Esau hugged and kissed his brother Jacob when he returned after 25 years in Haran. There seems to have been serious reconciliation between the brothers. I think Jacob took the humble position in that reconciliation. It’s not perfectly clear but it looks like Jacob wants to return the blessing that he stole from his brother. Genesis 33:10-11 tells us that Jacob presented Esau with many gifts but Esau was hesitant to accept them. Jacob said, “‘No, please, if I have found favor in your sight, then accept my present from my hand. For I have seen your face, which is like seeing the face of God, and you have accepted me. Please accept my blessing that is brought to you, because God has dealt graciously with me, and because I have enough.’ Thus he urged him, and he took it.” It appears to me that offering “my blessing” is like offering to return what he had stolen from his brother. Briscoe observes “Reconciliation requires those who have done wrong to admit it and those who have been wronged to accept the apology. Without both parties being willing to participate appropriately nothing is achieved.” We can all relate to this. We’ve all been wronged and we’ve all wronged others. I must admit that when someone has wronged me there’s something about my heart that wants to hold on to the bitterness. Sometimes it’s hard to forgive. It’s also hard to accept forgiveness.

Like Ogilvie says, we have “drunk so long and deeply of the waters of resentment that we find it impossible to break free from our addiction to bitterness.” Yes, it becomes an addiction. We can wallow in it, escape from our current trials into it, dream about it and let it eat our lunch in so many different ways. Someone said, “We refuse to stop drinking the wine of resentment and when we’ve emptied the cup, we find that what we’ve consumed is ourselves.” Isn’t it our pride? One must humble themselves to the wrong and the wronged and learn to be at peace with it and the frailties of ourselves and others. It seems like this happened to Jacob just before he met Esau. He wrestled with God. The great preacher Martyn Lloyd-Jones was once asked, “What does a person look like who has truly met God?” Alluding to Genesis 32:31, he replied, “He walks with a limp.” That is incredibly perceptive, isn’t it? After encountering the living Christ, Jacob was forever crippled—both physically and in regard to his ego. He could no longer strut around arrogantly as he had done before. His pride turned to lowliness (33:3). His greed turned to generosity (33:10–11). And his self-reliance had turned into worship (33:20).1

We’ve already read in the book of Genesis that the angel of the Lord proved that there is nothing “too hard for God.” He gave Sarah and Abraham a miraculous child in their own age. He brought Isaac back from the dead for Abraham on Mount Moriah. There’s nothing that God cannot do! Why is it that we have such a hard time applying this truth to our own sins and failures and guilts and grudges. Of all the things that seem impossible to me is for God to remove my grudges and griefs with those who have wronged me as well as the guilt and remorse I feel over those I have wronged. Forgiveness is a very hard thing to receive! It appears that Esau extended that forgiveness to his brother most graciously. “Father, forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

1 Kurt Strassner, Opening up Genesis, Opening Up Commentary (Leominster: Day One Publications, 2009), 132.