And Jacob said, God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, Jehovah, who saidst unto me Return into thy country and to thy kindred, and I will do thee good,
Esau is coming with four hundred men, and Jacob has just split his camp into two bands. Now he prays, quoting God's own command back to Him — real faith, or one more move in his plan?
Jacob makes his plan first, then prays. One writer says the two cannot live together.
True, he turns to God after he makes his plan, and cries to Him for deliverance. But as soon as he stops praying, he goes back to planning. Praying and planning will never work together. If I plan, I am leaning more or less on my plan; but when I pray, I should lean only on God. So the two things are incompatible; they destroy each other. When my eye is full of my own management of things, I am not ready to see God acting for me. Then prayer is not the voice of my need. It becomes a mere superstitious ritual, or a request that God would bless my plans. I should not be asking God to bless my methods, but asking Him to do it all Himself.
Jacob does not ask on the strength of his own record. He goes back to the command that sent him home. (Jehovah, in the quote below, is the name the verse gives as "the LORD".)
He reminds Jehovah, the God of his fathers Abraham and Isaac, that he was returning to his country and family at God's own command. He owns that he is unworthy of the least of all His mercies and of all His truth... We can easily see that it was faith, but as yet mixed with human schemes.
One writer turns this into a pattern anyone can copy.
He told God that He Himself had told him to return home, and had promised to do him good... If you plead God's promises, and confess you are not worthy, but only a lost sinner, He will hear your prayer.
At Bethel, Jacob had vowed to take the LORD as his own God. Here he names God twice as his father's God, and once as the LORD who spoke to him. One writer sees that vow still unpaid.
It is all Jacob here, and not Jehovah; Jehovah's glory set aside and only Jacob's blessing thought of... I, I, I, fills the scene, and is the whole subject of his prayer. So in this hour of trial he fails to keep his vow. He owns Jehovah only as the God of his father Abraham, the God of his father Isaac, the Jehovah who spoke to him — but not as his own God.
Another writer presses the danger on anyone who leans on a godly family.
He was trying to draw on the piety of his father and grandfather. He thought the godly lives of his forefathers would add weight to his prayer. What a serious mistake! Every man must stand on his own responsibility before God. Your mother's prayers will not do you the slightest good, unconverted prodigal, unless you trust the Lord Jesus for yourself.
Still, this is not the Jacob of Bethel. The man who once bargained now opens with God's promise and closes with his own unworthiness.
But where was Jacob's faith to be sure that God would deal well with him in his own land? He should have had perfect confidence that God would do this, because God said He would. Still, he has learned more than he had when he made his vow at Bethel. He had thought then that he would prove fully worthy of whatever blessing God would give him. Now he confesses, "I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies and all the truth which You have shown Your servant." At least he is giving up the self-confidence he showed before. But he has not yet learned to have total confidence in the living God.
Commentators differ on how much faith this prayer holds. Some find almost none in it. Others say Jacob was right to make the God of Abraham and Isaac his refuge. They agree the answer had to wait until Jacob's own resources were gone.
He was greatly troubled, full of fear, and rightly enough made the God of Abraham and of Isaac his refuge. His prayer, as recorded in Genesis 32, was humble, earnest, and pleading. But along with it there was some reckoning on his own policy... So God had to deal sharply with His servant before answering his prayer. That way Jacob would give the glory to the One who alone deserved it.
- Plan — Jacob's first move was to manage the danger himself, not to seek God. Praying and planning cancel each other out, because a plan gives you something else to lean on.
- Plead — the ground he takes is right. He pleads God's command to return and God's promise to do him good, and claims nothing for himself.
- Personal — he calls God his father's God, not yet his own God. The vow made at Bethel is still unpaid, and no one else's faith will stand in for yours.
- Progress — "I am not worthy" is real growth in the man who once bargained at Bethel. Full confidence in God is still missing.
- Prevail — he still leaned on his own policy while he prayed. So God had to break him before answering, and the glory went where it belonged.
-- I am too small for all the loving-kindness and all the faithfulness that thou hast shewn unto thy servant; for with my staff I passed over this Jordan, and now I am become two troops.
Twenty years after fleeing home, Jacob is back at the border, and Esau is marching toward him with four hundred men. He prays, and this verse is not a request but a confession: he weighs his life between a walking stick and two companies, and says he has earned neither.
The writers below quote an older translation. Where they say "mercies and truth" and "two bands," the ESV says "steadfast love and faithfulness" and "two camps."
Jacob has heard God speak before. Here we finally hear Jacob.
God had stepped in before, and Jacob had made a vow, but this is the first prayer of his that Scripture records. It does not have the closeness to God and the prayer for others that marked Abraham in Genesis 18. It was simply a plea to be kept safe, while acknowledging God's mercies to him in the past. Yet notice how rightly he took a low place, though not as low as Abraham, who said, "I … am but dust and ashes" (18:27). Jacob says, "I am not worthy of the least of all Your mercies," which was true, though it did not go far enough. In every age, the closer a person comes to God, the deeper their sense of unworthiness and nothingness grows.
The order of the chapter matters. Jacob divides his camp first, and only then turns to God.
Jacob's first thought was always a plan, and in this we have a true picture of the poor human heart. True, he turns to God after he makes his plan, and cries to Him for deliverance. But as soon as he stops praying, he goes back to planning. Now, praying and planning will never do together. If I plan, I am leaning more or less on my plan; but when I pray, I should lean only on God. So the two things are completely incompatible; in effect they destroy each other.
Years earlier at Bethel, Jacob made a vow. What he says now shows how much has changed.
He has learned more than he had when he made his vow at Bethel. He had thought then that he would prove fully worthy of whatever blessing God would give him. Now he confesses, "I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies and all the truth which You have shown Your servant" (v.10). At least he is giving up the self-confidence he showed before. But he has not yet learned to trust the living God completely.
The two halves of the verse are the two ends of twenty years, and the second half carries its own danger.
He is on his way back to Canaan, but it is a different Jacob and a different journey. He was an empty Jacob at Bethel; he is a full Jacob at Peniel. He has become two bands. Flocks and herds and servants and wives and children tell of his prosperity. Twenty years before he had been on that road, friendless and alone, with a staff in his hand. Now we see him surrounded by all this. He has become a rich man. He has a stake in the world. He has something to lose.
Behind these words is a past that Jacob could now see clearly.
He had been false and crooked. But Jacob was now before God, and he saw himself in the light of heaven. He saw how he had deceived his old father, cheated his brother, made bargains with God, and deceived his uncle. You and I are not worthy, but God shows His mercy and truth to us bad, crooked sinners. Let us come and tell it all to God.
Jacob rests his case on mercy rather than on any claim, and that is exactly the ground God honours.
Their hope is not in His justice, but in His mercy. This is what Jacob depended on when he prayed, "I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies and of all the truth which You have shown Your servant" (Gen. 32:10). Can God possibly ignore such a prayer? No: He delights in the confessed weakness and failure of a believing heart, and His mercy is fully extended to them.
Commentators differ on how much faith this prayer shows. One finds none in it.
Where is faith in this? There is none. If he had only had in his soul the sense that God was with him, he could not have prayed like this. There is nothing more blessed for a man than to have in his soul the sense that God is for him and with him. But Jacob did not have that.
Another sees real faith in it, mixed with something else.
He owns his unworthiness of the least of all His mercies and of all His truth. He compares how poor he was when he first crossed the Jordan with the two companies he has now… We can see that it was faith, but faith still mixed with human schemes. So he was far from resting calmly on God, and was even in sheer terror of Esau.
- Unworthy. Jacob's first recorded prayer takes a low place. The closer we come to God, the smaller we feel.
- Unlearned. At Bethel he thought he would prove worthy. Now his self-confidence is gone, though his trust in God is still not complete.
- Unmixed. Planning and praying cancel each other out — leaning on a scheme is not leaning on God.
- Unearned. A staff at the start, two companies at the end. Everything in between was mercy to a false and crooked man.
- Unashamed. God shows mercy and truth to crooked sinners, so come and tell Him everything.
Deliver me, I pray thee, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau; for I fear him, lest he come and smite me, [and] the mother with the children.
Jacob is heading back to his own country with his wives, children and flocks. Word has just reached him that Esau — the brother he wronged years before — is coming to meet him with four hundred men.
The prayer is real. It also comes from a man who has already worked out a plan of his own.
After the trembling man had made his plan, he turns to God, and we can trace the work slowly going on in his soul. He reminds the LORD, the God of his fathers Abraham and Isaac, that God Himself had told him to return home. He owns his unworthiness of the least of all His mercies and of all His truth... He begs God to deliver him from the hand of his brother Esau, whom he dreaded both for himself and for the mother with the children... We can readily see that it was faith, but as yet mixed with human schemes. So he was far from resting peacefully on God, and was even in abject terror of Esau.
Esau was not the real problem. God had already promised to keep Jacob, so the fear came from somewhere else.
God had said to Jacob, "Behold, I am with you and will keep you" (Gen. 28:15). Esau would not have been able to touch him. If Jacob's ways had not been deceitful, he would not have been afraid of Esau. But you see, his conscience is working... He was afraid of his brother, whom he counted as his enemy. Esau was not his enemy, though he might have been. It was Jacob's own conscience that suggested Esau was against him. God was for him, but he had lost the sense of it.
God had already sent Jacob encouragement. Jacob lost sight of it, and Esau's four hundred men filled his whole horizon.
Still, despite this encouragement from God, unbelief renews Jacob's fear when he faces his brother Esau. Rescue from danger does not destroy unbelief. You do not get rid of the difficulties in the path of faith by trying to avoid them. You must overcome them by the power of God. Jacob had brought these difficulties on himself, because he had not trusted God. God's army was forgotten. Esau no longer held any hatred in his heart against his brother, but his army still frightened the feeble Jacob.
Jacob asks God to deliver him, then goes straight back to his own arrangements.
Jacob's first thought was always a plan, and here we have a true picture of the poor human heart. True, he turns to God after he makes his plan, and cries to Him for deliverance. But as soon as he stops praying he starts planning again. Now, praying and planning will never work together. If I plan, I am leaning more or less on my plan; but when I pray, I should lean on God alone. So the two things are completely incompatible; they destroy each other. When my eye is filled with my own management of things, I am not ready to see God acting for me.
The trouble was of Jacob's own making, and God still met him in it.
We may be in trouble that our own wrongdoing has brought on us, and we may rightly dread the consequences. Even that we can take to God, if we have sincerely confessed our sin... Jacob had deeply wronged Esau, and now, after years apart, he has to face him... Jacob's conscience naturally makes him fear Esau's resentment. He learns that Esau is coming to meet him with four hundred men. But he lays it before God in prayer (v. 11). The result was remarkable. The man whose revenge he feared "ran to meet him and embraced him and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept"!
The prayer did not settle Jacob, and his gifts did not settle Esau. What came next went deeper than either.
The fact is that he was dissatisfied with himself, and feels the need of drawing near to God in a way he had never yet known... His plans did nothing to soften Esau, any more than to relieve his own dread. But he was now to be alone with God. God took him up in a way worthy of Himself. He laid the basis for the deepening work in his soul ever after, and for a blessing which at last shone in Jacob's later years beyond his father or even his grandfather.
- Conscience — The dread is not about Esau's four hundred men. It comes from Jacob's own wrong against his brother.
- Forgetting — God had just encouraged Jacob with His own army, and unbelief erased that the moment a threat appeared.
- Divided trust — He prays for deliverance, then goes back to his own plan. Leaning on a plan and leaning on God cancel each other out.
- Answered anyway — Esau had no hatred left in his heart, and the meeting Jacob dreaded ended in an embrace and tears.
- Purpose — The fear drove Jacob to be alone with God, and there began a blessing greater than his father's or his grandfather's.
And thou saidst, I will certainly deal well with thee, and make thy seed as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude.
Jacob is on the way to meet his brother Esau, and he is afraid Esau will kill him. His prayer ends with no new argument, only an old one — a sentence God Himself had spoken, and the verse turns on two words: "you said."
One writer traces the steps of the prayer, from Jacob's appeal to the God of his fathers down to this closing plea:
He reminds the Lord, the God of his fathers Abraham and Isaac, that he was going back to his country and family because God told him to. He admits he is unworthy of the least of all His mercies and of all His truth. He compares how poor he was when he first crossed the Jordan with the two companies he has now. He begs God earnestly to save him from his brother Esau. He dreaded Esau both for himself and for the mother with the children. Then he reminds Him of His promise — to surely do him good, and to make his descendants as countless as the sand of the sea.
That way of praying is open to anyone who has a Bible:
You will find it the very strength of your soul to go before God with a text and say, "This is written in Your word. Because You cannot lie, I know that I have that thing."
The verse sets God's promise and Esau's threat side by side, and asks how both can stand.
"For You said," he adds, "I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea," and so on. He was in effect saying to God, "You said this, but now Esau might kill me, and what will happen to Your promise?" Did he need to plead with God to keep His promise?
Commentators differ over Jacob's wording. One reads it as a mistake:
He did make an error in saying that God had told him He would make his descendants as the sand of the sea. God had said this to Abraham (Genesis 22:17). To Jacob He had promised descendants "as the dust of the earth" (Genesis 28:14).
Another finds meaning in the change:
Isaac pictures the heavenly company and Jacob the earthly. So God speaks of the stars to Isaac and of the dust to Jacob. Yet in Genesis 32:12, Jacob says God had also promised to give him descendants as the "sand of the sea." In this chapter Jacob is about to meet Esau and make peace with him. That is a picture of the Gentiles brought into blessing through the Jew in a day still to come. It is striking that just here Jacob should mention the sand.
The prayer sits between the plans Jacob made and the gift he sent.
Jacob arranges his plans, though not without prayer (Genesis 32:7-12). He sends his presents (Genesis 32:13-23) to appease his brother — a brother God had already appeased, since Esau was coming to meet Jacob with family affection. In his appeal to God he recalls His promises, for he had faith, however feeble.
Another writer turns that mixture on the reader:
The trouble of the present day is that people, even Christians, rank policy side by side with faith. A godly young man used to say, "Policy I hate; but faithfulness to God I love." Surely nothing is more clearly stated in Scripture than that "without faith it is impossible to please God." But this mixture of faith and contrivance is what is before us here. The truth urges us strongly to judge ourselves about it.
The words Jacob quotes were never a bargain he had to secure. They were God binding Himself.
Here we have the blessed statement of what the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob promised to do for Jacob and for his descendants. It is crowned by these memorable words: "I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you of." These are the terms by which God binds Himself to Jacob. And these terms, blessed be His name, God has kept and will keep to the letter, though earth and hell should try to prevent it.
- You said — Jacob's strongest plea is a quotation. He brings God nothing of his own at the end, only what God had already spoken.
- Faith, however feeble — the prayer is real faith, mixed with human scheming. The praying and the planning run side by side.
- Already answered — Esau was coming in family affection before Jacob ever sent the gifts. God had moved first.
- Sand or dust — God promised countless descendants in more than one form. Writers differ: was Jacob's "sand" a mistake, or a reach toward the blessing of the nations?
- Bound by His word — the promise Jacob leaned on rests on God binding Himself, and He will keep it to the letter. Judge the scheming in yourself; the promise itself never wobbles.