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Parasha Vayishlach/And He Sent
by Rabbi Jack "Yaacov" Farber
The Scripture readings for the Shabbat of November 23/18 Kislev are: Bereshit/Genesis 32:4-36:43; Hoshea/Hosea 11:7-12:12; Mattiyahu/Matthew 26:36-46. Bereshit {32:9} Ya'akov said, "G-D of my 'ab (father) Avraham, and G-D of my 'ab Yitzak (Isaac), HaSHEM, who said to me, 'Return to your country, and to your relatives, and I will do you good.' {32:10} I am not worthy of the least of all the lovingkindnesses, and of all the truth, which you have shown to your servant; for with just my staff I passed over this Yarden (Jordan); and now I have become two companies. {32:11} Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esav: for I fear him, lest he come and strike me, and the ‘em (mother) with the children. {32:12} You said, 'I will surely do you good, and make your seed as the sand of the sea, which can't be numbered because there are so many.'" Yaacov (Jacob) had no sooner left Lavan when he gets the bad news; his brother Esav along with 400 fighting men were riding hard to meet him. Have you ever wondered how Esav found out that Yaacov was on his way back to Caanan? Do you think Lavan might have turned him in? Interesting thought but it is not what I would like to talk about in this Parasha. In the above Scriptures G-d allows us to eavesdrop on one of Yaacov’s prayers. What I find important here is not so much how Yaacov was praying but rather what he was praying. G-d had made Yaacov some very important, far-reaching promises. Now here we find Yaacov faced with a potential catastrophe that would definitely, in the natural, interfere with the fulfillment of those promises. So how does Yaacov pray? He prays back G-d’s promises to him, he reminds G-d of the promises He made to him. We find many examples of this type of prayer throughout Scripture. An excellent example of this is the prayer of Daniel: Daniel {9:2} In the first year of his reign I Daniel was reading the Scriptures and understood the number of the years, whereof the word of HaShem came to Yirmeyahu (Jeremiah) the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Yerushalayim (Jerusalem). {9:3} And I set my face unto HaShem G-d, to seek by prayer and supplications, with fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes: Daniel had discovered through the reading of the Scriptures, that G-d had determined seventy years for the captivity of Israel. Realizing that this period was reaching its end Daniel began praying, reminding G-d of His promise, so that Israel might indeed return to her land. Yaacov found himself in a situation that in his mind did not correspond to what G-d had promised. Surely it would have been impossible for him to make it home, as G-d had promised him, if his brother Esav massacred the entire company along the way. So he, in prayer, reminded G-d of the promises He made to him. No, G-d does not have to be reminded of anything, He knows and remembers everything. G-d was obviously testing Yaacov’s faith, did he in fact remember His promises and was he prepared to claim them and stand firm on them? G-d does the same with us! There are many promises in Scripture that apply to us as believers in Yeshua; promises that are ours to claim. However many times G-d may put situations into our pathway that seemed to contradict those promises. He does it in order to see if you rememer the promises and to test our faith. Do you, when faced with such situations pray back G-d’s promises to Him? Have you been reading your Bible? Do you know all the promises G-d has made to you? After all, how will you ever be able to stand on the promises if you don’t know what they are!Rabbi Jack "Yaacov" Farber is the spiritual leader of Congregation Melech Yisrael in Toronto, Canada. Copyright 2002
- Romans 1:16, NIV |