A Manuel on Facing Trouble Genesis 32:1-21

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None of us know what the future holds. We plan our days ahead of time, but we don't know what each day might bring.
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Proverbs 16 .9 says, the heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.
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Every week, I write a sermon. Yet, I have no way of knowing for sure if I will preach on Sunday.
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Something could happen where I don't make it to this pulpit. But there is a high likelihood
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I will be here to preach. In fact, in two years at this church, by God's grace, there have been no emergencies and I have preached every sermon
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I plan on preaching. None of us knows what the future holds. And this is a good thing since it's nice not knowing the trouble that might be on the horizon.
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As the saying goes, ignorance is bliss. But what we do know is that trials are coming.
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James 1 -2 tells us that we will meet trials of various kinds. You can mark it down.
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You will have trials. And you know this because you've lived long enough. Life is full of trials.
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And you may be experiencing some right now. Trouble will come. But the question
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I want to ask is, what do we do as we anticipate problems or danger?
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It's always wise to plan ahead. The Word of God gives us much instruction on navigating through difficulty.
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We would be wise to think through these things so that we are prepared. My high school coach used to say, if you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail.
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And as we continue our sermon series this morning through Genesis, we are going to see apparent danger on the way for Jacob.
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Jacob just left one trial as he escaped his father -in -law
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Laban. And now he's about to face another trial as his vengeful brother
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Esau is approaching. And Jacob is going to set us an example, an excellent example, as he anticipates danger in the right way.
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And these patterns set by Jacob will teach us how the Lord expects us to live as we anticipate trouble.
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So as always, I encourage you to turn in a Bible with me to Genesis chapter 32. We'll be looking at verses one through 21.
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And if you're using a red Bible in the pew, it's on page 32. The sermon is titled,
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Emmanuel on Facing Trouble. Our big idea, our proposition is as we anticipate trouble, we must follow the
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Lord's counsel. As we anticipate trouble, we must follow the Lord's counsel. We'll see two patterns, as I already mentioned.
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And the first pattern is to conform to the model of prayer prescribed in Scripture.
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To conform to the model of prayer prescribed in Scripture. And we'll see this in verses one through 12.
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But before we jump in, I want to give you a little recap of last week's sermon. We finished the narrative of Jacob's escape from his father -in -law,
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Laban. Over a several day period, Laban pursued Jacob and finally tracked him down.
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We saw two weeks ago that Laban told Jacob he was in the wrong for leaving, when in reality, Laban was in the wrong for taking advantage of Jacob for all of those years.
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Last week, we saw Jacob respond by setting the record straight. Jacob told
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Laban his spotless record and showed Laban how he wronged him over the years. What we saw in the last part of this narrative between these two men is the
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Lord abundantly shows up for his people in times of conflict. Life is full of conflicts, and so we saw how the
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Lord guides us through this. We saw two ways the Lord helps us in times of conflict. The first is by protecting his people from those who desire to harm.
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The application for us is that as Christians, we will face enemies. We face flesh and blood enemies, humans, and spiritual enemies, demonic forces.
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The Lord always protects his people in different ways as they face harm. The Lord protected Jacob by delivering him from Laban.
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The second way how we saw the Lord shows up abundantly is by leading believers to pursue peace with offenders.
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In that narrative, the Lord made a way for peace to happen and as Laban was forced to pursue peace with Jacob, and Jacob gladly made a peace covenant with his father -in -law.
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The Lord showed us the example of peace in this narrative, and he expects us to pursue peace in our own lives as well.
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This leads us to our text today as Jacob leaves one problem only to encounter another, his brother
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Esau, with whom he had a very troubled relationship. If you think you have problems with siblings, this is to the next level.
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And so he enters the picture again. Before we jump into this narrative, we have to remember the tenuous relationship between these two brothers.
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If you can remember back to chapter 25, Jacob took advantage of Esau by stealing his birthright when he was tired after hunting all day.
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Esau is out hunting in the field, Jacob is in making a stew, and he comes in and he takes advantage of him by saying, if you eat this meal,
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I get your birthright. And Esau was the older son, so Jacob steals it from him.
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Then in chapter 27, Jacob deceived his father Isaac by stealing the blessing from Esau.
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Esau, as the firstborn, was in line to receive the blessing as well, and Jacob took it from him.
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All of this happened according to God's providence. As he planned for Jacob to receive the blessing and not
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Esau, the Lord prophesied in 25 -23 that the older shall serve the younger.
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And the Lord brought this about through strange means as Jacob received the birthright and the blessing.
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All of this led Esau to be very angry at Jacob. In 27 -41 -42, we are told that Esau comforted himself by plotting to kill his brother.
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That's what brought him comfort, the thought of killing his brother. So this background was why
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Jacob was sent to Pot -on -A -Ram in the first place, where he ran into Laban. Jacob's mother,
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Rebekah, sent him off to where Laban lived to kill two birds with one stone, namely to protect her son and for him to find a wife.
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But now that Jacob's heading back to the land of Canaan, he's about to cross paths with his brother
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Esau. So 20 years he spent up there. He's with Leah and Rachel now.
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He has 12 children. He has all of these possessions and he comes back to the land of Canaan and now he's wondering, where's my brother?
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He hasn't forgotten that his brother plotted to kill him all those years before. So verses one and two of chapter 32.
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Jacob went on his way and the angels of God met him. And when Jacob saw them, he said, this is
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God's camp. So he called the name of that place, Mahanaim. I'm going to stop right here.
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Because we have to notice these angels here. As Jacob continues his travels, he comes to this place where the angels of God are there.
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Now this encounter is mysterious. If anyone of us had an encounter like this, it would probably be the most memorable moment of our life.
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But Jacob has had several encounters with angels sent from God. The only other time in scripture where the phrase angels of God is used is in Genesis 28, 12.
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That was Jacob's ladder. The account where we read that the angels were ascending and descending on this ladder.
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So in verse one, Jacob sees a multitude of angels. How remarkable this is.
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We must understand that angels surround us all the time. Now Jacob saw them on several occasions, but their reality is no less real today than it was in his day.
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And we'll see the significance of these angels as this narrative continues over the next couple of weeks. When Jacob saw these angels, he names this location
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Mahanaim, which in Hebrew means two camps. And he may have named it this because he and his family belong to one camp and the angels belonged to another camp.
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Now that Jacob is close to where his brother Esau resided, as I mentioned, he wants to know where his brother is and what's going on in his life.
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And he probably is thinking this way because he's concerned that his brother's going to hurt him. So verse three, and Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau, his brother in the land of Seir, the country of Edom.
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It's important for us to understand where Jacob is geographically. He's northeast of the
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Dead Sea, just north of the Jabbok River. You might be wondering, okay, where in the world is that?
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You might know where the Dead Sea is, it's a northeast. The place where he was, where the narrative with Laban was hundreds of miles northeast of this location.
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So he's traveling back to the land of promise and this is where he stops. And these are the instructions that Jacob gave his servants concerning Esau in verses four and five.
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Instructing them, thus you shall say to my Lord Esau, thus says your servant Jacob, I have sojourned with Laban and stayed until now.
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I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, male servants and female servants. I have sent to tell my
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Lord in order that I may find favor in your sight. So Jacob had just finished resolving a conflict with Laban and he does not want there to be another one as he's entering the promised land with his brother
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Esau. Jacob knows full well the history between he and his brother from 20 years before.
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And by offering this gift of herds, Jacob is hoping to appease Esau's wrath as he says at the end of verse five.
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After Jacob's messengers went south to find Esau, they returned to him and gave him a report in verse six.
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And the messengers returned to Jacob saying, we came to your brother Esau and he's coming to meet you and there are 400 men with him.
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So Jacob gets the news. There's 400 men coming with Esau.
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And as you might expect, and maybe if you were in his shoes, what's his response gonna be?
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That 400 men are coming with his brother who plotted to kill him 20 years before.
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This is Jacob's response in verses seven and eight. Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed.
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He divided the people who were with him and the flocks and herds and camels into two camps thinking if Esau comes to the one camp and attacks it, then the camp that is left will escape.
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So clearly Jacob doesn't think his brother had a transformation in the past 20 years.
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He's terrified over what might be coming. There's apparent danger on the way.
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As Americans who live in northwestern Wisconsin, the fear of a military invasion can be foreign to us.
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In fact, the last war fought on American soil was, anybody know? Civil War, very good.
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It took a military veteran to get that answer. That's remarkable when you think of it.
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Think of how many countries in the world can say that. Very few, most countries have faced a war of one kind or another on their soil in that time.
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We are very blessed. At this point in the ancient Near East, invasions would have been commonplace.
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When Jacob heard that Esau was coming with 400 men, he immediately thought military invasion as they were approaching.
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So what Jacob does in verses seven and eight is divide the people and the flocks into two camps.
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He's thinking, I don't wanna lose everything, so I'm gonna make these two camps. So if he attacks one camp, he'll think that's everybody, and so at least the other camp will be spared.
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The first thing that Jacob does is wisely come up with this plan. His quick action here is the right thing to do.
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But as we have seen Jacob grow over the past 20 years, if he just did this plan, he would have fallen short.
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He has grown as a man, specifically his relationship with God. And so Jacob does something very, very important and very, very wise in verses nine through 12.
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Let's see it right here. And Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham and God of my father
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Isaac, O Lord who said to me, return to your country and to your kindred that I may do you good.
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I am not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant.
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For with only my staff, I crossed this Jordan and now I have become two camps. Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him that he may come and attack me.
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The mother is with the children. But you said, I will surely do you good and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for a multitude.
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Wow. So as Jacob faces this frightening situation, he does the right thing by praying for the
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Lord's help. In verse nine, Jacob alludes to what the Lord told him in chapter 31, verse three, specifically that as Jacob returned to the land of Canaan from this region way in the north, the
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Lord promised to be with him. And then he prays in verse 11, Lord, do what you promised.
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This is where we see God's sovereignty and human responsibility working together.
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This is one of the great mysteries of the world, but both are true. God is sovereign over everything and yet we make free choices to do whatever we want.
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And we see that here. The Lord promised to be with him as he returned to the land of Canaan.
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And then he prays in verse 11, Lord, do what you promised. The Lord wills to do things when we pray.
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To say this another way, the Lord plans that we would pray and then he would do what he promised.
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James 4 .2 says, you do not have because you do not ask.
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So the Lord promised help for Jacob. And when Jacob prays, the Lord delivers on his promise.
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And we'll see this more in the next couple of weeks. How the Lord answers this prayer and the very things that he promised beforehand.
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Jacob also reminds the Lord what he told him in the Jacob's ladder. Event in chapter 28, verse 14, the
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Lord told him your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth. So Jacob, you'll notice here in his prayers is repeating
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God's words back to him. These are the kinds of prayers the
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Lord loves to hear. Jesus said in John 15, 16, that whatever you ask the
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Father in my name, he will give it to you. And what he means by my name, the things that God desires.
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Do you pray the things that God desires? 17th century Puritan Thomas Manton wrote that when you pray, show
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God his handwriting. To give you a little illustration of this, how it's worked in my own life, a number of years ago,
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I was down in Florida with my uncle and my uncle was an unbeliever and we were out on his boat in the
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Cove area before you get out to the Gulf of Mexico. And as we were going on his boat,
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I wanted to share the gospel with him. Scripture tells us to be ready in season and out of season.
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And as we were going, I was thinking, Lord, would you open up a door for me to say a good word about Jesus? And then like two minutes later, my uncle asked me the question,
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Seth, what do you do in your spare time? And at this time, I was getting involved in my church and I'm thinking, okay, this is it.
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This is the open door he's given me. And I explained to him. And before we knew, we were talking about his salvation just a few minutes later, after that conversation started.
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And I was thinking, the Lord answers prayer and he answers prayers that are in his word.
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Colossians 4 .3, Paul prays that people would pray that a door would be open to them to be able to share the gospel to unbelievers.
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If we want our prayers to be answered, we must pray God's promises back to him. And let me give you a couple of examples.
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If you're facing a difficult situation in your life, Isaiah 41 .10 says, fear not, for I am with you.
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Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you. I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
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So you can pray, Lord, you're claiming the promise of Isaiah 41 .10. Lord, help me not to fear.
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Help me to remember that you will sustain me, that you will uphold me with your righteous right hand.
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Or what if you pray with sincerity, Lord, will you make me more like you?
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I wanna be holy. 1 Thessalonians 4 .3 tells us that the purpose of our lives is our sanctification or to be made more like Jesus, to become holy.
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God loves that prayer because it's his desire. It's in his word. He's told us what he wants from us.
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So we should follow Jacob's example and pray God's promises back to him.
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And in Jacob's situation, do you think the Lord is eager to answer Jacob's prayer of deliverance so that he would enter the land of promise unscathed?
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You better believe it because he promised it to him. And we're going to see over the next couple of weeks that he will deliver on this.
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I read from James 4 just a little bit ago that you do not receive because you do not ask. The Lord expects us to pray.
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Let me give you an example of this. If we don't pray for the Lord to work in our midst at Eureka Baptist Church, guess what's gonna happen?
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Nothing. Nothing of spiritual value will happen here unless we pray. So we need to be a church that prays and then sit back and just see the
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Lord work. And if we pray for selfish desires, if we ask for the wrong things, treating
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God like a genie and not our heavenly Father, we should not expect to receive anything from Him.
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In Jacob's prayer, we should also take note, the note of humility and the thankfulness that he showed as he prayed.
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You'll notice in verse 10 that he said, I am not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant, for with only my staff
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I crossed this Jordan, and now I have become two camps. Jacob is humbly thanking the
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Lord for his goodness toward him ever since he left Pot on Aram, where his father -in -law held him captive for all those years.
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And he says he left with very little and now 20 years later, he returns the two camps full of people and all of these possessions.
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And he knows that this is due to the Lord alone. How important it is that we recognize the
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Lord's goodness to us in our lives. This includes the gifts he has given us and even more importantly, his provision and sustaining power for our spiritual life.
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Jacob has been blessed and he expects to receive more of the Lord's blessing in the future because he promised this to him.
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And as he prays for deliverance from Esau, he highlights how the Lord's hand has been over his life for all those years before.
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The Apostle Paul wrote in Philippians 4 .6, he said, do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, make your request known to God.
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See the point I'm making here? When Jacob prayed, he prayed God's promises back to him and he also prayed a prayer of thanksgiving.
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He thanked the Lord too. So whenever we make a request prayer, what we should also include in that prayer is something of thanksgiving to the
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Lord. We should thank him for something. That's the model that God has given us when we pray. And these are the prayers the
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Lord loves to answer. We should always follow Jacob's example here because this is what the
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Lord has shown us. This is his counsel here. And if you're wondering how to learn more about this, there are two books that I recommend that teach us how to pray in this way.
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The first book is called Praying the Bible by Don Whitney. And the second is
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Take Words With You by Tim Kerr, K -E -R -R. Or if you would like to read something much smaller, but still every bit as good,
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DesiringGod .org has an article titled What Should We Pray For?
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And that would help you as well. So as we anticipate trouble, we should follow the Lord's counsel.
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And the first pattern to follow is to conform to the model of prayer prescribed in scripture.
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The second pattern to follow is to show respect even to those hostile to you.
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To show respect even to those hostile to you. And we'll see this in verses 13 through 21.
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So Jacob, after splitting all the people with him into two camps because he's afraid of what
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Esau might do to him, Jacob prepares for this encounter. Verse 13.
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So he stayed there that night and from what he had with him, he took a present for his brother
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Esau. So what we see here is Jacob's great desire, as we saw in verse five, is to turn
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Esau's wrath into favor. What we must note is that we don't know for sure if Esau is even planning revenge on Jacob.
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You notice that? There's nothing here that would indicate that he's actually coming to do anything to him.
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But Jacob is thinking danger is on the way because 20 years before this, his brother plotted to kill him.
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But Jacob seems to be wise in gathering all the information and planning ahead for the worst. Think about people in Florida when meteorologists are saying that a category four hurricane is approaching the coast and it may hit your home in five days.
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The wise thing to do is to secure everything you have and then to pray. This is what
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Jacob does here. And the present that Jacob is going to give Esau is a portion of his flock and we are about to see how wealthy
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Jacob became over the years. Let's look at verses 14 and 15. He's going to give him 200 female goats and 20 male goats, 200 ewes and 20 rams, 30 milking camels and their calves, 40 cows and 10 bulls, 20 female donkeys and 10 male donkeys.
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So I'm not a farmer. That sounds like a lot of herd and a lot of cattle. And if you're a farmer, you're probably thinking, wow, that's a lot.
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Jacob knows the value of having strong herd at this point in history. And so he decided to give plentifully to his brother
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Esau in order to please him. And this is the instruction he gave to his servants in verse 16.
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These he handed over to his servants, every drove by itself and said to his servants, pass on ahead of me and put a space between drove and drove.
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Okay, so he tells them, he gives these to them and instructs them to split them up into droves, probably so that Esau would know the precise gifts that he is getting from Jacob.
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Then in verses 17 through 19, Jacob instructs his servants as to what they are to say when they meet
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Esau. And I want you to pay very close attention to this because this is the point we're pulling out. He instructed the first, when
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Esau my brother meets you and asks you, to whom do you belong? Where are you going? And whose are these ahead of you?
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Then you shall say, they belong to your servant Jacob. They are a present sent to my
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Lord Esau. And moreover, he is behind us. He likewise instructed the second and the third and all who follow the droves.
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You shall say the same thing to Esau when you find him. So Jacob anticipates what
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Esau is going to say to them. And so he preps his servants so they know what to say.
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So Jacob is planning ahead, this whole narrative. This gives us counsel. We should always be people who plan.
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It's always wise to plan and he's doing that right here. And when he tells his servants is that they are to tell
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Esau they belong to your servant Jacob. They are a present sent to my
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Lord Esau. And he also instructs them that he will soon follow.
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We know what Jacob is doing here. He's hoping that this large present will appease
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Esau's wrath. But we also see here that Jacob's humility is shown.
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You notice how he addresses him as Lord and Jacob addresses himself as servant.
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This might sound like flattery, but what Jacob is doing here is right and proper.
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And the point I want you to see here is that we should show respect to those, even to those who we are in conflict with.
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So we should show respect to everybody. And this text is telling us even to those who are hostile to us.
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I remember when I was younger, I think it was an elementary school and we would get these magazines.
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I can't remember if it was Time Magazine or Newsweek, but it was a part of the class. We'd get these magazines.
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And one time we had the president, I think it was Bill Clinton at that time. And one of the students was coloring on his face.
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You know, they made funny ears on him and did all these funny things. And the teacher got very upset at the student because of the disrespect that he was showing our president.
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And I don't even know if our teacher liked the president. And it wouldn't matter.
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Whoever the president is to that person, Scripture tells us that.
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We should show respect to our authorities. And so what Jacob is doing here is he's rightly honoring his brother,
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Esau. And he calls him his servant. What's funny here is that Esau is older than Jacob, barely.
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They're twins. He came out of the womb right before him, but he's treating his brother like he's the elder.
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You notice that? And this is an application for us. Not only should we show respect to everybody, we should especially show respect to our elders.
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In Exodus 20, 12, children are commanded to honor their father and mother. Leviticus 19, 32 says, you shall stand up before the gray head and honor the face of an old man.
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And you shall fear your God. That's probably a verse you've never heard. That's interesting.
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We should show respect. And this is especially important in our culture.
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A lack of honoring older people in our country is a problem because American culture is very youth -driven.
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Younger people are typically held in a higher place than the older. And sometimes those who are older, sometimes they're just forgotten, but other times there's disrespect that can even take place.
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But we should be those who set the example of respecting those with seniority over us and going against the pattern of this world.
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We should not only treat our elders with respect, but we should treat everyone with respect.
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The apostle Peter wrote in 1 Peter 2 .17, honor everyone, love the brotherhood, fear
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God, honor the emperor. What we should most follow about Jacob is respecting those who we don't want to respect.
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And that's what's so exemplary about this. We may have a governing authority that we despise, but do we respectfully disagree with them?
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This is what God expects from us. And it's hard, especially if they're doing bad things. The Lord still wants us to show respect.
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He wants us to disagree too, absolutely. And to stand for truth. But we should always show honor to those whom the
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Lord has put over us. And Jacob is showing respect to someone who was trying to kill him.
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So we should follow his example. And in verse 20, we are reminded of Jacob's motivation in sending this large present ahead of him.
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Verse 20, and you shall say, he's saying this to his servants, moreover, your servant
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Jacob is behind us. For he thought I may appease him with the present that goes ahead of me. And afterward,
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I shall see his face. Perhaps he will accept me. Okay, so we see what
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Jacob is doing here. He set it up so that the worst case scenario, one camp would be destroyed and the other spared.
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But his greatest hope is that no one would die. So he sends his servants off with the gifts, praying and hoping for a good outcome.
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And verse 21 leaves us this way. So the present passed on ahead of him, and he himself stayed that night in the camp.
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As we anticipate trouble, we should follow the Lord's counsel. The second pattern we've seen is to follow the pattern of respect, even to those who are hostile to you.
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So to summarize our sermon this morning, as we anticipate trouble or problems in the future, we should follow the
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Lord's counsel. We should be people who are ready, people who are prepared. We see two patterns.
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The first is to conform to the model of prayer prescribed in Scripture. And the second faith pattern is to follow the pattern of showing respect to those who are hostile to you.
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So as we think about what danger might be approaching us, we don't know. We don't know what is going to happen in the future.
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At least in the small perspective, we don't know, right? We know how the world's going to end. We know Christ is coming back.
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We know that we are the Lord's forever. We'll be with him forever, if you know the Lord here today in paradise.
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However, we don't know the tiny details of the future. We don't know how we're going to die. We don't know what suffering might be ahead of us.
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But this morning, we've seen two things that we should follow. We need to know how to pray.
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And when danger comes, we need to pray. And we need to know the right way to pray so that the
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Lord will answer our prayer, so that he will be with us, so that he'll carry us through that difficult time.
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And as we pray and see God work, it is remarkable to go on this journey with him and see him work as we work alongside him.
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We're a people who have received all of these promises. If you think of the
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Bible, this is a book that is full of promises. And that's how God wants us to pray.
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He wants us to trust these promises and to remind him of these promises. I heard an illustration this week.
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A father promises his child that I'm going to go take you to get ice cream next week.
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And then a few days later, the child tells the father, dad, remember you're going to take me to go get ice cream.
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And the dad likes to hear that because he promised it just a couple of days before. And he's going to deliver on that, hopefully in a few days.
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So we see what the Lord has shown us here today. And so as we anticipate danger in the future, we need to be ready.
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And one of the ways is by praying and knowing how to pray in the right way.
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Now the two most memorable moments in Jacob's life are Jacob's ladder, which we saw in chapter 28.
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And now we're going to see the most memorable moment possibly in Jacob's life. And that is when he wrestles with God.
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And we will look at that next Sunday and see what the Lord has for us. Let's pray. Father in heaven, you are a wonderful God.
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Your plans are wonderful for this world. And right now, Lord, we are in the midst of this story of life that we are living.
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And we meet together on Sundays because we need to be encouraged. We need our tanks to be filled up.
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And I pray that each one here, Lord, would be encouraged. And Lord, if anyone here does not know
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Jesus Christ, if they came here today and they're dead in their sins, and they're on their way to hell,
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I pray, Lord, that they would understand that Jesus died on the cross for them so that they might have eternal life.
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If they would just believe in Him and turn from their sins, they would have eternal life. I pray for that,
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Lord. And that everyone here who is on the journey going through the life of faith, may we pray to You in the right way.
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May this church be a church full of people who pray Your promises back to You and then see
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You work and see You do wonderful things in our midst. And may we anticipate, as trouble might come in the future, may we pray to You and be ready to pray to You in the right way.