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Gen. 25:21 “Now Isaac pleaded with the Lord for his wife,”

The Spirit of intercession gives birth to all ministries of the Lord. When is the last time we pleaded with God in prayer for the answer only He can give? If we are to pioneer a ministry of God, the groundwork of prayer and intercession must be the preparation for any work to succeed.

If birth is to occur, it must begin with the intimacy of intercession.  When planting a church in Greensboro, in Greenville, in Chapel Hill, and in Belarus the movements always began with a small prayer meeting, a gathered few pleading with God.  Prayer is the pattern. 

Jonathan Edwards, George Whitfield, John Wesley, Billy Graham, and all great revivalists of the ages recognized this need for incessant petitioning God and sent prayer teams before them into any area before the evangelism began.  Whenever God is about to move on the earth, He begins by calling His people to prayer.

For many years the church has lost the need to plead to God.  But now God has raised up a concerted prayer movement unrivaled in all of history.  “This is Jacob, the generation of those who seek Him, who seek Your face.”  (Psalm 24:6)

You are a part of this historic generation that God is raising up as a forerunner for revival across the globe. We are the Jacob Generation, and God is calling us now to humble ourselves in prayer, to turn from our wicked ways, and to seek His face so that He will heal our land.

Jacob’s first calling, the circumstances of his birth, his tattered walk through the wilderness, and the legacy he left as Israel combine to make a ministry of pleading, praying, and wrestling with God for the blessing on the earth.

When is the last time you wrestled with God for His purpose to come on the earth?  If He has given you a vision and a heart to see change occur, if you are seeking to birth a movement or church, it must begin in the place in intimacy with Jesus. 

Cry out like Hannah.  Do not be restrained like Isaiah.  Continue to bow and pray like Elijah and give the Lord no rest until He establishes peace on the earth.  Jacob was birthed in response to the pleas of Isaac for his barren wife.  From the moment he was conceived, God was teaching him, and us, something about the importance of prayer. 

Gen. 26:5  “because Abraham…”

The blessing to Isaac and Jacob comes not because of his own obedience, but rather because Abraham “obeyed My voice and kept My charge.”  

Famines have a way of striping us from self-righteousness, so we realize our goodness is nothing apart from Him.  When I was successfully employed, I had the accolades of others constantly feeding my sense of self-righteousness.  When things went right, there was applause. When events occurred, a host of like-minded friends were there to celebrate my success.  A desert, however, has little room for a gallery of onlookers.

Here we are alone, and in our famine we begin to realize that we really have nothing to bring to the table to earn God’s favor or the applause of others.  Instead in our silent habitations, we are tempted to hear a voice of condemnation listing our sins and reasons for failure. We are too lazy, incompetent, unfocused, undisciplined, or too tired to put up a fight.

In this emptiness, a fresh filling is desperately needed which states anew the power of the Gospel.  God loved and loves us when we are utterly unlovable. He provides a promise of forgiveness, restoration, and provision not because we have earned it; but out of the covenant with Jesus, the seed of Abraham, our righteous One.

I am delivered and sustained in famine not because of my reserves, careful planning and prudent use of resources.  Famine scorches my self-sufficiency. I realize how desperate I am for God to send rain from above or a well from beneath.  Around me is dry, barren earth; and even the most careful cultivation of my surroundings promises no relief without the dew and water of heaven.

Isaac, Jacob, all succeeding generations from the promise to Abraham have only to look to their father of faith to trace the reasons for their hope.  God may not be moved to do it because of me—but because of Abraham and a covenant of faith, He is obliged.

Abraham’s covenant is simply the Gospel of Christ.  What one Man did in obeying the commands of God is vicariously credited to my account simply because I choose to believe.  If instead I try to conjure up my own solutions, defend my own righteousness or work my way into a blessing; I am destined to wrestle eternally with God for His hand of grace.

Instead, the desert and the famine teach me only to believe.  Nothing of my own can make the desert flourish, but because of His Promised Covenant, my dry land can become an open stream

Gen. 33:4 “But Esau ran to meet him and embraced him.”

Esau was ready to forgive his brother the moment they are reunited. Jacob had foreseen a difficult process of reconciliation, a listing of past offences, a time to pay back all he had stolen; but Esau simply ran to meet his brother.

The story of the Prodigal and the story of the Supplanter is the same.  Even though we have deeply offended the Father or the brother, we are family.  “We should rejoice because your brother who was lost is now found.”  Luke 11.

Family never disappears.  God is on a rescue mission with the Son to restore all the brothers and sisters to the family.  He is seeking His children, and our place of belonging comes from this initial relationship with the father. Malachi 2:10-11.

Have we not all one Father?

Has not one God created us?

Why do we deal treacherously with one another?

God desires a reconciled family of believers.  To enter the promises of his blessings, we must take our Esau’s along, our spouses who we may have offended, our hurtful masters and wayward children all before the throne of grace.

This millennial generation is on a global quest to bring all of humanity into one community.  While their cultural diversity and “We are the world” slogans may be distorted by humanism, the longing for one voice of humanity is a desire of heaven.

As we approach eternity, more and more voices from every tribe, tongue, and people will join the chorus of Hallelujah.  The gathering of the nations is woven deep into the heart of God and echoes in the DNA of all of His children.

Rather than building walls between races and nations, we are called to run towards them, embrace them, kiss them and weep as Esau did to Jacob.  This call to the nations is the initial commission of the church and remains her lasting marching call.

Your movement is only going to be completely mature as you embrace the nations that are different from you and seek them to be reconciled to the higher purposes of God on the earth.

If Jacob and Esau can be reconciled, there is no gap too wide.