place; and I did not know it. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is nothing else except the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” Why, if Jacob had had faith, he would not have been afraid of God: on the contrary, he would have rejoiced that God had thus permitted him to hold fellowship with him. Now, hear Jacob’s bargain. God had simply said to him, “I am the Lord God of Abraham your father, and the God of Isaac: the land on which you lie, I will give it to you, and to your seed.” He did not say anything about what Jacob was to do: God only said, “I will do it,” — “Behold I am with you, and will keep you in all places wherever you go, and will bring you again into this land; for I will not leave you, until I have done what I have spoken concerning you.” Now, can you believe, that after God had spoken face to face with Jacob, that he would have had the impudence to try and make a bargain with God? But he did. He begins and says, “If” — There now, the man has had a vision, and an absolute promise from God, and yet he begins with an “If.” That is bargain making with a vengeance! “If God will be with me, and will keep me in the way that I go, and will give me food to eat, and clothes to wear, so that I come again to my Father’s house in peace, then” — not without — note, he is going to hold God to his bargain — “then shall the Lord be my God: and this stone which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God’s house: and of all that you shall give me I will surely give the tenth to you.” I marvel at this! If I did not know something about my own nature, I would be utterly unable to understand it. What! a man who has talked with God, then begin to make a bargain with him! who has seen the only way of access between heaven and earth, the ladder Christ Jesus, and has had a covenant made between himself and God, a covenant that is all on God’s part — all a promise — and yet wants after that to hold God to the bargain: as if he were afraid God would break his promise! Oh! this was vile indeed!
11. Then notice his whole life. While he lived with Laban, what miserable work it was. He had fallen into the hands of a man of the world; and whenever a covetous Christian gets into such company, a terrible scene ensues! There are the two together, greedy and grasping. If an angel could look down upon them, how would he weep to see the man of God fallen from his high place, and become as bad as the other. Then, the device that Jacob used, when he endeavoured to get his wages was most extraordinary. Why did he not leave it to God, instead of adopting such schemes as that? The whole way through we are ashamed of Jacob; we cannot help it. And then, there is that grand period in his life, the turning point, when we are told, that “Jacob wrestled with God, and prevailed.” We will look at that — I have carefully studied the subject, and I do not think so much of him as I did. I thought Jacob wrestled with God, but I find it is the contrary, he did not wrestle with God; God wrestled with him. I had always set Jacob up, in my mind, as the very model of a man wrestling in prayer; I do not think so now. He divided his family, and put a person in front to appease Esau. He did not go in front himself, with the holy trust that a patriarch should have felt; guarded with all the omnipotence of heaven, he might boldly have gone to meet his brother, but no! he did not feel certain that the latter would bow at his feet, although the promise said, “The elder shall serve the younger.” He did not rest on that promise; it was not big enough for him. Then he went at night to the brook Jabbok. I do not know what for, unless he went to pray; but I am afraid it was not so. The text says, “And Jacob was left alone: and there a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day.” There is a great deal of difference between a man wrestling with me, and my wrestling with him. When I strive with anyone, I want to gain something from him, and when a man wrestles with me, he wants to get something out of me. Therefore, I take it, when the man wrestled with Jacob, he wanted to get his cunning and deceit out of him, and prove what a poor sinful creature he was, but he could not do it. Jacob’s craft was so strong, that he could not be overcome; at last, the angel touched his thigh, and showed him his own hollowness. And Jacob turned around and said, “You have taken away my strength, now I will wrestle with you”; and when his thigh was out of joint, when he fully felt his own weakness, then, and not until then, is he brought to say, “I will not let you go, except you bless me.” He had had full confidence in his own strength, but God at last humbled him, and when all his boasted power was gone, then it was that Jacob became a prevailing prince. But, even after that, his life is not clear. Then you find him an unbelieving creature; and we have all been as bad. Though we are blaming Jacob, brethren, we blame ourselves. We are hard with him, but we shall be harder with ourselves. Do you not remember the memorable speech of the patriarch, when he said, “Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and you will take Benjamin away: all these things are against me?” Ah, Jacob, why can you not believe the promise? All other promises have been fulfilled. But no! he could not think of the promise; he was always wanting to live by sight.
12. Now, I say if the character of Jacob, is as I have described it, and I am sure it is — we have taken it from God’s word — there was, there could have been nothing in Jacob, that made God love him; and the only reason why God loved him, must have been because of his own grace, because “he will have mercy on whom he will have mercy.” And rest assured, the only reason why any of us can hope to be saved is this, the sovereign grace of God. There is no reason why I should be saved, or why you should be saved, but God’s own merciful heart, and God’s own omnipotent will. Now that is the doctrine; it is not only taught in this passage, but in multitudes of other passages of God’s Word. Dear friends, receive it, hold it firmly, and never let it go.
13. Now, the next question is a different one: Why did God hate Esau? I am not going to mix this question up with the other, they are entirely distinct, and I intend to keep them so, one answer will not do for two questions, they must be taken separately, and then can be answered satisfactorily. Why does God hate any man? I defy anyone to give any answer but this, because that man deserves it; no reply except that can ever be true. There are some who answer, divine sovereignty; but I challenge them to look that doctrine in the face. Do you believe that God created man and arbitrarily, sovereignly — it is the same thing — created that man, with no other intention, than that of damning him? Made him, and yet, for no other reason than that of destroying him for ever? Well, if you can believe it, I pity you, that is all I can say: you deserve pity, that you should think so lowly of God, whose mercy endures for ever. You are quite right when you say the reason why God loves a man, is because God does do so; there is no reason in the man. But do not give the same answer as to why God hates a man. If God deals with any man severely, it is because that man deserves all he gets. In hell there will not be a solitary soul that will say to God, oh Lord, you have treated me worse than I deserve! But every lost spirit will be made to feel that he has gotten his just deserts, that his destruction lies at his own door and not at the door of God; that God had nothing to do with his condemnation, except as the Judge condemns the criminal, but that he himself brought damnation upon his own head, as the result of his own evil works. Justice is what damns a man; it is mercy, it is free grace, that saves; sovereignty holds the scale of love; it is justice that holds the other scale. Who can put that into the hand of sovereignty? That would be to libel God and to dishonour him.
14. Now, let us look at Esau’s character, one says, “did he deserve that God should cast him away?” I answer, he did. What we know about Esau’s character, clearly proves it. Esau lost his birthright. Do not sit down and weep about that, and blame God. Esau sold it himself; he sold it for a mess of pottage. Oh, Esau, it is in vain for you to say, “I lost my birthright by decree.” No, no. Jacob got it by decree, but you lost it because you sold it yourself — did you not? Was it not your own bargain? Did you not take the mess of red pottage of your own voluntary will, in lieu of the birthright? Your destruction lies at your own door, because you sold your own soul at your own bargain, and you did it yourself: Did God influence Esau to do that? God forbid; God is not the author of sin. Esau voluntarily gave up his own birthright. And the doctrine is, that every man who loses heaven gives it up himself. Every man who loses everlasting life rejects it himself. God does not deny it to him — he will not come that he may have life. Why is it that a man remains ungodly and does not fear God? It is because he says, “I like this drink, I like this pleasure, I like this Sabbath breaking, better than I do the things of God.” No man is saved by his own free will, but every man is damned by it who is damned. He does it by his own will; no one constrains him. You know, sinner, that when you go