Jacob's life illustrates the tragedy and trial that can arise even when one attempts to do what is right, particularly when falling short of divine commands. The sermon traces Jacob's detour to Shechem instead of proceeding to Bethel, highlighting the dangers of settling for half-measures and the consequences of compromising faith, as seen in his daughter Dinah's disgrace and the subsequent distress brought upon his family and himself. The core lesson emphasizes that true obedience involves going the full mile with God, not just halfway, and that even when striving to live righteously, believers may face severe trials and bereavements. The message concludes by noting that despite these hardships, Jacob ultimately returned to Bethel, cleansed his household, and became the spiritual man God intended him to be, demonstrating God's sufficiency in carrying His people through their burdens.
Restored with Diffio
Audio restored with Diffio. Diffio processed the original archive recording to reduce noise and produce a cleaner listening version; the original stays available.
Speech quality score (model-estimated, SCOREQ): before 2.17 → restored 4.50
It's wonderful what you can get out of a rock, isn't it? You know, they went all the way to the moon to bring some rocks back. I don't know what they're doing with them now. I said, if they'd come to me, I'd let them take all the rocks out of my garden that care to take out. You come to the Word of God, you find you can get water out of the rock, out of the smitten rock. And He gives us oil out of the rock. He gives us honey out of the rock, and when you come to the New Testament, he tells us that rock was Christ. Tonight we're going to continue our study in the life of Jacob. And might I say this, that what we study tonight, I believe to be the darkest era in Jacob's career, the darkness before the dawn.
And you'll find as we study through tonight that it's when Jacob is trying to do everything that's right that the worst trials come upon him. So what we'll cover tonight is what I like to term the years of Jacob's tragedy and trial. I don't misunderstand me. He has himself to blame for some of it. And then we'll see how he moves from tragedy to trial. Now, last night we finished off with Jacob bidding farewell to his brother Esau. He deceived his brother Esau again, you know.
Brother Esau made a lot of offers to him. He said, no, no, just you go your way and we'll just take it easy and we'll come on and be with you later on. He had no intentions of going near Brother Esau. God had told him to get back to Bethel. But rather, Esau says, come on, come to Seir. He says, you go on and we'll follow on. Now we'll take up from there tonight. Verse sixteen of chapter three will give us our connection. Chapter thirty three of the book of Genesis, verse sixteen. So Esau returned that day on his way unto Seir. And Jacob journeyed to Sucker.
He went in the opposite direction. and built him a house and made booths for his cattle. Therefore the name of the place is called Sakath. Jacob came to Shalom, the city of Shechem, which is in the land of Canaan, when he came from Padanaram and pitched his tent before the city. They bought a parcel of a field where he had spread his tent at the hand of the children of Hamer, Shechem's father, for a hundred pieces of money, and he erected there an altar and called it El Elohi Israel. Now I want you to pause with me here just for a moment or two and find out a simple lesson of so from this section before we get away on to chapter thirty-five.
You will remember that God said to him, Jacob returned. Now he had promised, remember when he was at Bethel, on the way out, that if God would bring him back, that there where he erected the pillar, that would be God's house. Now here he's coming back and he's on his way to Bethel, but instead of getting to Bethel, he gets stuck at this place called Shechem. When I was a young Christian, I heard a man call this the Christian's glue pot. That's why I used the word he got stuck there. He's called this the Christian's glue pot.
And sure enough, Jacob got stuck at Shechem. Now he had no right doing that. This is the tragedy. Now if you want to put some kind of title over this, this is the way I view these few verses there and what happened. It's the danger of stopping short of the divine command. The danger of stopping short of the divine command. You might want to look at it the other way. It's like just having half measures. Instead of going the full mile, stopping at the half mile.
That's exactly what Jacob did here, and he landed himself in trouble. I used to wonder why Jacob did this until later on when you come way on to chapter thirty-seven of the book of Genesis, you get a little cue there as to why he stopped here. There must have been good pastures here. And Jacob, you see, had his herds and these animals had to be grazed. They had to find good pasture. And so I suppose when he looked around, he says, this looks a pretty place.
I could settle in here fine. Everything in my favor. The reason I believe that is when you come to chapter third to seven, you remember when Joseph is sent out to go and see his brethren, he had to come down to Shechem. That's where they had gone to graze the sheep. So there must have been good pastures here if they traveled all that way, way down there to find pasture. So Jacob is coming up and he journeyed here and he stops. Place looked all right. Another mistake he made here was this, that he bought himself a piece of ground.
Now, don't get angry with me. I'm not saying it's wrong to buy a piece of ground. But it's wrong to buy a piece of ground if somebody has promised you you're going to get it for nothing. Something wrong there, isn't it? Now, hadn't God promised him this land? Hadn't God promised the land to Abraham? confirmed the promise to Isaac and again to Jacob. Why did Jacob want to go and buy the thing that God said he would give him? Couldn't he wait God's time and get it from God? Instead of that, he goes to buy the piece of ground. And then I find here that he built himself a house.
Nothing wrong with building a house. Some of you have built yourselves very pretty houses at Park of the Pans. I don't know a better place where you could have built them. And you've got nice houses and nothing wrong with building a house, but it was wrong for Jacob. Because the moment he did that, he lost his pilgrim character. And just for a time, of course, he lost his pilgrim character. So Jacob here you see stopped short of the divine command. The divine command for Jacob was this get back to Bethel. Instead of getting back to Bethel he got stuck at Shechem. And if you and I are going to stop short of the divine command we can find ourselves in difficulties.
And that's exactly where Jacob found himself. Some people are quite prepared to go halfway. But if you want them to go the whole way, they think you're being too hard. You're pushing them just too far. And you mustn't push them too far these days, because if you do, they're going to resent it. And it's not me that's pushing too far, but when I sit down to read the Word of God, If I find in the Word of God something that God says, I should submit to that. I should be prepared to say, not my will, but thine be done.
Obedience is better than sacrifice. And how many more scriptures could you quote that would build up the whole argument for perfect obedience to the things of God? Here's a man who's prepared to leave Peyton Aram. He's prepared to come over the borders, but he is not prepared to go the full way and get back to Bethel, the house of God." And so therefore he stayed there. But that doesn't mean that he ceased to be religious, you know. For you'll notice that in verse twenty he erected an altar. Now the altar is always indicative of something religious, whether it's an altar to God or an altar to Balaam or an altar to some idol, it's still religious.
And this man, Jacob, when he comes here, he's still going to be religious. He's got to think of his family and he's got to think of the people around the bottom, so he erected an altar. If you saw a man erecting an altar, you would go over and have a look at it. You say, this fellow's religious. I wonder, what God does he worship? Because in that land, they all had their variety of gods. You remember when Abraham came into the land and he erected an altar, he erected an altar unto the Lord, unto Jehovah. He wasn't ashamed to let them know who he worshipped. He worshipped the living God.
But suppose some of the neighbors had come over And they said to Jacob, I see you're a religious man. You've erected your altar. Who's your God? What God do you worship? Oh, my altar is erected here to El Elohi Israel. Well, what does that mean? It means I worship the God who's the God of Israel. But who is Israel? They didn't know who Israel was. You and I know today, but they didn't know then. He had just newly received this name, hadn't he? God had just newly said to him, At PNL, your name will be called Israel.
So he takes his new name. He says, I worship the God who is the God of Israel. But who is Israel? Me. Oh, I see. You worship your own God. That sounds good. None of your business will worship. I'll have my own kind of religion. I'll have my own kind of worship. I'll worship my own God. You see, he was religious here but it didn't convey any thought whatsoever at that time. He was just worshipping his own God. So far as the neighbors were concerned, it meant nothing. Now this is important because you'll find what happens when he gets back to Bethel, there's a difference. Now, he still wants to be religious, but he doesn't want to go the full mile.
He doesn't want to go right back to where God told him to go. He just wants to go half roads. And you know, border dwellers are always in danger. You're better to be either one thing or the other. There used to be an old man, his name was Walter Turnbull. He was saved when he was up in life a little, I suppose, and listening to his testimony, old Walter must have been a pretty rough one before he got converted. Some of you might not understand this, but you Scottish people here will, and giving his testimony, he said, before he was converted, he ate more poached rabbits than he did poached eggs.
You know what that means, eh? So you know the kind of man he was. If you don't know what a poached rabbit is, that's some of those Scotch people. They'll tell you after what it is. But Walter left his home and he went away to live in the city of Glasgow. Million and a quarter people there. You could live in Glasgow for years and never know your next door neighbour. Strange thing. See, you go in one of those doorways and up a winding stair, what they call the old tenements, And there might be three or four doors on every landing. And you may go in and go out for years and never know who the person was that lived above you or below you or next door to you.
I know because I had a room there when I was working there in the city for some time and I can't remember ever seeing the next door neighbors except one night I went in the wrong house by mistake. See, they all looked the like to me. Now I walked in as an old man was preparing to go to his bed. I got out quicker than I went in. I was on the wrong landing. It was at the right door, but the wrong landing, you know. The old Walter went to live there. And they got the furniture out. Took it up the stair. You know, ladies, when you go into a house, how long it takes to get the carpets down and the furniture set. and his dear wife with some others was trying to get things set.
She says, where's Walter? And they heard the noise down the back court, they looked out the window, three stories up, and they looked out, and here was Walter, out in the back court with all those houses round about. One street over there, one here, one here. He was preaching. No jagged on, shook sleeves, he'd been working. He's preaching away. Just ten minutes or so, and then he came up. She says, Walter. Could you not have waited till we got things set round and then you'd have plenty of time for that? He says, you're just as well letting the people know what you are when you arrive. Well, he could have lived there for a long time and these people would have looked out of their windows and watched them.
They would have wondered where he had come from and they may never have seen him again. He said, let them know what you are when you arrive. That's a good idea. There's something to what old Walter said. Don't hide your light under the bushel. But you see, this man, Jacob, was going to erect an altar, but he wasn't going to let them know exactly what he was, and he was going to find himself in danger. Now, old Walter had told you about was no border dweller. I can tell you that. Many a Sunday morning before he reached the... the place where he would be at the morning service, he would go and take a roundabout walk that would take him about two miles and he would be preaching all the way before he got to the service.
He liked to shout out texts and preach on the streets before he got to the service. He let people know what he was. And a lot of those rough characters that heard them, they admired them. But people who were border dwellers, They're only prepared to go halfway. They're in danger. And chapter thirty-four is one of the most distressing chapters in the whole of the book of Genesis. A most distressing chapter. Jacob at this time had eleven sons and one daughter. May I suggest that his one daughter must have been the apple of his eye?
Can you think of a man with eleven sons? There's another little fellow to be born after this, but at this point eleven sons and one daughter. He stayed there in a place where the inhabitants were wicked, idolatrous people. The first thing I want you to note is this, the danger to which he exposed his family. He exposed them to this danger and Dinah, his daughter was right there exposed. You followed through from that point and you watched the desire of Dinah.
Suppose you could picture that young lady with eleven brothers. Whose company was she going to seek? She's bound to go out and seek the company of the other young women in the area. Can you blame her? It's where her father has settled down. And this teaches me a lesson that it is important and it is extremely important where Christians live. It is important. Perhaps some of you have proved that in life. Some have no option.
They've just got to stay where the work is. They get moved around and so on. But others had opportunity and they made their choice. They look back on life and they're sorry for it. Jacob exposed his family, including his only daughter, to this danger. And the desire of Dina was to go out and move around with the other young women. And with moving with young women, wherever you get young women, you'll get young men. And it seems obvious to me that Dina was a good-looking young woman. And you know, the better looking they are, the greater danger they get into.
You know that. She must have been good-looking. For one of the princes of the land said his eye on her. Not one of the boys of the street. Oh no. One of the princes in a good position. Position of power. And having plenty said his eye on her. And that leads you to the point that must nearly have broken the heart of Jacob. His daughter was brought into disgrace. I may be touching a sore point with some of you tonight, but I have known dear Christians who have shed many a tear and have had broken hearts because of members of the family.
They got into wrong company. And as a result, they brought disgrace on their own fair name, disgrace on their family, disgrace on the assembly. But don't be too hard. Don't blame them a hundred percent all the time. If the whole truth was known, perhaps the blame could be laid at the doorstep of others. Jacob, you cannot blame... Diana all the way, why did you stay there to begin with? Why didn't you get back to Bethel?
Jacob had got back to Bethel. This disgrace would not have come upon Dina and upon the family. But the closing part of the chapter brings distress upon Jacob himself. Notice what he says here in verse thirty of chapter thirty-four. And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, You have troubled me. You make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Parasites. I, being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me and slay me. Thy shall be destroyed, I in my house. And they said, Should he deal with our sister as with an harlot?
And if you read the chapter at home, you'll see why Jacob said that to his two sons, and he never forgot what they did. Because these two boys, these two sons of Jacob, they deceived the men of that area. And it's a very interesting point to notice as you go down the chapter. There was a compromise here. They were prepared to compromise on condition that the inhabitants of the land would submit to a little religious right. That's all it was. If you'll accept our little religious right, you can have our sister. A lot of folks like that. A fellow was attending some meetings on one occasion and shown an interest in a young woman.
And someone said to him, Is it true, Devi, that you've been converted? Well, he said, you know, you've got to see that to get Maggie. And he got Maggie, and that was the last time he ever come back near a service. You've got to see that. A little religious right. I'll see I'm converted, and I'll get baptized as long as I get it. Then after that, fare you well. Let us be careful, brother. Lest we impose something on somebody and they're prepared to submit to it just to meet their own ends. They brought distress upon Jacob and he didn't know which way to turn.
He says, they'll all be against me. Now we're so few in number. They'll come out and destroy us. Now write at that. I want you to know this. Chapter thirty-five. Quickly, verse one. And God said unto Jacob arrived, Go up to Bethel and dwell there. and make there an altar unto God that appeared unto thee when thou fledest from the face of Esau thy brother. He says, get back to the place where I appeared to you at first. I want you to notice now in this little section from verse one, right up to verse seven, it's back to Bethel.
Back to Bethel. But before he goes back to Bethel, I want you to notice a principle in verse two. It's the principle of parental authority. Then Jacob said unto his household, unto all that were with him, put away the strange gods that are among you and be clean and change your garments and let us arise and go up to Bethel and I will make there an altar unto God who answered me in the day of my distress and was with me in the way which I went. Jacob said this to his household.
Now let me ask you, where did they get those strange gods that were to be put away? Well, now I emphasised this in one of our readings one night, that when they were leaving Peyton Aram, Rachel, the one he loved, she stole her father's little gods, his little idols. She didn't need them. Nevertheless, she stole them. So there were some things that they brought from Peyton Aram that they should not have brought with them. But may I suggest that while they were there at Shechem, they had collected a few more. And if they hadn't stayed there, they wouldn't have collected them.
And so, says Jacob, if we're going up to Bethel, the house of God, we can't take idols up with us. All these idols will have to be put away. They'll have to be buried out of sight. And so he uses his parental authority and he puts his household right first. He starts at home. I think we'll all agree tonight that that's the right place to start. And by the way, these were not little children that he was ordering here. Now we have an idea because of the... environment perhaps in which we've been raised, we have an idea that when we reach a certain age then we please ourselves and we do our own thing.
But that was not the idea in the East. As long as a man was alive, no matter how old he was, even if he lived to be ninety years of age and he had a son there who was quite a young fellow of seventy, then the father at ninety still had authority over the son of seventy. He maintained his right of authority, no matter how old his children may be. That was their custom. Jacob here shows his parental authority at this point.
And he spoke to all his household and gave them directions as to what was to be and what was not to be if they were going up to Bethel. Now, after he states the case, then there's the purifying actions. It's not just a matter of listening to him and pushing him aside and saying, well, he's just an old fogey. Now he doesn't know what he's talking about. We'll just keep our idols and we'll hide them again. That wouldn't do. Look at verse four. And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hand and all their earrings which were in their ears. And Jacob hid them, or if you like, Jacob buried them under the oak which was at Shechem.
These things were dead and done with. There was no need for those little gods. These little idols, these little teraphim. Whether you're dangling your little idol from your ear or dangling it on a chain, I noticed a lot of them dangling them now at the dashboard of their car or some of them hanging up at the back window. I asked somebody what they were for. They said, oh, that's some accidents. I don't know why so many of them are all... knocked up on the sides and had so many accidents with these little things dangling in them. And they tell me these little things are supposed to be blessed and they pay a good price for them.
Stick them in the car, the little saint that keeps you from having an accident. You and I know the whole thing is a lot of rubbish. These little idols, little terraces. He says, you're finished with them. Get rid of them. Burry them under the old oak. Watch what happens in verse five. And they journeyed, and the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them, and they did not pursue after the sons of Jacob. They journeyed. That suggests that once more he takes up his pilgrim character.
No longer is he stuck down there at Shechem with his booths and his house. No, no. He's now a pilgrim again and he's going on towards the place that God has told him to go to. But not only so, but while he's going, the very thing that he feared, no longer need he fear these things because God protected him. For the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them. And the very people that he thought would pursue after him and bring him to the end and stamp him out with all his family, God protects them. And these people did not pursue after the sons of Jacob.
Then we get him back to the place. Verse six. So Jacob came to love, which is in the land of Canaan. That is Bethel. It was Lazar the first to remember the place of separation becomes Bethel, the place known as the house of God. Came to Bethel, he had all the people that were with him, and he built there an altar. First thing he did, he prepared the altar. And watch the name he gave to it, and he called the place El Beth El.
That L there is for God, you see. He called it God of the house of God. You know now, he's got the true name now. Because there God appeared unto him when he fled from the face of his brother, back to Bethel. May I suggest to you that something that is not recorded here may have taken place that day. I've often tried to picture this a lit light. I picture that family coming to Bethel. And Jacob says to his sons, we're going to build an altar here.
So he built his altar in the scriptural fashion. And he would conduct the service. And I'm sure he gave his testimony that night. And he would say, boys, It's just so many years ago now, since I was fleeing from your uncle, my brother Esau. It was right there that I laid down my head. All I had was a stone and my little parcel of goods and my stick. It was there I had that wonderful vision that night and he would outline it all to them again as we had it in chapter twenty-eight.
He would tell the story of his dealings with God and God's dealings with him. He would say, it was right there that I erected that pillar and it was there I poured my oil on that pillar and he would rehearse the whole thing to his family. And then there again they would all stand as Jacob like the old patriarch he was. would leave his family in a time of devotion. You don't think I'm stretching the imagination, do you? Isn't that what you would have done? And he would say, look, God told us to come back here and I've got back.
And that night when he lay down and the family had gone to rest in their various tents, I'm quite sure of this, that Jacob didn't sleep too much that night, he'd be so excited. His mind would be going back to the old days. He'd been thinking what happened in the old home. He's hoping soon to see his father again, but he's not going to see his mother. He's thinking back of things that used to be. He would reminisce that night, and no doubt it did him a lot of good. But now he's got back to Bethel.
Now here's a big point in chapter thirty-five. The man is now back in the right place. Positionally he's right. And may I go a little further and suggest that conditionally he's right for he has cleansed his household. No doubt he has made a full and open confession of things even before his own family. He's upheld the honor of God. Here's a man now back in the right place doing everything that's right. Now you would say to yourself, well now surely the blessings of God will be showered upon Jacob.
He's doing everything that's right. Doesn't work that way. It's when Jacob comes back to Bethel, and tries to do everything that's right that is hard as blows fall upon him. Have you ever found that? That some people, when they're not doing the thing that's right spiritually, they seem to get on in other ways. And then when you're doing the thing that's right spiritually, everything seems to go against you.
You're saying, now, how do you arrive at that conclusion with Jacob very quickly in the minutes that are left? Let me show you something. Look at verse eight, please. And Deborah, Rebecca's nurse, died. And she was buried beneath Bethel under an oak. The name of it was called Alan Bacchus, the Oak of Weeping. Ah, I suppose he shed tears here. I've been remarking again and again that I don't think he ever saw his mother again.
But here was the old nurse called Rebecca's nurse. Is it possible that this was the lady who attended to Rebecca when the twins were born? possible this was the lady that was there at Jacob's birth if he didn't see his mother again here was the link with his mother the nurse that had been there at the time of his birth and he's not going to see his mother he's going to stand at the grave when they bury the old nurse the link with his mother and he weeps he's shedding tears there at the oak of weeping That's the first funeral.
But let's go a little further down. Look at verse sixteen. And they journeyed from Bethel. And there was but a little way to come to Ephraim. And Rachel travelled and she had hard labour and it came to pass when she was in hard labour that the midwife said unto her, Fear not. Thou shall have this son also. Because you remember, she was the mother of Joseph. Now she's going to bear another one. And it came to pass, as her soul was in departing, for she died, that she called his name Benoni. That means the son of my sorrow.
But his father called him Benjamin. That is the son of my right hand. And Rachel died and was buried in the way to Ephraim, which is Bethlehem. Here's the second funeral in this chapter. He buries the one that he loved, the one for whom he served seven years. Here's the link that he had with Peyton Adam. He served his seven years down there for Rachel. Now she's gone. Perhaps you've always thought of Bethlehem as the town where Jesus was born, and rightly so.
But may I remind you that also Bethlehem is the place where Benjamin was born, and Benjamin, of course, has two names. He's the son of my sorrow and the son of my right hand. And it takes both of these names to give the picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. He who was to be the man of sorrows, acquainting himself with our grief, was born there. And he who was to be seated at the right hand of the throne of the majesty and high. The Father saying, Sit thou there until I make that enemy thy footstool. He was born right here. at Bethlehem but here is a little prefiguring of that and when he was born here Rachel moves out but Jacob has to go to the burying ground once again and he sheds his tears again no doubt for Rachel that's not all look at verse twenty eight of the chapter And the days of Isaac were in hundred and fourscore years.
See, he lived five years more than his father Abram. Abram died at hundred and seventy-five Isaac, hundred and eighty. And Isaac gave up the ghost and died and was gathered unto his people, being old and full of days, and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him. So first of all, He's got to bury the old nurse, the link with his mother. He's got to bury Rachel, the link with that seven years of service in Pedenaram. The last link with the old homestead, he buries his father.
And notice that his brother Esau is there. I wonder what his thoughts were that day. When his brother Esau and him stood and looked at each other as they buried their father. Would his mind go back again to what Esau had said? I'll wait till the days of mourning have passed. Then I'll wreak vengeance on you. Perhaps he has melted a lot by this time. Perhaps he's forgot that threat. But my point I want to press home tonight There's the burdens of bereavement, the nurse, the wife and the father.
Three times in one chapter, the Spirit of God brings these things together to show us that these things came upon Jacob when he was doing the thing that was right. You know, bereavement can be a great burden. But there's something else comes out in this chapter and I call it the baffling blow. Have you ever been baffled by things that have happened in your life? Have you ever had to face things that puzzled you and you couldn't find the answer to them? You just await. And even yet today it may be you can't account for them.
There's a baffling blow here. Verse twenty-two, it's a sad thing. It came to pass when Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father's concubine, and Israel heard it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve. That may mean very little reading it there. But when Jacob came to lie on his deathbed, he never forgot this. And when Reuben came in, they looked to them, he says, Reuben, you may be my firstborn, but you are as unstable as water.
Thou shalt not prevail. And Jacob remembered this incident. If in chapter thirty-four there is the disgrace upon his only daughter, In chapter thirty-five there's the disgraceful conduct of his oldest son. Oh the burdens that Jacob had to carry. Things that came upon him, the sin of Reuben. When Jacob was doing everything that was right. Now if these things happened to men who were doing the thing that was wrong, you might in some measure understand it.
But after he's got back to Bethel and he's put up the altar and he's worshipped his God and he's doing everything that God told him to do and he's anxious now to do the right thing and he's back in the land, it's then that the burdens come upon him. You wonder how the man carried it. Each and one day was doing business. He was a salesman. He went into this store. It was a shoe shop. You know how they've all those boxes piled up on the shelves and so on.
The little boy was helping his father, taking stock. There were shifting boxes from this shelf through the back and so on. The little boy was just standing with his arms out and his father's building them up on his arms to be carried through. The salesman looked in a kind of patronizing way. He said, I'm afraid that's too big a burden for you, my little fellow. That's too big a burden for you. And he looked at the salesman with a look of disdain. He said, my father knows how much I can carry.
That's it. My father knows how much I can carry. His father wouldn't put an extra box on if the little fellow couldn't carry it. You know, beloved, our Father knows exactly how much we can carry. And some have had to carry a much heavier load than others, and they've managed. For he says, My grace is sufficient for thee. And I might say this, this is not all that Jacob had to carry. She comes a little heavier afterwards. Tomorrow night we hope to finish up showing you the grand old man that Jacob turned out.
In the last seventeen years of his life there's nothing to equal him. He was a gentleman, a Christian gentleman, if we use modern language, of the first rate. A spiritual man, the man that God expected him to be. So tomorrow night we'll look at his years of triumph. Shall we pray? Father, take our thanks again for an evening spent together in Christian fellowship, in the reading and studying of thy word. Help us to take these truths, these lessons, and to apply them to all our hearts, that we may walk with thee day by day.