Golden Text: Genesis 32: 9 – 12.
And Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, the Lord which saidst unto me, Return unto thy country, and to thy kindred, and I will deal well with thee:I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies, and of all the truth, which thou hast shewed unto thy servant; for with my staff I passed over this Jordan; and now I am become two bands.Deliver me, I pray thee, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau: for I fear him, lest he will come and smite me, and the mother with the children.And thou saidst, I will surely do thee good, and make thy seed as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude.
EXPOSITION:
Our aim in this series is to glimpse from allegories in the Old Testament, in order to appreciate the reality of the new creature. The new creature isn’t imaginary. The new creature isn’t a delusion. The new creature in not an hybrid. The new creature isn’t caricature. He is new indeed.
Previously, we have seen that Esau can only fight Jacob but not Isreal. We have seen that Isreal prevailed without fighting, which is tantamount to “more than conquerors”. We also said, human effort to please man is unnecessary. For all these to take place, Jacob died and Isreal began.
Today, we continue on our insight into how Jacob became Isreal (new creature). The journey of Jacob becoming Isreal began by hearing the word of God. God told him to leave Laban and return to his country. Jacob believed this word and acted on it.
As part of acting on the word, he left Laban’s house. As part of acting on the word, he prayed to God on the basis of the word that God spoke to him, which he believed.
For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10:13
So, Jacob was saved simply by believing and acting according to what he heard. Consequently, he became a Isreal- a new creature.
The same is true about a man in Christ. You don’t need to do any other thing other than believing the gospel. That’s believe Jesus is the son of God, who died for your sin and he resurrected. And the moment you believe and confess that, God declares you a new creature.
The person who came to be as a result is different from the person who did the believed and confessed. This person is a new creature. This is similar to the way Jacob did the believing and the prayer, but woke up as Isreal.
Now, for anyone to tell you that you need to add another deliverance to it is to bring you into identity crisis. That’s not different from the way Isreal was using human’s efforts to save himself from Esau, because he was still seeing himself as Jacob.
May the Lord grant you understanding. Amen!
By: Ebenezer Odufuwa
Bible in a Year: Nehemiah 7-9.
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