["Pomp and Circumstance"]
["My Savior's Love"]
Good evening, everyone. Welcome to First Works Baptist Church.
Let's all make our way inside, find our seats.
Let's all grab a songbook. Open that songbook up to song number 185,
My Savior's Love. Let's all stand together for our first song.
Song number 185, all of us standing together.
My Savior's Love. Everyone, nice and strong all together on that first verse.
I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene
and wonder how He could love me, a sinner condemned unclean.
How wonderful, how wonderful my song shall ever be.
How marvelous, how wonderful is my Savior's love for me.
For me it was in the garden, He prayed not my will but thine.
And He had no tears for His own grief but spread drops of blood for mine.
How marvelous, how wonderful and my song shall ever be.
How marvelous, how wonderful is my Savior's love for me.
He took my sins and my sorrow, He made them His very own.
He bore the burden of Calvary and suffered and died alone.
How marvelous, how wonderful and my song shall ever be.
How marvelous, how wonderful is my Savior's love for me.
When with a ransomed glory His face I last shall see,
It will be my joy through the ages to sing of His love for me.
How marvelous, how wonderful and my song shall ever be.
How marvelous, how wonderful is my Savior's love for me.
All right, great scene. We've got a treat for you guys tonight.
Pastor Anderson from Faith Ward is preaching for us.
It was supposed to be a surprise and so I just kept it under wraps.
We've known about this since before we started the church,
that we're going to have this day designated for him to come out.
No, I'm just kidding.
I'm looking forward to having him so make sure you thank him.
He's out here with his daughters and so make sure you thank him for coming.
Let's go ahead and pray. We'll get started.
Father, we thank you so much for our salvation, Lord.
We're thankful for the privilege we have to meet in church tonight.
I pray you be with Pastor Anderson as he preaches.
Lord, may you fill him with your spirit and your power
and give us ears to hear that what you would have for us this evening, Lord,
and help us to leave here changed.
We love you. We thank you.
We pray these things in Jesus' name.
Amen. You may be seated.
Song number 288, I Am Resolved.
Song number 288 in your song books.
Song number 288.
Everyone nice and all together on that first verse all together.
I am resolved no longer to linger
Charmed by the world's delight
Things that are higher, things that are no blur
Please have alert my sight
I will hasten to Him
Hasten so glad and free
Jesus' greatest highest
I will come to Thee
I am resolved to go to the Savior
Leading my sin and strife
He is the true one, He is the just one
He hath the words of life
I will hasten to Him
Hasten so glad and free
Jesus' greatest highest
I will come to Thee
I am resolved to follow the Savior
Faithful and true each day
Heed what He said, do what He will and
He is the living way
I will hasten to Him
Hasten so glad and free
Jesus' greatest highest
I will come to Thee
Okay, great singing. Thank you so much for being here this evening.
Just a few announcements. If you did not get a bulletin, go ahead and raise your hand and one of the ushers can get one for you.
Our services are as follows. Sunday morning is at 10.30. Sunday evening is at 5 p.m.
And then we have our Thursday night Bible study at 7 o'clock.
We are currently going through the book of 1 Thessalonians. Of course tonight we have a special guest with us tonight.
Pastor Anderson is going to be preaching so we are taking a break from that.
You see there the fall program is almost over. This coming Sunday
we have the November birthday breakfast that we are going to be celebrating so make sure you are here nice and early for that.
And then along with that we have the pie baking contest.
We do not have the rules on here but we have been giving out the rules so if you do not have the rules
you can go ahead and sign up. I am pretty sure everyone already has them.
There will be a first, second, and third prize winner for the pie baking contest.
Looking forward to that. And then of course we conclude our fall program with the annual
church Thanksgiving banquet and that will be on Tuesday, November 23.
The address is right there. Of course we are not publicizing the address there
but we do have it on the bulletin there.
Make sure you are as VP by November 14. I have seen a lot of people already sign up
so if you have not already make sure you do so tonight.
And I do want to mention this we are going to have a professional photographer there that evening
to take photos for all the families.
But you have to be there, so the service starts at 7 as usual
but you have to be there at 6.
From 6 to 645 is when the photographer is going to be there taking pictures of the families
and it is one photo per family.
If you show up at 646, sorry, it is not happening.
It is from between 6 and 645. We have to keep it strict because
we want to start the service on time. So if you want to get a photo with your family
just make sure you are there at that time and we are going to get that for you.
Looking forward to the banquet. If you have visitors you want to bring to that
that is great. Make sure you let us know how many people are coming with you with your family
so we can prepare accordingly with that.
Keep that in mind. Friday November 26 is the men's prayer meeting.
Just as a reminder to make sure you are filling out your point sheet system
on Sundays so we can get you your hoodie at the end of the fall program.
Then we are going to be announcing the first, second, and third prize winner at the Thanksgiving banquet.
Make sure you are turning those points in so we can record that and get that to you.
Quiet time resumes on Sunday evening from
3pm to 4.15 in the main auditorium and mother baby room.
No food or drink allowed in the main auditorium except for water and coffee.
Make sure you silence your phones during the preaching so as to not be a distraction during the service.
That is it. Let's go ahead and sing our next song.
364 standing on the promises of God. Song number 364.
Song number 364 standing on the promises of God.
Song 364. Everyone nice and strong
all together on that first verse. Standing on the promises
of Christ my King. Through eternal ages
let his praises ring. Glory in the highest
I will shout and sing. Standing on the promises
of God. Standing
standing. Standing on the promises
of God my Savior. Standing
standing. I'm standing
on the promises of God. Standing
on the promises that cannot fall. When
the howling storms of doubt and fear assail. By
the living Word of God I shall prevail. Standing
on the promises of God. Standing
standing. Standing
on the promises of God my Savior. Standing
standing.
I'm standing on the promises of God.
Standing on the promises of Christ the Lord.
Bound to him eternally by love's strong
sword. Overcoming daily with the Spirit's
sword. Standing on the promises of God.
Standing standing.
Standing on the promises of God my Savior.
Standing standing.
I'm standing on the promises
of God. Standing on the promises
I cannot fall. Listening every moment
to the Spirit's call. Resting in my Savior
as my all in all. Standing on the promises
of God. Standing
standing. Standing on the promises
of God my Savior. Standing
standing. I'm standing
on the promises of God.
At this time the ushers will collect the offering.
.
Good evening. We're in Genesis chapter 28.
And the Bible reads, and Isaac called Jacob and blessed him
and charged him and said unto him, Thou shall not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan.
Arise, go to Pate and Aram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother's father,
and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban, thy mother's brother.
And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful and multiply thee, that thou mayest
be a multitude of people, and give thee the blessing of Abraham to thee,
and to thy seed with thee, that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger,
which God gave unto Abraham. And Isaac sent away Jacob, and he went
to Pate and Aram unto Laban son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah,
Jacob's and Esau's mother. When Esau saw that, Isaac had blessed Jacob,
and sent him away to Pate and Aram, to take him a wife from thence, and that as he blessed him,
he gave him a charge, saying, Thou shall not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan,
that Jacob obeyed his father and his mother, and was gone to Pate and Aram. And he saw,
seeing that the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father, that when Esau
unto Ishmael, and took on to the wives which he had, may he let the daughter of Ishmael,
Abraham's son, the sister of Nabajoth, to be his wife.
And Jacob went out from Beersheba, and went toward Haran, and he lighted
upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set. And he took of the
stones of that place, and put them for his pillow, and lay down in that place to sleep.
And he dreamed, and behold, the ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven,
and behold, the angels of God descending and descending on it. And behold, the Lord
stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and
the God of Isaac, the land whereon thou allowest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed,
and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and I shall spread
abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south,
and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And behold,
I am with thee, and I will keep thee in the old places whither thou goest, and will bring thee
again into this land, for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken
to thee of. And Jacob waked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely
the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful
is this place! This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.
And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took his stone that he had put for his
pillows, and set it for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. 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, and will keep me in this
way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on, 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. Let's pray.
We thank you, Heavenly Father, for such a wonderful church, dear God, for wonderful brothers
and sisters in Christ, and we thank you for Pastor Anderson preaching your word tonight, and we ask that you please
bless him with your Holy Spirit as he preaches your word. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Amen. It's great to be here once again tonight, and
the title of my sermon is Having Power with God,
I'm preaching on the biblical character of Jacob,
and I believe your pastor preached just a few weeks ago on Jacob,
and talked about some of the bad things that Jacob did, or some of the mistakes
or wrong things that he did, and obviously there are a lot of
negative things that we could say about Jacob, but yet
in spite of those negatives, clearly Jacob is
someone who is greatly used by God, and a very important
person in the Bible, because this is the guy
who God chooses to change his name from
Jacob to Israel, and this guy becomes Israel,
the person, the man who is the father of
the great nation that God used throughout the Old Testament, and
those chosen people. It could have just been Isaac,
and it would have been an easier name change, because you already got those
first couple letters in place, but yet God chooses
Jacob to be the guy who becomes Israel, where
all of his descendants are the children of Israel, whereas
you look at Abraham, not all of his descendants are the chosen people.
You look at Isaac, not all of his descendants are the chosen people, because you've got Jacob
and Esau, but Israel is the final guy, Jacob,
his descendants. So what was good about Jacob for this guy,
even though he had problems, even though he had faults, to be so mightily
used of God, and to have such an important position in
the biblical narrative? Well, right away there are some things that
jump out, things that I'm not really going to focus on tonight, but let me just throw some things
out there right away. First of all, he's a very hard worker.
We see him consistently being a great worker, to the point
where when he's working for Laban, Laban just doesn't want him to leave.
He's just doing whatever it takes to keep this guy around, because this guy is good
for business, because he's a hard worker. This is demonstrated
right away when he gets to Laban's town, because usually
they would wait until everybody gathered to take the stone off the mouth of the well.
Jacob walks up and just removes the thing himself. And the way that you get
strong like that in the ancient world is not by hitting the gym, because there is
no gym at that time. It's by working hard. You know, a guy who
works hard is going to have big muscles. A guy who's sitting around, not
so much. And so these are some things that show that Jacob
is a hard worker, and he's very employable, and
everybody wants his labor. But not only that,
he was one who loved and obeyed and respected
his parents. And we're right there in Genesis
chapter 28. It says in verse 7, and that Jacob obeyed
his father and his mother, and was gone to
Padan Aram. So there's a contrast between Jacob and Esau, that Jacob
is an obedient son. And we know that he
respected his parents very much, because he wanted that
birthright, didn't he? And what was that birthright? What was that blessing
it was to inherit from his father? Not only just material
wealth, but also spiritual blessings. Now,
obviously he didn't go about it the right way, as far as how he got
the birthright, or how he got the blessing. But let's just put that aside for a minute
and just think about the fact that at least he really wanted that birthright,
and at least he really wanted that blessing. And so this is the
great thing about Jacob, is that he wanted the right things,
he respected his dad, he respected the promises of God
and the blessings of God, and he wanted in on that blessing.
And so that's actually a good desire, even if he didn't necessarily go
about it the right way. He still wanted it.
He had the ambition for it. And so these are some good things
about Jacob that I believe that went into why God ended up
using him, and why he ended up being blessed by God.
But what I really want to focus on tonight
is the idea that Jacob was one
who really put God to the test, and was even
willing to wrestle with God, and strive with God,
and if that's not impressive enough that he would actually
wrestle with God, but that he wins the wrestling
match in Genesis 32. Pretty amazing. So let's jump in here
in Genesis chapter 28 and talk about having power with God, which is going to
come up later in chapter 32. But look at chapter 28,
excuse me, yeah, chapter 28 verse 20, it says,
And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way
that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on,
raiment is clothing, 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. Now, what's interesting about this is that his grandfather
Abraham, it says of Abraham in Genesis chapter 22
that God did tempt Abraham. So God is
testing Abraham, but what we see here is that it's almost been reversed now
because Jacob is the one who's testing God, and
saying, you know, God, if you will bring me back in peace,
if you will keep me in the way that I go, and give me bread to eat,
and clothing to put on, he says, the Lord will be my God,
and I will give the tenth unto thee. Now, if you would, keep your finger here and
go to Malachi chapter 3. There's a really similar passage in Malachi chapter 3.
Jacob brings up giving one tenth unto the Lord,
and of course, Malachi chapter 3 is a famous chapter about
giving one tenth to the Lord, and it's interesting that they both have
this idea of putting God to the test, because in Genesis, he's saying,
well, if you'll do this for me, and if you'll do this, and if you'll do this,
then you're going to be my God, this pillar that I've set up is going to be
the house of God, and I'm going to give the tenth unto you. So look at Malachi
chapter number 3, verse number 8, it says, will a man
rob God? Yet ye've robbed me, but ye say, wherein have we robbed
thee? In tithes and offerings. You're cursed with a curse, for you've robbed me,
even this whole nation. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, tithes
means tenth, one tenth, ten percent. And so he
says, bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in my house,
and prove me now herewith. What's he saying? Test
me now. Prove me now. Put me to the test right now
if I will not open the windows of heaven
and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it,
and I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of
your ground, neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith
the Lord of hosts, and all nations shall call you blessed, and ye shall be a
delightsome land, saith the Lord of hosts. And so he says, put
me to the test, try me out, you know, bring the tithes into the storehouse,
and I will pour you out a blessing so great that you won't
even be able to receive it. Just test it, just
try me. And the saying that popped into my mind thinking
about this from a famous missionary was, attempt
great things for God, expect great things from God.
And that's what we see in the life of Jacob, is that he's willing
to work. He's willing to put himself out there
and to fight and to struggle and strive and do something
for God, but he also wants to put God to the test
and see what God can do for him, and see what God's going to do in his life.
And I believe that this is one of the big things that God liked about Jacob,
was the fact that he would put him to the test in that way. Now go, if you would,
to Genesis chapter 32.
And while you're going over there to Genesis chapter 32,
let me talk about another situation of putting God
to the test. And here's a bad example from Isaiah
chapter 7. You can flip over to Isaiah 7 if you want, otherwise just keep your finger in
Genesis 32. But over in Isaiah chapter 7, we've got
a guy named Ahaz, and he's not a famous guy
in the Bible. You know, when we think of the great kings of Israel
or Judah, Ahaz is not one of them.
If I said Ahaz, you'd probably be like, oh, you mean Ahab.
Right? I mean, that would be your instinct, is like, is he saying Ahab
wrong? Is he pronouncing it wrong? Because Ahaz is such a
nothing of a character. And this is the scripture that shows us
why this guy is such a nobody. Look down at your Bible there, if you're
there. Otherwise, listen in. Isaiah 7, verse 10. Moreover, the Lord spake
again unto Ahaz, saying, Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God.
Ask it either in the depth or in the height above.
I mean, this is a pretty cool offer. Man, ask me whatever sign you
want. It can be in the height above, you know, below.
What do you want, man? And he's just like, oh, I don't know.
But Ahaz said in verse 12,
I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord, and that's
why nobody cares about you, and nobody names their kid Ahaz,
and nobody preaches about you, and nobody talks about you, and there's no Sunday
school lessons about you, and you're a big nobody who nobody cares about, and everybody mixes
you up with a guy that nobody likes named Ahab, and you're just nobody.
Why? So, well, I don't want to tempt God.
You know, I don't want to ask. I don't want to do anything.
Do something! Be something! Say something! Ask for something!
Pray for something! Build something! This is what this story
says to me in Isaiah of this guy who said, well, I'm not going to ask. I don't want to
tempt the Lord thy God. Now, look, obviously there's a wrong kind of tempting God.
The wrong kind of tempting God is, oh, if you're the son of God,
throw yourself off a building, and then the
angels will come rescue you. That's a stupid kind of tempting God, right? Hey,
I'm going to run out on the freeway and show that God can protect me, or I'm going to
go out in the snow, and I'm going to wear swim trunks and be out there for days,
and God's going to keep me warm or something. That's stupid. That's a tempting of
God. That's a wrong kind of tempting of God, but the
right kind of tempting of God is what we see in Malachi chapter 3.
The right kind of tempting of God is what Genesis 28 shows us
with Jacob. He's one who's putting God to the test in a good way,
and here we see a man who's not willing to put God
to the test. He doesn't want to see any miracle. I mean, if God says, hey,
I'm going to show you a miracle, just what do you want to see? Well, I just
don't feel right about asking. You're pathetic.
And he moves on to somebody else. Now, let's go to
2 Kings chapter 20. What's interesting
is that we could stay right there within the book
of Isaiah, but it's better. The story's better in 2 Kings
because it gives more detail in 2 Kings. But it's interesting that it's in
the same book, how in Isaiah chapter 7, you've got Ahaz
who refuses to ask for a sign from God, even when he's being given that
opportunity to get any sign from God that he wants. He
won't ask. Well, later in Isaiah chapter 38,
God actually offers Hezekiah,
his descendant, a similar opportunity to see
a miracle, to see a sign, and this miracle ends up
being in the sundial of Ahaz,
which recalls your mind to this guy from chapter
7 who wouldn't ask for a sign. So that's
the guy's claim to fame is he has a sundial named after him.
So cool. But anyway, 2 Kings
chapter 20, verse 8, we get more detail of that story. It says,
And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, What shall be the sign that the Lord will
heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the Lord the
third day? So he's like, well, I want to see a sign. Where's my sign?
And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the Lord,
that the Lord will do the thing that he hath spoken. Shall the shadow go forward
ten degrees, or go back ten degrees? And Hezekiah
answered, It's a light thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees.
I don't know how he figures, but anyway. No, I do know how he figures.
I'll tell you in a second. Nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees.
And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the Lord, and he brought the shadow ten degrees backwards,
by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz.
Okay, so this connects those two stories just with the name of the dial.
Okay, so what does he mean here? If the shadow
goes backward, why would that be a bigger miracle
than the shadow going forward? I mean, either way, he's moving
heaven and earth to make it happen, because we're talking about the earth and the sun,
these tremendous heavenly bodies. It's a pretty incredible miracle
to make time go in either direction, basically.
But I guess it's a bigger miracle to make it go backward, because
maybe he thinks that there could be some trick where, I don't know, maybe
Isaiah could just kind of, like, put him in a little trance or something
and make him not realize that a few minutes went by, so I don't know, you know.
So I was trying to figure out how he said, Well, it's a light thing to make it go forward.
Like, I don't know, you know, you could just put me on pause mentally or something, and then
he's like, I want to see it go backwards. But the point
is, and then, you know, he does, he sees the shadow go backwards, so
it's like the timing of the universe going in reverse there for a minute, as far as
the heavenly bodies are concerned. And so the thing that I want
to really point out here, though, is that Hezekiah
wants to see the bigger miracle. You know, in his mind,
going backwards is the bigger miracle than going forward, so he says,
Give me the biggest miracle. I want to see the biggest thing. And so that's
the exact opposite of Ahaz, who doesn't want to see anything. Okay,
Hezekiah wants to see something big. That's why Hezekiah is a major Bible character.
He gets several chapters, and he did great things for God,
was mightily used by God. And we see a lot of biblical characters with this mentality
because look at what Elisha says when Elijah says, Ask
me whatever you want, and he asks for something hard.
He says, Give me a double portion. He didn't say, Well, I just want to be half the man
that you are. I mean, that would already have been a pretty big request.
But he says, I want to have a double portion of thy spirit. And Elijah says,
Thou hast asked a hard thing. Nevertheless,
it's going to be granted unto you, you know, to make a long story short.
And so God wants us to think big.
God wants us to put Him to the test. God wants us
to desire to see great things happen. But
obviously we've got to be willing to work hard and do great things for God, attempt great things
for God, and expect great things from God.
So in Genesis chapter number 32, we have the famous
story where Jacob actually wrestles with God. But
at the beginning of the chapter, in verse number one of Genesis 32, it says, When Jacob went on his
way, and the angels of God met him, and when Jacob saw
them, he said, This is God's host. And what that basically
means in this context is, this is God's army. Because in the Bible,
the word host is often used to refer to like an army, or a group
of, a huge group of soldiers. And the Lord is the
Lord of hosts, right? Great multitudes or crowds. But it's often a
military type term. And so the angels of God meet
Jacob. And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is God's host. And he called the name
of that place, Mahanaim, which is basically just the Hebrew word
for those hosts that he saw. And so the thing
I want to point out here is just that Jacob sees a lot
of powerful visions in the book of Genesis, because
back in chapter 28, we read it right before the sermon started. Remember, he
sees the vision of the ladder going up to heaven, the proverbial
Jacob's ladder, and the angels of God ascending and descending
upon it. And that was in a dream. This doesn't even seem to be
in a dream. This seems to be even in wakefulness now. 20 years later,
that he actually sees the Lord's
hosts of angels. He's able to see into that spiritual
world somehow. God shows him this amazing vision,
and he calls the name of that place Mahanaim, because the angels of God
met him. So then let's jump down a little bit further in the chapter to
verse 24. It says, And Jacob was left alone,
and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking
of the day. Now, at first, he doesn't necessarily know who this is. It's just a man.
Later, it's going to become apparent in the story and from other scriptures
that it's actually the Lord that he wrestles with, actually God that he wrestles with.
But at first, it just says a man wrestled with him.
Now, you may wonder, how does this work?
You're walking along. It's evening.
It gets dark. You're traveling on foot. Remember, he is separated
from his wives and his children and all of his company
because he's crossing over alone and
he's separated himself from them because they're going to meet Esau first and
hopefully soften up Esau because he doesn't know how Esau is going to react.
That's really outside the scope of the sermon, but that's what's going on in the story.
How does he just end up wrestling this guy? Here's how I picture it.
When you read these stories, sometimes the Bible doesn't give a lot of detail and
it takes a little imagination sometimes to figure out how this would work.
But the way I picture this is Jacob is journeying on foot
alone and I believe that he's praying to the Lord at this time
because he knows he's going to meet Esau tomorrow. He's scared about it. He's worried about it.
He's in a spiritual frame of mind because he already just was
met by the host of the angels of the Lord and everything.
Do you believe he's walking with God or praying or
at least meditating upon the things of God if not actually praying to God
on his own, by himself, walking out late at night
in the evening, as it were?
I think somebody just jumps him.
I don't picture it as just, hey, want to wrestle?
It doesn't work. You don't just ask a stranger if they want to wrestle.
If a man wrestled with him,
to me, realistically, the way this would happen is basically
he's just walking along and he gets attacked.
That makes sense. A guy just jumps him and the wrestling begins.
It's not like they drew a circle and say, okay, here's the rules.
It's going to be Greco-Roman. Are we going to do the jiu-jitsu
with the gi or without the gi?
What are we allowing here? What rules are we invoking here?
There's no rules. Basically, he just
gets jumped and the wrestling begins.
He wrestles with this guy all night.
It says in verse 24, Jacob was left alone
and they wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day.
I don't know exactly how many hours this is, but it's a long time.
He's wrestling for an extended period of time during the night.
This kind of exercise is exhausting.
Wrestling is exhausting. Even just wrestling for a few minutes is exhausting.
When we were growing up, my brother and I would wrestle around.
As my kids got older, as my sons got older, I would wrestle with them.
At first, it takes three of them.
Three versus me. Then I'm wrestling all of them.
I take two of you guys. Then it's one-on-one.
No thanks.
Sometimes you'll wrestle with brothers.
I'm sure if I asked you, hey, whoever did a lot of wrestling with your brother growing up,
a lot of hands would go up. Sometimes this kind of wrestling
could last for a half hour, an hour.
Just fooling around, wrestling and struggling. But man, afterward, you're tired.
This is hard work. Jacob's an older guy, and he's out there.
But remember, he's a hard worker. He's got stamina.
He's got endurance. So he's wrestling for an extended period.
It says in verse number 25, when he saw that he prevailed
not against him. I believe that what this is saying
is that when the man who's wrestling with him, this isn't Jacob,
when the man saw that he prevailed not against Jacob,
he, the man, touched the hollow of his
Jacob's thigh. So the other guy's losing,
or at least he's not winning. Maybe it's a tie or whatever.
So he, when he sees that he's not prevailing, touches the hollow
of Jacob's thigh, and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint
as he wrestled with him. And he said, again, this is the man,
let me go for the day breaketh.
And he said, I will not let thee go, Jacob says this, except
thou bless me. And he said unto him, what is thy name? And he said, Jacob.
And he said, thy name shall be called 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 didst ask for my name?
And he blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel,
for I have seen God face to face and my life is preserved.
What a statement. I've seen God face to face and my life is preserved.
Peniel, the word Peniel, simply means face of God.
So he names the place face of God,
because he says, I've seen God face to face and my life is preserved.
And then we have an alternate spelling of it in verse 31, where it says,
and as he passed over Penuel, the sun
rose upon him and he halted upon his thigh. So he's limping
as a result of this fight because of the fact that his thigh was out of joint and so forth.
And it says that therefore the children of Israel don't eat
the sinew and so forth because of that event.
So the point here is that we see Jacob
wrestling with God. According to his interpretation of the story here,
he says, because a lot of people debate, is this just an
angel? Is this really God? Is this just a
guy? Who is this? Is it a prophet?
What is it? But here's the thing. Jacob says,
I've seen God face to face and my life was
preserved. And then he calls the name of the place face
of God. And it's still called that when the book of Genesis is
being written. It's still referring to that because it's basically
telling the reader where the name of a place came from that maybe the reader is
probably familiar with. They're familiar with this place in the land of Israel called
Penuel with the U, that second spelling. They're used
to a place called Penuel and then basically it's explaining
well here's where that name came from. Jacob wrestled with
this man here and he said, I've seen God face to face
and my life was preserved. So he called it Peniel, which literally
means face of God. And then over time it just evolved into Penuel
because people kept pronouncing it wrong. You know how it is.
Place names will kind of change over time. So that's why it gives those two spellings.
In the first spelling it's showing you here's what it was originally called because that's
what it means. Now look, nothing in the Bible is incidental,
coincidental, or accidental. If God's giving us this scripture
and making a big deal about why this place is called
the face of God, Penuel, and why
it's so significant here with Jacob wrestling and saying
I don't think it would put that in the Bible if Jacob wasn't correct.
If it was just some random dude. Why would this be in
the inspired word of God? But not only that, there's a verse
in Hosea that will back this
up. Go to Hosea chapter 12. The prophet Hosea is toward the end of the Old Testament
and the Minor Prophets. And there's a scripture in Hosea that will kind of back up
the idea that yeah, he really was wrestling with God. Now you say how could
he see God's face and live when the Lord
said no man shall see my face and live? Well here's why.
Because of the fact that whenever we have scriptures about not
being able to see God, we're talking about God the Father.
That's why the Bible says in John chapter 1, no man have seen God
at any time. The only begotten Son, which is
in the bosom of the Father, he had declared him. So specifically when the Bible
says no man has seen God at any time, we're talking about the fact that no man has seen God the Father
at any time. But have we seen God
the Son? Absolutely.
Because Jesus Christ lived and dwelled among us and we beheld
his glory. The glory is of the only begotten of the Father. Full
of grace and truth. And so we have seen God, not
us personally but as humans, we've seen God because we've seen the Lord Jesus Christ
and Jesus Christ is God. And so we haven't seen God
the Father but we have seen Jesus. And so this is the way that you could
fix this sort of contradiction that people experience in the Old Testament.
And people were confused about this in the Old Testament. Now we're not confused about it because we have
the New Testament to explain us everything. It's easy for us to sit back and say well
it's so simple. But when you don't have the whole Bible it's not as simple is it?
So people in the Old Testament are confused
where they don't understand like how could I see God and not die
but yet over here if I see God I die. It's explained by the Trinity.
Once you understand the Trinity then it makes sense. Because for example you have the Lord
capital O, capital O, or excuse me capital L, capital O, capital
R, capital D, all caps, Lord show up to Abraham
in the heat of the day in Genesis 18 and
you know how can God show up in human form
and talk to Abraham? Or you have the man
who shows up in Joshua chapter 5 and tells Joshua put off thy shoes
from off thy feet for the place where I stand is this holy ground. I'm the captain of the Lord's
host. Those are Old Testament appearances of the Lord Jesus Christ. Daniel
chapter 325, the fourth man in the fire. The form of the fourth is like
the son of God. The son of God. What does that mean?
Well we'll learn more about what that means in the New Testament. In the Old Testament
they saw through a glass darkly but there are these bodily
appearances
of the Lord Jehovah God. Or even in the
book of Genesis chapter 2 where the Lord is walking
in the garden in chapter 3 I should say. Or in chapter
2 where he's forming man from the dust of the earth. I mean
Jehovah God is forming man from the dust
of the earth, forming and fashioning him. Obviously we're
talking about Jesus Christ because when we have God in a bodily form
in Genesis 2 and 3 or Genesis 18 or any of these
other places we're talking about Jesus because God the Father, no man has seen God at any time.
So that's what's going on here. This is an
Old Testament appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ. He really did wrestle with
God. Look at Hosea chapter 12 verse number 3 and we're
talking about the person Jacob here. Hosea 12.3
He took his brother by the heel in the womb
and by his strength he had power with God.
So remember that's what the man told him that he wrestled with in
Genesis 32. He said that his name would no more be Jacob but
Israel for as a prince has thou power with God and with man and has prevailed.
And then in Hosea it refers back to that and it says
he had power with God
at the end of verse 3. Verse 4 Yea he had power
over the angel and prevailed. Now some people
would look at that and say oh it's just an angel. But we have to understand that sometimes
Jesus is called the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament
because angel simply means messenger. And Jesus
is also the messenger of the Lord according to the book of Malachi
and other places throughout the Old Testament he's called that.
But it says he had power over the angel and prevailed. He wept
and made supplication unto him. He found him in Bethel
but here's the key phrase. Don't miss it. You could
almost miss it. And there he spake with
us. Who's the us?
Who is the us? Okay. It's not Hosea.
Hosea wasn't around back then centuries and centuries
earlier. Who is the us? The us is God.
Because what does God refer to himself sometimes as in the Old Testament?
Let us make man in our image after our likeness because it's the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. And so God here
says that he had power over the angel, prevailed, he wept and made supplication
unto him. He found him in Bethel. That's the place that we've
talked about where he set up the pillar and the stone. That's where he was in chapter
28. That's where he's coming back to in chapter 32. And it says
there he spake with us.
That's why I believe that he wasn't just talking to some
dude and that he wasn't just talking to an angel but he's speaking
with the Lord. And he said, I saw God face to face when my life was preserved.
He even named the place that and God calls the place that because
he's apparently agreeing with that. Look at verse 5.
Even the Lord God of hosts, the Lord is his memorial.
Therefore, turn now to thy God, keep mercy and judgment
and wait on thy God continually. What he's basically saying in this verse
is Israel's been disobedient and wicked and he's saying
look how cool Jacob was. Be like Jacob.
Don't be the way you guys are being. Be like Jacob. That's what
this chapter is in context. So go back if you would to Genesis chapter 32.
Genesis chapter 32.
What am I getting at here with these points about Jacob?
We started out with some things about Jacob like that he wanted that blessing.
He wanted that birthright. As opposed to Esau
who is known for
not caring about those things because of the fact that for one morsel of meat
he sold his birthright. That shows that he did not have proper regard
for the things of God and for his dad and he didn't want it bad
enough. He was willing to barter it away. Jacob
obeyed his parents. Esau, not so much.
Jacob was a really hard worker. He was strong.
He tested God. He was willing to put God to the test in a good way.
Proving God. Tempting God in a good way. But also
he wrestled with God. He wrestled
with God and not only that he actually won that wrestling match.
How do you win in a wrestling match against almighty God?
Obviously it's because God is letting you win.
Now here's the thing. I've wrestled with
God. Like I said, you wrestle with your brother or your children or whatever
and when you wrestle with your children, sometimes you'll let them win.
If my sons are listening, anytime you won
I was letting you win. Just so you know.
You want to wrestle with them in a way where it feels evenly matched.
You don't just walk up and say, hey dad, let's wrestle.
You just body slam them and you're done.
Boom. Alright. Back to work.
Obviously you wrestle with them on a level
that is appropriate for them. Not only do you not just body slam them
and call it a day, you also don't just let them beat you too easily.
Because that's no fun either. So you make them
work for it. You get in there and you want to struggle.
Sometimes just jokingly I'll arm wrestle with one of my kids or something
and you're kind of like, you don't just go
but at the same time you don't just let them win.
You kind of fight them because you kind of enjoy watching them work.
Right? I mean you kind of want to see that they're giving everything
and if they weren't really trying that hard you'd be a little disappointed.
I want to see their face turning bright red. I want to see them straining, putting their whole body into it.
Like they really want to win. Isn't that what we want to see when we compete with someone?
You know, sometimes you do like a running race or something
and I'll run with one of my kids. If I get way ahead of one of my kids
then sometimes they'll just give up. My dad's too far ahead, they just give up on it.
Or if they get really far ahead they might get suspicious
if they beat me too easily they might get a little suspicious and just kind of like, this is no fun.
So what you want to do is you want it to just be right there, keep it really close
where they're pushing themselves and they feel like I can win
but it's not a sure thing. You want them to think I could win
but it's not a sure thing, I got to push myself, I got to work.
And when we run with our kids, we want them giving it 100%, right?
That's the whole point. That's why we're even going through this whole charade.
Is that they would give it everything.
Okay? That's the real test.
The real test isn't, are you better than me? The real test is
are you working hard? Are you giving it 100%?
That's the test with Jacob. And he's basically giving
Jacob a chance to win. Not making it easy for him.
It's going to be super hard. But he does have a chance to win
as evidenced by the fact that he does win. Because what does it mean to prevail?
To prevail means you won. That's what that word means.
And so he prevails. Some have pointed to this as the earliest
MMA fight in history. I read a book on the history of MMA
and it said the oldest recorded MMA fight is between
Jacob and the angel in Genesis chapter 32.
Because he even taps out. Because he basically says
let me go for the daybreak, not until you bless me.
So he had to officially tap out in order for this fight to be over.
And it was definitely no holds barred. So this is the original MMA fight.
Everything starts in Genesis, doesn't it? Great doctrines are first
introduced in the book of Genesis and then we carry them
forward from there. So Jacob
gave it everything. He's pushing himself.
He's working hard. He's struggling with God. He's wrestling with God.
And God likes that. And God likes the fact that he won.
And God likes the fact that he is willing to push himself and fight
and wrestle with him and to test him.
Now you might think to yourself that God would just prefer someone to just be
100% submissive and compliant and
put up no struggle and just kind of go along with anything.
But stop and think about it. Didn't God create us with free will for a reason?
I mean the reason that God created us with free will
and why he created us in his image is that he doesn't just want to have robots
to praise him and just mindless drones.
He created us to be like him in a sense, to be in his image
and he wants us to choose to love him and
to choose to serve him and to choose to follow him
but not just because we just have no will of our own.
He wants us to have a will. And I believe he wants to have a strong will
but he wants us to submit that will to his will but he doesn't
want us to just not have a will. He wants us to be real
human beings that actually have passions
and desires and drive and then
our submission to God actually means something at that point.
Some people might just be so compliant that
anybody could just tell them anything and they'll just do it. They'll just go along with it.
It wouldn't really be that satisfying to have someone like that follow you, would it?
I mean, imagine being a pastor and just
nobody in the church is really thinking about things for themselves or studying things
for themselves or trying to even understand the things that I teach.
What if I'm just getting up and I'm preaching the Bible? People aren't even trying to understand it.
They just want to know what's the answer.
And this is how it can be in school sometimes, right? There are some kids in school
that are saying like, I don't get it. I want to understand it. Explain it
to me on the board. Show it to me and I'm not satisfied until it makes
sense to me. And those are the kids who are actually learning the material.
And then there are other kids that are just basically saying, is this going to be on the test?
What's the answer? Let me just memorize some stuff, cram
it, forget about it. I don't really need to know why. I don't even care why.
And sometimes I remember when I was in school, sometimes I'd ask a question and sometimes
you could just get a feeling from some of the kids around you like, why are you asking that?
Why do you care? Why does it matter?
If it's not on the test, I owe nuts to it.
But sometimes it's like that meme, why though?
It's like you want to know why. You want to understand things.
Here's the thing. What if I pass it to a church where nobody wants to know why?
Nobody wants to think about these things and see it themselves.
Sometimes I'll hear a doctrine preached from the Bible
but I'm like, well, I don't know. And I dig into the scripture and I want to see if I can see it.
I want to see if I can come to that same conclusion.
If I say the Bible, is that going to pan out? Not just like, well, you know,
pastor said it. So, you know, that's what it is.
I mean, I don't know how to prove it. You just go listen to his sermon.
Well, can you explain it to me? Well, I don't know.
You know, it wouldn't be very satisfying to be a pastor of a group of people
who just believe everything that I say but without actually understanding it on their own
and like reading it in the Bible and learning it and grasping it.
It's where it becomes their truth. It becomes their doctrine.
They've kind of made it their own because they've learned how to not just know the answer
but how to derive it themselves, how to derive it themselves
and arrive at that conclusion on their own. You know, think about this.
You know, being married is a blessed relationship
and obviously we know that the wife is supposed to submit unto her husband.
You know, the Bible says, wife, obey your husbands in the Lord and submit unto your own husbands, right?
But it wouldn't really be very satisfying to have a marital relationship
where your wife just completely submits unto you and obeys everything that you say
but if she just had like no wills or desires of her own and no opinion of her own.
You know, obviously I want my wife to agree with me
but I want her to actually think and have an opinion and then decide that I'm right, okay?
You know what I mean?
But I'm just saying, look, obviously, you know, if my wife just blindly,
just blindly believe everything that I say, just does everything exactly as I told her to do,
you know, obviously that's good obedience but is that really what I'm looking for in a marriage
or am I looking for someone who's like an actual human who's smart and has wisdom and intelligence
and that thinks and that basically is going to sometimes maybe challenge something that I say?
Not in a disrespectful way and I don't think, you don't see Jacob blaspheming God.
You know, that'd be like the wrong kind of a challenge, right?
You don't see Jacob shaking his fist at God.
If you're up there, God, strike me with lightning right now.
He's not like some atheist. Isn't that what atheists do sometimes?
Okay, God, if you're, you know, that'd be like a loudmouth, obnoxious, rebellious wife.
Nobody's looking for that.
Okay, but, you know, what about challenging and saying, you know, let's say my wife challenged him
and said, well, where is that in the Bible?
You know, can you prove that from the Bible?
I mean, that's a good question, right?
I mean, if I got up and preached something behind the pulpit
and somebody walked up to me from the congregation afterwards and said,
you know, you've made a statement in your sermon, but where's the proof in the Bible?
You know, where's the proof for that in scripture?
I wouldn't be offended by that question. I mean, that's a good question.
Where's chapter and verse on that?
And at that point, I'm either going to say, well, you know, I don't really have chapter and verse on that.
That part is my opinion or that's, you know, or I'm kind of extrapolating that from these verses over here.
Or I'm going to say, well, the proof's right here.
But either way, you know, it's good that somebody is at least paying attention and thinking
and trying to understand things and grasp things.
And, you know, sometimes my wife has a different opinion than me
or comes to a different conclusion than me.
And you know what? That's not a bad thing because sometimes I'm never able to convince my wife of something.
You know, I'm still right, but it's like, I can't get her to see it all the time, you know.
But the point is, here's the thing.
If wives automatically and blindly always obeyed with their husbands have said, then there'd be no need for submission.
The whole point of submission is when there's a conflict, when there's a disagreement.
If there's no disagreement, submission doesn't even exist at that point.
And so just as I don't want to be married to some kind of a Stepford wife robot,
I don't want to pastor robots.
God didn't create us to be robots either.
You know, God doesn't mind having somebody challenge him.
He's up to the challenge.
He's ready to wrestle.
He's ready to jump you if that's what you want.
Okay.
And so you've got some people out there today that perhaps are good Christians in the sense that, you know, they check all the boxes.
They read their Bible. They pray. They go to church.
Maybe pastors in churches that are like that.
You know, I would call this like vanilla Baptist church.
Right? Just kind of just plain Jane, boring, like, like, yeah, they're preaching the Bible, but there's no passion.
There's no fire.
There's no excitement with it.
It's just, you know, but why?
Because they don't feel anything deeply.
They're not the type of guy that's going to wrestle with God.
I mean, if God jumps them in the middle of the night, they're just going to get in the fetal position and start crying.
And God's going to be like, look, I'm not going to hurt you.
What fun is that?
I mean, can you imagine if every time I said to my teenage son, Hey, let's wrestle.
Dude.
Well, he's a really good kid, though.
You know, he's he's doing real well in school, but it's like, you know, the kid's got no fight in him.
It'd be a little disappointing as a dad, right?
You want you want a little fight in them.
You want a little bit of a struggle there.
And so I believe that there are a lot of churches out there that are just they're just they're dull.
They're drab.
They're vanilla.
They're plain because they're just not a Jacob style Baptist.
They're more of a vanilla Baptist.
And they're not really doing much for God.
And they're real good people, but they're not really the kind of guys that God's going to use in a mighty way.
Because they're not willing to attempt great things for God, and they don't expect any things for God.
It's kind of like an Ahaz Baptist.
Ahaz Baptist Church, Pastor Vanilla Bean.
And so I've also noticed this phenomenon that sometimes you'll have these people that are kind of like perfect people.
And I put that in quotes because of the fact that we know nobody's really perfect.
Nobody's really that perfect, right?
But you run into some of these people that kind of seem perfect.
And they've got kind of the perfect family, the perfect life.
If you go to their house, it just kind of seems perfect.
Their clothes are perfect.
Their vehicle is perfect.
They've got like a little perfect family.
Children are perfect.
Everybody's perfect.
But then it's like they don't really do anything though.
Like you don't really see them tearing it up on soul winning.
You don't really see them winning people to Christ.
You don't really see them necessarily ever enduring any persecution.
Because their life's too perfect for that.
To go through any kind of persecution or tribulations or trials.
But at the same time they're not really doing anything.
They're just kind of like achieving excellence and just being so perfect.
But is that really what our life is about?
Is our life really about just living the perfect life?
Just kind of having a perfect little house and a perfect little set up
and a perfect little family and just perfect job
and just kind of cruise through life and everything's smooth and everything's good.
I mean it sounds good, but is that really why we're here?
God really wants us doing something.
When I think of Jacob, the first thing that pops up in my mind is like
Jacob did stuff.
Jacob is a go-getter.
Jacob's ambitious.
Jacob wants to be somebody.
Jacob wants to do something with his life.
He wants his life to matter.
And you know what?
That's how I am.
I want to do something for God.
I want to do something big for God.
I want to get a lot of people saved.
I want to go out and knock on somebody's door
and ask them, do you know for sure if you die today you go to heaven?
And show them from the Bible how to be saved.
Perfect people don't really do stuff like that.
They don't really go door to door.
They're too perfect to just knock someone's door
when there's a no soliciting sign.
They just knock it anyway.
That's not something that nice people do.
But yeah, it is something that nice people do
if they actually love people, if they love souls.
So the point that I'm getting at is Jacob wasn't perfect.
Your pastor preached recently and showed problems with Jacob.
And we've all preached sermons showing the problems that Jacob had.
We could look at all the problems with guys like Jonah.
And some people even just walk away thinking
Jonah's just a negative character in the Bible.
But you know what?
Jonah was an awesome man of God.
I guarantee that.
Because otherwise God wouldn't have even sent him to Nineveh.
And otherwise the whole city wouldn't have turned to the Lord
when Jonah preached if he wasn't a powerful preacher.
I mean, if he was a lame preacher,
he wouldn't show up and get the whole city to respond
and get even the king to respond and to get right with God.
Because he's a powerful man of God.
And you know what?
The same guy that's a powerful man of God being mightily used by God,
I guarantee you Jonah's in heaven right now with mega rewards
because he spent his whole life serving God.
We just have that one episode that, you know, got a little weird.
But he's still a powerful man of God who did great things for God.
And here's the thing.
What do we see Jonah doing in chapter 4?
He's wrestling with God.
I'd do well to be angry, even if I did death.
Yeah, I'm mad.
Now look, we look at that and we're kind of like,
whoa, it's kind of scary to think about talking to God that way, isn't it?
But yeah, we don't see God ripping his head off
and saying, like, how dare you talk to me that way?
I'll smash you like a bug, Jonah.
You think you are.
You know, God keeps talking to Jonah.
He never rips his face off because God likes Jonah.
That's why Jonah gets a whole book of the Bible
because God liked Jonah.
That's why God's even spending the time to go back and forth with him and talk to him.
Even though Jonah is wrong,
even though he's 100% wrong,
God is patient with him and talking to him and working with him because he likes Jonah.
Because you know what Jonah was not?
Jonah wasn't some nothing burger, vanilla,
just plain Jane, boring pastor who never makes any waves,
who never stirs anything up.
Oh, I don't want to go to that church where the church got bombed.
This church is the bomb, okay?
You know, why do you want to go to some boring church?
Yeah, you know what, I guarantee you
that we could show you some old IFB churches where nothing's happening
and a bomb will never go off, even if they last for a thousand years.
But how many souls are they getting saved?
How many people are they reaching on the Internet?
How many great works are they doing for God in foreign missions?
Or are they just kind of phoning it in every week
with no passion, no fire, no zeal?
I'd rather go to Jonah's church, even if he's got some anger issues.
I'd rather go to Jonah's church.
And we could go through the Bible and look at other people who struggled and wrestled with God.
Look at a guy like Elijah.
I mean, even Elijah had some ups and downs
and got to a point where he got so upset, he's just telling God to just kill him.
And God, just kill me, I'm sick of it.
I mean, that's not a good attitude.
But yet, here's the thing, the same guy who experiences those kind of lows
also has the highs where he's up on Mount Carmel
facing off with the prophets of Baal and doing mighty works for God
that people are going to remember for thousands of years and be preaching forever.
And so you'd rather be an Elijah, you'd rather be a Jonah,
you'd rather be somebody who actually cares.
And the thing is, yeah, these guys are sometimes getting angry
or getting passionate or maybe even crying out to God
in a way that might even make us get a little nervous
reading the way that they talk to God sometimes.
But it's because they feel something deeply and because they actually care
because they're actually in the game and they've got everything in the game.
Okay, and that's what I like about these Bible characters
and that's what God likes about these Bible characters
is that they are real people and they're on fire and they actually have passion.
They actually believe something, they actually want to do something.
And you know what?
Obviously, I'm not suggesting that you try to pick up some of these bad character traits.
None of us should want to have the bad character traits of Jacob or Jonah or Elijah or anybody else.
But you know what?
We've already got our own bad character traits that we already have.
Last thing we want to do is try to get more.
We want to try to fix things in our life and become better Christians
and become better people, better husbands, better wives, better children, etc.
We want to fix things.
But I just want to encourage you tonight that, you know what?
Even if you're not perfect, you could still be greatly used by God.
But I'll tell you what God's looking for with you and with me.
God's looking for a real relationship with you.
Just like I want my relationship with my wife to be real, like a real marriage,
not just some kind of a mindless drone.
Just like I'm looking for a real relationship with my wife,
I'm looking for a real relationship with my church members,
I'm looking for a real relationship with my friends,
I'm looking for a real relationship with my children.
God wants a real relationship with you.
He wants you to care.
He wants you to get into this thing of the Word of God and church
and make it yours.
Not just like, well, I just go to church because I'm Baptist
and I've been Baptist for 30 years,
or, well, my parents just bring me here, or whatever.
No, no, no. Why don't you get here and say, this is my church?
Yes, the church got bombed, so what?
Yours didn't?
Are you guys even preaching down there?
What are you guys even doing down there?
What was the persecution you went through?
Oh, none?
Super lame.
I'm not saying to be obnoxious like that.
Obviously, I'm exaggerating a little bit.
But my point, you know, you don't need to go around saying that to people.
But you should feel that way a little bit, right?
You know, the point is, God wants to have a real relationship with us, okay?
And you know what?
I'll just confess to you right now.
You know, I've yelled at God before, not in a disrespectful way.
Not in a disrespectful way.
I don't want you to misunderstand me.
I don't believe that these men, you know, are being blasphemous,
because there's a line where you could cross the line with tempting God
where you're just being stupid,
and you're being like what the devil wanted Jesus to do.
You could also cross the line to where you're being blasphemous.
I'm not talking about being blasphemous.
I'm just talking about, you know, God is real to me.
And I feel passionately about the things of God.
And I've gotten into some situations or felt a certain way
where I have yelled at God in prayer.
You know?
And again, not yelling at him like chewing him out or being disrespectful,
because that would be blasphemous.
I mean, just crying out to God.
Like yelling at God.
Like, God, what is going on?
What are we doing here?
You know, and begging God to do something,
or crying out to God, begging him to intercede in a situation
or to give me the answer to a question that I can't figure out.
I have yelled out and cried out to God.
Or I've cried out to God just about the wicked.
You know?
I mean, you know, you've heard me cry out behind the pulpit about the wicked.
You've heard your pastor and other pastors cry out.
But, you know, I've cried out to God about the wicked
and cried out imprecations to God, you know,
because that's just how I felt.
And I believe that God desires that kind of a real relationship
where there's passion and where there's fire there,
and not just a thing of just going through the motions
and, oh, yes, you know, just praying every single day
and you're so consistent with everybody.
Yeah, that's great.
But don't be a robot. Don't be a drone.
Don't be a vain repetition.
You know, when you're yelling and crying out to God,
he knows it's not a vain repetition.
When was the last time you heard Catholics screaming a Hail Mary
and throwing those beads around?
You know, they don't do that.
Because it doesn't mean anything.
Like, Hail Mary!
You know?
But guess what? God's not even listening.
Mary is not even listening.
It means nothing.
You know, and my prayers,
I don't read my prayers off of paper, by the way.
Okay.
I pray from the heart.
And you know what?
My prayers might get a little ugly sometime,
but at least they're real.
At least they're from the heart.
At least I mean what I'm saying.
Okay, and that's what God's looking for for us.
He's not looking for us to necessarily be perfect,
because he knows our frame.
That we're but dust.
He knows that we have feet of clay.
He knows that we are human.
He knows that we have like passions of everyone else,
and that we have the same struggles,
and that we have sin.
We can't hide our sin from God.
He knows.
But yet God loves us anyway in spite of our sin.
God loves us anyway in spite of our shortcomings.
And God desires to have a relationship with us.
And he wants that to be a real relationship,
not just us being mindless drones doing as we're told.
He wants us to question it.
He wants us to know why.
I mean, look at even the greatest man in the Bible,
John the Baptist.
He said, art thou he that should come,
or do we look for another?
You know, and look,
obviously we look at that as a low point for John the Baptist.
He's doubting,
and obviously it's better to have faith than to doubt.
But you know what, though?
And I'm not saying it's good that he doubted.
But what I am saying is this,
that at least he's a guy who when he doubts,
you know, he could come to grips with that
and be real with that.
You know, at least you could look at it that way.
And so the point is that God wants us to think
and to study and to want to understand things
and to want to know why and to care.
And here's the thing.
You know, you say,
well, I can't believe you ever yell at God
or cry out to God or yell at God
and demand that he do something for you.
But you know what?
You probably don't understand
because if you're not really doing much for God,
then you're not going to be real demanding of God either.
I mean, think about it.
Like if my wife didn't do anything for me
and then she starts making demands on me,
it's like, what?
I don't really do anything for her
and then I start making demands on her
and I'm not doing anything for her
and I'm making all these demands.
I'd be like, huh?
But you know, when you're doing a lot for God,
then you start demanding of God
and saying, okay, God,
here's what I'm going to do for you
and here's what you're going to do for me.
Here's what you've said in your word.
And saying, God, honor what you've said here.
Honor the agreement.
Have respect unto the covenant.
Honor what you've said.
Do what you've said.
And I don't think there's anything in the world
wrong with praying like that.
I think that God likes that
because he says, you know what?
You actually care.
You actually believe me.
You're actually talking to me
like I'm a real person because I am.
As opposed to just chanting
and going through the motions.
And so I believe that the reason why Jacob,
in spite of his flaws, had power with God
is that he was willing to put God to the test
and wrestle with God and struggle with God
because he was one who had a real relationship with God.
Not just one that was superficial, but that's real.
And you know what?
I believe that even all of us here,
we all have our different faults.
There are things that I have that are faults in my life
that you got that area covered.
There are certain areas where you would be
way better than me in a certain area.
And then other areas where I would be better than you
because we all have different strengths and weaknesses.
Right?
We're all different.
Sins that I struggle with are a piece of cake for you.
Sins that you might struggle with are a piece of cake for me.
And so we all have our different struggles,
but I guarantee you, nobody in this room is perfect.
Nobody in this room is without sin.
Nobody in this room has all their ducks in a row.
Everybody here has different strengths and weaknesses,
but God loves every single person in this room
and wants a real relationship
with every single person in this room.
And so you are one that can actually do something for God.
You can get out there, you can start.
And maybe you say,
I don't know if you're talking to me, Pastor Anderson,
because I barely even go here.
I'm new to church or I'm a new believer.
Or I'm only here because my parents brought me.
I'm here because I'm with a friend.
I don't even, this isn't even, what is this?
I don't know.
But here's the thing, you know,
you can get started on this path.
You know, Jacob didn't get there overnight.
The story of Jacob is a story that goes over decades.
It's decades, literally.
You know, you can get started by, you know,
just stepping outside the box.
And you know how you step outside the box?
You just show up for a soul-winding time.
I mean, because here's the thing,
if you show up for one soul-winding time in your life,
you've just done more to evangelize
than like 99% of saved people, literally.
I'm not kidding.
That is not a joke.
If you show up and go soul-winding one time
for one hour in your life,
you literally just jump the line
at the judgment seat of Christ by like 100 million people.
I'm not kidding.
You literally just like, you just like warp speed
at the, you just jumped the line of 100 million people
at the judgment seat of Christ
because you just went from like zero evangelism
to like 0.0001, but that's way more than zero.
So you're just like, you just pass 100 million people.
I'm not, that's not even a joke.
I believe that.
Because I'm telling you, most people,
I remember noticing this growing up,
like nobody's doing any evangelism.
Nobody's witnessing.
Nobody's winning people to Christ.
Nobody's soul winning.
I remember for years as a teenager praying every day,
just in my daily prayer, like, you know,
you have certain things you kind of pray for on a daily basis,
certain kind of routine prayers that you do.
I prayed every day for years,
Lord, please allow me to win one person Lord in my entire life.
I prayed that for years.
Now God answered my prayer to where every time I prayed it,
he gave me one, but I was talking one total.
I'm not even kidding.
I used to pray every night.
I'm talking when I was 13, 14, 15, 16.
I prayed every night.
God, please just allow me to win one person to you,
to get one person saved, to personally win one person to Christ
in my entire life so that my life can matter for souls.
And I was serious because I'd never won one person Lord when I was 13.
When I was 14, I was at zero.
When I was 15, I was at zero.
16, I was at zero.
And then at 17, I got in a soul winning church.
Thank God there was a soul winning church there for me to finally,
because I had the desire, but I needed the training.
I got in a soul winning church.
I went out soul winning.
I was 17 years old and I jumped the line of 100 million people in one day.
And I was just like, here we go.
You know, and then I just kept going.
And then looking back, it's kind of funny that I prayed
hundreds and hundreds of times to win one person to the Lord,
because doesn't it seem like I was aiming kind of low?
Like those of you guys who are here on Wednesday night at First Works Baptist Church,
you guys are like, I'm winning people to the Lord all the time.
I'm getting people to save every month.
I'm getting people to save every week or, you know, I mean, right?
I mean, so you're thinking like one soul, please.
But hold on a second.
One soul is more than literally 99% of Christianity will ever do in their entire life.
99% of Christians will go to the grave.
They'll live their whole life, go to the grave without even winning one person to the Lord.
It's true.
It's true, my friend.
Most of them don't do any soul winning.
They don't witness to people, or maybe they'll witness somebody,
but they don't get them saved.
It's like, because you got to witness to a bunch of people before you get somebody saved, right?
I'm telling you, I guarantee it.
I could prove it with math, but you don't want to hear math.
I could prove it with math.
I mean, if people were witnessing even just a couple of people,
like the whole world would get saved.
You know, it's like, no, most people aren't doing the soul winning.
And so if you want to be a Jacob, you know, you want to get outside the box.
You say, well, I just don't think that it's normal for Baptists to go door to door.
Yeah, that's why we do it because we don't want to be like normal Baptists
because normal Baptists are letting the world go to hell because they're so vanilla.
Well, I mean, I just don't think it's normal for a pastor to be on the news.
Yeah, you're right.
It's not because Pastor Vanilla Bean is never going to be on the news
because he's never going to say anything worth reporting.
But look, man, woman, boy, and girl in this room can get outside the box by doing what?
How about having a real prayer life?
How about getting in the Bible for yourself and saying,
I'm going to read the Bible because I want to figure this out.
I want to learn this.
I want to understand this myself.
How about showing up for soul winning?
Saying, all right, let's go.
Let's do it.
Even just those three things, I mean, that's already right there.
You're on your way to becoming a Jacob type Christian and having power with God.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for this great passage, Lord, in Genesis 32
and the other passage in Genesis 28.
And thank you for the example of Jacob, Lord.
The good things about him and also the bad things about him
helps us to be able to relate to him because we're not perfect either.
And so, Lord, I pray that every single person that's here tonight
would decide that they want to be a real Christian who does real works for you
and actually accomplishes something big with their lives, Lord.
I pray that all of us would have a relationship with you that is real.
And in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
All right, last song, song number 374.
Song number 374, Send the Light.
Song 374, Send the Light.
Everyone nice and strong all together on that first verse.
There's a call comes ringing o'er the restless waves
Send the light, send the light
There are souls to rescue, there are souls to save
Send the light, send the light
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine from shore to shore
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine forevermore
We have heard the best of last call today
Send the light, send the light
And the golden offering at the cross we lay
Send the light, send the light
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine from shore to shore
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine forevermore
Let us pray that grace from everywhere
Send the light, send the light
And the Christ lights hear it everywhere
Send the light, send the light
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine from shore to shore
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine forevermore
Let us not grow weary in the work of love
Send the light, send the light
Let us gather jewels for crown above
Send the light, send the light
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine from shore to shore
Send the light, the blessed gospel light
Let it shine forevermore