00:08Jacob's name is pronounced Yaqab. It sounds like the word akab, which means to grasp the heel or
00:15to deceive. Akab literally means to grasp the heel, but it was used figuratively to describe
00:22deception or metaphorically to suggest tripping someone up by their heels. Jacob literally seized
00:28his twin brother's heel at his birth, and he figuratively seized heels for much of his life.
00:34Jacob was a deceiver. He deceived his brother, Esau, his father, Isaac, and his uncle and father-in-law,
00:43Laban. Being a deceiver had become Jacob's identity. It was even his name. Yet, in the last few scenes
00:51that we've read, the author of Genesis described a change taking place in Jacob. He obeyed God and
00:58returned to the land of his father's. Then, he prayed and asked God for deliverance from his
01:04brother Esau. His behavior was changing, but the night at the Jabbok River was the night that would
01:11ultimately change Jacob's identity. Jacob wrestled with a man that night. Before the sun rose, the man
01:18told Jacob to let him go. When Jacob refused to let him go without a blessing, the man asked his
01:25name.
01:26Jacob again faced the reality of who he was, a deceiver. At that moment God changed his identity.
01:34No longer will your name be Jacob, but Israel, because you have fought with God and with men
01:41and have prevailed. At that moment God gave Jacob a new identity. God marked Jacob for who he would
01:48become, not who he had been. God gave him a new identity as a promise of what he would continue
01:55to do. God would continue to fulfill his promise to Jacob, blessing him as he did his father and
02:02grandfather. Jacob would receive the blessing and God would still get the glory. Jacob was crippled the
02:09night before he would face his first enemy. He faced the man who had vowed to kill him and he
02:15was
02:15physically impaired. Jacob could not be delivered by his own strength. God made it clear to Jacob that
02:22he alone was his source of deliverance. He alone would do it. It is incredibly gracious of God to
02:29rid us of our self-reliance. God will accomplish his purposes by his power alone. He does not need our
02:36help to fulfill his plans or keep his promises. No matter the plans we might create, God will make it
02:43clear that it is he alone who delivers us, he alone who saves.
