Hosea 12:3-5 - Hawker's Poor Man's Commentary

We have here the most honorable testimony of the Patriarch Jacob, in the record God the Holy Ghost hath been pleased to give of his conduct at Bethel in that memorable night, when expecting the furious anger of his brother Esau to break out upon him the following day. The history is given us, Genesis 32:1 and the Holy Ghost hath thrown so much light upon it of what is there said, by what is here recorded, that we can never sufficiently bless the Holy Spirit for his grace and condescension in this particular. I beg the Reader to recollect, that what the Prophet is here commissioned to tell the Church of the Patriarch Jacob, related to an event which took place a thousand years before. Jacob had been now dead for nine hundred and fifty years, and yet the Holy Ghost refers to it, as though it had been but yesterday. And how delightfully the Prophet is led to introduce it. He took his brother by the heel in the womb. So that he was an hero for wrestling from the very moment of his birth, as if to imply what great events in grace he would be remarkable for in the circumstances of his life. The history itself, with the cause, is very fully given us, Genesis 25:20-26. And as Jacob began, so in the events that followed he manifested the disposition he had to struggle. By his strength he had power with God; yea, he had power with the Angel, and prevailed. The Patriarch, it is plain, knew both, and referred to this circumstance when a-dying. The God, said he, (as he blessed Joseph's children) that fed me all my life long unto this day: the Angel which redeemed me from all evil. Genesis 48:15-16. Surely here Jacob rightly considered God the Father, in his covenant character; and the Lord Jesus Christ as the angel of the covenant, to whom he ascribed the great work of redemption. He had power with both: that is, I apprehend, he took hold of the strength of God's covenant promises, and Jesus's justifying salvation, and in that strength he prevailed by faith. See Isaiah 27:5. He wept and made supplication unto him; that is, Jacob wept and entreated; not indeed for that the angel touched his thigh and made him halt, but because the object of his petition was so great, and Jacob knew who it was he wrestled with. And hence he called this angel with whom he wrestled God, a plain proof of Christ's being known to Jacob as God, for he said, I have seen God face to face, and my life was preserved, Genesis 32:30. But what I beg the Reader yet more particularly to remark is, that as Jacob found God and his Christ in Bethel, so it is added, and there he spake with us. Who is the he that is here said to speak with us, but the Lord Jesus Christ? And who the us, but all the praying seed of Jacob, that as Levi the son of Abraham, so were we in the loins spiritually considered of our father Jacob, when Jesus met him. In confirmation see those scriptures, Hebrews 7:10; Galatians 3:29. The Lord God of hosts, the Lord is his memorial: these blessed words come in at the close of this wonderful relation, as if to silence every fear or doubt that might arise in the timid mind. All the persons of the Godhead are alike engaged, in confirmation of the covenant redemption, to the spiritual seed of Jacob in Jesus; and Jehovah takes to himself this glorious title of character, as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as his memorial forever to all generations. Exodus 3:15. So truly blessed and gracious is the record here made of that memorable transaction, and so much light is thrown upon it by the Prophet under the Holy Ghost's teaching.