A word from God Himself set Jacob right at the beginning of chapter 35. “Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there:. and make there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother.” Bethel had been forgotten again; God or at least. ways that pleased Him, had been forgotten too, and these things came. into Jacob’s mind now very clearly. If he was going to obey God in going to the place He told him of, the family and the servants must change their ways,—things that Jacob knew about all along the way, as we may suppose. For he said to them, “Put away the strange gods that are among you, and clean, and change your garments: and let us rise, and go up to Bethel.” Jacob buried their images and their rings under a tree before the new start was made for Bethel and home. God in His mercy protecting them from the people around, whom He made afraid of Jacob and his sons, they got safely to Bethel, and there Jacob built an altar to which he gave the name of “God of the house of God,” because it was there that God had appeared to him when he was going away from home for fear of Esau’s killing him. Here Rebekah’s nurse died, and was buried. God again appeared to Jacob, and repeated to him his change of name from Jacob to Israel, telling him again of His promise that his children should be a great nation, and that the land of Canaan should be his and theirs.
On the way, the loved wife Rachel died as her second baby was born. She called him, “The son of my sorrow,” but her husband gave him a different name, “The son of my right hand” (Benjamin).
At last after another stop, and more sin and sadness in his family, Jacob came to his old father at Mamre, but Isaac died, and Esau came home to join Jacob in burying him. Before this, Rebekah, Jacob’s and Esau’s mother, had died.
How little of Quietness and happiness there was in Jacob’s life, and so much of his worry and sadness was due to his own self-will. If he had been like Abraham his grandfather, as we have seen was in most of his life, Jacob would have had far less trials and sorrows. It is best to please God in everything, best for both this world, and for eternity. First though we need to be saved.