PowerPoint

Jack Graham: The devil's not your primary problem. If you're not walking with God and living for Jesus Christ, God is your problem. And that's what Jacob found out. When you're alone with God, you discover who He is and who you are.

Guest (Female): Welcome to PowerPoint with Jack Graham. On today's PowerPoint, Dr. Graham brings a message about the benefits of surrendering your life to God. Now, here's Dr. Graham with his message, Learning to Lean.

Jack Graham: Turn in your Bibles to Genesis, chapter 32. Jacob was a man who wrestled with God. After 20 years of living apart from God, living life really as a deception, a deceiver, I need to catch you up on who Jacob really is. Because we're told that Jacob was a twin.

The struggle in Jacob's life began in the womb of his mother, Rebekah. His grandfather was Abraham. His father was Isaac. His mother was Rebekah. And he had a brother by the name of Esau. And the Bible says they struggled in their mother's womb. This is where the conflict began. He spent all of his life in conflict.

When they became young boys and men, the conflict continued. And two men, two twins, could not have been more different. Esau, who was red and hairy, was a veritable man's man. He was a hunter, an outdoorsman.

But Jacob was turned differently. He was, well, you might say he was a mama's boy. Because he got behind his mama's apron strings and even deceived his own father with mom's help. But it was all over this idea of the birthright or the blessing of the father, which was the power of the family, the provision of the family. It was the favor of God upon the family. And every young Hebrew boy wanted this birthright.

Well, as the firstborn, Esau was given the birthright. But one day, Esau was out hunting and he came in and he was famished. He was so hungry. And Jacob had been cooking a stew. Esau smelled that food and he was so hungry, he bargained with his brother. In fact, Jacob bargained with Esau. He said, "Okay, you're so hungry. You can have some of my stew." But rather than giving it to him, Jacob cut a deal.

He cut a deal and said, "If you will give me the birthright, I'll give you this stew." And Esau said yes. Well, of course, this caused problems. In fact, this family puts the fun in dysfunctional. It is a terribly difficult situation in this family. Later on, Jacob stole the blessing by deceiving his own blind and dying father.

Esau had had enough by this point and says, "I will murder my brother. As soon as my father dies and a time of grieving is over, Jacob, my brother, is a dead man." And he meant it. And so Jacob did something that he spent the rest of his the next 20 years of his life doing, and that was running.

From time to time along the way in these two decades of being on the lam, he encountered God's living presence. He was a man who knew God, he certainly knew of God. He wanted God's blessing in his life. And from time to time, he would renew his faith and his vows to God. For example, he saw angels ascending in a dream up and down a ladder, Jacob's ladder. You've heard of that, right? And there, he gave his life to follow the Lord, but he continued his lying ways, his conniving, cheating ways. In fact, his very name, Jacob, means "the cheat," "one catching the heel," because when he came out of his mother's womb, he was taking hold of the heel of his older brother. And he spent the rest of his life really just grabbing and cheating and conniving and manipulating. He had messed his life up totally trying to live his own way.

And so God spoke to him and said, "Jacob, it's time for you to go home." Well, Jacob had no place else to go. He'd been away all these years and he knew he just at this point of his life needed to obey God. And yet he was not trusting in God. He was just going home.

On his way, he encounters an angel band. In fact, in chapter 32 and verse 1, Jacob went his way and the angels of God met him. And here he is assured of God's angelic presence, of God's own presence. And literally, there was an encampment of angels there. It was a battalion of the angel armies that showed up there to assure Jacob of God's presence and God's promise to protect him, that there was no reason to think that he was alone.

We're told in the Bibles that angels operate all around us. Psalm 34 and verse 7, the angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear Him and delivers them. Psalm 91 and verse 11, for He will command His angels concerning you to guard you in all of your ways because angels are there to assure us of God's love and God's grace. And when we get to heaven, whether or not you ever see an angel this side of eternity, when you get to heaven, your eyes will be opened to all the times in your life when angels were there, unaware, guiding, guarding, protecting, and providing.

And so God is bringing His servant Jacob along. And He promises him that He would be with him. And so Genesis 32 records a prayer, verses 9 through 12. And Jacob said, "O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac, O Lord, who said to me, 'Return to your country and to your kindred that I may do good.' I am not worthy of the least of all of these deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that You have shown to Your servant. For with only my staff I crossed the Jordan. Now I have become two camps."

In other words, God blessed him along the way. God had given him many things. And even though he was out of the will of God, apart from the provision of God and the blessing of God, God allowed him to be blessed and he has two camps around him. Verse 11, "Please deliver me from the hand of my brother." This is an SOS prayer at this point. "From the hand of Esau, for I fear him, that he may come and attack me, the mothers 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 multitude.'"

Now, that's a great prayer. The only problem that I think I have with this prayer is it's way too late at this point. Did you know this is the first recorded prayer in Jacob's sorry, selfish history? This is the first time that we know of that he prayed. Now, he may have prayed along the way, but here he's desperate.

And in my view, this is just Jacob doing what Jacob always did. He's trying to con God. He's trying to manipulate God, to use God for his own ends. He wants to go home. He wants to be safe from Esau. So he's crying out to God. It's a desperate prayer, but it comes from a prayerless life.

And it is as though he'd made his own plans. And you read the text. He'd already made some plans about how to salve the conscience of Esau, how to make things right. He set up a camp, set the camps up in two sides and two armies in case one got hit, the other would remain and be safe. And then he sent gifts over to Esau. You see what he's doing? He's doing what he was always good at, and that was cheating, conniving, swindling, working things out for himself. And now he's trying to use God. He's praying and asking God to bless what he wants to do.

But God, listen to me, God will not be used. Prayer is not a smokescreen. God does business with those who mean business with Him. And to this point, the only business that Jacob was interested in was his own. And it is at this point that the darkness encroaches. God turns out the light. It's night. And Jacob is all alone. Verse 24, "And Jacob was left alone." And watch what happens. "And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day."

To me, it's like God says, "Okay, Jacob. You want to fight? You've been fighting me your whole life. Let's go." And in the middle of the night or somewhere in the night, this being pounces on Jacob. Of course, Jacob had no idea of what is taking place here. Who was this? Was this Esau? He's desperately afraid. He's trembling in fear of his life. And now someone jumps him in the middle of night. Could be Esau. Or has Esau sent an assassin to take him out?

Well, we really don't have to wonder who this angel is. He is the angel of the Lord. Later, Jacob would say, "I have met God face to face." This is the angel of God. This is the very presence of God. And I believe this is the Lord Jesus Himself in a pre-incarnate appearance, the same fourth man standing in the fiery furnace, the same Savior who would appear from time to time in the Old Testament in angelic form or in powerful, supernatural form. I believe Jesus Himself is this wrestler who is now fighting Jacob. Jacob is alone. He is afraid. And now he's in the fight of his life. Sometimes God brings us to the end of ourselves that we might see the face of God.

Guest (Female): You're listening to PowerPoint with Jack Graham and the message, Learning to Lean. We are excited to share that we have a new way to connect with us. It's our texting service designed to keep you connected with everything happening here at PowerPoint. You'll be the first to know about upcoming events, special announcements, and truly enriching content. To join, start a new text conversation by texting the word CONNECT to 59789. Again, text CONNECT to 59789.

Every day, people are hearing the truth of Jesus Christ through PowerPoint's broadcasts, podcasts, and digital outreach. And friends like you help make it all possible through your support. So this month, we want to say thanks for your gift of $10 or more to help share the biblical truth with more people around the world by sending you Dr. Jack Graham's book, Ask. In this encouraging resource, Dr. Graham helps you discover that prayer is not about performance. It's about knowing God personally and learning to come to Him with confidence, persistence, and faith. Text JULY to 59789 to give today and request your copy. Again, text JULY to 59789 so that everyone has a chance to receive this helpful resource. Please limit one per household. Now, let's get back to today's message, Learning to Lean.

Jack Graham: If you want a spiritual breakthrough in your life, and I know you do, you want God's blessing in your life, you want a sense of God's future and purpose for you, then regardless of the circumstances or where you are or where you've been in your life, you need to get alone with God. Have you noticed that God most often deals with us in the darkness and in our aloneness? Up into this point, like most people, Jacob, when he was on the run from God, he didn't want to hear from God. He didn't slow his life down long enough to hear from God.

And many people do that today, right? Pop the earplugs, listen to music, go to clubs, turn the noise up, keep your life active, keep it busy, keep it going, keep it going, keep it going, keep it going, keep it going. And you don't slow down long enough to get alone from God and let Him deal with you at a personal level.

You see, all along Jacob thought his problem was Esau. All these years, he felt that his struggle was with his brother and his past. But he's about to find out what every one of us need to find out and as followers, as Christians, our problem is not our problem. Our problem, if we're away from God, is God Himself. And that's what Jacob found out. When you're alone with God, you discover who He is and who you are.

I don't know about you, but when I get alone with God, if I get up early, if I stay up late, if I withdraw just to seek God and to get alone with God, that's when the time I meet Him the most. And so there in his fear and his failure, he meets God. It was in a time of darkness. It was night. And have you noticed that in dark times in our lives, the worst of times, when we are hurting or when we are struggling or when we have come to the end of ourselves, that we most often meet God there in the darkness, in the trials, in the struggles of life?

And so they're wrestling through the night. And finally, the angel wrestler, God, just touches his thigh bone, his hip joint, and dislocates it. And he is broken. He is damaged. And instead of fighting and resisting and struggling, now all he can do is hold on. And God says, "Gotcha. This is where I've wanted you all along, to come to a place of personal defeat and complete surrender to me." Have you noticed that so often God has to hurt us in order to help us? Now, it doesn't mean that every broken situation in our lives is a is God-inflicted. It may be that you are broken because of suffering or grief of some kind. But in the case of Jacob and in the case of many of us, God allows us to run and to run and run and run until finally we have run enough. And God brings us to the end of ourselves and He breaks us in order to bless us.

There's tears, there's pain. He's laying exhausted on the ground, but he's holding on. He's clinging. You've been living your life like you want to live your life. You've been living life your own way. You've been doing what Jacob did best, and that was to run. Jacob could, if he could do nothing else, he could always get away. He could always work his way out of it, get his way through it. But now he's broken and he can't run anymore.

And when God got hold of him and when God gets hold of you in that broken state, that's when He blesses us. He's crushed, but he's not destroyed. Paul said God's strength is made perfect in weakness. Paul himself, the great apostle, had a thorn in his flesh. And God chose to keep that painful dagger in his flesh all the days of his life. Even though he prayed and prayed and prayed three times, God said, "My grace is sufficient for you and though you are in pain and though you struggle and though you hurt, this thorn is a reminder to you of just how much you must depend upon me."

And now Jacob can't depend on his legs. He can't depend upon his scheming and conniving. He can only depend upon God because now God has crushed his resistance in order to claim his reliance. He crushed all of his resistance in order to claim his reliance.

Now, let me just say to you that if you're fighting with God today, if you're struggling and resisting God's will and God's plan for your life, you're a follower of Jesus, but you're not following Him all that much, if you're fighting with God, let me remind you, let me warn you, you're going down. You're going down. In fact, this is a battle you don't want to win. This is a fight that was fixed to begin with, because God could have demolished him immediately. But God let this man come to the end of himself and then He broke him to bring him to a place of a lose-win.

Jacob prevailed with God in this in this match, this cage fight. But the way he prevailed with God was to lose, to lose himself, to lose his arrogance, and surrender himself completely to the Lord. And when you surrender your life to Him, you lose, but Jesus says you gain. In fact, the way to gain your life is to lose your life, and the way to lose your life is to try to hold on to it and keep it.

Stop running from God and start running to Him and with Him. Stop fighting God and begin fighting for Him. Really, this story's not about Jacob as much as it is about the stubborn grace of God to go get his man, the relentless grace of God that refuses to let us go.

God asked him his name. Tell me who you are. Now, God was not looking for information, but a confession. Who are you? And Jacob says, "I'm Jacob. I'm a fraud. I'm a deceiver." And it is in that act of confessing his name that he repents. It is an attitude and an action of repentance. And God gives him a new name. He says, "You will no longer be Jacob, the liar, the cheat, the supplanter, the conniver. But now you will be Israel." The word Israel means "to struggle." And here's a man who struggled with God and God changed his life. He totally surrenders now. God rules. No longer are you the man you used to be, Jacob. Now you're a new man with a new name, depending upon the Lord.

And when we take our plans and dreams and schemes and surrender them to Him, when we say, "Lord, I take hands off my life. Lord, I will not let you go unless you bless me. More than anything in my life I want you, Lord, and your blessing. I will not let you go." It's not just now that he wanted the blessing, now he wants God. And with God comes the blessing. "Lord, I'll never let you go. Lord, I'll never turn loose of you." Have you said that? Maybe today your life is a wreck and now you're ready to give up and let God take command and control of you.

By now, it's daybreak and it's a new day in Jacob's life. He has prevailed with God. But something remains for the rest of his life, and that is his limp. His crippled leg reminded him for the rest of his days of this mortal combat with God and how God blessed him. And every time he was tempted to run, he realized, "I can't run anymore." Every time he was tempted to go his own way, he said, "My legs won't take me there." Now he knows that he can't run, but he can walk with God, even if it's with a limp.

And sometimes we carry the consequences of our actions for a lifetime. Sometimes the pain that we experience in life and our struggles with God, our struggles with life, we carry some of this with us the rest of our lives. But Jacob turned it into a blessing. When he is accounted for in Hebrews 11 as one of the heroes of the faith, imagine this guy becoming a hero and showing up in God's hall of fame. But he did. And do you know what it says about him? Not some great adventure, not the angels descending up and down the ladder, not his keen mind, his brilliant intellect, but it says in the book of Hebrews that Jacob worshiped God and blessed his family, bowing down or leaning on his staff. He spent the rest of his days leaning on God. He spent the rest of his life trusting in God.

And the one thing that he can now do is the only thing that any of us need to be doing, and that is to cling to Jesus, to allow our weakness to become His strength in us. Jacob would never be the same. A spiritual hero now, a father of a nation, his very name would represent the nation, God's people, Israel. God breaks us in order to bless us.

Guest (Female): You're listening to PowerPoint with Jack Graham and the message, Learning to Lean. We want to remind you about a powerful resource Dr. Jack Graham has created to help strengthen your prayer life. It's his book, Ask. This practical and encouraging book explores Jesus' invitation to ask, seek, and knock, helping you discover that prayer is not about saying the right words, but about growing closer to your Heavenly Father through faith-filled relationship. When you give today to support the outreach of PowerPoint Ministries, you'll help share biblical truth and the life-changing hope of Jesus with people around the world through broadcasts, podcasts, and digital ministry. Text JULY to 59789 to give your gift of $10 or more. Again, text JULY to 59789 so that everyone has a chance to receive this helpful resource. Please limit one per household.

We're excited to share that we have a new way to connect with us. It's our texting service designed to keep you connected with everything happening here at PowerPoint. You'll be the first to know about upcoming events, special announcements, and truly enriching content. To join, start a new text conversation by texting CONNECT to 59789. Again, text CONNECT to 59789. Pastor, what is your PowerPoint for today?

Jack Graham: It's interesting that the first recorded prayer of Jacob is when he was so desperate and when his life was in such great danger. Like Jacob, sometimes God brings us to the very end of ourselves and to places in which we are very alone and very afraid. Why? In order that we would seek Him and draw near to Him.

So if you want a spiritual breakthrough in your life, to know God's favor and blessing, to live with a sense of purpose and peace in your heart, then you first and foremost need to get alone with Him. Let Him bring you to the end of yourself that you might seek Him first and always. It's when you're alone with God that you discover who He is and who you really are. It's in the quietness that you hear from Him and realize your utter need to surrender to Him. And when you surrender your life to Him and to know and do His will, you lose everything and are willing to give up all, but you gain so much more. And that is today's PowerPoint. Remember, when you give a gift to PowerPoint, we'll send you Dr. Graham's book, Ask. Just text JULY to 59789. And join us again next time as Dr. Graham brings a message about how God wants to help you achieve your dreams. That's next time on PowerPoint with Jack Graham. PowerPoint with Jack Graham is sponsored by PowerPoint Ministries.