chapter four, in the case of Cain, that when there was something, there was a wrong attitude in the heart, it was expressed on the face.

And this is the second time we see in the book of Revelation, a wrong attitude in the heart expressed on the face. And anyone who is wholehearted in this matter of salvation and sanctification will really seek to work out salvation not only in the fact that we don't do anything wrong, but that we have so cleansed our hearts that there is no change in the expression of our face.

We know that when we have a difficulty with someone, or when someone has treated us in some way badly, or there is jealousy, we sense that the expression on our face is not the same as it is towards people to whom we are very warm and friendly.

Well that's just an indication that we need to still work out our salvation there. We need to really take that seriously. Lord, I see there that there was a slight change of expression in my face towards that person, which is an indication that I really need to work out my salvation in this area till I really become like the sun that God has created, which shines exactly the same on good and evil people.

It's significant that twice in Genesis we come across that, that the face of a man changes when his heart attitude towards someone is affected. It's significant that in both cases, mentioned in Genesis 4 and Genesis 31, it was caused by jealousy.

And dear brothers and sisters, there is far more jealousy in our flesh than we think there is. We can think that we are free from it, but we need to ask God to give us light in this area so that we are thoroughly cleansed from this evil, wretched thing.

Jacob's Twenty Years of Discipline

And then the Lord said to Jacob, return to the land of your fathers and your relatives, and I will be with you. See, Jacob himself was quite comfortable there, he really had no plans to go back, but God made the circumstances so difficult that Jacob was compelled to move.

And then the Lord said to him, it's time for you to go back. And he had already spent twenty years in Mesopotamia, twenty years of discipline, twenty years where he had to live in his father-in-law's house.

If you have lived in your father-in-law's house, you know what it is like to be twenty years there. It wasn't easy. It's interesting that God trained Moses for forty years in the same way in the wilderness, put him in his father-in-law's house for forty years.

What a breaking. It's amazing how God uses our in-laws to break us. There in Genesis, there in Exodus, there in the twentieth century, He uses our in-laws to break us so that He can discipline us, provided we respond to that treatment of God in the right way.

It's possible for us to rebel and to waste that discipline. I believe that when we stand at the judgment seat of Christ and see God's plan for our lives as He meant it to be, there will be many, many believers who will feel so sad and have so much regret because of the wasted discipline, the wasted sorrows and sufferings that could have accomplished something that would have made them rich for eternity, but in which they didn't see God, they only saw their in-laws.

They only saw their father-in-law, they only saw their mother-in-law, they only saw their brothers-in-law. They never saw God in that whole situation, trying to break them and discipline them. And therefore, all those years were wasted, no doubt Jacob also must have gone through that attitude.

It took twenty years, finally, before God's time came for him to, for his period of discipline to be over. God doesn't forget about it, twenty years is a long time. Think back to where we were twenty years ago, and think from, say, where were you in 1967?

And where are you today? Twenty years is a long time to be disciplined. You can almost think God's forgotten about you, but he hasn't. God knows exactly the right time to open the prison door, or the door of the school, where he can graduate us out of that school of discipline.

There's a verse in Psalm 105 which says, Psalm 105 and verse 19, speaking about Joseph, when he was in prison, and the word of God says, here in Psalm 105, verse 19, until the time that God's word came to pass, the word of the Lord tested him, then he was released.

Think of that phrase, there is a time when God's word comes to pass, till that time the word of the Lord tests us. Jacob was tested, Moses was tested, Joseph went through periods of testing, David went through periods of testing, Paul, Peter, every man of God has gone through a period of testing.

John the Baptist was tested out in the wilderness for many years. The untested people in scripture were people like Isaac, and you know how he ended up. King Saul, and you know how he ended up. Solomon, you know how he ended up.

These were the untested people who got everything on a silver platter, dropped into their lap. But every man of God that we read of in scripture has been tested, trial and discipline. Jacob was a young man when he went out, and it's good for a young man, we read in Lamentations 3, a very wonderful word for young people, if God is to really fulfill His purpose through them.

Bearing the Yoke in Youth

As the years have gone by and I've seen many young people who have come to the Lord, I've come to see the reality of this verse, that this, one would say, is almost the number one reason why many people for whom God had a wonderful plan and purpose and ministry have not been able to accomplish it in their lives because they were not willing to submit to His discipline.

Lamentations is a book after Jeremiah, chapter 3 and verse 27. It's good for a man that he should bear the yoke, and that's a symbol of discipline, in his youth. Let him sit alone and be silent, since God has laid it on him, not his in-laws, God.

Let him put his mouth in the dust, that means keep his mouth shut, and fall upon his face in the dust, and then there will be hope. Let him give his cheek to the smiter. Let him be filled with reproach, not just one word of reproach, but be filled with it, for the Lord will not reject forever.

If he causes grief, he'll have compassion. He does not afflict willingly, verse 33, or grieve the sons of men. Verse 37, who is there who speaks when it comes to pass, unless the Lord has commanded it?

Yeah, God permits these things, and it's good for a man, when he's young, to go through the discipline that Jacob went through in his youth. He could prophesy later on in his life as a prophet, because he's gone through a discipline in his younger days.

And that's why God arranges our circumstances, and teaches us submission in our younger days, and breaks the strength of our will. Those of you who are young people, and those of you who are growing up from being young people, also need to ask yourself whether there's ever been a time in your life when God has been able to break you by your submitting to authority.

Many young people today know almost nothing of submitting to authority. They have been a law unto themselves from the time they are born again. They know everything. They don't know what it is to submit to authority, and God says, all right, go ahead.

And the result is, even when they are forty years old, they're shallow. There is no richness in their life and ministry, because they've never known submission to authority all their life. They've been a law unto themselves.

What a sad thing. Think if you were saved when you were young, by the time you come to that age, you should have had a richness of content in your life, but that can only come if you submit to discipline and authority that God places over you.

And we see that Jacob did. He didn't rebel against Laban. He submitted. And God was able to do a work in Jacob, slowly, it's a slow process. And one day God said, all right, now you can go. Wonderful, if God is able to do that with us.

God’s Protection Through Circumstances

It's very wonderful to see what follows after that in the next chapter. And so God spoke to him by a direct word, and also by circumstances, that's usually the way He guides us, by word and by circumstances.

And so He calls His wives, Rachel and Leah, to His flock in the field, and said to them, I see your father's attitude, that his face towards me is not friendly. He said, you know that I served your father with all my strength, he wasn't lazy, yet your father has cheated me and changed my wages ten times.

However, God did not allow him to hurt me. Yeah, that's part of discipline, where God allows other people to cheat us, take advantage of us, and He humbles us, and we don't get our wages, we're treated unjustly.

And if we don't know in all those situations what it is to keep our mouth in the dust and humble ourselves, we'll never come to that place and ministry that God has appointed for us, and to that life that God desires us to have.

And he goes on to describe how God had blessed him, and so he says, let's go. And his wives agreed with him, verse fourteen, do we still have any portion or inheritance in our father's house? And they followed.

It's amazing. Way back there in the Old Testament, these wives behaved better than some New Testament Christian wives, who still think that they belong in their father's house. I want to ask all the wives here, where do you belong, in your husband's home or your father's home?

Which do you really consider your home? It's very important. The word of God says in Psalm 45, forget your father's house. I think it's true that very few sisters who are wholehearted enough to obey that.

Very few. But there, Rachel and Leah said, sure, we're going. And then Jacob arose, verse seventeen, and put his children and his wives upon camels, and he drove away all his livestock and all his property.

And when Laban, verse nineteen, had gone to shear his flock, then Rachel stole the household idols that were her father's. She had also learned some tricks from her husband, how to swipe something when the father was not watching.

Gold, golden idols. Daughters wanting to grab their share of the father's property before somebody else grabs it. Do you have anything like that? I must grab. I'm going away from home now. I better grab whatever I can from the house before I leave.

After all, it's my father's property. I can take. It's mine. I can take it and go. This lust. Yeah, we see that there. She had become like her husband, all right. And Jacob deceived Laban, verse twenty.

He was a deceiver. He got a wife who was a deceiver. And he fled with all that he had, verse twenty-one. And when Laban heard it on the third day, he followed after. And he took his kinsmen and pursued him for seven days and overtook him.

And see how God cares for Jacob. God came to Laban, the Syrian, in a dream of the night, and said, Be careful that you do not speak to Jacob, either good or bad. It's amazing how God can speak to. Laban was not a converted person.

Laban was a godless idolater. We see he was worshiping these idols. And he was chasing after these people partly to recover his gods who had been stolen. But God Almighty could speak to this heathen man's heart.

It's tremendous to see in scripture how God can speak to a heathen man's heart, saying, Don't trouble that child of mine. Tremendous comfort if you have faith in this God, that when we are children of God, God can even speak to heathen people who are seeking to trouble us and restrain us.

Their hearts are in His hands. He's Almighty. It's wonderful to live under the protection of a heavenly Father. And Laban came up and caught up with Jacob and he said, Why have you deceived me? Why have you fled secretly?

And then he says in verse 29, It is in my power to do you harm. But the God of your father spoke to me last night. Not my God, the God of your father spoke to me last night, saying, Be careful not to speak either good or bad.

God’s Authority Over Human Threats

And we see here how he uses similar expressions to what Pilate used to Jesus in John 19, verse 10 and 11. Pilate said to Jesus, Don't you know that I have authority to crucify you and I have authority to release you?

And Jesus said, You have no authority over me unless it's given you from above, from my father. Unless my father has given you that authority, you have no authority to crucify me or release me. And that's what Jacob's attitude was.

He didn't realize that fully as Jesus did, but God worked for him. Laban could not harm him because God came in between Laban and Jacob. And it's very good for us to see that, that God stands in between us and those who seek to harm us.

If we are called, if we are among the called, if we have made our calling and election sure, if we are those who have submitted to God's discipline in our life. And then here is what Laban says about who his God is.

He says, The God of your father, in verse 29, he says, But my gods, why did you steal my gods? His gods are the type that can be stolen. And he comes to recover his gods. It's amazing, the stupidity of idolatry, that somebody steals your gods and you've got to go and recover these gods of yours.

And finally, Rachel is clever enough to hide these idols by sitting on them, verse 34, and not getting up in her father king. And so he didn't discover it. And then Jacob tells Laban, I served you for 20 years, verse 38.

If a beast was torn, if an animal was torn by the beast, I replaced it myself. Verse 40, I worked by day, the heat consumed me, and the frost by night, and my sleep fled from my eyes. In these 20 years I have been your house lighter.

And then they made a covenant not to harm one another, and Laban says, This is a covenant that you will take care of my daughters, and you won't marry anyone else. And this is a witness. And like that, they parted.

When we come to chapter 32 and verse 1, as Jacob went on his way, the angels of God met him. Yeah, he had obeyed what God had told him, and when we obey God and we are in God's ways, the word of God in Psalm 91, 11 says, He will give His angels charge over you, concerning you, to keep you in all your ways.

And this was sort of God's encouragement, because he had just finished with Laban, and now he was going to meet another enemy, Esau. And in between one enemy and another enemy, both of whom God was going to restrain.

He restrained Laban, and He was going to restrain Esau. God sent His angels to encourage Jacob. Wonderful. Now one would, Jacob was not such a wholehearted, zealous, devoted disciple that God should do all these things.

One would think that God does this only for those who are perfect. It's amazing how He does these things for those whom He has called. It's one of the things that I've discovered, that when it comes to material things and earthly protection, which is what most believers are interested in, God gives it to everybody.

You don't have to be wholehearted to get God's protection. You don't have to be wholehearted to get answers to prayer. You don't have to be wholehearted to get physical healing or material things. You have to be wholehearted to partake of God's nature.

But here we're not talking about Jacob partaking of the divine nature. Here we're talking about the angels of God encouraging him and comforting him, protecting him from Laban on one side, Esau on one side.

Yeah, God does that even for crooked Jacobs, because He loves them, because He's called them. But I trust that none of us will ever find our comfort in the fact that God protects us from our enemies. The greatest message I get from Scripture is that God answers my prayer and protects me from my enemies.

I don't have a clue about the New Covenant at all. This is Old Covenant. But God encourages him, sends his angels, and Jacob says, this is God's camp. So he named that place Mahane. It's very interesting to see that when God speaks to people, they don't necessarily have to be wholehearted.

God spoke to Balaam, God spoke to Jacob. Today you hear somebody says God spoke to him personally. Maybe He did. But it doesn't mean He's spiritual. He may be a godless heathen like Balaam. God spoke to Laban.

So don't get excited when you hear somebody say God spoke to me face to face. Maybe He did. He spoke to Laban and Balaam as well. It doesn't prove much about the person's spirituality. It's partaking of divine nature alone that is a mark of a spiritual man, not that God speaks to him.

Jacob Faces Esau in Fear

And Jacob said when he saw them, and then Jacob sent messengers, sorry, verse 3, before him to his brother Esau. He knew that he had escaped from one enemy. His father-in-law chased him. Now he had another one in front, and that was Esau, who he knew would be waiting for him for 20 years to finish him off.

And he says, go and tell my lord Esau. You know what Isaac told Jacob when he blessed him? Do you remember the birthright blessing? Be lord over your brother. But he's scared now. He says, Esau is my lord, and I'm your servant.

And please let me find favor in your sight. And the messengers, I don't think they even got a chance to give the message to Esau, because halfway through they heard that Esau was coming in 400 people, and they just ran back to Jacob saying, we came to your brother Esau, and he's coming to meet you, and 400 men are with him.

And Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. How very much like us. We have experienced God delivering us from a laban. We have experienced the angels of God comforting us. And a similar situation arises again after a few days, and we are scared.

We wonder whether God will help us this time, like he did last time. And so, the scheming Jacob starts working, divides the people in the flocks, and he says, if Esau comes to one company and attacks it, then the other company can escape, like a military commander.

And Jacob said, oh God, this is the last resort, just in case everything fails, we better turn to God as well, after we have schemed and planned and manipulated. The last resort is God. Oh God, who did say to me, return to your country and your relatives, I'll prosper you.

I am unworthy of all the loving kindness. It's very easy to recognize our unworthiness when we are in the soup, and when we are in difficulty. The problem is to recognize our unworthiness when everything is going well, and we have no labans or Esaus chasing us.

At that time, to say to God, Lord, I am unworthy of the least of thy mercies, that's the mark of a spiritual man. When a man says to God when he is in a real difficulty, oh God, I am unworthy of the least of thy mercies, it means nothing.

It means nothing. For twenty years he hadn't thought of that. But now, when he's in difficulty. Yeah, the Bible faithfully describes Jacob for us as a man exactly like us in every way. No different. And that's an encouragement to us.

You see, you read the biographies of a lot of modern day saints, it'll never be like this. All the followers of John Wesley think that John Wesley never made a mistake, there was nothing wrong with him.

All the followers of Martin Luther would think that he never made a mistake, there was nothing wrong with him. All the followers of William Booth will think that he was a great man, there was nothing wrong with him.

And all the followers of John O. Smith think there was nothing wrong with him, he was a perfect man. That's true all over the world. Everybody thinks our leader was a perfect man. But the word of God describes people in their human frailties.

These are biographies inspired by the Holy Spirit, because these encourage us that God has chosen such people and transformed them. And if we are honest, we see that we are like this, and we get hope.

These other biographies and stories that we hear of so many great men only make us idolize them, which God never wants us to do. But here are biographies in scripture that encourage us, whether it's of Jacob's or Abraham's or Paul's or Peter's in the New Testament.

They're all honest, all absolutely honest. And so we see here that Jacob was a man exactly like us, who reacted like us in times of difficulty. And yet God cared for him and helped him. Of course, his concern is only for his own safety.

Deliver me, I pray thee, he says, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau. For I fear him, lest he come and attack me, mother of his children. But I would say, I'll surely prosper you and make your descendants the sand of the sea.

Well, if God had said that, he'd keep his word. There's no need to fear. So he spent the night there. And he still schemes how to please Esau. He selected from what he had with him a present and collects a whole lot of goats and rams and camels and sends them by the hands of his servants.

And he commanded them to say to Esau in verse 17, say to them in verse 18, these belong to your servant, to the present and to my lord Esau. Here is that undignified attitude before a worldly person, which is absolutely unbecoming of a child of God.

Humility is one thing. But to act like this, because I want a favor from this worldly person, I need to ask myself, would Jesus act like this? Oh, I am your servant and you are my lord. That's why Jesus said, don't learn humility from the dictionary, learn it from me.

Learn of me, for I am humble in heart. Otherwise we'll never understand humility. There's a dignity about a child of God, which is not opposed to humility. We don't see that dignity in Jacob, because he was scared.

The fear of man. And because he wanted some favor from this man. Again we see how much like us he is. And so the present passed on before him. And then he arose the same night and took his two wives and his two maids and his eleven children and crossed the ford of the Jabbok.

And he took them and sent them across the stream. And he sent across whatever he had. And then, this is a very important period now that we enter into Jacob's, in Jacob's life. This particular night, he had just finished with one enemy, another enemy in front of him.

God had disciplined him for twenty years. One pressure after another. And a man wrestled with him until daybreak. If you turn to Hosea chapter twelve, verse three and four. Hosea chapter twelve. Verse three and four we read that that was an angel that wrestled with Jacob.

It says in Hosea twelve, verse three,. In the womb he took his brother by the heel. And in his maturity he contended with God. Yes, he wrestled with the angel and prevailed. He wept and sought his favor.

He found him at Bethel. And there he spoke with us. So we see here that the one Jacob wrestled with was an angel. And prevailed, he wept and sought his favor. So turning back to Genesis thirty-two. We read these wonderful words.

And that was what God was waiting for. God was waiting for Jacob to be alone. He had to deal with him personally. And I would like to think that God is very often waiting to meet with us alone. And that's what we may not have time for in the busy world we live in.

Occupied with a job and property and wife and children. Jacob had all this. He had more than us. Four wives, eleven children and more property and more to take care of. It is so difficult to get him to be alone.

And God could never do what he wanted to do with this man while he was in the midst of all this. Occupied with all these things. He had to put pressure after pressure after pressure. And get him into a circumstance where he had to send off everybody and be alone.

And then God said, now I can deal with him. And he began to wrestle with him. And that wrestling was a picture of what God had been trying to do with Jacob for all these twenty years. Twenty years ago when he met him at Bethel.

With that ladder that led up to heaven. He had spoken to him but he hadn't responded in the way God wanted. And so for twenty years he had been wrestling. And this final night God was going to give him.

It was like, we can say, it was the graduation day from the school of discipline. And the way God took him through his convocation was quite different from earthly convocations. By breaking him. It was the final, it was giving him the certificate of discipline.

After twenty years in this school. And he wrestled with him. Wrestling like God wrestles with us. And we can ask, why does God wrestle with us? And we can answer that question by saying, God always wrestles with us to bring us down to a zero point.

When we are converted we are all so high up. Every one of us. And the younger we are, the cleverer we are, the higher up we are. And the richer we are, add all this, add it. Riches, youth, intelligence.

And then we are pretty high. And for God to break a man who is young and intelligent and rich. To bring him down to zero is quite a job. And so he arranges circumstances. Gives him a certain type of wife, certain type of in-laws, certain type of circumstances, certain type of job.

And if that man will submit to authority. Gives him certain types of brothers and sisters who make demands on him. And if that man can submit to authority in his younger days. And live with a yoke upon his neck and not think that he knows everything.

God can do such a work. Finally, that he can bring that person also to a convocation day. Say, alright, I'll give you a certificate now. God seeking to bring us down to zero. To bring us down to nothing.

To bring down all those high thoughts we have. Of our knowledge and our ability and our usefulness to God, etc., etc. And it says here in verse 25, when he saw that he had not prevailed. That means even after 20 years, it's been a tough job for God to break Jacob.

That he touched the socket of his thigh. So the socket of Jacob's thigh was dislocated while he wrestled with him. That was the final breaking. That was the certificate. Right? For 20 years I've hit at you little by little by little by little by little by little by little by little.

And I haven't succeeded. I have to now give you one big blow. Because I love you so much. I can't allow you to waste your life. Have you come to that place? Have you ever come to that place, dear brothers and sisters?

It's very difficult for us to know how God deals with other people. But Jesus said, by their fruits you shall know them. I've come to see one thing. That every man whom God has used and done a work through.

In a deep and lasting way. In the history of the church that I've ever heard of. Has been a broken man. So by their fruits you know them. And then you can ask, is God partial? He is not. It must mean that many others have resisted that breaking somewhere along the line.

Their knowledge is good. And it's possible, brothers and sisters, to know all about Jesus coming in our flesh. Putting the flesh to death in a new and living way. About being kind and good and merciful.

And all the things. And submitting to injustice and injury and all that. And yet, for a strength in ourselves that remains with all this knowledge. And all this external submission. And everything that can be inside.

A self that has never been bent or broken. And that manifests itself. And there's a sudden provocation. And that's a wonderful thing. When God has been able to break a man so thoroughly. That he cannot be offended anymore.

That he does not seek his own. Or think highly of himself anymore. That is the place to which God wants to bring every one of his children. But I wonder whether even 1 of his children ever reach there.

99%. Even those who know the theory of it. Theory of it. Never reach that place. Because if they reach that place. God would have made them into Israel. Because that was the time when it says he broke him.

From Grabbing Earthly Things to Holding God

And this man who all his life had been grabbing earthly things. He came out of his mother's womb. Grabbing his brother's leg. Grabbed his brother's birthright. Went to his uncle's house and grabbed his two daughters.

And grabbed his property. Grabbing, grabbing, grabbing. Women, property. Whatever one can get for oneself. Now, what does he grab? He's grabbing God. He says in verse 26. God said, let me go for the dawn is breaking.

And he said, I will not let you go. Unless you bless me. You see what he's holding now? He's holding on to God. He's not interested in all those things now. He's not grabbing his property. He says, Lord you.

Unless you bless me. I will not let you go. It's wonderful when God has done such a breaking in us. That the only thing we want to hold on to. Is God himself. I believe that's the mark. One mark anyway.

Of a really broken man. That he doesn't want to hold on to anything more in life. Except God. That's all. And we may think we do. But let somebody. Run across our path and do something. And immediately we rise up.

And anger or self-justification or something. All of which prove. That God alone is not enough for us. We need something else as well. All of which proves. That God has still not been able to. Bring us down to zero.

When you're running after earthly things. When you justify yourself. These are all indications. That God has not been able to bring us down to zero. Our mouth is not in the dust. Our mouth is very much open.

Up in the air. And so God has to wait. Like we read in Isaiah. He waits. That he might be gracious to us. With Moses he waited 40 years. With Jacob 20 years. With some people he's waited all their lifetime.

And never succeeded. And I wonder if you realize the seriousness of this. Dear brothers and sisters. You can be baptized in the Holy Spirit. And yet if God has not broken you. You'll never never in your whole life.

Ever be able to fulfill all that God wanted to fulfill through your life. We read that when Jesus took the five loaves. He blessed them. We can say that's the picture of the baptism in the Holy Spirit.

Then before he fed the multitudes. He broke the loaves. That's always the second step. Between the blessing and the feeding. There's a breaking. And that is what releases the power. And so God has done one thing.

He's got this man to lay hold of him. And then another step. He said to him. What is your name? Something like Isaac asked him. When he came with the meat curry. What is your name? That time he said Esau.

This time he's honest. What is your name? Deceiver. Alright. I'll change you. I wonder if we see this. This is brokenness. Lord I've got nothing to justify myself. I am a deceiver. I'm a cheat. I'm one who grabs for myself.

That's the meaning of Jacob. That is my name. There's nothing that God loves. Like honesty. And that's why God hates the self justification so much. Because when we justify ourselves. We're saying my name is not Jacob.

I'm righteous. I've acted in a spiritual way. God says alright. You've got to wait some more years. The word of the Lord is not yet ready to release you. Go back into the school of discipline. But if we can be honest.

And say my name is Jacob. I'm a deceiver. Always seeking. That which will promote my own ends. And my own name. And my own gain. My own honor. That will make me somebody in the eyes of others. That which will prove to others.

That I was right and the other person was wrong. God says wait. Few more years. Back to the school. Till we. Till our mouth is in the dust. And we say Lord that's my name. Deceiver. Cheat. Grabber. Then he said your name will no longer be Jacob.

Think how God is so quick. To meet an honest man. You will no longer be Jacob. From now on. Because you were honest with me. If you had tried to fool me. And tried to justify yourself before me. And say.

Yeah Laban did this to me. That's why I behaved like that. He can say all that to Laban. But he can't say that to God. Because he was honest. God said to him. You shall no longer be Jacob. But you shall be Israel.