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December 31 Daily Devotional

Jacob Remained Alone

Frans Bakker

And Jacob was left alone. —Genesis 32:24a

Bible Reading

Genesis 32:24–30

Devotional

Jacob sent everything he had over the brook Jabbok, but he himself does not go. He stays behind. Why does he stay there by himself? Jacob remembers what happened twenty years ago: he lied to his blind father and he deceived Esau. Sure, he is ready to meet Esau with lots of presents. Things may become right with Esau, but Jacob is not yet right with God. The guilt towards his brother is at the same time guilt towards God.

And when Jacob is there alone, a man approaches him, and wrestles with him. Is this Esau? Is Esau here to get even with him? No, it is the Lord. In his loneliness Jacob finds God as his opponent, because the Lord remembers the deceiving attitude of Jacob.

In this way you cannot cross the Jabbok, Jacob. Your guilt is not confessed. Esau also stands guilty before the Lord. Esau despised his birthright by selling it to Jacob for some red pottage. The guilt we bear, we have to bear alone; we cannot share it with each other. Men will have to meet God alone. We will have to carry the guilt alone, just like Jacob. God and the sinner must meet alone.

It is the last day of the year. We also have to cross the brook, like Jacob had to cross the Jabbok. The turning of a new year is only a station on our journey to eternity. Every year is a year closer to our death. When will we have to cross the Jordan of death?

When that time comes there will be no new year. Our last day will come and we will have to face it alone. We will have to appear before the all-knowing God.

We cannot cross the Jabbok unless we have learned to stay behind, alone, in solitude. We need to consider before God’s face who we have been in ourselves. And we will be no better off than Jacob because we have sinned much. “Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting,” says Daniel the prophet (Dan. 5:27). And that is why the Lord has to confront us, just as with Jacob. If we still live without acknowledging our guilt, then the Lord is against us on the last day of the year. And He will also be against us on the last day of our lives. In this condition we cannot enter a new year, and certainly not heaven! We need God’s grace personally. Let us stay with Jacob alone and plead for His mercy.

 

From The Everlasting Word by Frans Bakker, compiled and translated by Gerald R. Procee. Reformation Heritage Books and Free Reformed Publications, 2007. Used by permission. For further information, click here.

 

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