In this sermon, the preacher discusses the story of Jacob and Esau from the Bible. He highlights Jacob's fear of Esau and his prayer for deliverance. The preacher emphasizes the theme of God's goodness and how Jacob learns to see a purpose in difficult situations. He also mentions Joseph and his brothers, emphasizing the importance of trusting in God's perfect ways. The sermon concludes with Jacob's return to Canaan and his preparation to face Esau.

Which has been a specific faith committal, such as Abraham's or Isaac's, to God and His word of promise. And which has been responded to by God's own self-revelation, because it always must be. This life is revelation, it's living in the knowledge. Not obtaining the knowledge, but the knowledge of turning up, living in the consciousness. And this consciousness had come to Jacob through a dream at Bethel. So God was his God, and he was totally what is involved in being a son of God, which is a guardian in some form. But he didn't know that yet, in its total form. Because God has to have a, if necessary, has to become real persons, who have personality, and know how to function as persons, and know where he should put persons. Because we are going to be that personality, three persons, operating as God, in redeemer activity on earth, and world, universe development, in the next dimension I suppose. So he needed properly trained people, which means we know how to use ourselves. So Jacob, as we all do, had to go through a long and inescapable further phase, when he could, at last, totally and basically understand the subtlety of the fallen dimension, which is a negative human self operating as if it combined its own life, its own self, for its own ends. The second part of that is that within the new birth, for its own ends, that we first come out of. We are separated from God by our misuse of ourselves for our own ends. That's the new birth. We haven't yet, at that stage, learned that the final form of the fallen dimension is running ourselves. You see, we are made living persons, who make living choices, that's what makes a good person, having living consciences, living choices. We have not got the resources to fulfill our choices, that's God only. The negative hasn't got the resources, the positive has the resources. Therefore, in the fallen condition, we are living persons, who make our choices, and haven't got the resources to fulfill our choices. Either, in our fallen condition, we try to satisfy ourselves by false choices, in the field of the world and the flesh, we are out of that in regeneration, but we still try to satisfy ourselves by right choices. So, to try to do right is as much a part of the fallen dimension as doing wrong. That's the lesson we learn after we are saved. To a certain extent, people may do it in an unfair condition, who grow up in religions which emphasize legal demands. As if God is a person who is approached by self-righteous acts. But in the main, we find that's not often the case. So, Jacob has to find that although he is for God now, God is for him, he is a good God and God is good in him. Life is going to be a hard thing for him. While it might be fulfilled by his own energies, if you like, dedicated energies, with a frustrating consciousness that life is tough for him. We are governed by our inner selves. We are our inner selves, by our inner understanding of ourselves, recognition of ourselves. So, while we think that life is redoing God's will, redoing it, we don't like what happens to the we. So, we do it under strain and negative reactions and weaknesses. Life is tough, because what comes just comes to ourselves. Well, we are in the Lord's service, but we take it with self-pity, self-pity hardly. I'm gunned down, the way it's tough. The situation is unpleasant. And my major sense is a duty to God, a commitment to God, but a commitment with a great sense of the hardness of the way, and the unpleasantness of the way, and the wish we could get out of it. And accusing other people of causing our difficulties, and having a personal reaction to people. By all those ways, we have finally to be forced by some final crisis, to realize that we've still got life on the wrong foot. It's a mixture now, of flesh and spirit, God and man. It isn't wholly on the wrong foot, it was when I was totally self-oriented. That's finished. When I came, as we would say, I came out and found the Savior, and justified, and so on. But it's now a mixture. I am a person of spirit. My life is committed to the will of God. He's my end and my aim. But I'm living in this nigh of separation from God, which is the only thing I can know unless I'm in union. If I'm in union, I just know I'm in union and there's nothing more to it. If I don't know I'm in union, I'm in separation, or I may lose the separation. And I'm seeking to handle life on a self-active basis. As if it consists of the I as a human, directed by God to function as a human, for Him. And that's the false mixture. It came in Jacob's case by his going to his uncle, his mother's uncle Laban, under a right commission that as being the beginning of the nation of God, the wife should be of the same faith family as the husband, and not of some other family who was in no relation to the new revelation of God which was coming through. So he rightfully sent to Laban, from which Rebekah had come. Rebekah was a godly woman, or the same one. The foolish concept we have so often now, is that God is always on the corner, to smack us when we need it. Jacob was going to be paid back in his own coin, because he deceived Isaac. Therefore, he will now be deceived by Laban. God doesn't work like that. This wasn't for the purpose of punishing Jacob. It was for the purpose of being made of which Jacob would find life to be a tough, and not unprosperous, not unblessed, but tough, disillusioning servant of God. And the prosperous and disillusioned, he made the fit of it, not the crown of the glory and like that. So he interprets what happened to him on that level. What happened to him had to be. It's all God. This is how the family can be. Now, of course, in those days, the social mores allowed for polygamy. It didn't arise. Polygamy wasn't a sin. A doubtful sin might be a sin, of course, but it's not polygamy. So that doesn't arise. The fact that he had, first of all, Leah, and then he had Rachel, and then he had Leah's maid, and then he had Rachel's maid, a slave in those days, I suppose, and the four other wives by whom the family came into being, that's not the point. That's just on the standard of those days, so we needn't discuss that as a matter of matter. The point was that he so tripped all the time. You see, he so tripped, because life on his basis was, I'm a person. I was on my life, and couldn't care less if I had to do tricks, and games played on me, and tests, tests, tests, tests all the time. If he'd known the real life, and this was God put into his own attention, he'd get from God. It's the attitude that matters. He'd say, oh, well, God's taking me, OK. God's taking me this way by this means. He's bringing me my wife, or his other wife and children, OK, OK. And he'd be released in his ministry, because it would be God's way of expressing his own purposes through Jacob. Jacob didn't know that, because he separated our problems. Separation is the consciousness which came into the form. It has to be. Because if I'm not one with God, so that I'm God's person by me, I can only be by myself. And that's a self-life. I'm the Lord. So being with God, in the union of grace, you're on the other side from God, and God treats you like a Lord. So you shouldn't be like that. There's no Lord in God. You're on the right side of God. It's only God's freedom. Because the only Lord in the universe is love, and you live in love. There are no Lords in God. That's when we are continuously a form of God, expressing God. And then you don't see the other, because the other's not there. Adam and Eve didn't know that life, when they first started, and they moved into the other one. The deceitful life, where they tried it out for themselves, and so they kept separate. And the separation from God is either you find yourself trying to do what you want and hide away from the fundamental basis of being you ought to be, that God told you to be. You're on the judgment, because you're not. You hide away from that, in the sins of the flesh, and so on. Or you come up and try to do it. And the prime miserable life, under guilt, because you can't be what you should be. That's the other one. That's also a kind of being. In this case, you can come over into Christ. It hasn't got settled in to the realization of this new dimension into which it is introduced. Spirit is one. There's a touch in the new birth. A touch of the witness of the Spirit. A touch of acceptance by Christ, and forgiveness, and child of God. But it's so far within the touch. It hasn't been what we really are, sons in union, and operating on this pre-level. So we're still on a halfway level. We are here. We have begun this life under new control, because we haven't yet got ourselves into true focus. We're operating as if we've now got, as human cells, to function for God. And we haven't got what it takes to do it. Or if we do it, it's a hard way. So that's what Jacob went through. He's a lawless apostate. God's goodness, though, you can see it. God's goodness always there. And every now and then, of course, Jacob would see it. And no one saw it. Other people see it. Laban laid a large... Lay a mighty rock in 1327. So I've learned by experience the Lord has blessed me for thy sake. Said to Jacob, So I've learned by experience the Lord has blessed me for thy sake. The blessing of God. He had a lawless austerity as a shepherd. The wealth of Laban increased vastly as he looked after Laban's sheep and the cattle, sheep, goats, and so on. So the austerity was there, he knew it was there. The family life was there, but there was jealousy. Because he didn't know how to accept everybody equally in God. He had favourites. The soul had favourites. So Leah was... Rachel was a favourite. Leah was not. Leah was supposed to be a favourite. I mean, physically a favourite. God knows how to balance things out, because she's the one who has the sons. The main part of the family came to Leah. And Leah was a happy woman. Because Jacob made her unhappy. Because he couldn't accept... He could only see people in flesh. He didn't like Leah like... Rather like he saw, I think he saw. He didn't like Leah, he didn't like Rachel. Well of course that actually hurt Leah. And he wasn't a person who was creative enough to be able to accept all God's people on a light level and give them a right view to all. And not only on the soul emotional reaction, but the spirit... One united reaction which loved all. All or anybody later. So there were the internal reactions in the family situation. The fact that God blessed him. He had these sons, which was a great ambition in those days of course. He had eleven sons and one daughter. Nine other daughters. Mainly by Leah. And Leah's servant became his other wife. And right towards the end, when he finished his time with Laban, he'd won his favourite son again by Rachel. Right towards the end of his time. But you see, the sense that Jacob had, that he's hard done by that, I'm getting at. I'm not getting at the facts. Life is that. Life is going to be hard. Because it's a perfection of the people of God. That's how you see it. That's what matters. It's what you are inwardly. Now if you know the union, your God, God coming through you in certain situations, this is how God expresses his blessing and calling and liberation, well then life's adventure and fun isn't that hard. He's not saying they're hard. If you're seeing the adventure and the fun and the thrill and the outgoing, if it's not that, if it's you apart from God, just a God's servant. See, it's possibly a servant. We're not servants of sons. Servants aren't just sitting on a law. We're under no law. That's on a relations course. And in a sense, while you're a servant, I'm God's servant. God would have me do this, or whatever I thought I was doing. It's tough. And you're seeing life as a self, on a self-reaction basis. It's not hard. So his comments on, besides that, he said, very exciting, he said, he poured out the labour at the end. Man's labour is tough. It's a good thing. But he wasn't here to be punished. He was there going to use different ways to make him find that self-reaction is a hellish life. It's still part of the, goes straight to the core. Independent self is weak. It's under that he had composed it. Weak. Can't handle it, because you can't see. It's good through evil. So it's always responding with criticism or reaction or hurt or scheming and so on. That's what it does. So his comment at the end was very striking. Thus I was, in the day the drug consumed me and the frost by night. Thirty years of it. Well, the drug isn't too good. No, it's fast. Because it's the same, the attitude you've got towards it. See, this is one thing you've got to learn. We're not in health and sickness. And we're not in cold and heat. We're in eternal life. Health and sickness are part of the four opposites. Well, we still feel them quite a bit. I feel cold quite a bit. But ideally we don't. And when we get into God we less and less do. I think we know how to take things better. But all those opposites are part of the four. We shouldn't talk health and sickness. We should talk about life. I don't see my Princess Pauline now. She's been through a tough time. It's not always easy. She is weak. She's too weak. She's very weak. I've seen her in God's life all the time. God's goodies have taken her through all she's gone through. God's goodies. God's life there. Now you see, but if you don't see that then you feel the drought and you feel the cold. And then you see what what annoyed him. I don't wonder. He said, That I was in the day the drought consumed me and the frost by night and my sleep departed from my eyes. Like you folks downstairs who never sleep at all. Doctor, I've been twenty years in thy house. I serve thee, you see, not serving God, serve thee fourteen years for my two daughters, for thy two daughters and six years for thy family. And I've changed my wages ten times. Well, who wouldn't be hurt? They need a few George meanies in those days, I think. Psyche or something. Changed my wages ten times. Well, all you see, you see, is resentful. Who wouldn't be resentful? So why does God have to put him in places where things change in those situations, the less good situations the harder? Why is he in a harness? It means we haven't got the union in action. We don't know it. Maybe we do know it because we're off at a pace but we don't know how to get back. Or we don't know it. But you start by not knowing it. You know the relationship and not union. So it's quite clear as we go through these men and women you see it all the time. There is this second phase. It's a perfect set of people. We're to be perfected people. Released humanity. Not deity. Humanity's second deity. Humanity's deity. That's God. We're to be released, perfected humans. Be ourselves. Before I be myself, I've got to be myself. I'm a negative. I'm a... a... a... God's agent. Yet the paradox is I'm not a negative like a creature is more than a negative. I live by instinct. You can only go as far as your instinct can take you. I'm a person like God. But whereas a creature just does what it wants. It's creature instinct that sets us apart. They're very wonderful too as far as this nice little dog we have here. Creatures like that. But they're of course that's all they can do. We're a God. So the paradox of our negativity is we remain just as positive. We're negative yet we act as a person. When we're in the right places. That's what we've tried to find through the fall how to act as a person. How to reach... Everyone wants to be a God. Of course you do. We are God. We all may be God. That's why everybody wants to be something. Quite right. We can't do it. We're inferior. Can't do it. We're either captured by our sins or captured by our self-interest. Our reactions and so on. Can't do it. Because the positive part really is the God by us. The two together makes a person. Really. The source is a God. The source is by us. But that's another matter. So we went through tough times because we saw them tough. They had to be because this is God's way. He knew it. Jacob was to be the multiplier. That was the third stage. And then suddenly it began to spread out through Jacob. So it had to be. So God was all the time using these crises to bring out the perfect purpose. But the point was how do you take it? So it was a tough time for Jacob. At the same time God rewarded him. Because again we pay up. Now I'm not a shepherd so I can't go into B.D. lessons too much. There are other parts of me or these rods in the water which make them breed certain types. I'm not going to leave you geneticists to understand those things. But he said God told him. He God's with him. And there came a time quite likely when Joseph had been born and finally God said that's when you have to go back. But first of all he himself said it's about time I had something out of this now. I've served you 20 years. You've got an enormous wealth of cattle and goats and sheep and so on. Now I could have my share too. Quite right. Quite right. And so he said and they both agreed. That's when Laban said I've learned my truth. God blessed me by you. OK. So he made his plan. But mind you God it looked like a sort of dirty trick. So I don't understand anything exactly. But he put aside all the plain sheep goats and so on. They were Laban's. There was some way by which he made the breeders breed mixed ones. I don't understand that. You may experts may know about those things. He did somehow in a way he tricked them. And he also looked after he looked after Laban's sheep which he'd done for years three days journey. And he took out the healthy ones and made them breed the way he wanted them to breed. He did it. But mind you God confirmed it. That's my point. You see so it's not much to say. It's very serious. It's actually Oh wow. Cheating. He'd been cheating twenty years by Laban. For twenty years Laban was a big wealthy man to Jacob. Well it's quite fast that he should be able to return now to Israel to Canaan with a certain amount of his own property. So he utilized his method and he actually said to he told his told his wives this I don't think he told Laban this and the angel of God said to me in a dream saying lift up their eyes now see how they're bleeding he didn't discuss how they do this bleeding business the angel said to him see how they're bleeding I'm the God of Bethel where thou noticed the pillar where thou vowed to bow to me now arise get thee from this land which was the land of thy kindred. So you see he had a confirmation of God that is in Genesis 31 11 that God himself according to these things the natural man would turn out a trick. So we've got to watch these people of faith they're funny people funny people but a presence of God and a rightful presence of God going through it and God feeling it all the time. Until they took their journey back to the land of Canaan. Laban-Rod is a tough fellow because when he put this to his neighbour's daughters they reacted strongly with Jacob against Laban and they said Rachel and Leah said is there any portion or inheritance past our father's house? Are we not counted as strangers? We are soldiers and quite devoid of our money. So they themselves reacted against their father and were holy along with Jacob. On the human level Laban appeared to pay Jacob a pity. But all the time God's goodness is there God preparing the family that the children were coming and the shepherd's rice was being prospered and the cattle and sheep and so on both for Laban and himself. So he makes his journey back to Canaan. So it's an incident there evidence there of idolatry going on in the Laban household. The daughters were mixed up in it too. And when they left the household escaped with Jacob Rachel had taken the images which belonged to Laban and put them among the furniture of the equipment of her family. Images. So she was at least a mixed faith in Laban. I'm sure Jacob didn't have that because Jacob was always a friend to God. And she apparently wanted them. But again God is knows how to work things out. Because what exactly did he want? Laban lost his images which is good for Laban. Because when he searched for them Rachel wouldn't let him search for them. Rachel because she was sick. And he wouldn't let Laban search for it. She was clever. And you see things again. But the point is first of all the images were removed from Laban and later on when the Bible came Jacob swept the images out of the law. So by that means the whole lot got cleared of the images. So God was working that out too. And so they parted. And parted amicably. They decided the time of separation had come. And Jacob proceeded on his journey. Now the final issue was coming with Jacob. If you've got yourself you've already got your fears. You've got your labours your strains your resentments and your reactions and your fears. Because you can't take things. You haven't got it That's what you've got to learn. And underneath all the time Jacob was a fearful man. Maybe all I meant by nature was the the realisation if he thought I'd got him he'd give him something. If he thought I'd get him he'd kill him. And maybe that preserved him somewhat in the lab. He didn't want to go back maybe. Because if he did he'd have to meet Esau. Esau became a big man in his own way. Now he had to go back. God sent him return. Now Jacob in the end when the voice came he thought because he was the Lord. So he returned. He returned in fear. This was a great crisis moment. He was comforted God gives us comfort because it says on the way ages of God let him. Just to give him the encouragement I'm with you. He said continually I'm with you. So he knew God was with him as it says so. And he approached the way back into Canaan. And he sent messengers forward to Esau that he was coming. This was the crisis. The messengers brought back the message yes he's coming with 400 men. That's obviously what he was going to do. With 400 men. Jacob had no men. Except his own growing son who I suppose he had teased. And I suppose he's chatting and so on. So it's obviously what Esau was coming to do. Jacob prayed a very lovely prayer. This is the real Jacob. And if you want to expose what the real Jacob was it comes out in a very lovely prayer on his way back. When he's preparing to face what he meant to meet Esau and presumably be lynched. In verse 9 and 32 Jacob said Oh God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac the Lord extends to me the turn of thy country and thy kingdom and I will deal well with thee. I am not worthy the least of all the mercies and of all the truth which thou shalt not thy servant. For with my staff I passed over this Jordan and now I am become two bands two bands of 40 people. Deliver me I pray thee from the hand of my daughter and from the hand of Esau for I fear him lest he will come and strike me and the mother with the children. And now I sense I surely will do thee good and make thy sins as the sand of the sea which shall not be numbered among the children. That's a very beautiful prayer because of how humility is in the middle of it. So you see how Esau Jacob, all the time appreciating what God was doing and of worrying all the mercies that's what Esau he's overwhelmed by the heat and the cold and the cheating and so on but underneath it all out came this this is the real Esau so watch always the men of spirit watch to see the spirit in them not the flesh and so now he comes up to the room where he's got to meet Esau he prepared what he could best he could do he made a set of presents for Esau cattle and camels and goats and so on set the cord but those of them with the jacked basinas one by one Esau should meet with these and attempt to appease his vengeance and yet obviously Jacob knew it would take more than that to appease Jacob he thought it determination for revenge so it comes to this final moment when it came to the final brook or little river which had the cross on the other side they'd meet Esau the book that's when he prayed this prayer this beautiful prayer he sent he sent his finally sent his family over we're not to say he meant this as a victim they crossed they encamped on the other side of the brook all the presents were going forward to meet Esau en route finally he put his family over the brook left alone and Jacob was left alone Jacob was left alone 24th verse of Genesis 32 and they wrestled a man with him until the break of the day now this wasn't Jacob wrestling with a man it was a man wrestling with Jacob because Jacob was as tense as a folk could be tense if this was a victim he was a strong folk he was able to get all the way through if this was a victim what can I do what must I do I must do something so you see a man in the last moment of tension now this really all the time was God come on now press him come on he couldn't see anything when you're obsessed you can't see he couldn't see everybody's fear and his fears and himself and what he gets that's what the hypertension is so they wrestled right through the night and they moved and then this different thing happened whether it was a divine shock or whether it was just his tension to do a specific reaction I don't know it doesn't matter it says when this man saw that he prevailed not against Jacob he touched the hollow of his thigh and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint as he wrestled with him he couldn't wrestle he can't wrestle with a thigh out of joint now then at last he's there it may have been that Jacob was a hardy man he'd become that if he'd started a plain man very intent he had to grow with drought and heat for a few years he was a tough man he may have thought well at least I can run that was God I couldn't even run now there comes a moment doesn't it when the Holy Spirit has got you of course at salvation it has to come by the Holy Spirit saying I'm your saviour take me oh I'm your saviour I'm your saviour take me that's salvation we've got you we've got something else and the the the revelation that came to Jacob is oh I'm looking along the way if this person has something important it's God he's got something to me not I for myself transferred he transferred his his his his his his his his his his his his Names are things which are part of a Universal. A Universal has no name, it's just the All. So what do you do? You can be part, you can't know. That's where we move into this, shall we say, final consciousness. When we are part, we don't know Him, we are He. As I continue to say, just as you don't know yourself. You don't say you are, you don't know yourself. You say you are, because you are Universal. Now you come back to who you really are. In the image of God, expression of Universal. Don't say I can't have God, Universal God. Say you don't know yourself, say you are God, yes I am. And you move into a relationship which has a, what shall we call it, a consciousness that this is the truth. Just a consciousness this is the truth. You see, there's ultimately no truth, not by utter revelation, not by a Jesus Christ who came and died and rose again, not by a Bible, but by inner consciousness. That's all you know. Because all you have is inner consciousness. And our inner consciousness registers the truth. That's how you know the truth. That's how you know the truth. That's why all men know love is right. They know we ought to love. It is not that a political party is based on we ought to love. But we all know that. You see, the truth is what really is within. Now you see, when you first face the ordinary death, then you know you are not. Now they're telling me, oh I'm not. Now if you're honest you'll say that. That's the truth. Everybody will say, oh I'm not that. I'm just not all that. Now I've got two truths inside me. Not by a Bible, not by a real Jesus Christ, inside me. Now then, when I move farther and beyond that, now here it does come to reveal Jesus Christ in some form, although it may come to come without knowing him. And you find then that the purpose of God has been to bring the not-God into reality, to destroy it forever. If it never comes to reality, it might come again to reality. When the not-God, the fallen level, has come into reality and been gone on forever in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, then it's out. Now that's it. Now I'm back. There's no more law, no more guilt, no more doubt. I'm back in God. I'm part of God's permanent love. I'm perfect in His perfection. I'm operating. I have no law. I'm just operating by myself, which is by my own love. I'm operating. And if I deviate a little, I come back. That's not sin. I just deviate a little bit because I'm impressed by the world around me. I can change stuff. I can. Now this, this is still a truth. And that registers. It's the same thing as when you say, I know I can't find God, but I can register. You see, truth is never outside yourself. It's inside. You are the truth. Therefore, you don't find God just by worshiping five times a day. It's just now again. Or you've got a relationship with somebody and you'd better worship five times a day, or you're in trouble. Or you'd better go to church on Sunday, or you're in trouble. All that nonsense business we carry on. No, it is all nonsense business. If you have to get help, God will bless you. If God doesn't bless you, stop it. That's it. It's nonsense business. Go to outside, you'll never hear what's outside you. You'll never hear what's outside. What gets you on Sunday doesn't hold you on Monday if it's not God inside you. Of course it doesn't. You live by what you are inside. That's all you are. Now there is that in man which registers the truth without any outside truth at all. What one is, that is that love is the way. The whole world knows that. And there are not that love. The whole world knows that. If I'm honest. Now there does come in a step of revelation, this is a step of faith there, when we can say, now here is the way, but that's white cloud. No one else can say that. How then can I get back, you see, this life isn't, it ought to be love, I'm not love. If I am love, then I'm not love. How, how move through the gap from the not love to the am love? That's it. And no one does that without Jesus Christ. Now I'm not saying that there may be some who've never known a response to Jesus Christ who may inwardly have passed through what's equivalent to a death and resurrection. But somehow inside themselves they've turned away from a life as if they could get there by themselves. Like Abraham, without God, without Jesus Christ, believed God and that was kind of his righteousness. Well you can't have righteousness if Jesus Christ has wiped out the false righteousness and the unrighteousness. You can't. Jesus Christ has wiped out that whole unrighteous law law of sin level brought that way. So if Abraham was kind of righteous it means in God's sight he was identified with Jesus Christ before Abraham was I am. The eternal Jesus Christ was there. So it is possible there are many more than we think who've been come to God by inner involvement with a death and resurrection. Something which is weak or in those terms they might not. Which is equivalent to turning myself away from the idea that I become something and do something and so on. No, no, no. I'm dependent only on God's mercy. Death, death and resurrection. So I'm not saying that I think we can meet the end like that. But I'm saying there's no other way. If there's something which brings you to a gap between I should be love, I'm not love, I am love. How? There's no way except somebody's wiped out the not love and put it back on the unlove. And that's Jesus Christ. That's the gospel. And you move into that. That's what you can move into. And you move into the illimitable, the unknowable. And yet curious things you do happen to the extent I think that we live by inner Christ. That's our inner reality. Your proof of your faith is not a bible. It's not a Jesus Christ who dies in public. It's because inside you know it's true. That's your proof. That's what you do. You'll die on that. Oh, I just know it's true. This, this, this, this, this ring of the bell. Oh, yeah. That's it. Let me tap when I want to tap. I'm afraid this way, Master. That's it. That's from which I can never be shaken if I remain true to what I know to be true. I know to be true that everything should be love. I know to be true that I love that love to be love. I know to be true that there is a way which I have become loving God. That Jesus Christ did do a thing which wiped the whole of the old business out and introduced me in the Holy Spirit to the new one. And it registered me. And so I'm free, I'm free in God's universal family, universal, I do what I like. Because I'm, I'm now part of a divine compulsion of love. Divine compulsion of love. I am the law now. You're either under the law or you are the law. See, God is the law. And the law is love and the other side up. The other side is not there. God is that law. The Father, Son, Spirit are that law. Now, the Bible says in Christ, have at all the law. But to find that you have to find what is not to be the law. Because you've got to find not God before you can find God or you're not conscious. You've got to find that that which is not God is that which is God. That's the point. So that I found was not to be God. And then I found how that the whole purpose was the Son is always going to be the one who creates us, who redeems us, what the business of and head up, head up for eternity. This great, great family. He has a second birth. The Son was born at the resurrection. Note that. The Son's birth is the resurrection. This day have I forgotten thee. The resurrection. Note that. He has an earth birth which we celebrate if you're foolish enough to do so by us today, we call Christmas. That's up to you. But the real birth was not at all. The real birth is this one. We declare unto you glad tidings how that the promise which was made to us unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same unto us, their children. If you have raised up Jesus again, as it is written also in the second Psalm, thou art my Son, this day have I forgotten thee. For Jesus Christ was forgotten on the resurrection. A new Jesus Christ came to be. A eternal Son with above us. This is the eternal new Son. The new perfect God to eternity. This Son and we as sons, one. That's Acts. Acts 13 32-33 confirmed by Hebrews 1 under which of the angels says he at any time thou art my Son this day have I forgotten thee. Again, I'll be to him a father, be to me a son. It refers back to the poem. It doesn't mention the resurrection there but it's the same thing. So now you see I'm laying this foundation but the only foundation to reality is inside you. It's not in the Bible. It's not even in the visible Christ because the Christ is in every eternity. It's not in anything else. And this is the danger of everything else. The danger of our false churches or our churches. The danger of ministry and all that Sunday stuff. You think there's something in that but nothing in it. Nothing in it unless it's inside you. Nothing is anything unless it's inside you. And you are what you are and what you are is imparted to you and you are that. And there are certain conscious decisions which I say all men know they're honest. I've told you one. There ought to be love and there aren't love. The faith comes in when I'm humble and I say yes I'm not and I accept this fact that God's in his love by his Son wiped all that thing out. That guilt I'm under. That false that thing I'm under. It's wiped out and I receive back this work to build a family in Jesus Christ. That is a step on the basis of my honesty which many won't take of course to what I really am my confession like David said I'm not worthy. You see the only judgment you can have is you judge yourself. You've got all these things wrong. There's only one statement I can find it about this Acts 13 verse 46 See it's referred to those who reject Christ See you put it and judge yourself unworthy of a life in life. That's a wonderful statement get that? Not God judges you you judge yourself unworthy and nobody goes to hell except those who judge themselves unworthy in other words the sarcastic way of saying you you you won't come and receive what's given which is the gift of grace the gift of God's grace and you you judge yourself unworthy of receiving the gift of God's grace you judge yourself there's no other judgment and this is the dividing line between the children of the devil children of God saved unsaved and this is how inside that dividing line we have to go through these further processes to establish that in the sonhood the woman consists with God and as we see in other lives in other cultures like Moses and so on if we don't go back to Abraham we should see it there and so on they all have this phase because when you highly misuse yourself or find out your misuse and the misuse what is your sin? it's yourself it's independent self the misuse that seems very serious Romans 7 sins are products the misuse and so that's why to try to be somebody is my worst sin when I discovered that I really discovered that by revelation like Jacob by Christ or somewhere and Charles said oh it's not that it's God and you move in well then you'll be fooled again you'll be tricked you'll be fooled again and now you can be a real person let me tell you to be a real person be confident you're kept I don't care about faith or education or the faith of what people do confident be yourself be free dare anything move in this is the freedom this is the life this is the life Jacob moved into mind he's a great pioneer yes it doesn't come out in Jacob as we go on it comes out in certain ways with Jacob but it comes out it comes out more royally it comes out more royally we may say in Abraham and Joseph and Moses and David and so on but Jacob was a very great man we'll proceed on a little further and see the end of his life but this is the crisis time well Norman would you yes that sounds good I can't find it oh and Jesus and Jacob call the name of the place Peniel for I've seen God face to face and my life is preserved well I'm only saying that you brought up a good point there that this has changed his understanding of God because previously like most people apart from God regard him as one who produces fear and so on but here he's he's had a family relationship love that's all there is in God that's all so instead of clearly he might lose his life because he gained his life that's all that's it all he produces release fear he produces fear he sounds like what they are now if there had been a fearful frightened Jacob coming to meet Esau you would have got the reaction back at Esau yes you better you would have riled up Esau yes you better fear you've got to have a bit of fear but when he had met my brother he knew Jacob who respected him and bowed seven times before him and showed lovely courage to come forward in a lovely way God did the very same thing we have said to people God transmitted through Jacob the same thing he saw he counted 400 men to make a public mention as we've said so that he gave him a public embrace embraced him called him my brother kissed him and this meaty transformation this miracle of a transformation took place in a man for 21 years said I live to kill that man now's my chance before faith and love and release which was which was of course a God-consumed Jacob the same spirit who worked on Esau there's no evidence of Esau but he was a man of God he may have he may be that's what somehow we saw when we had gone closer God does the same old art but this miracle very miracle reconciliation took place the opposite to what Esau had intended for 21 years and Jacob had feared for 21 years so you see everything has an inner attitude all lies in attitudes there's nothing else all you are is an inner attitude which is an inner consciousness and you're you transmit your inner attitude your inner consciousness and it both expresses through you and reacts to others and Esau Jacob who might have thought he had become fearful and what should he do and suspicious and evil wrongly thinking he was guilty Jacob was not guilty Jacob did the right thing but false condemnation to make him think he's guilty because he he'd taken that birthright by that act in which he deceived the blind Esau which is God's will God intended that God God sealed that to him and Isaac he said yes you will be judged you're right so he proved rightly what he did but the man the natural man who criticized God said no you had to move in by faith this is the way you had to move in against Esau's deceit because Esau I beg your pardon Isaac had no business seeking to give the birthright to the one whom God said was not to go so Esau was Isaac to be blamed and Esau who was the rejecter not Jacob but Jacob could have taken like we could take false guilt so it could have been that that was free so you see we get the product of our our inner actions and we are subject to those inner actions while if we're independent of ourselves we're unbearable we're servants we're servants of all the powers of darkness servants of the discord so you know what you're doing so you see evil and you fear evil and you work at it and you must do that and you have a servant servant spirit a balanced spirit and you transmit fear and doubt and and misery whatever or struggle and then it was released because of Esau it's God operating by him I just go forward and God operates so he's on top and his attitude changes and he's seeing God in every situation Esau as well as Jacob he's seeing God in every situation and he's on top and he moves in and as he moves in God produces the manifest release of the form it takes that's the new Jacob now the rest of the story of Jacob the history I should say of Jacob is not so dramatic until we get a little nearer to the Joseph situation but that was more dramatic around Joseph than around Jacob really but life is living at ease in God's appointed situation God isn't trying to be anything He's not trying to achieve this or trying to be that and not why I'm like this person why I'm like that person but relax that into the way in which God means that life should be lived we saw Isaac's life had meant to be lived just confirming that he was in the land digging wells which was the reason by which his crops couldn't live and persisting digging them to have his own wells against opposition he was yet to persist to be the person whom God had said was to be the one of the originators of the family who was to occupy the promised land out of which the promised saving would come and then of course the whole world becomes the promised land all all saved people become the promised land and um and now in this case Jacob uh now God's purpose is that he should be the father of the family so he's the patriarch the father leader of the family this was God's next purpose he should have these children and they should be brought up and have their families and have their wives and be established as a family out of which the great family would come the great nation would come that was his job so this time Jacob's little relaxed life God overshadowed over certain ways until he found the place they could settle God used his change to do that um God used a sin we always see God using sin to his own advantages God's very good at using the devil to his own advantages he's particularly adept at doing that um and in this case as they moved through having left Esau to settle where they first went to Bethel which is where God first met Jacob he never forgot that God spoke from the top of a ladder that now God lived in his heart the ladder had gone he didn't need angels between him and God and God and he were one now um and um so he would go raise an altar there and where was he to settle he settled in a rather attractive place in Shechem now there was a flourishing tribe city of those days in Shechem with a heathen as we'd say of course a non-Christian king and princes and people um Jacob was a apostate he bought large herds we heard how he got his large herds of goats and cattle and sheep and brought with him so a very big population moving in the family by that time about 40 and then all so it was quite an addition and they could make a great estate if they were um could be controlled by the Shechemites and a little thing happened the prince of Shechem fell in love with Jacob's only daughter as the deucer he didn't want to marry her but we must say mercifully the young the young sons were very loyal Israelites very young actually like that oh I'm taking that so it seemed like a massacre of the Shechemites which took place um it openly says the Shechemites showed what was behind it the Shechemites um uh uh the 34th chapter um thought they would have them and make use of them um shelled out their cattle and their substances and every beast that there be out including what did marriage see they were playing a game a game on on the more or less innocent Jacob who had come as a stranger back to his country if we can get them and form this marriage and turn the seduction into a marriage and they shell out their cattle their substances and every beast that there be out only I can think of them only there are certain arrangements made and they'll be out uh the sons stepped in by trick he demands that they shall be circumcised to line up with him while they were going through the circumcision and disabled they moved in to the uh um men of the nation um Jacob then showed uh a characteristic he always had I've pointed out he got very careful not to make on people's negatives um which he loved to do with the negative he loved to be able to pick out a weakness from the earth because we have so many assholes and that's a danger people criticize Jacob and criticize this and criticize no no no these are God's people God sees the greatness God doesn't see evil I'll point you out later on where I said he saw no iniquity in Israel but he had 40 years fussing and disbelieving and rebelling God saw no iniquity in Israel God doesn't see iniquity in you if you're a child of God it's the if other people pick up their negatives excuse themselves pick up their weaknesses God doesn't see weaknesses it's we so don't be negative and critical be careful but in passing at least do see certain things which have certain effects and you have to mention in passing and the effect that the um um characteristic that Jacob had was it was a little bit outtook a product of fear he always saw things in fearful terms he never saw how to see God operating through an evil until afterwards he never saw that so even after he was in God's in union he carried with him and you'll find we all do carry with our weaknesses some weakness that thing will pop up into that you'll find with Jacob all the way through um although he said he was a royal man and in the end he he acted in with the words of the Lord in great royalty but there was this um aspect that this was his commission he lived quietly he had troubles and sadnesses um as we see with his family but he preserved his family and there are many evidences that in the end both through their sins and difficulties they became godly and uh they preserved they continued to be what they were meant to be a family who would ultimately come out of Israel out of Egypt back into Israel and the history of the nation of Israel could proceed um we just see that same characteristic coming out again and again in Jacob so let's just note it and in noting it we can watch ourselves um can I learn to see a purpose of God's goodness in a horrible situation can I learn God meant that horrible situation that he had a purpose of of um his own perfect ways to it we've been learning that all through these hours um and so a little later on you see then by a lie the brother of Jacob told Jacob that Joseph had been killed and brought back the many colored coat as an evidence with his blood marks on it and he refused to be comforted there was a tender relation there Jacob all his sons and daughters were not to come to him he refused to be comforted he said I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning that his father wept for him so you see we're in a tough spot if we can't see somewhere and of course these are pioneer days we know we see by hindsight they have to see by foresight although I think I'm very interested that God that work through something greater through this what a great thing when we say God you've got something greater out of this tragedy something greater out of this calamity this is this is this is seeking the ways of God um he felt the same when they wanted to take Benjamin up to introduce him to Joseph and um for the same reason he didn't want to to let Benjamin go my son shall not go down with you for his brother is dead and he is left alone if mischief befalls him by the way in which by the way which he go then shall you bring down my gray hairs as far as the grave but he did add because he knew he did add that word that great word that Jacob could add take also your brother when he finally had to give him and God almighty give you mercy before the man and he may send you away your brother Benjamin your other brother that was my ambition because Joseph was kept seemingly imprisoned if I did believe that my children I did believe that I was the highest and of course this is a a step where he's left recommitted back to God um and finally um in in his greatest moment was um tinged with that same um negative attitude that was when this amazing event took place and they were brought in welcomed back to Egypt to be given a special land to live in and welcomed by the pharaohs and um all that surrounding that and he was brought in to see pharaoh the very great moment was Jacob blessed pharaoh there was a God in Jacob blessing him the earthly king father I represent king of kings I bless you because you bless us that's that's the great Jacob God uh Jacob blessed pharaoh and later on the Bible says without contradiction the less is blessed of the better that's at his highest spot or near the highest spot at the same time he said when pharaoh that was in chapter 47 verses 8 and 9 when he pharaoh asked him about himself how old he was and so on Jacob said the day of my the year of my pilgrimage he said that the day of my he wasn't at home he kept that clear he said there was a man in the state always saying the day of my pilgrimage 130 years few and evil had been the days and years of my life here few and evil had been the days of my life had been not to say not the days of the life of my fathers the days of my pilgrimage when he died about 140 years age well that's his point of view he didn't say all his other times because there was a great blessing coming his whole life because he fulfilled God's purposes this was God fulfilling his purposes through this father of the family he wasn't the founder of the race he was the father of the large family next stage who came in the name Israel Prince of God the final scene of Jacob was when he was fresh in the spirit we read how Isaac was not fresh in the spirit when he was dim in sight and I heard this wrong purpose of blessing the wrong son he saw the right son Jacob Jacob he became old in spirit and blind and he said he stood worshipping leaning upon his staff so God always kept the forehead laying the leg he always had the reminder that it is not the founding of Jacob himself it's the founding God God is flesh through Jacob so he always had the laying leg and the last scene describes Jacob worshipping leaning upon his staff that worship is a remarkable presentation of the coming destiny as he starts it's a prophetic destination this was the key insight through the Old Testament we get great prophecies coming through we won't go into detail but you'll find each prophecy given on each son is fulfilled as they go on what he says they will be they will be when they get in the land and develop the chief indication of sensitiveness was very opposite to Isaac Isaac was so insensitive he turned to bless Esau instead of Jacob and God led Jacob through Rebekah to put this deceit on him so he thought Jacob what he saw that God made it a big deceit because he admitted at the end that God had meant that God had put tricks on him to get his purposes into adjustment no tricks for Jacob strange that little thing Jacob Jacob Joseph the final honor Joseph was to have he was to represent two sons Jacob only had 11 sons 11 for Benjamin the tapes of Joseph but in the end he replaced Joseph by Joseph's two sons so Joseph's two sons line up as you say Jacob's sons that's the final honor given Jacob given Joseph he should represent two of the twelve tribes Ephraim and Nassau now Nassau was the oldest and Ephraim he saw Joseph their father put his oldest Nassau under Jacob's right hand and his younger Ephraim under his left hand and Jacob deliberately reversed his hands oh no Joseph you're wrong you're wrong no no you're wrong of the two your younger sons to be the greatly blessed ones greater blessed than the than the the older sons it happens so often in the bible the younger ones it is just a final indication of the keenness of the insight of this lucky man of God you'll find that at the end of chapter 48 and then he outlined in no uncertain terms in some of them pretty tough terms of what would happen to these tribes in their in their different situations in their different histories his great role as a Judah now there he told it again his great role as Judah Judah was that Joseph said Jesus Jesus came the Jewish Jewish race and he put in a beautiful set of these little flashes that come until Shiloh come he saw Jesus coming he got these flashes coming out Moses said until a prophet arises out of thee like me the prophet uh so it was that he came through the treasonable midst of Balaam that there a star will arise in Jacob a scepter that it shall they had these they gave these terms as they come in the fire a star and a scepter in Shiloh comes him who the ruler will come who will be for everlasting Micah and of course Isaiah the great one wonderful counselor mighty God everlasting father prince of peace these names given to the coming Messiah they had been so that's the end of Jacob except he's given a tremendous funeral perhaps the greatest funeral which of course is a word of tremendous respect for his patriarch of the Israelite Church and an enormous funeral the Egyptians so respected Joseph they went into hundreds with the whole family into Canaan by the commission of Pharaoh to bury Jacob by the side of Abraham and Isaac in the cave of Macbeth and they had this great mourning but it's all indicative of the deep impression this man that we tend to criticize has upon man as well as God let's see the same this is the end of page 2 please