A Conflict of Peace (Genesis 31)

Hear the word of the Lord from Genesis chapter 31. That's where we're at. Yep.

Genesis 31 · chapter mention

That was a close one. Almost prepared the wrong sermon. Matthew,

I mean, Matthew, Genesis chapter 31.

Genesis 31 · chapter mention

Now, Jacob heard the sons of Laban were saying, Jacob has taken all that was our father's.

And from what was our father's, he has gained all his wealth.

And Jacob saw that Laban did not regard him with favor as before.

Then the Lord said to Jacob, Return to the land of your fathers and to your

kindred. I will be with you.

So Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah into the field where his flock was

and said to them, I see that your father does not regard me with favor as he

did before, but the God of my father has been with me.

You know that I have served your father with all my strength,

that your father has cheated me and changed my wages 10 times,

but God did not permit him to harm me.

If he said the spotted shall be your wages, then all the flock bore spotted.

And if he said the stripes shall be your wages, then all the flock bore striped.

Thus God has taken away the livestock of your father and given them to me.

In the breeding season of the flock, I lifted up my eyes and saw in a dream

that the goats that made it with the flock were striped, spotted and molted.

Then the angel of God said to me in the dream, Jacob.

And I said, here I am. And he said, lift up your eyes and see all the goats

that mate with the flock are stripes spotted and molted for I've seen all that Laban is doing to you.

I'm the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and made a vow to me.

Now arise, go out from the land and return to the land of your kindred.

Then Rachel and Leah answered and said to him, is there any portion of or inheritance

left to us in our father's house?

Are we not regarded by him as foreigners?

He has sold us and has indeed devoured our money.

All the wealth that God has taken away from our father belongs to us and to our children.

Now then, whatever God has said to you, do.

So Jacob arose and set his sons and wives on camels.

He drove away all his livestock and all his property that he had gained,

the livestock in his possession that he had acquired in Paddan Aram to go to

the land of Canaan to his father Isaac.

Laban had gone to shear his sheep and Rachel stole her father's household gods.

And Jacob tricked Laban, the Aramean, by not telling him that he intended to flee.

And he fled with all that he had and arose and crossed the Euphrates and set

his face toward the hill country of Gilead.

When it was told Laban on the third day that Jacob had fled,

he took his kinsmen with him and pursued him for seven days and followed close

after him in the hill country of Gilead.

But God came to Laban, the Aramean, in a dream by night and said to him,

be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.

And Laban overtook Jacob.

Jacob had pitched his tent in the hill country and Laban with his kinsmen pitched

tents in the hill country of Gilead.

And Laban said to Jacob, what have you done that you have tricked me and driven

away my daughters like captives of the sword?

Why did you flee secretly and trick me and did not tell me so that I might have

sent you away with mirth and songs, with tambourine and lyre?

And why did you not permit me to kiss my sons and my daughters farewell?

Now you have done foolishly. It is in my power to do you harm.

But the God of your father spoke to me last night, saying, Be careful not to

say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.

And now you have gone away because you longed greatly for your father's house.

But why did you steal my gods?

Jacob answered and said to Laban, Because I was afraid. for I thought that you

would take your daughters from me by force.

Anyone with whom you find your God shall not live. In the presence of our kinsmen,

point out what I have that is yours and take it.

Now Jacob did not know that Rachel had stolen them. So Laban went into Jacob's

tent and into Leah's tent and into the tent of the two female servants, but he did not find them.

And he went out of Leah's tent and into Rachel's. Now Rachel had taken the household

gods and put them in the camel's saddle and sat on them.

Laban felt all about the tent, but did not find them. And she said to her father,

let not my Lord be angry that I cannot rise before you for the way of woman is upon me.

So he searched, but did not find the household gods.

Then Jacob became angry and berated Laban. Jacob said to Laban, what is my offense?

What is my sin that you have hotly pursued me?

For you have felt through all my goods. What have you found of all your household goods?

Set it here before my kinsmen and your kinsmen, that they may decide between us too.

These twenty years I have been with you. Your ewes and your female goats have

not miscarried, and I have not eaten the rams of your flocks.

What was torn by wild beasts I did not bring to you, I bore the loss of it myself.

From my hand you required it, whether stolen by day or stolen by night. There I was.

By day the heat consumed me, and the cold by night, and my sleep fled from my eyes.

These twenty years I have been in your house. I have served you fourteen years

for your two daughters and six years for your flock, and now you have changed my wages ten times.

If the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and the fear of Isaac had not been

on my side, surely now you would have sent me away empty-handed.

God saw my affliction and the labor of my hands and rebuked you last night.

Then Labod answered and said to Jacob, the daughters

are my daughters the children are my children the

flocks are my flocks and all that you see is mine but what

can I say this day for these my daughters or

for their children whom they have born come now let us make a covenant you and

I and let it be a witness between you and me so Jacob took a stone and set it

up as a pillar and Jacob said to his kinsmen gather stones and they took stones

and made a heap and they ate there by the heap but Laban called it Jager-Sahadutha,

but Jacob called it Galid.

And Laban said, This heap is a witness between you and me today.

Therefore he named it Galid and Mizpah.

For he said, The Lord watch between you and me when we are out of another sight.

If you oppress my daughters, or if you take wives beside my daughters,

although no one is with us, see God as witness between you and me.

And Laban said to Jacob, see this heap and the pillar, which I've set between

you and me, this heap is a witness and the pillar is a witness that I will not

pass over this heap to you.

And you will not pass over this heap and this pillar to me to do harm.

The God of Abraham and the God of Nahor, the God of the father judged between us.

So Jacob swore by the fear of his father, Isaac, and Jacob offered a sacrifice

in the hill country and called his kinsmen to eat bread. And they ate bread

and spent the night in the hill country.

Earlier in the morning, Laban arose and kissed his grandchildren and his daughters and blessed them.

Then Laban departed and returned home. The grass withers and the flowers fade,

but the word of our God will stand forever. Amen. Let's pray.

Holy God, we give you thanks for your word, for these stories contained in them

and the wisdom that they share with us as you speak to us through them.

I pray that you would speak to us this morning, that you would encourage and strengthen our hearts.

It's in your name that we pray. Amen.

Well, that was already a lot, but you're about to get a lot more.

You know, in my undergrad, in my college days, there's only one class I remembered from those days.

Maybe for those of you who went to college, maybe you're like that.

Sorry, kids. You don't remember a lot from your school days,

but it's still good. You still got to do it. It's really important.

Really, you need to do it. But there's one class I remember from my college days.

It was a class I hated at the time, although I still, I think,

have the book, although I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. It was a book,

it was a class on conflict management.

It was one of those classes where they make you do all this kind of role-playing

stuff, which I hated that. It felt so weird.

But there is one thing of this class that I remembered.

And it's something that if you've been around here a while, you've likely heard

me say, it's that conflict is unavoidable.

It's an unavoidable part of life.

And not only that, like conflict isn't a sign of a lack of relationship.

With people, but conflict is a sign that you actually have and you're in relationship with people.

In fact, it's impossible to live in relationship with anybody without conflict.

Consider growing up with parents. You're going to have conflict with them,

probably, unless you live in our house.

Or a spouse. You're going to have conflict with them.

Or a friend. My best friend in high school was the guy that we were mortal enemies at one point.

Conflict is an inevitable part of life. It's unavoidable.

And I think when you come to terms with that, it helps us reframe conflict from

something to just try to avoid, you can't avoid it, into an opportunity.

Conflict is an opportunity for humility, an opportunity for growth,

an opportunity to deepen our relationships.

But though that class stuck with me, I know I believe that conflict is unavoidable

and it's, you know, an opportunity, who doesn't love another opportunity to grow in humility.

Conflicts are also exhausting. aren't they?

Conflicts drain us, you know, and because of this, we either get worn out to

the point where we just try to avoid them at all costs.

Like, listen, I can't deal with another conflict right now.

So I'm not going to say this thing that I really want to say,

or I'm not going to do this thing I really want to do because I'm pretty sure

conflict's going to come.

So we'd end up avoiding it and avoiding doing things that would cause conflict.

Or we try to speed our way through any conflict that we have and we go into

conflict like a giant wrecking ball, destroying everything around us.

And all this time, we just have to wonder, where is the peace?

Earlier, we just said the peace of Christ be with you and also with you.

I don't feel peace when there's conflict all around me. Where is this peace?

And if conflict comes in relationship, if being in relationship with each other

means that you're going to have conflict with each other, then how can we possibly

have peace when our lives are filled with conflict as we live life around other people.

Well, as we return to the story of Genesis and the story of Jacob,

what we remember about him is Jacob's story is also a story of conflict.

There's a conflict with his brother that causes him to run for his life and

flee. And then he finds his uncle and he's got conflict with him.

And then he's got, because of this conflict with his uncle, now his father-in-law,

he's got two wives. And you can imagine that creates conflict.

And then after this, we're going to find he has conflict and he wrestles with God himself.

Jacob's life is defined by his conflict, not a pleasant existence.

And his name itself means heel grabber or supplanter.

In other words, his name means conflict maker.

His story is our story, and it's a story of conflict. And here at Genesis 31,

we find the end of his conflict with his father-in-law as Jacob's been away

for 20 long years from his homeland.

He finally receives a call from God saying, hey, it's time. Come home.

And this scene of him trying to get home, what ensues after this is this great

showdown, this great battle between him and his father-in-law.

And I think in this passage has much to teach us about our own conflicts.

And what it's trying to show us is that In our conflicts God still provides,

And the question before us When we think about our conflicts Is in conflict

do we actually trust God to provide for us In the midst of them or Do we hedge

our bets with our own plans Trying to make Our own peace out of situations.

So, there's three things here that we're going to discover that this teaches

us as we consider this idea of conflict.

First, that God provides for us in the midst of conflict.

Second, that our instinct is to hedge our bets in conflict.

And finally, that God gives peace, even in unresolved conflict.

So, first, we're going to see that God provides in the midst of conflict.

God provides in the midst of conflict.

So to back up for a second, a little bit more, what is this conflict?

Well, a quick recap is that Jacob stole the birthright from his brother.

He feared his life. And so what did Jacob do? Well, he fled.

His mom said, hey, go to my brother, spend time with him.

I'll tell you when to come back home when it's safe. And so he goes and he sent to his uncle.

And we find his uncle is this trickster. He's a liar. He's a thief.

And he tries to marry. He falls in love with Rachel. And he says,

hey, work for me for seven years for free.

And I'll give you my daughter, Rachel. So, he works for seven years,

gets married to Rachel. So, he thinks, but he wakes up the next day and he's beside him.

But Rachel's older sister. Oops.

And then he's like, what did you do to me? He's like, well, no,

I need to get my older daughter married out first.

Work for me another seven years and I'll give you the other daughter.

And so he works another seven years and gets the other daughter.

And then finally, he's got his two wives. But as you can imagine,

there's a lot of conflict there fighting over Jacob.

And then in the midst of that, he's like, okay, it's time to go home.

And so he tries to go home. And chapter 30, he asked to go home.

And Laban's like, no, don't go home. Stay with me. And so he's stuck.

And so he takes these lambs and he gets them to be spotted and striped.

And he's able to keep them.

There's that whole weird story there. And if you want to hear what I have to

say about it. I actually don't remember what I said about it,

but a year ago I preached on that. I'm sure it was passable.

And through all this, God is blessing the work of Jacob's hands.

His wealth is growing. His flock is growing. His family's growing.

Meanwhile, Laban's flock is shrinking. And you see that this is growing because

Laban's sons feel like Jacob is stealing from them, like he's tricking them

out of their wealth, like they're being stolen from.

And so is creating this giant conflict as Jacob is amassing this wealth in their

father's land and their wealth is shrinking. They're thinking,

oh, this guy is stealing our wealth, stealing our well-being.

And this is the heart of this conflict. And I think it's the heart of all the

conflicts we have is feeling stolen from.

Feeling like something is being taken from us. Maybe it is money. Maybe it's time.

Maybe it's respect and honor. Maybe someone's taking opportunities from you.

And actually, this is what James 4.1 says, is that conflicts come when our passions,

when our desires are at war within us.

Where we desire for something and we don't have it. Well, this is what's happening here.

And we see this in verse two, it says, And Jacob saw that Laban did not regard him as favor as before.

Then the Lord said to him, said to Jacob, Return to the land of your fathers

and to your kindred, and I will spare you.

So he had been working under the thumb of his uncle, his father-in-law Laban,

for 20 years he'd been dealing with this conflict.

And this is no small amount of time to be dealing with this.

I mean, think about what conflict does to even small conflicts.

Small conflicts drain you. don't they? They exhaust you.

They rob you of sleep. Every time you close your eyes and try to go to sleep,

what do you think about? You think about this conflict. You think about things

you should have said, but didn't say.

You think about things that you said that you wish you didn't say.

They eat your energy. They eat your sleep. They eat your focus.

It's all you can think about.

Now, if that happens for even our small conflicts that we have,

imagine if you have this 20-year-long conflict where you're fearing for your

life, always on guard, always looking out for the next trap.

And yet it's in the midst of this conflict that we find God's provision for him.

God calls him home. And you might say, well, that's a little bit late to provide for him.

I mean, where were you in those 20 years where he's under his thumb, God?

Where are you now in the midst of my conflict? I'd like to get out of it. Yes, and thank you.

Well, even before the summons, you get this retelling of the story reminding

us that God was present with Jacob throughout.

You see this in verse seven, yet your father has cheated me and changed my wages

in time, but God did not permit him to harm me.

So even in the midst of this, God is protecting him. And then you see this again

in verse 11, then the angel of God said to me in the dream, Jacob, and I said, here I am.

And he said, lift up your eyes and see me. All the goats that mate with the

flock are stripes, spotted and molted, for I have seen all that Laban is doing

to you. So God sees and he provides.

Then verse 13, I am the God of Bethel, whom he anointed a pillar and made a

vow to. Now rise and go from this land and return to the land of your kindred.

God has reminded him, listen, yes, you have been suffering these 20 years under

this conflict, but I've been with you the entire time, providing for you,

growing your family, protecting you, growing Jacob's character,

growing his dependence and trust on the Lord.

And even throughout all of this conflict, even the conflict with Rachel and

Leah, as you can imagine is big, is worn down.

In verse 16, they say, now then whatever God has said to you, do.

Rachel and Leah finally, they finally agree on something. Yeah,

let's listen to God, let's go home.

All right, there's something here for us to remember.

The God's provision amidst conflict does not mean that he quickly removes it,

but his provision in our conflict means that he sustains us in the midst of

conflicts, even when you're in the middle of them.

It's in conflict that you actually learn to trust God's provision.

Because it's often in life when we don't see the way, when we're unsure where

to go is when we learn to call on God.

How does this one truth help reshape you in your own conflicts that you find yourself in?

That God is providing and sustaining you in the midst of your trials and the

midst of your conflicts.

This is reminding us that just as God is not absent for Jacob,

God is not absent with you.

He is strengthening you. And even in those moments of conflict,

you do get moments of peace.

But because God is providing for you, you can endure them, which sounds good.

But when conflicts in our lives drag out year after year, his provision can feel small to us.

Yeah, sure, we're glad he is there. Thanks for being with us,

God. But we can wonder, is it enough?

Is God's provision, is his presence enough?

And it's when we're in the midst of these long conflicts that we can tend to hedge our bets.

We can self-protect and find our own ways to provide for ourselves in the midst

of conflicts, which takes us to our second thing we learn about conflicts,

that our instinct is to hedge our bets in conflict.

Our instinct is to hedge our bets in conflict.

And so you get this scene here where Jacob is grabbing his family and his things, and he's careful.

He's only taking the things that belong to him, his own flocks,

his family, his children, his wives.

And he's heading out of town. They're going likely 30 miles a day.

He puts his family on camels. He himself is walking with his flock.

Shows just a little bit of difference between Jacob and Laban right there,

that he actually cares for his

family. He's like, no, you don't need to walk. You can go in the camels.

I will walk with my herd.

And finally, he tricks the great tricker. Well, he's out shearing his sheep,

which he does away from his home, out in the country, shearing his sheep.

He's like, okay, this is our moment. We can finally get out of here. And so they leave.

And on the way out, without Jacob knowing it, is careful to tell us this.

Rachel takes something, something that isn't hers.

We see this in verse 19. And Laban had gone to shear his sheep and Rachel stole

her father's household gods.

The literal translation for this is the teraphim.

So why does she take these household gods? Why does she take this teraphim?

Well, our first instinct is to say, oh, she's taking them for the purpose of

worship, right? They're idols.

What do you do with idols? You worship them.

And maybe she's thinking, hey, this journey is gonna be treacherous.

I need these idols to protect me or I'm gonna be in a foreign land now.

So I need these little sense of home, little taste of home away.

And I think that could be partly true, but there actually are some ancient documents

that have been gathered from this fifth century city called Nuzi,

Nuzi, N-U-Z-I, I don't know how to pronounce it. No one's surprised by that.

But in these documents, it gives

light to these teraphim, what these teraphim are and what they meant.

And there's at least some indication that they were a claim to an inheritance or land rights.

So maybe she took them to say, hey, if things don't work out,

I have the land rights for my father's home.

Another thought out there is that these were highly valuable,

made out of precious metals.

And so she's taking them as a means of taking wealth, money with her as she goes.

It's like a financial backup plan. And I think it's likely a combination of

all three of these are at play, leaning more towards the last two.

And if you think about even the household god in Laban, what was his household

god? Well, it wasn't these little statues.

His household god was wealth, was money. It's what he craved.

It's what he was tricking Jacob out of.

Even if you consider Rachel's own situation, which she summarizes in verse 14,

then Rachel and Leah answered and said to him, is there any portion or inheritance

left to us in our father's house?

Are we not regarded by him as foreigners for he has sold us and has indeed devoured our money?

All the wealth that God has taken away from our father belongs to us and to our children.

You see, what she is talking about here is Laban had spent the bride price.

So in the ancient times, whenever you were going to get married,

you offered a sum of money to the father, and then he allowed you to marry his daughter.

And that sum of money that was offered was meant to be saved by the father-in-law.

He was supposed to save it in case that something happened to the husband,

and then he needed to care for his daughter again. It was like a type of life insurance.

But what does it tell us that he's done with this?

He's stolen it. He spent it.

She's got nothing. If something happens to Jacob, which, you know,

he's out in the wilderness with his flock all the time, you know,

anything could happen at any time.

If something happened, what would she have left?

And so she takes back what is hers.

She's looking for a safety net. She's like, listen, I'm going to take back what's

owed. You stole this money from me, so I'm going to steal it back from you.

God has provided a way out of this, but I want more. She's hedging her bets.

She's trying to mitigate the damage.

And I think this is something we do often, especially in conflict.

When we get slighted, what is our temptation to slight back?

When we get wounded, we wound back.

When we're uncertain about the future, we steal to protect ourselves.

When we don't want to get taken advantage of, we withhold forgiveness.

These are all things we do in the midst of conflict because we're worried,

is God going to provide? Is he going to actually hold someone accountable.

And if he doesn't, then I'm the only one that can wound that person back.

We do this with our spouses. We do this with our families.

We do this with coworkers, with neighbors, with people around us.

But look at where this leads us. Look at the idols here, what happens to them in verse 34.

It says, now Rachel had taken the household gods and put them in the camel's saddle and sat on them.

And Laban fell all about the tent, but did not find them.

So what's happening here? When Laban's looking, searching all over for these

idols and she finds that she's sitting on them, what's happening here?

Well, she's sitting on them during her menstrual cycle.

And in biblical law, when you were bleeding, it meant that you were unclean.

And now as she is unclean, she is sitting on these idols. What is the text trying to show us here?

She's showing us, what this is showing us is that these precious gods of hers,

this hedge betting that she is doing, that she's counting on are actually worthless.

These idols are being defiled. They're exposed for what they are, powerless to save.

And this gamble of hers ends up putting a death threat on her head,

which kind of haunts her for the rest of her life.

And this is true for us. Our hedging, our sense of self-protection,

our clinging to idols, backup plans, backup gods, are actually powerless to save you.

They can't do anything for you. They were like these defiled household idols.

So how do we then learn to actually trust God in conflicts?

What can we expect in the midst of conflicts, especially those ones in our lives

that linger with no end in sight?

This is what we find next as we discover that God doesn't promise,

he never has to take away our problems, our conflicts quickly,

but he does promise his presence and his peace even in the midst of them.

And I think that peace that we long for actually is the goal,

but the peace that we are promised and the end goal is a peace that's so strong

that you can actually have it in the midst of conflicts.

And this is, I think, what we find and discover at the end of this story,

that God gives peace in unresolved conflict.

God gives peace in unresolved conflict. And so in this story,

right, Jacob leaves in the night.

He gets his three-day head start before Laban discovers him. And then the chase is on.

He mounts his own camel or horse or something, and he chases after him.

And obviously, Jacob's going slow because he's going by foot,

driving the cattle, the sheep, and the goats.

So it takes seven days and seven days he overtakes him. But right before he's

about to overtake him, you find something interesting.

God steps in, this great mediator of peace. And in verse 24,

it said this, but God came to Laban the Aramean and a dream by night and said

to him, be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.

Before we get into what he said in conflict with other people,

have you ever considered how God actually might be speaking to your opponent?

It's not something we often consider, I don't think. In fact,

we often don't consider our opponent of a conflict at all. They're just the

enemy, the one we need to take down.

That however bad it is, have you ever considered that God actually might be

restraining your opponent in some way?

So what is the restraint here for Laban?

It's kind of an odd thing for God to say. Don't say anything to him,

either good or bad. You might expect for him to say, go away from him or I will destroy you.

Would have been maybe what I would have said if I were God in that moment,

but that's not what he says. Don't say anything to him, either good or bad.

What's going on here? It's kind of odd.

I think what he's saying is don't manipulate him.

The thing about Laban has been manipulating, tricking Jacob this whole time.

And what God is saying is don't manipulate him, saying all sorts of sweet things

to try to make him stay as if you're gonna be sweet to him or don't threaten him to come back.

God is saying, let him go. In a lot of ways, this is a pre-Exodus moment that we're experiencing.

While Laban doesn't end up resorting to violence, he quotes,

he's like, hey, God spoke to me. I could hurt you, but God spoke to me and told me not to.

Although he doesn't resort to violence, he doesn't exactly listen to God either.

You see this in verse 26, when he finally gets there.

And Laban said to Jacob, what have you done? That you've tricked me and driven

me away, my daughters, like captives of the sword.

And he goes on and on with this giant plea. And, you know, at first glance,

if you didn't know the story of Laban, it could sound like a reasonable thing.

Who leaves and doesn't let the father-in-law kiss the children goodbye and you're

taking all my stuff away?

It seems reasonable, except for

when we remember the kind of person that Laban is and what he has done.

He's the one that's actually been treating his daughters as foreigners.

He's the one that's been mistreating his daughters, mistreating Jacob,

tricking him, changing his wages, using him.

Further, Jacob has actually tried to leave through the front doors.

He has asked for permission to go and he has been unallowed.

His only way to actually listen to God and leave is to do what he is doing now,

which is leaving in the night.

Laban is the exploiter. He is the trickster. He is the manipulator to the extreme.

He is not the victim, though he's trying hard to play the victim here.

I think we see this further when we notice what is his greatest concern.

He says all this big talk. Yeah, I care about my family. Why would you take

my family from me? But what is he actually trying to find?

What's these idols? He's like, okay, you take all this, but where are my idols?

That's his greatest concern here is what they provide and it's wealth.

And then what does he do? He goes and he starts searching through all these

tents. He's kind of making a fool of himself.

And then finally, Jacob unloads on him.

It says in verse 36, and Jacob became angry and berated Laban.

You know, you get to that moment in conflict where you're like,

finally, I'm going to tell you exactly what I think of you.

And you just unload on that person. In that moment, it feels good, doesn't it?

To say everything you want to say to somebody you're in conflict with, it feels good.

And especially when you have the facts on your side, and we always do when we're

thinking about our side of a conflict, we're always right.

And you just throw all the facts and you're like, I am justified in my anger.

What is wrong with you? Feels good.

Let it out. It's a question for you. If you've ever done that in conflict,

which if you've lived long enough, you have.

Does that ever actually work to resolve a conflict?

Does not work. It always does. It always does backfire. And it doesn't work here either.

Especially you think that Laban might finally have a moment of like,

oh, you're right. I have done those things to you.

But no, what does he respond with in verse 43? Then Laban answered and said,

the daughters are my daughters.

The children are my children. The flocks are my flocks.

He's claiming everything I see is mine. No, it's not.

Jacob has worked for free to gain his wives?

He has worked and had his wages changed and his flocks are his?

It's messy. It's heated. Like all conflict is, when it gets to the heat of the moment, it's messy.

It's heated. It's a powder keg ready to explode. How can we find resolution?

How does this resolve? Well, it doesn't actually resolve really.

I think there's a bit of grace in it not resolving well, because many of our

conflicts in life do not have nice and tidy resolutions either, do they?

So what happens? Well, they make a covenant in verse 52. We see them building

these heaps, which I love that heap of rocks, really descriptive.

But what is this heap of rocks? It's this boundary. It says,

hey, you won't come over here. I won't go over there.

It's like brothers sharing a room, drawing a line down the middle of the room,

saying, hey, you don't come over here and I won't go over there.

It's like that. It's a boundary, but there is peace there. There is a truce,

a fragile truce is the best they can do.

Jacob is free to go, but there's no reconciliation here.

There's just distance. He's never going to see Laban again. Laban's not going

to see him just distance.

And this is a heavy reality, a heavy burden that we face in conflicts.

Many of you know exactly what this feels like.

And you're living in conflicts like this now where there's no end in sight,

and there might not ever be resolution.

No one's ever gonna come and apologize.

No one's gonna come and say, you know what, I'm wrong. This happens with family.

This happens with friends. It happens with the church.

Just unfinished, unresolved, raw conflict.

Where is the peace in that?

I think what this is pointing us to is that peace is found here,

not because the conflict is resolved nice and tidy, Though I think our goal

should always be resolution in the midst of conflict.

We see here is Jacob's peace for his family doesn't depend on resolution.

It depends on God being with him, present with him, making a way.

Because if we want peace, if we want true and lasting peace,

it has to be a peace deeper than conflicts.

Otherwise we would never taste it because our lives are filled with conflict.

You resolve one only to face another.

You resolve that only to face another. You're going to have conflict in life.

And so true peace can't come from the absence of conflict, if we're to have it.

So what does it come from? Well, it comes from the very presence of Christ.

In the book of Ephesians, a book in the New Testament, it says this in Ephesians

2, that Christ is our peace.

Christ is our peace. He's not just a mediator of peace. He's not just one that

gives you peace, but he says he is your peace.

And as we're united to him, as we have faith in him, he shares his peace with us.

He lives inside of us. Well, how does he gain this peace for us?

Well, it's actually through conflict.

As he has his own conflict with Satan, with the great enemy,

with sin and death, as he conflicts with them to the point of his own death,

going to the grave, rising again three days later.

In this cosmic war between good and evil, he takes the weight of our conflict,

your sin, your shame, your guilt. He takes all that on himself on the cross.

The text tells us he makes peace by his blood. See, the great conflict that

we have is actually not with each other, but the great conflict that we experience

in life is our conflict between us and God, that we're distanced from him.

But through Christ, he makes a way. He takes on the conflict so we could have

peace. And that peace he offers to you.

In Christ, your conflict with God is over.

And friends, if we have peace with our Father in heaven, with the God who created

all things, who sustains all things, what can our human conflicts do to us?

Yes, they still linger. Yes, they hurt. Yes, they are real.

But they ultimately cannot touch the deeper peace that is promised to you in Scripture.

God gives you peace even when your conflicts on this earth are unresolved through

his Son, who is with you, who is your peace.

And as we receive the peace of Christ, we're supposed to be people of peace in this world.

Romans 12 calls us to, as much as we are able to, to live at peace with everyone.

Which tells us that as a people, we can have a profound courage to face conflict.

To engage in it, to enter into it.

Because we don't trust the absence of conflict to provide us peace,

but we trust the presence of Christ to provide us peace. And that presence is with you forever.

It's why we can forgive, even when people haven't asked for forgiveness.

It's why we don't need to lash out because we trust that Christ is our peace

and he will deal with that person in their time.

If you're a person here and you struggle to have peace in life,

then it is not found in winning the battles in front of you.

It is found in trusting the peace that Christ has brought with you already in

his blood. You have that.

That peace is yours here right now.

And it's the peace that gives us courage to live as peaceful people in this

world, which means that we don't need to be people who avoid it.

We can actually with courage engage the conflicts ahead of us.

And we don't need to be a people who rush through them, but we can patiently

endure because we trust God to provide in the midst of us.

So we can't look for the absence of conflict to give us peace.

We need to learn to trust the peace that Christ has secured for us.

May we be a people who learn to rest in that peace. Pray with me.

Holy God, we give you thanks for your word. your word, which leads us to life.

We pray that you would encourage our hearts with this word this morning,

that as we face so many conflicts in life, that we would learn to trust you to be our peace.

And as you are our peace, that we would bring that peace to bear in this world.

Do this work in us by the power of your spirit. Amen.