In Jacob becoming Israel we have a major story developing in the Bible that’s clearly designed by God to illustrate a problem – a problem so insidious and overpowering that eventually Jesus would die as the only way of curing it.
And to show us what the problem is, God opens this play of all plays in Act 1, Scene 1, with a wrestling match at the River Jabbok (meaning “Wrestle”) and Jacob’s name being changed to Israel (the “Isra” part meaning “Struggle”), both names setting the scene and putting the props in place to prepare us for what is to come.
And one thousand years later, in Hosea 12, we get to see what was coming – and it’s not a pretty picture, with God stating angrily in verse 2 that “he will punish Jacob according to his ways and repay him according to his deeds.”
So there’s still a lot of Jacob firmly embedded in the history of Israel, resulting in his descendants many years later being severely taken to task by God. And notice why his descendants are being punished too; it’s because of “his ways” and “his deeds,” referring to Jacob’s old habits of “grasping his brother’s heel” and “struggling with God” (3).
So who were these conniving descendants of Jacob following in his footsteps? Hosea 12 opens in verse 1 with “Ephraim pursuing the east wind all day” and “multiplying lies and violence,” because “he makes a treaty with Assyria and sends olives to Egypt.”
So it’s Ephraim that’s doing the same old ‘Jacob stuff’ of wheeling and dealing, and just like Jacob trusting in their own wits to get what they’re after, and like Jacob still lying and conniving and making others mad at them (including the mighty Assyria), and like Jacob still trying to wrestle through their problems by devious means.
And now they’ve made God really angry as well. “Ephraim had bitterly provoked him to anger,” verse 14, resulting in God ’s fearsome threat that he will “repay Ephraim for his contempt.”
And it’s that contemptuous spirit of human conniving, lying and resorting to cunning that makes God so angry – so “Leaders today, take note”….(next blog)
