OUR LORD WHO GIVES US FAVOR WITH GOD AND WITH MEN

Genesis chapter 3 verses 5 - 6 says this;

 I have cattle and donkeys, sheep and goats, male and female servants. Now I am sending this message to my lord, that I may find favor in your eyes.’”

When the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, “We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him."

This passage captures the roller coaster ride that Jacob experienced when he returned to the land of his fathers from the land of his father-in-law.

As he approached his homeland, he came close to the territory of his brother Esau with whom he had a strained relationship because of how Jacob had tricked Esau out of his birthright. 

Because of this, Jacob was not sure how Esau would receive him after all the years that had passed.

The passage starts with Jacob seeking to mend fences with his brother by sending envoys with a message of reconciliation and promises of gifts of goats and camels.

The envoys returned with a message that Esau was coming to meet him with four hundred men.

Upon hearing this, Jacob went into distress mode as he tried to work out how to placate his brother or if his brother attacked, how at least some of his family  could escape?

In a state of fear, Jacob turned to the God of his grandfather and the God of his father. Jacob's prayer in Genesis chapter 32 verses 9 - 12 reads this way;

 “O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, Lord, you who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,’ I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness  you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two camps. Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. But you have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’”

 Jacob's humble prayer for God's intervention stood on the promises that the Lord had given him to prosper Him and give him as many descendants as there were grains of sand of the sea because he knew that for those promises to be fulfilled, his children could not be slain.

And the Lord did intervene and save Jacob's children by bringing peace to Esau's heart and the two brothers reconciled and were at peace.

Amen.