Trusting God Through Life's Uncertain Seasons

Life is filled with transitions, unexpected changes, and unanswered questions. In this message from Genesis 28-32, Pastor Chris Teien explains how God faithfully guides His people through uncertainty, shapes their character, and prepares them for what comes next.

God's plans often unfold one step at a time. As we trust His presence, respond in faith, embrace His purpose in every season, and depend on Him daily, we can move forward with confidence, knowing He is working for our good and His glory.

In This Message: 

1. God Transforms Your Uncertainty with His Presence

When Jacob fled from home with an uncertain future, God met him with a promise of His presence and faithfulness. God's promises give us confidence even when we cannot see what lies ahead. (Genesis 28:10-22; Proverbs 3:5-6)

2. God Receives Your Response of Faith

Jacob responded to God's promise with worship, commitment, and trust. God calls us to draw near to Him, faithfully keep our commitments, and seek Him above everything else. (Genesis 28:16-22; James 4:8; Ecclesiastes 5:4-5)

3. God Uses Every Season for His Purpose

God used every season of Jacob's life, including hardship, waiting, and disappointment, to prepare him for the future. Even difficult circumstances become part of God's greater purpose for those who love Him. (Genesis 29-31; Romans 8:28)

4. God Shapes Your Character Through the Journey

Jacob's wrestling with God transformed both his character and his identity. God often uses life's greatest struggles to strengthen our faith and deepen our dependence upon Him. (Genesis 32:22-30; Philippians 1:6)

5. God Teaches You to Depend on Him

Jacob left his encounter with God changed forever. God continues to shape His people through life's uncertainties, teaching us to trust Him more deeply and rely on His strength rather than our own. (Genesis 32:31-32; Romans 10:9-10)

Takeaway

Trust God even when you cannot see what comes next. Walk faithfully in His promises, depend on His presence, and allow Him to shape your life through every season.

Illustrations

• Jacob's journey from fear and uncertainty to confident faith demonstrates God's faithfulness through life's major transitions.

• A mapmaker whose career changed because of advancing technology illustrates how God often redirects our plans in unexpected ways.

• Wrestling through the night pictures the spiritual struggle that often produces deeper faith and greater dependence upon God.

Key Quotes

"Sometimes the difficulties are where we see God the most."

"God doesn't always tell you every step. He guides you down the path."

"Trust God with what comes next."

Search Topics

Genesis 28, Jacob, trusting God, uncertain future, God's guidance, Christian faith, spiritual growth, God's promises, biblical encouragement, Pastor Chris Teien

Full Episode & Transcript:

https://www.buzzsprout.com/2285086/episodes/19191831

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Helping you apply God's Word and follow Jesus in everyday life. Learn more at ChrisTeien.com and Rockwell.church  Find episode transcripts at Well.faith 

Transcript

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Chris T 0:16

So, trusting God with what comes next. Trusting God with what comes next. It's going to be in Genesis chapter 28. Going to be using the New Living Translation for this narrative. And it is a time of life for the graduates. Most of them are over here, the graduates, that is exciting. Maybe exciting, maybe terrifying. Maybe like you, maybe like you, graduated a little while ago or a long while ago. And you remember what it was like to wonder how are you going to make it? How are you going to provide for yourself? What are you going to do for work? What will you do? How will it work out? Who will you marry? Who, or maybe you have the gift of singleness, and maybe you won't get married. Or if you're married, how many kids will you have? If you have kids and wherever you live, and all of those difficult things, trusting God with what comes next. If you were to look around the room, I think that a lot of us graduated a while back. I know that when I graduated, that I did not have any computer classes. I learned how to type on a typewriter. So I didn't buy my first compact music disc, my first CD till after I graduated from high school. So computers were not what they were today. The internet was not accessible like it is now. Many of the things that I do every day now weren't even a possibility back in back then. But as we go on, as we live in this world and new technology comes and new opportunities come and things change, we adapt. Many of us adapt. Some people don't adapt. But many of us adapt. And yeah, I didn't have a cell phone. None of those things. Many of us didn't, but we learn how to use the tools. They say it's going to make our lives easier, but actually, what it does is it just makes everything more stressful because now we're expected to communicate faster and better, and we're expected to produce more, and we're expected to use all the latest technology to get the fastest results. And it can be difficult. But long, long ago, Jacob in the Old Testament, he was in a transitional time of his life. He didn't know how it was going to work out. He didn't know what he was going to do. He didn't know if God even cared about him. But we'll see that he did. That God cared so much and twice promised him a great future. And I think that when we follow the Lord, when we follow our Savior, He can give us a great future. Sometimes it's not the future we expect. Sometimes it's not in the timing that we expect. But as we're faithful to follow, many times we get extra opportunities and great God experiences. And sometimes the difficulties are where we see God the most. Sometimes it's in the sickness or the hardship or the job loss or the difficulty that we grow the closest to the Lord. And it helps us to be more effective with the rest of our days. But T. God transforms your uncertainty with his presence. God transforms your uncertainty with his presence. A lot of people, like I just mentioned, are asking, what comes next? People get near their retirement age and they're like, Do I retire? What would come after that? What comes next? Lose a job. What do I do next? After you move, what should I do next? Or a broken relationship or an unexpected change. What comes next? Sometimes plans change, sometimes doors close. Sometimes the things that you are trained up to do become something that's not needed anymore. So I have a friend that went to college and he learned how to make maps. He was really good at topography. That was his skill. That was his future. And then Google Maps came out, and Google Earth came out, and he's like, I don't think they're gonna need me anymore. I think I think I'm gonna be replaced by that technology. So he became a pastor instead. But nonetheless, we have this opportunity to look into the Bible and see how God treats people, what God does in the midst of the story. So you remember Jacob, right? Let me just get you up to speed real quick. So God called Abraham and promised that through his family all nations would be blessed. And Abraham's son, Isaac, married Rebekah, and for many years they couldn't have children, and eventually God answered Rebekah's prayer, and she became pregnant with twins, Esau and Jacob. Even in the womb, the twins struggled against each other, and God told Rebekah, the older will serve the younger. Esau was born first, hairy and rugged, becoming an outdoorsman and hunter. Jacob was quieter and more settled. Isaac favored Esau while Rebekah favored Jacob. The divided favoritism created tension inside the family. One day, Esau came home exhausted from hunting, and Jacob was cooking stew and offered food only if Esau would sell him his birthright, which was the special inheritance and leadership blessing normally given to the firstborn son. Esau impulsively traded it for a meal, showing little value for the spiritual things. So Jacob came along later and also stole Esau's blessing. So years later, Isaac became old and nearly blind. Isaac planned to give the formal family blessing to Esau before dying because he was the oldest and that was the tradition. Rebekah overheard and devised a plan for Jacob to impersonate Esau. Jacob, wearing Esau's clothing and covered himself and covered in goat skin, so Isaac would think he was hairy and rugged like his older son, had Isaac bless him. So Isaac blessed Jacob, believing he was blessing Esau. The blessing included prosperity, leadership, authority, and God's covenant promises passed down from Abraham. Esau was so angry when he discovered the deception that he was furious and planned to kill Jacob after Isaac died. So Rebecca warned Jacob and told him to flee to her brother Laban and Haram until Esau's anger cooled down. And then Jacob fled all alone. He left home suddenly and alone, likely the first time he had ever been away from his family. He was leaving behind his home, his security, his relationships, his stability, and he was carrying guilt from deception, fear of Esau, and uncertainty about the future. So that should catch you up about where we are in this passage. And God shows up. God shows up in an amazing way, tells Jacob that I'm on your side, I'm on your team, I have a great future for you. So, Genesis 28, verse 10. Meanwhile, Jacob left Beersheba and traveled toward Haran. At sundown, he arrived at a good place to set up camp and stop there for the night. Jacob found a stone to rest his head against and lay down to sleep. So when you don't have anything, I guess that's what you do. You just find a place in the dirt to lay down and sleep. Didn't have people, he didn't have resources, he didn't have good camping equipment, he didn't have an RV, he didn't have even a car to sleep in. He's got nothing. Wondering what the future could hold, and if his brother was behind him, ready to kill him. But the text says after he slept, he dreamed of a stairway that reached from the earth up to heaven, and he saw the angels of God going up and down the stairway. At the top of the stairway stood the Lord, and he said, I am the Lord, the God of your grandfather Abraham, and the God of your father Isaac. The ground you are lying on belongs to you. I am giving it to you and your descendants. Your descendants will be as numerous as the dust of the earth. They will spread out in all directions, to the west and the east, and the north, and the south, and all the families of earth will be blessed through you and your descendants. What's more, I am with you, and I will protect you wherever you go. One day I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have finished giving you everything I have promised you. Now, I'm sure that we've all read this entire story in Genesis, and we know that Jacob is going to go through some amazing times and some very difficult times. And sometimes he's going to experience great joy and prosperity, and sometimes he's going to experience the great pain of thinking that his youngest son is dead, of thinking Joseph is dead. And so it doesn't mean, just because the Lord is with you, that everything's going to be easy and perfect. It does mean that when you're walking with the Lord, that He is going to get you through. So when I graduated from college, I didn't I graduated from a public school, so they didn't give out verses when I graduated at the public school, but uh for college they gave a Bible verse. And so Proverbs 3, 5, and 6 was the verse they handed me that said, Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will and all you do, and he will show you which path to take. To trust. You don't know, nobody knows what comes next, but to trust that God is going to get us through, to trust that God is going to provide, that God will give us whatever new skills we need for the future, and to help us to hang on to the traditions that should never change. To know that the word of God has endured for thousands of years and it will continue on. And while our technology and our styles and our transportation and our opportunities and restrictions all change, the word of God is still living and active and valuable. And so to trust the Lord with all your heart, to pray that God would guide and direct you, that God would provide what you need. To pray about, if God, if you don't know yet, to pray, what God, what is Lord, what do you want me to do with my life? How should I spend my life if I want to serve you more than anything? Tell me what it is. Guide me. Or maybe instead of just telling you today what it is, maybe you just start to take on jobs and take on volunteer opportunities. You can volunteer in the church, you can volunteer in the community, you can get different jobs and to learn different experiences, to learn different skills. When I look back on my life, I see all the different times when I did different things, either as a volunteer or the job that I didn't think was worth my time. I learned all sorts of skills. So I learned carpentry and I learned how to do home repair and stuff while I was working for a couple of guys as a laborer. I'd learned all these different things along the way and had all these different experiences in different places because I was faithful to show up. Be faithful to show up. If God is leading in a direction, if God is giving you an opportunity, try it and see what you might learn. Maybe you'll end up working, maybe you already do have work in a restaurant. Now you've got cooking skills. Those will last you for a lifetime and save you a lot of money. But nonetheless, to trust the Lord and let him guide you. And know that sometimes he doesn't tell you every single, he doesn't tell you exactly what it is that you might be. Instead, he guides you down a path. And as you continue to learn new things, he prepares you for what comes next. And I think it would be kind of scary actually if you were handed a book of your life and given an opportunity to look at it. So would you look at it? Many people would take the book and they'd look straight to the back and they'd be go, How does this end? How does my life end? Oh, that's not good. And that would be terrible to know your end. It's better to walk through with hope and not know when the end would be. But on the other hand, if you are confident that the end could be any time, then maybe you live your life on purpose serving the Lord. About this stairway, by the way, Jesus said, when he was recruiting the disciples, Jesus said, I tell you the truth, you will see all heaven open, and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth. So the Lord was talking to Jacob before Jesus came, but the general idea of this connection that we have to the eternal, the connection that we have to God, the connection is so important. And R God receives your response of faith. God receives your response of faith. So Jacob had experienced this, and so now what is he gonna do with it? Is he gonna laugh it off? Is he gonna walk away? Say, oh, I don't know what I ate. I must have had some weird berries or something, because that was a weird dream. Or will he see that as from the Lord? So God receives your response of faith. So here's what Jacob does. Verse 16 Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, Surely the Lord is in this place, and I wasn't even aware of it. But he was also afraid and said, What an awesome place this is! It is none other than the house of God, the very gateway of heaven. The next morning Jacob got up early and he took the stone he had rested his head against, and he set it upright as a memorial pillar, and he poured olive oil over it, and he named that place Bethel, which means house of God. And so he took it as a sacred dream, he took it as a sacred place, he took it as God has spoken to me. God is serious about this. I am excited about this opportunity. I think too that he's like, I've done a lot of deceitful things in my life. I know it, and God probably doesn't want to have anything to do with me. But here God is saying, I'm on your team, I'm on your side, and those are good things to know. Sometimes in difficult seasons, we need to remember that God answers prayer, that God can carry you through deep, dark valleys. God can be faithful in the past, God can be faithful in the future, and that God is faithful now. Sometimes the worst part is just waiting for God's plan, waiting for God's way, putting God first in everything, because sometimes it's easier to force our own way and do our own thing. Sometimes we want to hold out for a godly man or godly woman to marry, but instead somebody comes along and they look good enough. They're not Christians, but they got money, they have resources, they're handsome or cute or whatever. It's good enough. I'll probably win them over to Christ later in life, and that'd be terrible. That'd be terrible to spend the rest of your life if you love Jesus married to somebody that doesn't. And the Bible forbids it. You're not supposed to be unequally yoked. But there's other compromises too. There's other compromises that you can take that might seem fun at the time, but they lead to disappointment and regret. Be careful of that. All right, so then Jacob responds. Here's how he responds. He made this vow. If God will indeed be with me and protect me on this journey, and he if he will provide me with food and clothing, and if I return safely to my father's home, then the Lord will certainly be my God. And this memorial pillar I have set up will become a place for worshiping God, and I will present to God a tenth of everything he gives me. So Jacob's like, okay, if you're gonna do this, then I'm gonna do this. Is how I'm going to respond. It is kind of the big if and testing of faith. He wasn't sure, but God did respond, and Jacob did reply or answer, and those are good things. So James 4.8 says, Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world. Come close to God. Let that be a reminder for every one of us that when we stop and check our spiritual pulse, if it's not beating in tune with the things of God, that we need to, I don't know, shut off the video game, turn off the music, get back to praying and asking the Lord to help us, to restore us, to help us to follow him, to get back into the spiritual disciplines of spending time in God's word and putting him first, because that's where great reward is. That is great where great reward is. You know, vows are serious things too. When you make a vow to God, he expects you to follow through. I made a vow a long time ago that if God were to provide for me, that I would tithe. And so he did provide for me, and I do tithe. Ecclesiastes 5 4 says, When you make a promise to God, don't delay in following through, for God takes no pleasure in fools. Keep all the promises you make to him. It is better to say nothing than to make a promise and not keep it. And in Psalm 15, 1 and 4, it says, Who may worship in your sanctuary, Lord, who may enter your presence on your holy hill? Verse 4, those who keep their promises even when it hurts. But to trust God, God uses every season for his purpose. God uses every season for his purpose. So between what we just read and where we're headed here, Jacob goes through a lot of difficult things. So he does go to Laban's house, and Uncle Laban says, Oh, you're my flesh and blood. Oh, what would you like to work for? And he's like, Hey, I'd like to work for your hot daughter for seven years, and then we can get married, and that would be pretty awesome. And he's like, God's a deal. But then, as you know, Laban switches out daughters and he works another seven years, which is kind of weird. Again, whenever you see multiple wives and concubines and whatever, that is descriptive, not prescriptive. There's nothing in the Bible that tells us that is a good, smart way to live. Bible makes it clear in the Old Testament and Jesus in the New Testament that marriage is between one man and one woman for a lifetime. Back in that day, they were trying to accumulate children as quickly as possible, and that was the culture's way to do that. But so you could read in Genesis between 29 and 31, and you could read about all the conflict and the difficulty and how Jacob in the past has been a deceiver. But his uncle Laban is also a deceiver. And so eventually God makes it clear that it's time for Jacob to leave and go back to where he came from. Makes it clear. So now he's got all this, he's got all these, he's got all these, he's got four wives, he's got these wives, he's got all these kids, he's got all this stuff, and he's heading back home. But the problem is he fears that when Esau said that he was gonna kill him because they didn't have a good long-distance plan, that he's afraid that Esau still wants to kill him. So he's terrified that he's about to send his family and all of his stuff into a trap because Esau's got, I think the text says, like 400 guys, and he doesn't know what he's getting himself into. But God can use these difficulties for good things. We quote this all the time that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them. And repeatedly I've shared experiences that I've had, and I've heard experiences from many of you, of how you thought you were in this bad situation, or how you were doing this thing, and you didn't think that it was the best use of your time or whatever, but how it was working everything out for you to get this next opportunity or get this key to open this door, this career door, or whatever. And you look back and you're like, oh, I see how all those things work together for me to be where I am today or have what I have today or know what I know today because God was working in my life, because I loved him and I'm love him and I'm called according to his purpose, and all of those things are working for good, and I can trust God in that using every season for his purpose. And Jacob's seasons of not knowing what he was gonna do, to looking forward to being married, to accumulating kids, to accumulating sheep, and all these different things helped make him who he was and helped him to have the experience. It wasn't always easy, it was often difficult, but God was working in it. Yes. God shapes your character through the journey. God shapes your character through the journey. Okay, so like I said, he's coming back on his way. He's he's maybe I didn't say this. He's he sent groups of his people and his stuff ahead of him, hoping that if it's if there's like a trap or whatever, it will be launched on them and not his family or him. But he's gonna have some alone time again. He's fearful again. So here he is. This left verse, chapter 32, verse 24. This left Jacob all alone in the camp. And a man came and wrestled with him until the dawn began to break. Now, I've looked in commentaries and stuff, and no one can explain why they're wrestling. It's very clear that it's not just a man, it's either an angel or a pre-incarnate uh appearance of Jesus, so because he says he saw the face of God, and I think in Hosea it says that he wrestled uh an angel, and it also says in the passage that he wrestled with God, but nonetheless, so I don't know if it's like a stress reliever because he's feeling terrified and he doesn't know what comes next, and he's so full of anxiety that he sees some guy and he's like, Hey, you, you want to wrestle? And then they start wrestling all night. That's a guy thing, actually. When I my first Semester, my yeah, my freshman year of college, there was a guy across my dorm, uh, across the hall, Glen, and about three o'clock after the classes are done, we would get together and we would slap box in just about every day. And there was a rule that said no horseplace, and then we try to make sure we didn't leave red marks or bruises, but it was like a stress reliever and it was a good time. So I was thankful that we could beat each other up. But this is something bigger. This is something bigger, and it's also symbolic. So Jacob is wrestling the sky until the dawn began to break. He's just holding on, he's not letting go. Verse 25, when the man saw that he would not win the match, he touched Jacob's hip and wrenched it out of socket. And so I think Jacob knew that there was something more to this, and he wanted so bad. He wanted whatever it was that if you're an apparition, if you're something of God, I want whatever you've got for me, and I'm not gonna let it go. I'm gonna hold on no matter what. And he was wrestling with his own thoughts of the life that he lived, led his brother to want to kill him, and just all the things that he went through. He had a lot of guilt and difficulty. But this was a spiritual thing to wrestle with God, but it gets even better than that. It gets even better than that. It's not just a wrestling match, it is a life transformation event. Verse 26. Then a man said, Let me go forth. Let me go, for the dawn is breaking. But Jacob said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. Hanging on for the blessing. And so some of this is a rhetorical question. What is your name? The man asked. I'm sure he already knew. He replied, Jacob. And he says, Your name will no longer be Jacob, the man told him, From now on you will be called Israel, because you have fought with God and with men and have won. And God is recognizing the struggle that Jacob has gone through, the deception that he's gone through with Laban and all the difficulties he's gone through, and that God's changing his name, giving him more of the details on his future. Israel wrestles with God. And Philippians 1 6 says, I'm certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ returns. And you may wrestle with your faith. You may wrestle with where is God in the hard times? You may wrestle with what do I do in the future, but God can get you through. You want to hold on for a blessing. You want to continue to serve the Lord and trust him. T. God teaches you to depend on him. God teaches you to depend on him. Sometimes he doesn't give you every single thing that you think you want. Sometimes he lets you serve him with difficulty, with a lack of resources. Sometimes it just seems like he wants to make sure that you know that you're serving him and he's blessing you more than you're so smart, you're so wise, you're so every great thing that you're just really doing God a big favor. That's not how God works. He wants us to worship him. So, verse 29, Jacob says to this guy, this angel, this representation of Jesus, please tell me your name, Jacob said. Why do you want to know my name? The man replied. Then he blessed Jacob there. Jacob named the place Penil, which means face of God, for he said, I've seen God face to face, yet my life has been spared. The sun was rising as Jacob left Penil, and he was limping because of the injury to his hip. Even today, the people of Israel don't eat the tendon near the hip socket because of what happened that night when the man strained the tendon of Jacob's hip. So God marked him, and he had a limp that rec that made it recognizable that something had happened. But we need to trust God. We need to trust God in the future for education, for new jobs, for marriage, for parenting, and illness and retirement and financial struggles and unexpected change. And we need to move forward and to trust. But the most important thing that we need to do is we need to know Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. So Romans 10 9 says, if you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you'll be saved. For it's by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved. And so saved from what? Saved from the penalties of your sin, saved from living an empty life, saved from living a life that won't amount to what it could if you place your faith in Christ and served him all of your days. Those are good things. But if you question faith, if you wonder what does it mean to be saved, I would love to talk. Many of us would love to talk to you about that, to answer questions. We have the How to Find God New Testaments out there. And you open up the front cover and it starts out right away with how can I be saved from the penalty of my sins and have a relationship with Jesus? But I'm going to pray and the worship team's going to come up here. But Lord, I thank you so much that in our lives that you give us new opportunities. Just in the way that the clock moves, we age, we mature, and then we gain opportunities. And sometimes those opportunities lead to great resources. Sometimes we don't have a lot of great resources, but we do have great ministry, great faith, and a great relationship with you. Lord, I know that sometimes money and resources and riches and possessions destroy people because they don't trust in you. And other people handle it well and are greatly blessed and are a blessing to others. But I pray for every person in this room, whatever comes next for them, if it's the job, if it's retirement, if it's a different place to live, if it's their kids graduating or they're graduating, God, we pray that you guide, direct, protect, and Lord, that they would just be constantly connected in their relationship with you, that they would be empowered by your spirit, that they would be able to see how you're working behind the scenes to better their life and to help them live faithfully, and that they would serve you in a local church somewhere every day. That if they're going to college or they're moving away, that you would give them good Christian friends to help them grow in their faith, and that you would help them to influence the world for Jesus. We are so thankful in Jesus' name. Amen.