The moment Jacob heard that Esau was coming with four hundred armed men, he did what his grandfather and father had done before him: he prayed. But notice the opening he chose. He did not say, "God of the universe." He said, "God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac."
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan preserves this careful stacking (Genesis 32:10). Jacob reminds God of the covenant family — three generations now bound together. And then he reminds God of something else: a direct promise. "You said to me, Return to your country and to your kindred, and I will do you good." Jacob is essentially holding God to the receipt. You told me to come back. You told me things would go well. Here I am, and Esau is riding.
Why name the ancestors?
The rabbis of late antiquity understood this kind of prayer as leveraging zekhut avot, the merit of the fathers. You do not approach the Holy One empty-handed; you come wrapped in the faithfulness of those who came before. Abraham's willingness at Moriah, Isaac's silence on the altar — these become a kind of spiritual inheritance Jacob can draw upon when his own courage runs thin.
The takeaway: in the tightest moment of his life, Jacob does not boast of his own righteousness. He names his fathers, names God's promise, and waits.