Incredible encounters (1)

The book of Genesis tells of several encounters between Jacob and God, but two stand out as having particularly marked the course of his life. It’s probably like that in our own lives, too. Hope-fully we’re meeting with God every day... but every now and then there is an insight or experience that stands out from the rest. Jacob’s “incredible encounters” both happened at critical transition times in his life. The first was when he was fleeing in fear from his homeland and the murderous wrath of his brother. The second happened twenty years later when he was, probably just as fearfully, returning home again. Jacob was a single man, probably in his forties, at the time of the first encounter, and a married man with many children at the time of the second. Both happened at night time, though, so that Jacob was completely alone when he met with God.

The first encounter is related for us in Genesis chapter 28. You’ll remember that after deceiving his father and brother, Jacob left Beersheba and began the long journey (more than 450 miles) to Haran, where his parents’ relatives lived. I wonder what thoughts and emotions filled him on this long, lonely journey. He was leaving his heritage and his family’s land of promise; had he forfeited his inheritance by deceiving his seemingly dying father? Would he ever see his mother again? Would his twin brother pursue him and try to kill him? Would he ever live in safety again? Had he gone and sabotaged the blessing that he’d gained by trickery, and pretty much messed up everything?

With such worried thoughts and insecurity about his future, it’s not surprising that Jacob was exhausted by the end of the first day - tired enough to fall asleep with his head on a hard stone for a pillow. And so it happened that God spoke to Jacob in a dream. Some people nowadays might dismiss it as “just a dream,” a product of his own troubled and wishful thinking. But people in Jacob’s day, just like many non-western cultures even today, were very aware that dreams are one of the ways God bypasses our confused thinking in order to speak to us. In this instance, Jacob has a vision of the interface between heaven and earth, with God and angels involved in the drama.

The part where God speaks must have been particularly meaningful to Jacob. Here he was, fleeing from his homeland and wondering perhaps if his own actions had caused him to forefeit the inheritance that God had promised to his father and grandfather. So the very first thing that God says to him (after introducing Himself as the God of that father and grandfather) is, “The ground you are lying on belongs to you.” Then God goes on, in the middle part of the dream, to repeat basically the same promises that He had given to Abraham. After that comes the postscript, the “what’s more” in verse 15: “I am with you and I will protect you wherever you go.” For someone fleeing the vengeful anger of his brother, someone travelling alone and potentially at the mercy of any bandits en route, that part must have been a real relief and reassurance for Jacob.

Isn’t that just like God? He doesn’t simply give Jacob the same message given to his ancestors, the story that Jacob had probably been hearing since he was a small boy. Instead, God sandwiches the promises between things that Jacob really needed to hear in his present situation and predicament:

a) you may be leaving it for now, but this land is yours
b) no matter how far away you go, I will still be with you to protect you.

God is not a God of formulas; He’s a God who speaks personally to the needs and fears of every individual. He didn’t stop there, however; after that (vs 15b) came the cherry on the cake: “One day I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you before I have finished giving you everything I have promised you.”

Wow! What a dream. No wonder Jacob woke up with such a strong sense of the presence of God in that place. And, perhaps for the first time in his selfish and wayward life, Jacob is also filled with the fear of the Lord - with a holy respect for who God is. The next morning, Jacob sets up a memorial stone (using the big stone that had been his pillow during the dream) and he gives that place a new name. It used to be called Luz  (which, rather appropriately, means “separation”) but Jacob renames it Bethel, which means house or home of God. He may have been separated from his family, but Jacob was about to begin a journey where he would no longer be so separated from God, a journey that would lead him to the place where he would finally begin to allow space for God to make a home in his life.

Jacob makes a vow (vs 20 - 22) and from his own lips we hear the evidence that the Lord has never truly been his God before now. We sometimes make the assumption that all the Bible characters were lifelong followers of God; but here is Jacob, a man already in his forties, admitting that he has never fully been on board. He’s been selfishly living his life according to his own rules. He makes a solemn declaration that, if God does in fact do these things He has promised, then Jacob will really make Him his God.

Jacob being Jacob, opportunistic as ever, hasn’t completely shaken off his self-seeking tendencies, however, and can’t resist “padding the promise” a bit. In addition to what God actually did promise (presence, protection and bringing him home again), Jacob adds his own clause: “If He will provide me with food and clothing.”  I can imagine that God just smiled: it had always been His pleasure to provide for His people anyway.  God is so gracious: He meets us where we are and accepts us as we are, even when our approach is a little clumsy or disrespectful at times.

Maybe Jacob remembers this, because he adds an extra facet to his own side of the commitment: as well as acknowledging God as his God, Jacob commits to tithing: to giving back to God a tenth of everything that God gives to him. Even in making this vow, Jacob is still speaking of God in the third person (and not yet speaking to God), but it’s definitely a stake, or a stone, in the ground. Jacob has encountered God personally and his life will not continue to be the same.

Keep reading in the post below, to fast forward twenty years and read about another of Jacob’s incredible encounters with God.