Jacob was in a hurry when he left Beersheba
for Haran. In Genesis 27:43 he was told to flee. So here he departed and came
to a certain place when the sun had set. There he stayed for the night. He must have felt
so awful. Not only was he all alone but the fact that he was a fugitive must be
fearful. He had no one to consult with. So in the quietness of the wilderness
he had time to reflect. His thoughts most naturally would gravitate towards all
that he had done so far. He came to grips with all that his deceitful scheming
had brought. There would certainly be a sense of foreboding. Tired and
despondent, he didn’t mind even though his pillow was a hard stone. So he was
fast asleep and too exhausted to think about his future. The last thoughts he
entertained perhaps were those that Isaac said to him. “May God Almighty bless you and make you
fruitful and multiply you, that you may become a company of peoples. May He also give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and to
your descendants with you, that you may possess the land of
your sojourning, which God gave to Abraham.”
He had a dream as he fell into a deep sleep.
Though we don’t think too much about our dreams at night, it is certainly one
of the means that God often uses to speak to men of faith. We should not
discount our dream as nothing. That night in his dream, Jacob saw a ladder set
up from earth and the top actually reached the heaven. He also saw the angels
of God ascending and descending on it. The focus of his whole dream was on the Lord
standing above the ladder. The Lord Himself visited him. We are not told how
Jacob recognized the Lord but he did. And there was a divine transaction and
his soul was invaded by the Lord, as God spoke and reiterated the word of His
covenant with him. He said, “I am the Lord, the
God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie, I
will give to you and to your descendants. Your descendants will also be like
the dust of the earth and you will spread out to the west and to the
east and to the north and to the south; and in you and in
your descendants shall all the families of the earth be blessed.”
The promise God had made to Abraham and Isaac
earlier, He now made it to Jacob. He had personally become Jacob’s God. The
title that we read so often in the Bible, is the God of Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob. What’s amazing in this account was God’s
promise to him. He promised to be with him and keep him wherever he went and
would bring him back to the land. God undertook to see to the completion of all
that He had promised. And for 20 years Jacob had the dynamic presence of God
leading and guiding him. What Jacob experienced was entirely grace. God came to
him not based on the merits of something he had done. In fact he was a conniver
and a cheat and did not deserve what God was promising him. Furthermore, he
wasn’t even seeking God. He was actually running away from a situation of his
own making. Yet all he received was unbridled grace, and not a word of chiding.
The magnanimity of our generous God! As he had so graciously led Jacob, it is
also his desire to bless us who by faith turn to Him through Christ Jesus. What
a glorious God!
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