From Lockdown to Blessing

TOURNING POINT WITH TOWNHALL PLATFORM
TOPIC: From Lockdown to Blessing
SCRIPTURE: Genesis 32:27-29 The man asked him, “What is your me?” Jacob,” he answered. Then the man said, “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome. “Jacob said, “Please tell me your name. “But he replied, “Why do you ask my name?” Then he blessed him there.
MESSAGE: There are various kinds of lockdown you can encounter as you journey through life. A part from the recent Covid-19 pandemic lockdown that resulted in economic hardship to some people and blessing in disguise to others, a person can also experience a short or prolonged lockdown in many other areas of life. It could be a lockdown as a single girl or bachelor. It could come as unemployment, childlessness, abusive marriage, as tenant under a hostile landlord, generational family curse endless slavish suffering and so and so forth. Today God telling is you that you are about to move you’re your current lockdown to blessing.
The story of Jacob in the bible narrative in the book of Genesis is a typical example of a prolong lockdown experience. After swindling his elder brother Esau to sell his birth right and thereafter cajoling his father Isaac to bless him, Jacob life went into a lockdown in his maternal uncle Laban’s house where he escaped to. For 20 years Jacob served his uncle who cheated him and changed his wages ten times (Genesis 31:7). He served for seven years to marry the Racheal who was the love of his life. On the night of the marriage, he was deceived and given the elder sister Lear instead of Racheal. He served for another seven years to marry Racheal. Being tired and frustrated after a prolonged lockdown in his uncle Laban’s house Jacob in a showdown talk told his uncle “Release me, that I may go to my own place and country. Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you, that I may go, for you know the service that I have given you” (Genesis 30:25-26). Jacob after few more years of service was reluctantly freed by his uncle and father in-law. On his way back home and before meeting Esau his estranged brother for reconciliation Jacob had an encounter with God by wrestling with an angel. As a result of that encounter, Jacob was blessed by God and his name was changed to Israel which means Prince of God or God’s content.
Friends, are you in any form of lockdown? God can change your situation today and introduce new contents into your life. He is God of Turning Point and ever ready to turn around your life in Jesus name-Amen.
PRAYER: O, Lord I come to you seeking your help to change my story. Pull me out of my current lockdown of childlessness, joblessness, financial hardship, ill health (name your case). Change my name and inject your new contents into me. Bless me and enlarge my tents. Cause a turning point to happen in my life. I promise to also be a blessing to others as you bless me in Jesus name-Amen