As we start today, Jacob is about to leave a place where he was practically a slave for years, turning his back on the past, but is about to enter a place where his brother's wrath may destroy him. Laban kisses his daughters and grandchildren, who are his legacy, and much of his wealth goodbye, ruined by his attempts to ignore God and deal unfairly with Jacob. He has come to accept this and peacefully made an agreement with Jacob, but it still must have hurt him.
Along the way back to Canaan, Jacob runs into angels much in the same manner as he did at Bethel on the way out of Canaan. These angels seem to be there to remind Jacob that he is doing the right thing, that he is stepping into the land promised to him, the land blessed by God. He has been away far too long. Bethel, the House of God, is very near this place, Mahanaim, Two Camps. God, the spiritual, the divine, is encamped right with Jacob, the earthly, the human. The two meet at this place.
Jacob is clearly growing in his faith...the prayer he prays is such a poignant one, appropriate for any time we face something that scares us. Like we ought to do in the face of danger, Jacob takes the practical active steps he knows to do to prepare, dividing what's important to him ("diversifying his portfolio", if you will) into two groups and offering propitiatory presents to Esau, and then when he has reached the end of all he can do, he prays. First, he calls to mind the legacy of faith in his forefathers and by extension calls to mind God's mighty and wonderful deeds done for Abraham and Isaac. He brings specifically to mind then the call he has received to leave Laban and the promised help from God that should follow now that he is obeying. God has been good in the past, has delivered amazing blessings in the present, and will continue to protect in the future. Jacob lays all this at God's feet and in faith asks for the promise of protection to be fulfilled. He didn't stop after the division of his assets or the peace offerings, believing that they would keep him safe, but continued on to place himself in God's hands in prayer.
That night, starting from this basis of increased trust and faith, Jacob meets the divine one last time. The first time, he envisioned a ladder with angels climbing up and down...envisioned what it was like to have an actual relationship, a back-and-forth, give-and-take, with the God of the universe, and he wanted in. The second time, he gets even closer, describing the existence of a place where God and Man camp together...not a God you have to climb to see, but a God who lives with you. Jacob is strengthened by this idea and wants to live where the divine dwells. Now, there comes the final picture to complete Jacob's relationship with his God. Here, in this scary moment, something supernatural (an angel? God himself?) comes and wrestles with him. Jacob comes to understand that his life is about grappling with the mystery and trying to lay hold of a God who is so close as to be touched, smelled, and tested. He wants blessings, good things to come his way as a result of being in relationship with God, but this does not come easily. Being so close to God as to see Him and talk to Him leaves us both keenly aware of our disabilities compared to Him and unbelievably blessed as a result. Jacob is crippled by the angel physically in a way that reminds him that God is in control of his life. His transition from entering the House of God, to encamping alongside Him, to seeing His Face is complete. Like Abraham before him, Jacob is renamed to more clearly coincide with his new mission in life. He is no longer the Underminer, the Supplanter, the one who contends with his brother...he is now the one who contends with the mystery of God. No longer fisherman but fisher of men.
He receives the fruits of this new improved relationship with God almost immediately. The one who undermined his brother, now that he has a new mission, is capable of making peace with Esau. At first, he, as I, doesn't quite believe what an amazing thing has happened. He approaches Esau still on the defensive, putting his most valuable stuff (Rachel and Joseph) behind the less important stuff, but when the time comes, Esau ignores all of it. He runs up to his humble brother and greets him with the kind of warmth with which you greet the brother you have missed for so long. He comments on how abundant the blessings Jacob/Israel has received are, but refuses to accept a peace offering. None is needed. Jacob thanks God for this and gives Esau a gift anyway...more of an offering of thanks to the God Jacob sees in Esau than a peace offering to his human brother, so Esau accepts this on God's behalf. The two walk back to Canaan, with Jacob walking slowly without an escort of Esau's men, ostensibly because he has a lot of slow children and such to keep his pace down. They needed a rest, and Jacob himself needed to stay out of anyone's debt, no longer bound to anyone in that way.
Finally, Jacob reaches the border of the promised land and stops there, at a place he names Shelter, Sukkoth, in order to remind him of the shelter God has given him from what could have been a very painful situation. When he crosses the river into Canaan, he buys some land near Shechem, near where his ancestors are buried, thus increasing the amount of Canaanite foothold his family possesses.
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