Detention

Genesis 32:1-21

¹Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him.

²And when Jacob saw them he said, “This is God’s camp!” So he called the name of that place Mahanaim.

³And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother in the land of Seir, the country of Edom,

⁴instructing them, “Thus you shall say to my lord Esau: Thus says your servant Jacob, ‘I have sojourned with Laban and stayed until now.

⁵I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, male servants, and female servants. I have sent to tell my lord, in order that I may find favor in your sight.’ ”

⁶And the messengers returned to Jacob, saying, “We came to your brother Esau, and he is coming to meet you, and there are four hundred men with him.”

⁷Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks and herds and camels, into two camps,

⁸thinking, “If Esau comes to the one camp and attacks it, then the camp that is left will escape.”

⁹And Jacob said, “O God of my father Abraham and God of my father Isaac, O Lord who said to me, ‘Return to your country and to your kindred, that I may do you good,’

¹⁰I am not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant, for with only my staff I crossed this Jordan, and now I have become two camps.

¹¹Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him, that he may come and attack me, the mothers with the children.

¹²But you said, ‘I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude.’ ”

¹³So he stayed there that night, and from what he had with him he took a present for his brother Esau,

¹⁴two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams,

¹⁵thirty milking camels and their calves, forty cows and ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten male donkeys.

¹⁶These he handed over to his servants, every drove by itself, and said to his servants, “Pass on ahead of me and put a space between drove and drove.”

¹⁷He instructed the first, “When Esau my brother meets you and asks you, ‘To whom do you belong? Where are you going? And whose are these ahead of you?’

¹⁸then you shall say, ‘They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a present sent to my lord Esau. And moreover, he is behind us.’ ”

¹⁹He likewise instructed the second and the third and all who followed the droves, “You shall say the same thing to Esau when you find him,

²⁰and you shall say, ‘Moreover, your servant Jacob is behind us.’ ” For he thought, “I may appease him with the present that goes ahead of me, and afterward I shall see his face. Perhaps he will accept me.”

²¹So the present passed on ahead of him, and he himself stayed that night in the camp.

There is an incident from my life as a first grader that still hangs with me today. For some reason (which is completely gone from my memory at this point) my entire class got in trouble. We were made to stay after school for 10 minutes past the final bell with our heads down on our desk. I was terrified. That meant I was going to get home 10 minutes late and then my parents would find out that I was punished for something at school. My dad was always very clear about the fact that if you were punished for something at school, you would be punished again at home. He was on the teacher’s side - always. That entire day I was on pins and needles. How would I explain this to my dad? I can remember that anxiety as if it happened yesterday! Needless to say, when I was finally released from my detention along with the rest of the class, I ran all the way home as fast as I possibly could. When I finally came in the door my mom looked up from cooking dinner and said, “Hi. How was your day?” She didn’t even notice that I was a couple of minutes late! I wasn’t going to be punished again! I was released from the terror of the unknown. (Weird what we remember, eh?)

Moses, the writer of Genesis, does a great job as he records this history of including us the readers in the drama. As the story unfolds, neither we nor Jacob know whether Esau is going to still be murderous or if he has mellowed over the years and will be peaceable. It could go either way. The anxiety over the anticipated punishment is almost palpable. Jacob is on pins and needles. Not only does he have himself to worry about, he also has the responsibility of all of his wives and children as well. He is basically at Esau’s mercy. Will Esau be gracious or have a long memory of the injuries of the past? With this question in mind Jacob formulates a plan that he hopes will save at least some of his family. He divides his people into two groups (camps) and then sends a vast fortune ahead of himself as a gift to Esau. Maybe if he sweetens Esau up a bit with gifts the bad blood between them will be mitigated. And – he prays. He asks God to bend Esau’s heart away from revenge. Clearly, Jacob still has some learning to do in regards to God’s power and God’s promises. Both are immutable but Jacob doesn’t seem to trust that yet. Jacob the schemer is still just that – a schemer.

Only 2% of the things that cause us worry actually come about. Wish I had known that back in the first grade! And when we’re worried we start to scheme and plan. There must be a way out of this trouble! What I love about this story is that while Jacob does indeed come up with a plan, he prays first! Here we have an indication that maybe he’s actually growing in his faith and learning to count on God. It is a positive sign. If we take nothing else from today’s reading it might be that to pray first is always a good idea. (Oh, and by the way – I came clean with my parents about the detention at the dinner table that night. They were unconcerned.)