Blessings | Find Your Way Home Week 4

00:00:01

- Hey, welcome to Crossroads. My name is Hannah.

00:00:02

- And I'm Kyle.

00:00:04

- Today, our senior pastor, Brian, is going

00:00:05

to help us with the things that we wrestle with.

00:00:07

- That's exactly right.

00:00:08

I know we both wrestled with things like shame

00:00:11

and pride and maybe something more practical,

00:00:13

like money and giving, you know?

00:00:15

And I want to say, if that's you,

00:00:16

this message is here to help, and so are we.

00:00:18

- That's right. So with that, let's get started

00:00:20

and go to Brian and hear about the story of Jacob.

00:00:27

- We're all on a journey in life.

00:00:28

Some people know where they're going.

00:00:30

And some people don't.

00:00:32

The difference?

00:00:33

It's knowing your origin story

00:00:36

and finding your way home.

00:00:39

You have to know where you came from

00:00:42

if you're going to know where you're going.

00:00:44

We believe that there is a God,

00:00:45

and He made you for a journey, a life of adventure.

00:00:50

Crossroads exist to help you get there.

00:00:52

We're going all the way back to the beginning

00:00:55

of the story in Genesis

00:00:56

to find our way home to blessings.

00:01:09

- Hey, I'm Brian, Senior Pastor at Crossroads.

00:01:12

You know, if you follow God,

00:01:14

you're in the family, that's good news.

00:01:16

I'll give you even better news.

00:01:17

There's a blessing for being in the family.

00:01:21

The Genesis story unlocks for us

00:01:23

how you actually get that blessing.

00:01:26

And part of it is I'm going some place right now.

00:01:30

I'm actually in an anti friction machine.

00:01:33

Everything about this is designed to minimize friction.

00:01:38

Round wheels instead of square wheels,

00:01:40

ball bearings everywhere,

00:01:41

grease everywhere to minimize friction.

00:01:44

The thing about our life is that

00:01:46

our life is going to have friction,

00:01:48

specifically if you're moving some place,

00:01:51

if you're going some place,

00:01:52

this thing is about going some place.

00:01:54

And if you are going to try to go some place,

00:01:56

you're going to have friction.

00:01:59

Life is about movement, and the big word

00:02:02

for today really is life is about hustling.

00:02:04

It's about going some place.

00:02:06

We're going to look at Jacob today because

00:02:08

there's things in this ancient hero's story

00:02:10

that help us understand God

00:02:12

and help us understand our life.

00:02:13

And if you've been in church before,

00:02:15

you've heard sermons before,

00:02:16

you've heard anything about

00:02:17

this ancient character named Jacob,

00:02:19

you're going to be really confused about

00:02:22

what I'm going to talk about today

00:02:23

because Jacob is normally the bad guy.

00:02:25

He's normally seen as just a jerk.

00:02:28

He's a person who's selfish,

00:02:29

and that's really not the case at all.

00:02:31

We misunderstand somebody who's moving some place.

00:02:35

Now, Jacob is definitely not a pristine character.

00:02:38

The Bible's heroes, especially Jacob,

00:02:41

are not whitewashed.

00:02:42

There's no diplomacy about showing these people's faults.

00:02:46

And Jacob has a lot of faults, but he is used by God.

00:02:51

He is incredibly blessed,

00:02:53

and he should be a model for us.

00:02:56

Let's start back beginning,

00:02:58

the very beginning of his life.

00:03:00

He's in the womb with his twin brother, Esau.

00:03:04

His parents are named Isaac and Rebekah.

00:03:07

They're having twins.

00:03:08

And in the womb Jacob is trying to move some place.

00:03:14

He's trying to move out of the birth canal,

00:03:16

and he's actually trying to move out before Esau.

00:03:20

So, he comes out holding onto his--

00:03:23

holding on to his heel, grasping onto his heel.

00:03:28

Some people look at this and go,

00:03:29

"Look at Jacob, he's just trying to supplant

00:03:33

what Esau has coming to him as the eldest,

00:03:37

as the first born."

00:03:39

There's the thing with this ancient culture,

00:03:41

you had the the birthright.

00:03:43

The Birthright was something

00:03:45

that the oldest son would have.

00:03:47

This is their cultural context.

00:03:48

The older son had a birthright, which meant that

00:03:52

he was to be the one that got the lion's share

00:03:54

of the inheritance from dad and mom.

00:03:57

He was the one who is supposed to manage the family.

00:04:00

It was his birthright.

00:04:01

And Jacob, he wants that position.

00:04:04

He wants that birthright.

00:04:06

It's like in his birth he's he's trying

00:04:08

to beat his brother outside of the womb.

00:04:11

But he doesn't.

00:04:12

Some people who are misinformed would say that

00:04:14

Jacob means one who supplants.

00:04:17

He's not trying to supplant anything.

00:04:19

There's no deception going on here at all.

00:04:22

He's actually hustling. He's hustling.

00:04:25

Two points for today.

00:04:26

One is this: hustle, Jacob hustled.

00:04:29

His name, Jacob, doesn't mean one who supplants

00:04:32

or supplanter or deceiver.

00:04:34

His name means one who grasps.

00:04:37

He's grasping at the heel, he's grabbing the heel,

00:04:40

which is why they called him that,

00:04:41

trying to beat Esau getting out of the womb.

00:04:46

Hustle is not a negative term.

00:04:49

It can be, if you're hustling somebody,

00:04:52

you're not being honest with somebody.

00:04:53

That's not good.

00:04:55

But hustle, according to Webster, also means

00:04:58

obtaining by energetic activity.

00:05:02

That's what he does, his whole life

00:05:03

he's trying to obtain by energetic activity.

00:05:07

In Genesis 25:28, it says:

00:05:18

Part of the tension we're going to be seeing

00:05:20

here in this story is that there is

00:05:22

a lot of family dysfunction that's taking place.

00:05:26

This combat that Esau and Jacob have in the womb

00:05:31

is actually seen throughout the whole family

00:05:33

because Esau is the one his dad likes.

00:05:38

He's a manly man. He's the one who hunts.

00:05:41

Jacob is the one his mom, Rebekah likes.

00:05:43

He's the, you might say in today's vernacular for some,

00:05:47

he's the girly man. He's the one who's not hunting.

00:05:50

He's not doing the manly things.

00:05:51

He's doing the cooking.

00:05:52

Rebekah likes Jacob. Isaac likes Esau.

00:05:57

There's some family tension that's going on between them.

00:06:00

In the midst of this family tension

00:06:02

we see a seminal story take place in their family tree.

00:06:06

It goes like this in Genesis 25:29 and following:

00:06:51

There's nothing wrong here at all. Nothing wrong.

00:06:54

Christian-y, spiritual-y churchy types would say,

00:06:57

"Oh, shouldn't Jacob have just given it to Esau?

00:07:00

It's just be so much nicer to give, to give.

00:07:01

We should give."

00:07:03

I like giving, giving is

00:07:04

a very important spiritual discipline.

00:07:06

There's a time for giving, though,

00:07:07

and a time for hustling.

00:07:09

If you get a paycheck,

00:07:11

you're doing exactly what Jacob did.

00:07:13

It's a fair trade.

00:07:15

You're saying to your employer,

00:07:16

"I'm going to give you my time

00:07:17

and you're going to give me money."

00:07:19

Are you just giving your employer

00:07:20

your time all the time?

00:07:21

You might sometimes,

00:07:22

but you can't pay the bills that way.

00:07:25

If you own a business, are you just giving

00:07:27

your widgets away or whatever?

00:07:29

I don't even know the widget is.

00:07:30

We talked about that in business class.

00:07:32

Are you giving it away? No, you're trading it.

00:07:34

If you're a counselor, are you just giving away

00:07:36

your counsel to everybody?

00:07:37

No, you've got to put food on the table.

00:07:39

You're giving -- you're trading your counsel

00:07:41

for a fee of one hundred bucks an hour,

00:07:43

however good you are, based on how you can charge.

00:07:48

There's nothing wrong with what Jacob's doing.

00:07:50

He's just having a basic trade.

00:07:52

In fact, that verse said that it was Esau

00:07:55

who despised his birthright.

00:07:57

He undervalued his birthright.

00:08:00

And he's just a weak. He's weak.

00:08:02

He says, "Oh, I'm about to die."

00:08:04

You're not going to die.

00:08:06

You have raw meat with you.

00:08:07

You can eat raw meat if you're going to die.

00:08:09

You're not far from the village, you're going to be fine.

00:08:12

But man, Esau did not want to hustle.

00:08:15

Esau could not handle friction.

00:08:17

Esau could not handle difficulty.

00:08:19

He would take the easy trade any day

00:08:21

than hold out for something better.

00:08:23

That's not the way it is with Jacob,

00:08:25

and that can't be the way it is for you and I.

00:08:26

We've got to hold out for better things.

00:08:28

We've got to.

00:08:29

We've got to think through how to get ahead.

00:08:31

We've got to actually hustle.

00:08:40

Now, Jacob does have problems, in fact,

00:08:41

his whole family has problems.

00:08:42

He's not pristine, clean here.

00:08:48

This scenario goes down, years go by.

00:08:51

The official blessing hasn't been given yet.

00:08:53

The blessing as it goes to the person

00:08:55

who has the birthright.

00:08:56

The blessing happens --

00:08:57

The blessing, the blessing, the blessing --

00:09:04

Christmas vacation. Come on.

00:09:05

I can quote movies that are 30 years old, can't I?

00:09:08

The blessing.

00:09:09

The blessing is when the father would officially

00:09:12

bestow the birthright, put his hands on the eldest son

00:09:15

and say the blessing.

00:09:17

That hasn't happened yet.

00:09:18

In this scene it does happen.

00:09:20

Years and years have gone by,

00:09:22

and Esau wants to get this blessing,

00:09:25

even though he's fairly traded it to Jacob.

00:09:30

And the mother, Rebekah,

00:09:32

who again, Jacob is her favorite.

00:09:35

Jacob is a momma's boy. She hears about this.

00:09:37

She's like, "Hey, Jacob,

00:09:38

your brother's trying to pull a fast one on you.

00:09:40

Here's we're going to do.

00:09:41

Your dad's getting older in age,

00:09:42

that's why he's trying to do the blessing right now,

00:09:44

he's trying to pass it on.

00:09:46

He can't see very well.

00:09:47

So, your brother is like a hairy manly man guy,

00:09:51

hunter guy. He smells like wild game.

00:09:53

He's hairy all over the place. You're not.

00:09:55

We're going to have to get you smelling like a manly man,

00:09:57

and we have to go get some goat skins,

00:09:59

but some goat skins on you because your dad's losing it.

00:10:02

Reach out and feel you, and he'll feel hair

00:10:04

and he'll think he's your brother.

00:10:06

And then you can get the official prayer of blessing."

00:10:08

"Great. We'll do that."

00:10:11

They go and do that.

00:10:12

Isaac prays the blessing on him.

00:10:14

Not long after that, Esau comes in.

00:10:17

He wants the blessing, and he cries out in anguish.

00:10:19

"No, no bless me too. Give me the birthright."

00:10:23

He can be blessed,

00:10:24

but he can't have the birthright blessing.

00:10:28

Who's at fault here?

00:10:30

Everybody's at fault here. No one's clean here.

00:10:33

Jacob shouldn't have been lying the way it was.

00:10:36

It's just an out and out lie to deceive his dad.

00:10:38

Rebekah shouldn't have been trying to deceive

00:10:41

her husband and go behind his back.

00:10:44

Mom and dad have always got to be like this, right?

00:10:47

Esau, he already made a deal.

00:10:50

He shouldn't have been like this.

00:10:51

And on top of that, Isaac the father, him as well.

00:10:54

He's in the wrong. Why is he and the wrong?

00:10:56

He probably knew, he had to know

00:10:58

that this event went down, and if he didn't,

00:11:01

there were very clear instruction

00:11:03

that had come to him and Rebecca from God

00:11:07

that the older was to serve the younger.

00:11:11

The blame here is very clearly put on Esau

00:11:14

because it was him who despised his birthright,

00:11:17

but the parents were trying to

00:11:19

go against the plan of God.

00:11:21

Actually, here's what they initially heard from God

00:11:23

before all of this took place,

00:11:24

before the boys were actually born.

00:11:27

In Genesis 25:23, before this all happens,

00:11:30

God tells Isaac and Rebecca

00:11:32

the older will serve the younger.

00:11:35

The older, the one who should get the birthright,

00:11:37

is actually going to serve the younger.

00:11:39

That's the way I want it.

00:11:40

Some people look at that as God just predicting,

00:11:43

prophesying what's going to happen in the future.

00:11:45

It wasn't a prediction.

00:11:47

It was instruction from God that

00:11:50

this is the way I want it.

00:11:51

I want the younger one to get the blessing.

00:11:54

I want the younger one to get the birthright.

00:11:56

In fact, in Romans 9, that's in the New Testament,

00:12:01

looking back on this and makes it very, very clear.

00:12:04

It says there again that this was the plan of God.

00:12:08

The younger was to have the blessing and the birthright.

00:12:12

And Isaac didn't care.

00:12:13

He just wanted to go right by there.

00:12:15

This is dysfunction junction,

00:12:16

any way that you look at it.

00:12:19

Just so you can hear everything about Jacob,

00:12:22

we've got to appreciate him.

00:12:23

Too many people don't appreciate him.

00:12:24

I just wanted us to see that holistically here

00:12:27

Jacob is the innocent one.

00:12:30

The book of Hebrews in the New Testament.

00:12:32

Hebrews is written to? Hebrews.

00:12:34

Good. Very good job. Good. Good job.

00:12:36

The Jewish people trying to actually help people

00:12:39

of the Jewish faith understand

00:12:41

the Old Testament scriptures in light of Jesus.

00:12:43

That's what the Book of Hebrews is about.

00:12:45

In Hebrews 12:16-17 in talking about this story it says:

00:13:08

Who is immoral and unholy there? Esau, not Jacob.

00:13:12

And he regretted it.

00:13:13

He's crying to his dad, "I want it."

00:13:15

"Sorry, dude. You made a decision way back when

00:13:19

to take the easy path.

00:13:20

You made the decision way back when not to hustle."

00:13:22

And there's a certain blessing that comes to you

00:13:25

when you hustle.

00:13:27

You might not have hustled up to now,

00:13:29

but starting right now, if you want a blessing,

00:13:32

you've got to be up for some friction.

00:13:35

You've got to start to hustle.

00:13:47

Jacob hustles and Jacob wrestles.

00:13:53

I'm about to tell you about one of Jacob's traits

00:13:57

that inspires me maybe the most.

00:13:58

Before we get into that one, another thing inspires me

00:14:02

is that our church, Crossroads, hustles.

00:14:05

Thanks for being a part of our church.

00:14:06

Thanks for doing what you're doing.

00:14:08

And if you give around here, you're part of us

00:14:12

and you're going to be getting one of these in the mail.

00:14:15

This is an annual report, and I love this.

00:14:18

It is encouraging.

00:14:19

Who needs some encouragement?

00:14:21

Oh, I do. I do. I need encouragement.

00:14:23

If you're on our online church and you're a giver,

00:14:25

you're going to be getting one of these in the mail

00:14:27

and you're going to find out that your church

00:14:30

and you, we've been hustling for this whole last year.

00:14:33

There's a lot of good stuff that's been taking place.

00:14:35

Look for this.

00:14:37

Thank you for being generous and helping us bless people

00:14:40

and we trust that we're blessing you as well

00:14:42

as I'm trying to do right now by helping you

00:14:44

understand the life of Jacob.

00:14:47

Jacob hustles and Jacob wrestles.

00:14:51

Our world has always been fascinated by the idea

00:14:56

of some sort of physical contact,

00:15:00

some sort of wrestling, of grapping, of fighting.

00:15:06

Every single culture has some version of wrestling,

00:15:10

whether it is sumo wrestling, Greco-Roman,

00:15:13

Olympic freestyle, Brazilian, jiu jitsu, Judo, MMA,

00:15:18

WWE, I think that counts.

00:15:23

But that place exists and people go

00:15:25

because we are drawn to wrestling.

00:15:28

It's a good thing that we're drawn to it

00:15:30

because we're in a fight.

00:15:32

Fighting and wrestling, it never stops.

00:15:36

This annual report, it's a report of hard church work,

00:15:41

wrestling through ministry is a form of fighting.

00:15:43

It's wrestling.

00:15:44

If you're a parent, that is a fight,

00:15:47

it's a form of wrestling.

00:15:49

When you're a hard financial place,

00:15:52

it is a form of wrestling to get to a better place.

00:15:55

When you get a bad diagnosis, it's a form of wrestling.

00:16:00

We're never going to get away from

00:16:02

the fight inside of our life.

00:16:04

But Jacob learns that his fight

00:16:07

that he's been dealing with and is going to deal with

00:16:09

is going to actually lead him to a blessing.

00:16:15

Jacob has this attribute of hustling, of wrestling.

00:16:19

And I think that's actually part of why God uses him

00:16:22

and why God has a plan for him.

00:16:27

And also part of why maybe God was choosing

00:16:31

Jacob over Esau, because Esau was a bit lazy.

00:16:35

Esau was a bit passive.

00:16:37

You saw was, "Okay, take my birth. Take my birthright.

00:16:40

Take the stew. Okay, I'll do the easy thing."

00:16:43

He's hustling and he's wrestling.

00:16:50

Now when Jacob gets to his campsite

00:16:53

he thinks he's going to just be having some me time,

00:16:57

some time alone with him, but instead

00:17:00

he's going to realize he's going to be in for

00:17:03

the most significant wrestling match of his life.

00:17:05

He's actually going to wrestle God.

00:17:09

God is going to come to him in the form of a human,

00:17:12

and Jacob is going to wrestle God himself.

00:17:17

Let's read it in Genesis 32:24:

00:17:46

Jacob is going to be way outside of his weight class here.

00:17:50

I one time wrestled in a backyard

00:17:52

an older friend of my friend.

00:17:55

He was two years older than me

00:17:56

and it was the hardest wrestle I ever had.

00:17:58

And I can't remember why we were wrestling.

00:18:00

There was something that got us fighting.

00:18:02

We actually wrestled so long we tired each other out.

00:18:06

And I can still remember lying on wet grass

00:18:11

in a stalemate with Jim Waggoner

00:18:14

lying on my inner thigh.

00:18:16

And we ended up actually becoming friends because

00:18:19

we were just tired and trying to recover.

00:18:21

Neither one wanted to let go of the other.

00:18:24

This is kind of what happened with Jacob and God.

00:18:27

They're wrestling all night.

00:18:29

But Jacob, I think he probably knows

00:18:33

that he's our classed and he's wrestling against

00:18:36

someone or something that's just tamping down his power.

00:18:40

God's obviously not going full out,

00:18:43

but Jacob is like holding on.

00:18:44

He realizes something is going on here.

00:18:46

He's like, "Oh, bless me, bless me."

00:18:48

He's clinging on to him, despite the fact that God

00:18:52

has just touched his hip and knocked it out of socket.

00:18:56

And yet he's holding on.

00:18:58

This is part of the beauty of Jacob.

00:19:01

He not only hustles, he wrestles, and he just hangs on.

00:19:07

Sometimes that's the best you can do is just hang on.

00:19:13

I know some of us have had a great last couple of years,

00:19:16

but a lot of us have not.

00:19:18

And it's really difficult when you're wrestling

00:19:22

against things that you can't beat.

00:19:24

Whatever you think about COVID,

00:19:27

whatever you think about the government,

00:19:28

or whatever you think about our racial issues

00:19:31

in our country, whatever you think about vaccines,

00:19:34

whatever, just about everybody's upset.

00:19:36

Just about everybody is.

00:19:38

And there's nothing you can do about it.

00:19:41

There's nothing you can do to get people

00:19:42

to stop wearing masks or make you wear masks.

00:19:44

There's nothing you can do about getting people

00:19:47

to have a vaccine if you think they should,

00:19:49

or you not having a vaccine

00:19:50

if your employer requires you to.

00:19:52

I guess you can now, because the courts

00:19:54

have kind of ruled on that,

00:19:55

at least as of the taping.

00:19:57

But there are so many things that are just beyond it,

00:20:00

we can't win, we can't win. You can't win.

00:20:02

So the best thing we can do right now,

00:20:04

and maybe the best thing you can do,

00:20:05

is you just hang on.

00:20:08

You try not to lose your mind.

00:20:12

You try not to lose your character.

00:20:15

You try not to lose your heart.

00:20:17

Sometimes the best you can do is just hang on.

00:20:21

It's an honorable thing to hang on.

00:20:26

In Genesis 32:27, here's what God says to Jacob:

00:21:13

Jacob's holding on, holding on.

00:21:16

God says, "What's your name?"

00:21:18

And when he says his name, Jacob,

00:21:20

he's saying, "I'm the one who strives.

00:21:24

I'm the one who hustles.

00:21:26

That's why I'm not giving up.

00:21:28

That's why I'm still hanging on here."

00:21:30

And God uniquely blesses him.

00:21:33

He gives him a new name.

00:21:34

He gives him the name Israel.

00:21:37

It's arguably the greatest name

00:21:39

He could give a human being.

00:21:41

This is the name of His chosen people.

00:21:44

He names His chosen people after Jacob.

00:21:49

It's hard to say exactly what this means.

00:21:51

Some say, like, it's translated, like,

00:21:53

I just read with you one who strives with God.

00:21:56

Maybe.

00:21:58

I think a better idea is one who is God's fighter,

00:22:02

God's fighter.

00:22:04

This is a complimentary name, to be very, very clear,

00:22:07

complimentary, or else the nation of Israel

00:22:09

wouldn't be called this.

00:22:12

I like the idea of God's fighter, because both of us,

00:22:17

all of us, should be God's fighter.

00:22:19

God has put you in places where He wants you to fight.

00:22:23

Not physically beat somebody up,

00:22:24

not subvert and put your power and push people down.

00:22:28

But there are things that come across our radar

00:22:31

that we've got to grab, we've got to wrestle.

00:22:34

And these things normally are not fixed with one punch.

00:22:41

It's things that are arduous, backbreaking,

00:22:45

patient, long suffering, forbearing, just hanging on.

00:22:51

But I'm hanging on and I'm wrestling.

00:22:56

Sometimes that's it, it is wrestling with God.

00:22:59

God, why are you allowing this to happen to me?

00:23:03

God, why are you not allowing this to happen to me,

00:23:07

when I'm seeing it happen to other people

00:23:08

who seem to be less qualified for a blessing than I am?

00:23:13

God, why is it that you haven't given me this?

00:23:16

God, why is it that you've given me this?

00:23:20

There is the wrestling with God, the holding on.

00:23:24

Every great person that God uses

00:23:27

will go through wrestling matches with God.

00:23:29

And it's not just the one.

00:23:31

It's going to happen again and again and again in life.

00:23:34

These things qualify us for the real fights

00:23:36

that God wants us in,

00:23:38

and they strengthen us spiritually.

00:23:41

Jacob has more than his share of problems,

00:23:44

and has more of his share of outages.

00:23:47

We've talked about some of those today.

00:23:50

But he's used by God, he's loved by God

00:23:53

because he's a fighter and he will always remember

00:23:56

the day that he fought with God because he limps.

00:24:00

Some of us have a limp

00:24:02

and the limp might be an annoyance,

00:24:04

but the limp that you have, the pain that you have,

00:24:08

the remorse that you have over some certain loss,

00:24:12

every step that Jacob took, he was reminded

00:24:17

of how close he was with God

00:24:18

and how close he is with God.

00:24:20

Because not many people get to wrestle with God.

00:24:23

I try to think of that

00:24:26

when my joints are out of socket,

00:24:29

when I don't feel I can hang on anymore,

00:24:32

when I'm just tired of it.

00:24:35

I think, "I'm learning something about God right now

00:24:39

that I won't learn when I'm on a chair at the beach."

00:24:45

God has a special place in His heart

00:24:48

for people who wrestle with Him

00:24:50

and wrestle with the assignment that He gives us.

00:24:56

Because He's there,

00:24:57

because when you're wrestling with Him, He's there.

00:25:01

He's here with you right now. He is.

00:25:05

Jesus is here with you right now.

00:25:07

Actually, in all likelihood, this was

00:25:10

a prefiguration of Jesus Himself

00:25:15

who's actually wrestling with Jacob.

00:25:18

I believe Jesus was there.

00:25:22

And right now, as you wrestle,

00:25:26

as you feel like you can't hang on any longer,

00:25:28

as someone is lying on top of you on the moist ground,

00:25:32

as your muscles are cramping up

00:25:33

and you don't know you can do it any longer,

00:25:37

a blessing may be right around the corner

00:25:41

in the very next minute or the next hour,

00:25:44

the next day, the next week, or the next year.

00:25:47

God is with you and Jesus is here.

00:25:50

We're going to sing right now.

00:25:52

And I know for a lot of us,

00:25:53

singing is a wrestling match.

00:25:54

You don't like to do it.

00:25:55

Some of you just turn it off right now.

00:25:57

"Forgot it. I'm doing the singing thing."

00:25:59

I know a lot of people who are into that.

00:26:01

It's not a good call, because singing is a way

00:26:03

that we wrestle with God, especially for those of us

00:26:06

who don't like the sound of our voice

00:26:07

or don't like the process.

00:26:09

It's a difficult thing to sing out loud

00:26:12

and to participate,

00:26:13

just like it's difficult to wrestle with God.

00:26:16

And we're going to sing When Jesus is Here.

00:28:48

- I think the reason why Jacob is so misunderstood

00:28:52

is because in America, the culture of spirituality

00:28:56

or the culture of church-ianity

00:29:00

doesn't know what to make of Jacob.

00:29:03

It's like in church work we think

00:29:05

it's our responsibility to reprogram people to be nice,

00:29:11

like, whoever they are, whatever drive they have,

00:29:13

let's just tamp that down.

00:29:14

Let's just reprogram you to be nice.

00:29:18

Being timid and nice is not a godly combo.

00:29:22

Maybe nice is.

00:29:23

I mean, we need more of us being nice,

00:29:25

quite frankly in our culture,

00:29:26

more people need to be kind.

00:29:27

But I'm talking about the niceness

00:29:29

that's just, like, surface-y

00:29:30

and it's just like hoping and assuming

00:29:33

that things are going to go your way.

00:29:35

No, no, no, things are not just going to go your way.

00:29:37

No, no. We need to learn from Jacob.

00:29:39

We need to get back home to his life and say,

00:29:42

"What is it that God wants from me?"

00:29:44

And I've got to exert some energy

00:29:46

and some action, overcome some friction

00:29:50

to get that blessing.

00:29:51

We need more feisty followers who have a vision,

00:29:53

they're going after something.

00:29:55

Don't be lulled into complacency

00:29:57

like so many people are.

00:29:58

You're not entitled to have a blessing

00:30:00

just because you're alive and God loves you.

00:30:02

You're not entitled.

00:30:04

You'll get them, because God is incredibly generous.

00:30:07

But there's a level of living, a level of blessing

00:30:09

that only comes for those of us who go the way of Jacob.

00:30:13

Keep hustling, keep wrestling.

00:30:17

Blessing may just be coming your way.

00:30:26

- That was a super clear message, right?

00:30:28

God wants you to wrestle with Him

00:30:29

and God wants you to hustle.

00:30:30

- That's exactly right. It sounds crazy,

00:30:32

but there was something in Jacob

00:30:33

that I think we can all learn from.

00:30:35

- Absolutely. I want to just say

00:30:37

that Crossroads is donor funded.

00:30:39

We're able to put together episodes like these

00:30:41

and do this kind of thing

00:30:42

because of people just like you.

00:30:44

- And if giving is something that you're interested in,

00:30:46

you can go to the Crossroads app right now

00:30:49

or go to Crossroads.net/give.

00:30:52

We'll see you next week on Crossroads.

00:30:55

- How can the story of Noah and the Flood be true

00:30:58

and God be the loving Father

00:31:00

we'd actually want to come home to?

00:31:03

Well, to get the answer, we're going to tackle

00:31:05

the hardest questions surrounding the story head on.

00:31:08

And I believe, if you hang with us,

00:31:10

you'll see this story in a new light

00:31:12

that helps you find your way closer to home.

00:31:24

- Do you know where you're going?

00:31:26

To get different results in life

00:31:28

you're going to have to do some different things.

00:31:32

And if you're up for adventure this year,

00:31:35

do the Bible Challenge with me.

00:31:37

Read every day, get inspired,

00:31:40

and see what others are saying.

00:31:42

I believe the Bible is more than a book

00:31:45

that's meant to sit on a shelf and just collect dust.

00:31:49

It's meant to take you somewhere in life.

00:31:52

What about you? Where are you going?

00:31:54

Download the Crossroads App

00:31:56

and do the Bible Challenge today.

Recent Series