Awakened In the Wrestle | Daniel Goulet

Good

morning, everybody. How are y'all doing this morning? Awesome. Well, you guys are a little more lively than last service. Good job.

We've

had our coffee. We've slept.

Excited

to share with you this morning.

And

we are in a series, as you just saw, called Awakened to His Voice.

And

what we need to know is this. God is speaking.

And

we are designed to hear His voice. Even Jesus says this Himself. He says, my sheep

will

hear my voice. But He doesn't stop there. And I know them, and they follow me.

See,

it's not just that we hear Him, but it's that we respond.

To

trust Him.

And

to be formed by what He says. See, awakening, to be awakened, is not to strive harder or even just getting everything in your life figured out. What we're discovering

is

to be awakened is to start to become aware of His voice, of His presence. You know that God is working all over the place, all around you, all the time.

So

we're learning to become aware of Him.

And

then we're learning to adore Him, or we could say worship Him in every single circumstance. That's not always easy.

But

we're learning to do that so that we can be activated in who we were made to be. God's ultimate goal for your life

is

to activate you in who He made you to be. This is what it means to be

awakened. Last

week, Julie walked us through a great, powerful message in the life of Abraham.

Abraham

teaches us a lot.

And

he shows us what it means to be awakened to God's voice through obedience and trust. If you look at Abraham's life,

he

hears God, he leaves what's familiar, and then he learns over time

to

be totally dependent on the Lord, even when the promise doesn't come right away, or it's even costly.

So

today we're going to continue in that family line of Abraham, and we're going to look at his grandson, Jacob.

If

Abraham shows us what it looks like to obey God's voice, Jacob shows us what it looks like to wrestle with God

in

the middle of the promise.

Yes,

you heard that word right, wrestle.

Have

you ever been in a season

of

tension? Maybe you're in that right now,

where

there's just uncertainty about your future. Maybe it is about

something

concrete like your job. Maybe it's a pressure situation

where

you're not really sure about your current life stage or circumstance. And maybe you've asked the Lord, Lord,

could

you just fix this?

It's

not that you're doubting God

or

even doubting his faithfulness.

You're

just,

you're

tired of the wrestle. The wrestle is exhausting,

and

you just want relief.

I

think for many of us,

this

is the uncomfortable reality

of

becoming awakened.

And

today we're going to look at a moment of huge tension in Jacob's life

where

God doesn't do what you expect him to do.

See,

awakening doesn't always come through clarity about what's next.

It

comes through an encounter with God right where you are.

Lord,

I'm just going to pray and invite the Holy Spirit. Actually, this is kind of strange,

but

would you all stand?

I

want you to just put your hands out. Holy Spirit,

I

just felt like we were supposed to wake up a little bit

to

receive from you.

And

so, Lord, we just invite you

to

move in this room,

to

fill our hands and our hearts.

Would

you open our ears right now to hear your voice?

And

I just silence every distraction that's going on. Lord, we want to hone into your presence right now. Jesus, Jesus, you are the one that we are trying to listen to.

So

we bless you and invite you to teach us today, to guide us.

in

Jesus' name.

Amen. Okay,

you can have a seat.

I

remember several years ago being

in

a season where my calling, the thing that I was made to do,

felt

less clear than it ever had.

It

wasn't that I was like doubting God or questioning that he was faithful. I was just wrestling. And I had all these questions that started to come up. Like, is this really what I'm made to do?

Is

this season over? Am I just supposed to move on?

Now,

this comes to a really disturbing time in our culture called COVID. Anybody remember that? Like, oh, he said it.

You

know, people were leaving their jobs like left and right.

In

culture, they were calling it the great resignation

because

everybody was resigning, right?

And

honestly, that language resonated with me way more than I wanted it to.

And

for several years,

it

felt like what had once made sense

no

longer fit the same way. And what was weird is I could see God moving. I could feel him moving. I could see what was happening. But I just wasn't sure how I fit in

to

what he was doing.

And

the tension was exhausting.

And

to be honest,

I

just wanted God to rescue me out of it.

And

during this season, we had this guest worship leader

come

to lead here on a Sunday. And in between services, she did something really special. She started to encourage and pray and prophesy over the team backstage.

Now,

that just means to share God's heart. Like, you hear something from God and you share his heart with them.

And

when she came to me, she started to speak over this transition I was in.

and

she's like, hey, I see you on this mountain road.

See,

many times when we're awakened to God's voice, we start to see pictures or we get these feelings as this knowing. And in this instance, she was seeing this kind of little movie reel. She's like, I see you on this mountain road

and

it's one of those places where you pull over in an overlook and God pulls you out of the car and says, look. And

she

said, you know, you're expecting to see what you always saw. You know, trees, nothing new, just something familiar. But instead of seeing the 300 acres that you're used to seeing, God shows you thousands and thousands of acres as far as the eye could see. And then he said,

this

is all yours now.

And

I like, listen to this word and

in

this weird way, it like resonated with me. But I also like, this sounds impossible.

Right? See,

at the time, I didn't know even what to do with this picture. Like I believed it,

but

I didn't know how to stand in it.

And

here's what's interesting about the word.

The

word didn't remove

the

wrestle I was in.

If

anything, it deepened it.

because

now I wasn't just wrestling with uncertainty, I was wrestling with a promise I didn't know if I was even ready for.

And

it wasn't until four years later, four years does feel like a long time

when

you're in it,

when

I stepped into the role as director of School of Kingdom Ministry

that

I began to feel the weight

of

that word because suddenly that word wasn't poetic,

it

was reality.

The

scope was larger, the responsibility was real,

the

leadership gap, it was undeniable. And I started to have this question and it wasn't like is God faithful? It was more like do I actually have what it takes to carry what he's asking of me?

See,

I learned something in this process. Stepping into the promise doesn't automatically remove the wrestle. sometimes it reveals it.

Think

about your life for a moment right now. Maybe you're in a tension right now. Maybe you have a bunch of unknown. You're carrying a weight that you're not sure what to do with. It could be in a relationship, it could be with your job, it could be with your life calling.

And

maybe you're just saying, God, rescue me, get me out of here.

See,

I think Jacob's story

has

a lot of insight

for

us today.

and

so we're going to jump in

to

his wrestle.

Now,

we're going to look at Genesis 32 and I'm going to give you a bit of context so you understand where we are. If you're reading with a one-year Bible, hopefully many of you are. If you're not, you still can. You can join us. And this reading was on Friday

and

here's what you need to know about Jacob. Jacob is one of the central figures of the story of God's people. you'll often hear this phrase, I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Well, Jacob is the one we're talking about here. And what's cool about Jacob is that family line leads all the way to the birth of Jesus. It's the same family line. It's pretty amazing.

But

Jacob, he didn't really start out

as

a spiritual hero.

If

you look at his life,

it

was marked by striving

and

self-protection.

And

even his name reflects that. Jacob, the name Jacob means grabber. Someone who gets ahead by grabbing or deceiving. And, you

know,

he was born this way, born grabbing on to his twin brother Esau's heel as he was born. How about coming out of the womb like that?

Be

interesting.

He

tricks his brother out of his birthright. He deceives his father and grabs his brother's blessing. Right? So, Jacob's whole life

was

spent managing outcomes, controlling situations,

trying

to secure these blessings on his own terms. And he just spent years running and running from all these mistakes, all these consequences. And here's what's

key,

though.

This

is really important. God still chooses him.

God

still chooses him.

You

might have forgotten. You might think, hey, you know, my life, if you look at my life, God would never use me. That's not true.

You

hear that?

That's

not true.

God

will still choose you. God

speaks

all these promises over Jacob's life, similar to Abraham. He's going to bless you with so many descendants and all the nations of the earth are going to be blessed through you. All of those promises are still there, but Jacob is still fighting

to

do it on his own. So by the time we get to Genesis 32, Jacob is returning home after years away and he's trying to get to this promised land and standing in between him and that promised land is his brother Esau,

the

one he deceived,

the

one he wronged.

So

right in front of him his promises but also his past mistakes.

And

he does what many of us do when the pressure starts to build. He tries to control it. Now before we read this passage,

I

want to give a little overview of when we read

stories

in the Old Testament. This story in particular

is

very often misunderstood. It's very confusing to many people. So we have to know this, that the Bible tells one big story,

the

Old Testament and the New Testament. And the whole story of the Bible comes into a pinnacle

in

Jesus.

It

all points to Jesus, right? So when we read the Old Testament, we often say that we need to put on our sunglasses, our SON glasses.

Now

I tried to get AI to kind of depict what this would look like and this is kind of what it came up with. This is not exactly

what

I was hoping for. Then it went to the next one and those were a little better.

I

was like, I want a pair of sunglasses like that. Our sunglasses, why am I saying that?

See,

the scriptures say if we have seen Jesus, we have seen the Father. That's John 14, 9.

He

is the visible image

of

the invisible God.

And

so when we're reading about God,

the

Father, especially in the Old Testament, we need to ask him to put on the sunglasses. Holy Spirit, let me see

through

the lens of Jesus and what he has done and who he reveals God to be. So I want you to put your hands on your eyes. Jesus, we just invite you, Holy Spirit,

to

let us see through the lens of Jesus,

through

your lens.

In

Jesus' name, amen.

All

right. Let's read.

People

are like, what story is

this? He

set this up. Genesis 32. During the night, Jacob got up and took his two wives, two servants,

and

his 11 sons and crossed the Jabbok River with them.

After

taking them to the other side, he sent over all his possessions. This left Jacob all alone in the camp.

and

a man came and wrestled with him until the dawn began to break.

When

the man saw that he would not win the match, he touched Jacob's hip

and

wrenched it out of its socket.

Then

the man said, let me go for the dawn is breaking. But Jacob said, I will not let you go unless you bless me.

What

is your name? The man asked.

He

replied, Jacob.

Your

name will no longer be Jacob, the man told him.

From

now on, you will be called Israel because you have fought with God and with men and have won.

Please

tell me your name, Jacob said.

Why

do you want to know my name? The man replied. Then he blessed Jacob there. Jacob named the place Peniel, which means face of God.

For

he said, I have seen God face to face,

yet

my life has been spared.

The

sun was rising as Jacob left Peniel.

and

he was limping

because

of the injury to his hip. Even today, the people of Israel don't eat the tendon near the hip socket because of what happened that night when the man strained the tendon

of

Jacob's hip.

Very

interesting story.

So

what do you do when all you want

is

for God to defeat your enemies, get rid of your fear, give you some clarity, but instead

he

wrestles with you.

How

about that?

Let's

break this down so we understand because

God

is initiating something very intentional with Jacob here that we can learn from. So Jacob separates himself from everything he has, his family, his servants, all his possessions, everything, all he's putting distance between everything and what he fears, right? What's in front of him.

and

everything he's gained

through

grabbing, manipulation, and control

that

he's relied on is now across the river. And it says that this left Jacob all alone.

This

is the first time in Jacob's story that he's not grabbing anything. Man, we like to grab at things, don't we? Anybody ever feel that way? I'm like, I'm just going to take that and grab it,

right?

He's not grabbing at anything. He's alone. In many ways, this is kind of what fasting looks like

or

when we abstain from things. See, Jacob is removing the things that bring him worth and value,

that

is giving him significance. And without even really knowing what he was doing, he's putting himself in a place where he can encounter God.

See,

this is often the very first step we need to do

when

being awakened.

It's

when we remove what we rely on

so

we can discover who we rely on.

When's

the last time we were intentional about that? I want to be real. You're at church, so you're being intentional.

You're

being intentional right now. When's the last time at home that you started to remove things from your life, remove the need for possessions, your self-reliance,

and

created space

for

God.

So

it says, this left Jacob all alone in the camp

and

a man came and wrestled with him until the dawn began to break.

Well,

this is interesting. Who is this man? Well, Jacob himself

says,

I have seen God face to face and my life was spared. So he believes it was God. Hosea talks about this account and says, this man wrestled with an angel.

Right?

Jacob wrestled with an angel. But what we need to know is that this is a divine representative of God.

In

other words, God meets Jacob in the form of a man

and

wrestles with him.

See,

sometimes when we're in tension,

when

we

feel

uncertain about our future, or maybe when our past starts to feel really close.

Maybe

it feels so close, your past life

feels

so close, it feels like the present. Anyone ever feel like that? Like, I thought I was done with that.

many

times in those places, God creates space in our lives not to punish us, but to form us,

to

wrestle with us. And what I've found in these places of tension, it's what God uses to get us ready for the future, not keep us from it.

And

as much as I don't like this, I mean, I actually don't like this part. I'll just be real.

it

is crucial formation time. And it's not just so we get stronger, it's so we stop relying on ourselves.

See,

there's a reason God doesn't always rescue us from the wrestle.

Let

me give you an illustration.

Many

of us know about a caterpillar.

When

they're about to become a butterfly, they build this cocoon, right? And in that cocoon, they completely transform. And once it transforms, it has to struggle to get out of the cocoon.

But

here's what's fascinating about this process.

If

you try to speed up that process,

if

you try to help the butterfly, help a butterfly out, right?

You

actually seal its doom

because

the butterfly doesn't survive.

It's

because it never developed the strength it needs to fly.

See,

the struggle isn't a flaw in the process.

It's

the very thing that strengthens it to do what it was made to do.

Yeah. See,

awakening isn't the absence of wrestle.

It's

God forming us through it.

And

see, some things can only come

through

resistance.

I

want you to think about a tension that you're in right now.

I

know there's some tension in this room.

There's

relationships, there's jobs, there's future.

You're

in it. Maybe you've forgotten about it and you're like, why are you reminding me, Daniel?

Let

me just give you a question I often ask myself.

Am

I asking God to rescue me from this tension

or

to form me through it?

You

know, a lot of our prayers,

they

sound like, God, get me out of this. God, fix this.

God,

would you just make this easier? I mean, I've prayed these prayers, guys. Okay? God is not offended by those prayers, let me tell you.

But

sometimes his answer isn't rescue,

it's

wrestle.

Again,

I want to put

on

my sunglasses again.

I'm

not saying that God is causing the pain because he isn't.

God

is not causing the strain. Sometimes we're walking in the consequences of our own actions.

I

said it.

This

is what Jacob is doing. He's walking out the consequences

of

his own actions. But just because God doesn't cause it, it doesn't mean he doesn't want to meet you in it.

Does

that make sense?

He

meets us in the wrestle because it forms us

for

what's coming. Sometimes we're asking God to remove the very thing that's awakening us for the future.

Because

there's something happens in the wrestle.

So

what happens? Verse 25.

When

the man saw that he would not win the match, he touched Jacob's hip and wrenched it out of socket.

Then

the man said, let me go for the dawn is breaking. But Jacob said, I will not let you go

unless

you bless me.

I

always found this part of the story so fascinating. Why would God wrench Jacob's hip out of its socket?

this

is very confusing for a lot of people.

So

confusing

that

I want to put back on my sunglasses

and

be really clear what this passage is not saying.

See,

this is not teaching that God hurts us in order to help us.

Okay?

It's not saying that God causes pain, sickness, or suffering to teach us a lesson

or

to break our self-reliance.

Do

you hear that?

Yeah. Why

do I know that?

Because

if I've seen Jesus, I've seen who?

The

Father.

If

I've seen Jesus, I've seen the Father. And Jesus never wounded people to make them holy.

Right?

He healed them. I just read a bunch of accounts in Matthew today. He healed all

who

were sick and oppressed of the devil.

He

healed all who were sick and oppressed of the devil. This is Jesus' heart. So what's happening right here?

Well,

what's happening is this is symbolic prophetic act.

That

God is meeting Jacob in a language that he understands. So it's specific to him,

not

prescriptive for us.

See,

Jacob has spent his whole entire life relying on himself. His own strength, his cleverness, his ability.

And

in the moment,

this

moment,

God

is revealing something to him. You cannot move forward the same way you've always moved. Something's got to change.

So

can we learn from this then? If it's so specific to him, can we learn anything?

Well,

yes, we can.

It's

the living word. That's what I love about the word. It's alive. It can teach us. And what it centers around is the symbolism of the hip.

I

don't know about you,

but

I have not thought much about my hips.

Anybody

else? Maybe some of you are thinking about your hips. I don't think about that very much.

But

as I did a little research,

I

realized the hip's major function in our body

is

to carry its weight for standing, walking, and even running.

and

the major function is for stability

and

endurance.

See,

when God is awakening us,

he

often touches the deepest places

of

our self-reliance in our lives.

You

know, maybe

it's

you're trying to do everything

by

yourself and you never ask for help.

Or

maybe you're so concerned about what others think about you that you spend everything to please them.

Or

maybe it's this,

that

I'm doing these certain activities in my life so I don't feel the pain

going

on over here.

See,

God doesn't touch these places to shame us.

He

does it to transform us.

And

up until this point, Jacob has just relied on himself, his cleverness,

and

this is what God is saying. Your time of self-reliance is over.

See,

he's forming dependence, not weakness.

Okay, I

have to stop right here. Is anybody dealing with hip pain?

Does

anybody have hip pain right now? Is anybody in here, would you be

right

over here?

Right

now, I just sense the warmth of God's presence is coming on anybody who has hip pain

and

you're just going to start to feel a warmth right now

and

I'm just going to check in a little bit later to see what he does. So I just bless what you're doing right now. I'm just being interrupted by the Lord in Jesus' name. Right now, she's standing for that. Okay, we bless that, Lord. Anyone with hip pain, even listening online,

even

listening later, right now, if you have hip pain, the Lord's warmth is going to come and heal that in Jesus' name. We bless it, Lord.

We

bless it, Lord.

Amen.

I'm going to check in on that a little later.

See,

God is giving him a sign.

That

was like a little commercial from Jesus and now I'm going back. Okay. God is giving him a sign

that

says, hey, your stability,

your

endurance,

your

ability to carry the weight can only come

through

dependence on me.

Now,

that'll preach, right? That makes sense to me.

And

then Jacob does something pretty crucial here.

He

says,

the

man said, let me go for the dawn is breaking. But Jacob said, I will not let you go

unless

you bless me.

see,

with God is not fighting against him.

It's

refusing to let him go.

I'm

going to say that again. Wrestling with God

is

not fighting against him.

It's

refusing to let him go.

See,

Jacob is no longer grabbing for control. He's clinging to the one he needs the most.

This

is what awakening often looks like.

God

is touching the places we trust the most not to shame us but just to change

how

we walk forward. Early on in my walk with Jesus

I

just tried to do a lot of things on my own.

And

my two friends

who

led me to Jesus

they

just kept trying to help me and help me and I just kept trying to push them away. And one day we had this really out and I was left alone.

I

was actually living in Germany so I was really all alone.

And

I wrestled and wrestled with God. Lord God how could you let this happen? What am I going to do now? And he was like you know you're pushing away the people that I put in your life to help you.

You

need to humble yourself.

You

need to apologize to them and ask for their help.

See

I wonder how many of us are in this place

where

we've relied on ourselves

we're

trying to make these things happen and we've let go of God too soon.

We've

given up.

Maybe

there's a promise over your life

and

you're like

God

I don't see this happening so I just give up.

Or

maybe there's a prophetic word. Sometimes people speak things over our life you were made to do this or that but you haven't seen it pass and so you're just like I just don't think that can happen or maybe you think you made too many mistakes

and

it's just too late for that.

I

know I've had those thoughts.

See

we can learn from Jacob here. Don't let go.

He

goes I will not let go

until

you bless me.

You

know one thing I've loved about raising my kids that they all have these different personalities but my third born Malachi he's what I would call tenacious

and

he kind of you know his older brothers you know with a third born

you

kind of have to fight for everything right

and

his older brothers they never let him get by with anything they don't let him presses in and fights for it I love that about him one time we were at this health convention

and

they were doing this planking competition and for eight year olds the record was five minutes and nine seconds which is a long time and he was like oh I can beat that

and

he gets in the plank and he goes I'm going to go for six minutes just in case someone tries to beat me

you

can see a picture of it right there

you

know when I asked him hey can I share this story about you and he goes oh can I get up on the stage and plank for everybody and I'm like

maybe

not this time

see

there is a tenacity in our relationship with God

did

you know that even Jesus says keep on seeking and you will find

keep

on knocking

and

the door will be opened

see

in the wrestle something comes alive in Jacob that wasn't there before

he

realizes the answer to his future is not in his own abilities

but

in his connection

to

God

I

will not let go unless you bless me but something super important happens

in

the blessing

he

says what is your name the man asked

he

replied Jacob

well

your name will no longer be Jacob

the

man told him for now on

you

will be called Israel because you have fought with God and with men

and

have won

see

Jacob cannot continue in his calling relying on the person

that

he once was

see

he must become who he was always made to be

Israel

he renames him

this

is really really key

Israel

means one who struggles with God or a better definition might be God prevails

in

him

it

doesn't mean he was fighting against God it means he gets transformed through encounter with God

see

Israel

is

who Jacob becomes

when

he stops striving as Jacob

and

allows God

to

prevail in him

where

do you need God to prevail in you

see

Jacob didn't win

because

he overpowered God he winned because he clung to him

he

didn't give up

see

this moment has really marked me

because

names are very important you know in scripture

a

name isn't just what people call you

it's

how you understand yourself

it's

how you understand who you are some of you may know this

but

I think most don't that my first name is actually Robert

people

are like what

growing

up I actually went by Robert even into college

and

before I knew Jesus I was in this season of doing a lot of auditions and performing and things I got a degree in music so I was doing a lot of that and several people had encouraged me to change my name to my middle name to start going by my middle name and if those of you older in the crowd you might know that there is a famous Robert Goulet out there and so they one person said you know if you want to step into what's next

you

need to set yourself apart from the guy that everybody knows huh

I

was like oh there's a little bit prophetic in there but at the time I didn't know God but I did change my name

and

what I didn't know

was

that the name Robert means bright fame

but

the name Daniel

means

God is my judge

hmm I

changed my name and about eight months later

my

life radically changed

when

I met God is my judge

when

I met Jesus

and

man I used to struggle with what people thought of me I used to handle criticism so personally like when you do auditions and they're like yeah we don't like you out you know it can be really hard it kind of ruins your day but as soon as I changed my name

as

soon as God became my judge those opinions didn't seem to matter as much it was like he got the final word over my life

see

it was like I started to live toward who I was made to be Daniel

and

I started to become that person

see

this is what God is trying to give a heads up we cannot live our old life we cannot live in the way that we used to live we have to live in the way God calls us voice to find who we are becoming

what

does God say about you

what

is he saying over your life

it

could be your physical name it could be another name

what

is God saying about you here's my challenge to you

if

there's one thing that we could take away don't rush past the place where God is trying to meet with you

see

I wonder if some of us the very

trying

to meet with you

trying

to form you

trying

to show you hey here's who you are becoming

I

want you all to stand as we move into worship

we're

going to take a moment

and

fix our attention on the one

that

this is all about

Jesus

Christ

he's

the one that before you were even formed in your mother's womb

he

knew you

he

knew you

and

you might be in a tension right now to wrestle a lot of unknown and sometimes we just like to rush past those places

but

the Lord is saying no no no

I

know exactly why you're here on earth

I

know exactly what I've made you for and I want to meet you in this place

would

you just put your hands out

Lord

right now

we

want to meet with you Jesus

Lord

would you start to speak

to

our hearts

who

you called us

what

is the name that you say where are you leading us toward Lord

and

God just like our open hands are

maybe

holding on to things that we shouldn't be holding on to anymore we're clinging to possessions we're clinging to an old life

right

now I thank you that these open hands represent things that you can take out of them

you

can take these things out of

our

hands

and

put yourself instead

if

that resonates with you just say yes Lord

we

say yes Lord

God

as we worship you

as

we put our affection our attention to you I thank you Lord that you are the deliverer

you

are the one that brings freedom

and

we say yes to that

in

Jesus name

amen