Good morning and Happy Friday. The weekend is here and the back to school season is thoroughly upon us. Marge and I were out doing some shopping yesterday and the crowds were apparent, moms and dads out buying up shoes for their young students. It seems to get earlier and earlier every year, a slow and steady theft of summer from the youth. I was talking about this with some folks this week, about how we always started the day after Labor Day. The school year ended in late May and started again the first of September, which gave you a nice full 90 days to enjoy summer. Not so much anymore. Some schools linger on well into June and I’ve seen some ISD’s starting as early as August 12 this year. I hear that the students have much more time off during the year but at what cost. Some of my fondest memories as a kid growing up were of the long lazy days of summer, riding bikes with my cousins on that dirt road in small town Texas. 90 days seemed like years as we lost ourselves in the seemingly endless moments. The simplicity of summer indeed.
Today we are studying chapter 33 of Genesis and in it we see a major turning point for Jacob. Fresh off of his wrestling encounter with God, Jacob is a changed man indeed, physically and spiritually. We see an immediate shift in his behavior and will continue to see the Spirit of God rule him the rest of his days. He has made amends with ol’ Uncle Laban and that chapter of his life is no longer a threat to him. Oh, the sweetness of peace of mind.
But what lies directly before Jacob is the issue now. You see in a very ironic turn of events, what lies directly before him is his past. As a result of him deceitfully tricking the birthright from his twin brother Esau, he has been living in fearful exhile for the last 22 years. Afraid of his brother, his past sinful actions towards Esau looms at the forefront of his memory daily. Oh, how our sinful past can hound us relentlessly.
So, Jacob is readying to meet his brother and knows not how the reunion will conclude. Expecting the worst, Jacob prepares a lavish offering of hundreds of head of livestock to be gifted in 2 separate waves. All in an effort to soften what he believes to be a hard, murderous heart in Esau. He carefully aligns his family in a defensive position, servants in the front and then his family in the back, lined up almost in an order of importance. In the very back, his most treasured loved ones, Rachel and Joseph. You see, Jacob’s past is fresh in his mind, his sin of that day 22 years ago seems like yesterday. It can be the exact same with us. Our unrepentant sin has a way of keeping itself in our memory’s forefront, a bully of the mind, forcefully pushing all the good out.
But as Jacob ventures out to address his brother, he is really venturing out to meet something much grander, he is venturing out to meet his past. What an image we have of this man in this moment. As a result of his wrestling match with God, he is limping. Limping out into the hot, dusty desert to finally and completely deal with the past sin in his life. What a long, fearful walk it must have been. Moments like this can define a life. My friends, we must all vividly and carefully picture this scene in our minds, as this is a walk we all must take at some point in our journey with God. We must move forward to confront our past.
I had a meeting with a man from church this week and our conversation drifted onto this very topic. Letting go of the past. He had done some bad things. Those past sins can haunt us relentlessly as we have no choice but to entertain them as they occupy the vacant spaces in our psyche. The things we have done against God, the things we have done to hurt others. Even so many years later, he was struggling with where these thoughts and feelings should go and where they should be filed for the duration of life. As we talked and I thought about my own wrongs, God revealed the answer in one word….blood.
You see we have all done bad things. We have all wronged the ones we love. We have dealt poorly with the ones close to us and with the ones we barely know. We have all made selfish, fleshly decisions that in the moment satisfied, but later tormented. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Rom 3:23) and all sin has a cost. A tremendous cost indeed. But not only has God made a way for us to spend eternity in peace with him after this life, He has made a way for us to live in peace here on this planet. And that peace comes through the precious blood of Jesus Christ.
You see, to properly deal with the past you must properly deal with the blood of Jesus Christ. That precious blood atones us, it covers us. When we arrive into the open arms of Heaven, God the Father will not see our past that is littered with sin, but He will only see the precious blood of His Son. You see the blood covers us completely, from the day of our birth to the day of our death. It covers our sins…all of them. And they are covered forever. And God’s forever is just that, an eternity that stretches beyond all time, existence and knowing.
In that moment a flush of peace washed over me as I told that man of the power of the blood. It reminded me of the old hymn, “There’s Power in the Blood.” But I think sometimes we completely underestimate those words. The power of the blood of Jesus Christ has the power to truly set you free. Not just freedom into the gates of eternity, but freedom today from the past sins that hold you in prisoner’s shackles. The blood of Jesus can and will break the bonds of what holds you today. But you must let it. Embrace the power of Jesus today and banish the past that lies before you. Just as Jacob embraced God and relied on Him to move him forward to face His past, we must limp out and meet our past head on.
Face your past today, leave behind your regrets and mistakes and embrace all that Jesus did on the Cross for you. His work on that Cross stretches not only to our future, but far back into our past. He came not just to secure your future but to secure your past. There is a peace, there is a freedom and a there is a joy that exists for you today, and it all comes through the precious blood of Jesus. Fully acknowledge the powerful work of Jesus today and let go of you past sins and embrace the abundant life that only He can provide.
“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” John 10:10
Praise God for the work of Jesus Christ.
Comments