Ge 32:24 ¶ Then Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak.
Ge 32:25 And when he saw that he had not prevailed against him, he touched the socket of his thigh; so the socket of Jacob’s thigh was dislocated while he wrestled with him.
Ge 32:26 Then he said, "Let me go, for the dawn is breaking." But he said, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."
Ge 32:27 So he said to him, "What is your name?" And he said, "Jacob."

Twenty years earlier Jacob had lied to his father, and told him that he was Essau. Essau was a very hairy man, and Jacob's mother helped him trick his father by putting goat skins on him. Isaac, who was nearly blind, was tricked, but remarked the, "the voice is Jacob's but the skin is Essau's. After lying several times the trick seems to have succeeded, now twenty years later Jacob wrestles with a man we believe to be Jesus (the theological term is a theophany - an old testament appearing of Jesus).  Jesus asks him, "what is your name?" You see God will always bring you back to the place you first left the road. He will always use memory and conscience to remind you of the day you started down the wrong track. It is only as we 'fess up that we can get back to where we ought to be. Jacob rights his wrong, by confessing, "my name is Jacob." Lies will chase you down the corridors of your mind, till you finally get back to the place you left the road, only this time you start walking on the right foot. Keep the fire burning. The Truth will set you free.

A Time to Shut Up

Several times in scripture God basically told people to shut up. Ecclesiastes 4:7 says there is a time to speak and a time to keep silent. James tells us that words can be set on fire by hell itself. The sad but terrible truth is that some hell sent words come from us. Lest you think you are exempt, remember,  Jesus told Peter, shut up. (Get thee behind me, satan.) God told Joshua to shut up, when he was belly aching that God had let him down, when in fact the source of the Jews problem was not a failure of God, but a moral failure of their own. (Joshua 7:7-12)

Listen, no one is better at cutting you down, than you are yourself. Ephesians talks about the fiery darts of the enemy, often in life, the enemy uses people to attack themselves! Don't cut yourself down, encourage yourself in the Lord. Don't cut your loved ones down, that is the devil's job, and he can do just fine without you. We need to build each other up. I have a precious woman in our church, who often ends her online day by saying, "good night facebook." Sometimes we need to learn how to cut off communication. We need to be able to get a little Fred Sanford with ourselves and say, "shut up, dummy," when we find ourselves slipping into a negative funk. It is pretty dumb to knock holes in the very ship you are floating in. Look at the comparison between the wise and the foolish in this verse: Pr 14:1 The wise woman builds her house, But the foolish tears it down with her own hands. Speaking negatively to yourself or family is tearing down your own house. Remember the old saying, if you can't say anything good at all, then don't say a thing. That's good advice to help keep your fire burning.

Be Careful Whose Hand You Shake

In the Bible leprosy was viewed as a somewhat communicable disease and people suffering from it had to keep away from uninfected people and where contact happened they were required to shout out, "unclean, unclean". Since the OT was written to teach through types and shadows, what can we learn from the law of the leper? First we can learn, some people in this world have communicable diseases. Not just in the physical realm, but in the spiritual also. Gossips, grumblers, malcontents, backbiters, rebels against authority, lustful, these are just a few examples.  Second we learn, that contact can result in contamination and spread of disease. You can't walk through a garbage dump, and not expect to get dirty. In like manner the people we come in contact with have the ability to both impact and leave a deposit inside of us. Germs require microscopes and effort to see, in the same way it is not very easy to see attitudes that we have been influenced by.

 Science teaches us the single best deterrent against the spread of germs is the regular washing of the hands. Prayer over what the eyes have seen, the ears have heard, and the nonverbal influences of others is not only recommended but necessary. Daily washing for daily dirt. But, we can take things one step further, the bible says not to be overcome of evil, but to overcome evil with good. May God help us to be more of an influence on evil, than evil is on us. Keep your fire burning!