Chapter. 18, Genesis 28. Jacob’s Dream.
FLEEING from the face of Esau, Jacob left Beersheba, beginning already to reap the fruit of his conduct toward his brother.
When night came, he took some stones for a pillow, and laid down to sleep on the hard, cold ground.
As he slept, he dreamed; and in his dream he saw a ladder set on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven, and angels were going up and down upon it. Above it stood the Lord, who spoke to Jacob, saying: “I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac; the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it and to thy children.” And then the Lord told Jacob that a Saviour should come into the world who would be a blessing to all the earth, and added: “I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.”
In those days God had not yet given men His written word, the Bible, as we have it today, and He spoke to His servants in dreams and visions. So Jacob knew that the Lord had sent him the dream and had truly spoken to him. Feeling deeply how he had sinned, and knowing that he, in no way deserved this grace shown him, he was afraid, and when he awoke out of his sleep, he rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it, and he called the name of the place Bethel, meaning, “The house of God,” for he said: “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. How dreadful is this place! This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!”
He could not realize God’s deep love and mercy to him, a poor sinful man, who deserved nothing but punishment. And so it ever is; the moment we begin to realize what we are before God, we are afraid to meet Him. Our conscience tells us we are sinners and deserve judgment and we, like Jacob, must exclaim: How dreadful, dreadful to stand before Him, a Holy God, and answer for our sins! But, oh! God is love, and in His grace, He comes to meet us as He did Jacob that night, and has opened a way whereby we may stand before Him in the person of our blessed Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ, who died in our stead on the cross! Then having accepted Him, He tells us “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.”
Jacob could not understand this grace, and instead of falling on his face and thanking God for these wonderful promises, and accepting them in faith, he vowed a vow, saying: “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the Lord be my God; and this stone which I have set for a pillar, shall be God’s house; and of all that Thou shalt give me, I will surely give the ‘tenth unto Thee.”
God does not ever make any promises, that He cannot or does not fulfill, and when, like Jacob, we doubt and fear Him, we dishonor Him. He wants our full trust; that alone can please Him, and instead of saying as Jacob: “if God does this and that for me, I will serve Him and do this and that for Him in return,” let us bow our hearts in thankfulness and praise, and say: “I thank Thee for all Thy love, and the portion Thou hast given to me, who deserves nothing but death and judgment.”
ML 05/23/1909