Genesis 32:1-8
Jacob also went on his way, and the angels of God met him. When Jacob saw them, he said, “This is the camp of God!” So he named that place Mahanaim.
Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the country of Edom. He instructed them: “This is what you are to say to my lord Esau: ‘Your servant Jacob says, I have been staying with Laban and have remained there till now. I have cattle and donkeys, sheep and goats, male and female servants. Now I am sending this message to my lord, that I may find favor in your eyes.’”
When the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, “We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.”
In great fear and distress Jacob divided the people who were with him into two groups, and the flocks and herds and camels as well. He thought, “If Esau comes and attacks one group, the group that is left may escape.”
So a lot has happened since chapter 28 and yesterday. Jacob made it to Padan Aram. He met his future wife and worked seven years for her father, Laban, who tricked him into marrying her older sister. Dear ole’ dad then let him marry Rachel, too, the very next week so long as he put another seven years in. In that time, eleven out of Jacob’s eventual twelve sons were born to four different women. Jacob and Laban end up against each other and Jacob flees. Laban chases him and they (sort of) resolve things around a campfire/sacrifice/hill country BBQ at the end of chapter 31. The whole tale is loaded with deception, conflict, and jealousy with a few glimpses of God thrown in. I find it all to be reminiscent of our frailty and insecurity, which brings us to the above.
Sort of out of the blue, chapter 32 opens with a theophany, another encounter with the divine. Another naming of a holy place. A different sort of reminder for Jacob and for us. An echo of a whisper of a prayer at least a decade and a half old.
“If God will be with me…”
With conflict behind him, Jacob turns his eyes, heart and life to the conflict that lay ahead.
He sends a message of peace and a promise of generosity to Esau. It is a hope and a prayer. And it doesn’t look very promising. Jacob brings herds and servants to the conversation. Esau brings a fighting force. It’s so frightening that Jacob divides everything in half in the hopes that one group survives. Do those words tumble through his mind again as he chooses who goes left and who right?
“If God will be with me…”
Things can change quickly and it doesn’t matter how strong your faith is or if you just met with some angels at a campsite that morning. You can be working hard, running hard, or living hard and it can hairpin on you. You can finally bring peace to fourteen years of deceit and conflict and the next day fear for your life or your future. You can have the best intentions and it can still all fall apart on you. And it would be no wonder if you started to ask if God was still with you. Nobody would, or should anyway, blame you if you started looking for the exit signs. Assurance is never all that far from uncertainty. I might pick a fight or two with this, but uncertainty is where faith shines.
“If God will be with me…”
Reflect:
On the hairpin turns of your life. On the quick changes that have tested your sanity and your faith. Pssst, you’re not alone. Pssst, pt 2, you’re also not less for going through those.
Journal:
On what it’s meant to wonder “If God will be with me.” On how you’ve navigated uncertainty. On how God has guided you… or how you wish He would. Every part of it is courageous.
Pray:
For a new sense of confidence in those words. That they will rise to the top again for you. That no matter what lay behind and ahead of you, that His presence will be enough for you to hold on to. And pray for the strength to hold on.