angel and prevailed.” The being with whom he wrestled is called God, an angel and a man. Now he could not, as we have seen, have been a mere man, forJacob sought a blessing from him. He could not have been God the Father, for it is written, “No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father he hath declared him.” It was therefore the Son —— God and man in one person —whom Jacob saw and with whom he wrestled. Besides, in all the appearances of Deity in the Old Testament it was not the Father or the Spirit that appeared, but the Son, the second person of the Trinity. He appeared to Moses in the bush — toJoshua, as the captain of the Lord’s hosts, with drawn sword in his hand, and he was with the church in her long and weary march through the wilderness. “Behold I send an angel before thee to keep thee in the way and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of him and obey his voice, provoke him not, for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him”. Ex. xxiii:20,21. It thus seems clear that the angel with whomJacob wrestled was the son of God.

Secondly. What are we to understand by the wrestling in the text? Some make it visional and in a dream; others make it entirely spiritual, consisting in earnest prayer in the exercise of faith with full trust in the promises of the Godiof his fathers. Hanging on the promise and command of God, Jacob believed that he would be brought back in safety to his native country. The wrestling was not visionary or merely spiritual; it was corporeal. This is evident from the effect of it; he touches the hollow ofJacob’s thigh and puts it out of joint so, that after the exercise is over, he cannot walk but with the greatest difficulty. But the greatest difficulty of all seems to be how Jacob could have strength to prevail over the angel; for are the angels not said to excel in strength? One of them smote with death in one night one hundred and eighty-four thousand of the Assyrian army. What then must be the power and strength of the Jehovah angel with whomJacob wrestled and what an unequal matchJacob must have been to struggle with the mighty angel Jehovah; yet he pre- vailed with the Lord of angels. This is truly wonderful, but the prophet solves the mysterious way in which his strength had power with God and prevailed; that it was God’s strength freely communi- cated toJacob by God himself, so thatJacob possessed this strength as though it were his own. It was God’s gift to him. Now in wrestling, Jacob exerted all his strength - all that was given him, all he possessed. The angel exerted no more strength than he knew Jacob would overcome. Thus, in this wrestling, God the Son is to be

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