The Known Unknown

 So He said, "What is your name?" He said, "Jacob." And He said, "Your name shall no longer be Jacob., but Israel; for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed." Genesis 32:27-28

      I was doing my churches Bible reading plan and was reading Genesis 32 about how Jacob feared seeing his brother Esau after he had flee him 20 years prior because he tricked Isaac his father into giving  him a blessing that his father Isaac wanted to give to Esau. To say that Jacob was a mischievous scroundrel in his younger days would be an accurate assessment. He was able to con Esau out of his birthright because Esau made a bad trade because of a weak moment spiritually in his life. He was more concerned about his physical needs than the spiritual needs and role as te first born son. God had foretold that two nations were in Rebekah's(Isaac's wife's) womb and that the older would serve the younger. God knew how things were going to play out and the decisions they would make. Rebekahs sent Jacob to her homeland to find a wife and apparently he had a thing for the farmers daughter but it turns out they were cousins. Rachel was Laban's daughter and he was Rebekah's brother. The thing was God used  Laban to teach Jacob some hard lessons. First off Laban tricked Jacob into marrying his homely looking daughter and also for the 20 years he lived with him he kept cheating him in payment for livestock and such. After serving Laban 14 years and another six years taking care of his father-in-laws flocks. He felt God tell him it's time to return home to his father's land. Of course the known unknown awaits him.

          Jacob has to go home and face the past and the sins which he committed.  Esau his brother waiting for him and he was scared to death. He wrestles with a Man all night. Many believe that this encounter was with Jesus before He came to the world in Mary's womb. It is called a Christophany. Jacob in his fear he goes before God alone, afraid, frustrated, and he was unrelenting. The Man in his struggle with Jacob dislocates Jacob's hip but Jacob refused to surrender until he was blessed by the man. That's when the man changed His name to Israel. So what is the moral of the story?

           The thing is it's okay to wrestle with God when times are hard and things are uncertain. It's hard to step out in faith when God has called to do something and we can't see how it's going to end. We don't know what we're facing and the known unknown is a scary place. Trust me I get it. When you take a step in faith make sure you're holding onto Jesus with all your might and don't let go. If you're holding onto Jesus in your journey of faith you're always going to be heading in the right direction. 

I hope this blesses you and if it does share it with a someone you know who needs it. May God richly bless you. 

Here I Am Lord Send Me

Then Mary said, "Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to Your word." And the angel departed from her. 

     

                 I was listening to my pastor preach on the Luke 1:26-38 this past Sunday and I kept thinking about other sermons I've heard other than his and those lessons from those sermons too. My pastor pointed out there was nothing remarkable about Mary. She was an ordinary teenage girl. She was young, in love, and had a her whole life ahead of her. Then the angel of God Gabriel shows up and tells her that if she submits herself to God's will she will be the mother of the Savior which the prophecies foretold. It was abig thing when the prophet Isaiah stepped up and said, "Here I am Lord send me." She was called out from amongst her people and she had the free will to tell Gabriel to say no. She could have turned God down. She didn't. She stepped out in faith knowing that her friends, family, and ther townspeople were going to judge her harshly. She knew that she could be accused of adultery and stoned to death. But God had other plans. When there's But God in the Bible you're going to see God do something miraculous. While Mary was visiting her cousin Elizabeth, Mary sings her song saying that all generations will call her blessed. She is probably the most celebrated woman in all of history. She was nothing special. She was a lowly poor teenage girl from Nazareth. Wha made her great was she stepped out in faith and said let it be done to me. She did not have a clue what lies ahead for her. She didn't know she was going to have to watch Jesus suffer right in front her. She said Lord sign me up. Who else could honestly say that they literally have that kind of faith? Moses didn't have this kind of faith. Whined and cried and found every excuse to say Lord I can't do it. But God said he could and he did. Joseph went through the same ridicule as Mary. He was an upright man from the house of David. He wanted to do what is right and was willing to divorce Mary quietly so that she wouldn't be harmed or put to shame. Joseph could have had Mary stoned to death but he loved her so much he could not do it. He obeyed the angel of God by faith and took Mary as his wife and they faced the challenges of being the earthly parents of the Messiah.

              So what? This story is 2,000 years old. It doesn't apply to today's society. Actually the Bible is just as relevant today as it was over the 1,600 years that it was written. What is God calling us to today. We are here to share the hope we have. Mary's hope was in looking forward to the coming our Savior. We get to look back and see how God orchestrated all of this. Now the question is today what is God calling us to? We're supposed to share the reason for the hope that is in us. Our hope is Jesus, His birth, His life, His death, and most importantly His resurrection that punched our ticket to Heaven. Let this message sink in and ask yourself a question of self-examination have you been churched or have you been changed? Have you been baptized or have you been born again? Are you on the church role or are you on God's roll? What's the most important thing to you in your life? I want to be wholly surrendered to God and His calling on my life. What has God called you to? Sometimes once you surrender to His calling on your life it might feel like the gates of hell are unleashed on you. It migh be His will to allow times of suffering after you submit to teach and train you to walk by faith and not by sight. To learn to trust God even if you are all alone it feels like. God told Elijah go tell King Ahab and Queen Jezebel that because of the sin they had lead Israel into it wasn't going to rain until God told him to ask for it. God told Elijah if you do this I'll take care of him. Elijah went into a ravine for a year and God dropped food down to him by ravens and he had water to drink from the brook of Cherith. He was sent there while he has a bounty on his head. God sent him there so that He would learn to trust God and walk by faith. Then Elijah was sent on a dangerous journey to Zarephath the hometown of Jezebel. God sent him on a dangerous journey through hostile territory while there's still a bounty on his head. Guess where he went and was sent? He was to a poor widow that had only enough food to make one meal for herself and her son. She was prepared to starve to death. Guess what God wanted to save this one widow through His prophet Elijah. Elijah asked this widow for a drink of water and a piece of bread and this woman responded that surely as Elijah's God lives she only has one meal left. God gave this widow the miracle she needed because she literally gave her last meal away to God by giving God's prophet her last meal and by this God rewarded her faith by miraculously replinishing the oil and flour everyday for about two and half years. 

              In this new year what do want God to see in your life? What has God called you to do and asked you walk by faith in 2026? Sometimes God will ask the impossible of you so that whatever you accomplish it can be explained by no one other God Himself. Jerry Falwell said in a sermon that a Christian is at his greatest potential when he crushed so diffuculties that are so severe that if God doesn't intervene everything is lost. God might call you to do something that you don't fully understand but learn lessons from Mary, Joseph, and Elijah. When you know that truly deep down in the bottom of our hearts and we are fully submitted to the Lord God tells you something and you say Lord here I am send me. We answer the call of like Isaiah and Elijah and your faith is tested time and again by the devil, your flesh, and the lost and dying world in which we live we have to remember to fight the good fight and run the marathon of the life of faith. We can't do it in our own strength. Isaiah 40:31 says, "But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint." I pray that those who read this surrender their hearts fully to the Lord's call on their life in 2026. Fight the good fight and continue your race until you can say what Paul wrote to Timothy that I am ready to be poured out as a drink offering and my time of departure is at hand. I have fought the good fight I have finished the race. I have kept the faith. If you read this and it's touched your heart leave a comment. I pray that this touches your heart and God speaks to you through. Have a blessed 2026.