Deceptive Hope

It was to save Jacob from deceptive hope that God confronted him that night on the bank of the river. To save him from self-trust it was necessary for God to conquer him, to wrest control away from him, to take His great power and rule with a rod of love. Charles Wesley, the sweet singer of England, with a spiritual penetration rare even among advanced Christians, wrote from the mouth of Jacob what he conceived to be his prayer as he wrestled with God at the ford of Jabbok:

My strength is gone, my nature dies;

I sink beneath Thy weighty hand;

Faint to revive, and fall to rise:

I fall, and yet by faith I stand.

I stand, and will not let Thee go,

Till I Thy Name, Thy Nature know.

Lame as I am, I take the prey;

Hell, earth, and sin, with ease o’ercome;

I leap for joy, pursue my way,

And as a bounding hart fly home,

Through all eternity to prove,

Thy Nature and Thy Name is love.

Verse

So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak. Genesis 32:24

Thought

To save Jacob from self-trust it was necessary for God to conquer him, to wrest control away from him, to take His great power and rule with a rod of love.

Prayer

We have no strength, Lord, and we sink beneath Your weighty hand. Lift us up and work in us through our defeat.