May 3, 2020, | Pastor Nathan Elms 1st Church CLT
What is the nature of divine blessing?
• Week 1, we tried to see blessings from the perspective of God. What is in it for God?
• Week 2, we saw how a limited view of blessing puts us at each other’s throats. Esau and Jacob. Issac will only bless one. Jacob blesses everyone.
• This week, I want to go deeper into Divine blessing.
Why? Because it isn’t as simple as I Have More Than My Neighbor. Remember, Jacob, tricked his father Issac, but had to flee for his life. Who inherited the wealth of Issac? The herds. The servants.
It could not have been Jacob. Jacob ran for his life and didn’t return until Genesis 33.
-And when he returns, Jacob is the one bowing and asking to be accepted.
-Jacob is the one telling his family to call Esau, my lord. And telling them to refer to him, Jacob, as Esau’s servant.
-Jacob is the one bringing gifts. Esau gives Jacob nothing but forgiveness.
God’s blessing is about transformation.
But let's go one step further.
The name "Israel," means, "God strives" or "God struggles." On the face of it, it is a jarring statement. Why would Almighty God, Creator of the Universe, Omnipotent Lord of Hosts, ever need to struggle?
God struggles with those on whom he has fixed his love so that we will stop our own ill-fated, short-sighted, bound-to-fail struggles to get life's best and rely on him. God wanted to bless Jacob's life. God had told Jacob so. He wants to bless yours, too—beyond your wildest imagination. But you cannot get God's blessings doing things your way.
• God wrestles with us in order to break our will without violating our will.
• God will sometimes handicap us. Whatever it is that makes your will so strong, God will touch it and cripple it.
• God will also offer to leave us. Consider what the stranger says in verse 26: "Let me go, for it is daybreak."
One of the strange things about this story is that Jacob first wants to get the attacker off his back, while later he won't let his attacker go.
Who's wrestling whom here?
This is the struggle of spiritual becoming!
God wrestles with us, takes what is precious, reduces us to desperation, and then somehow in the angry darkness when we think we've had it with God, he offers to leave. It is at that moment that we realize we cannot let God go.
God also makes us face ourselves. That's what happened in verse 27 when the man asked, "What is your name?" He was asking, "Who are you, really?" God breaks our wills by making us face our grasping, self-centered, desperate selves. You live with yourself so long, that you get used to your ways of doing things. They look normal, right, reasonable. But on that dark night, God will say, "Who are you, really?" Facing what we are is crushing—even humiliating. It is also necessary.
God’s blessing is about transformation, not possession.
When you know who you are in God, it allows you to represent his kingdom on earth.
