33 JACOB ON HIS OWN

Here is what Jacob does just after the dream—we too should respond when God speaks.

As Jacob was fleeing from his brother’s anger, God gave Jacob fresh promises fitting his present condition, “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you” (15). Jacob was apprehensive of danger from his brother Esau; but God promises to keep him. Those are safe whom God protects, whoever pursues them. He now had a long journey before him, must travel alone, in an unknown road and to an unknown country. Wherever we are, we are safe, and may be at ease in our spirits, if we have God with us.

Jacob did not know, but God foresaw, what hardships he should meet with in his uncle’s service, and therefore promises to preserve him in all places. God knows how to give His people graces and comforts accommodated to the events that will be, as well as to those that are. Jacob was now going as an exile into a place far distant, but God promises him to bring him back again to this land. God who preserves His people’s going out will also take care of their coming in. “The Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore” (Psalm 121:8). He seemed to be forsaken by all his friends, but God here gives him this assurance, Whom God loves He never leaves. This promise is sure to all his descendants by faith as indicated again in Hebrews 13:5 “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.” What God allows sometimes seems to contradict the promises; Jacob is therefore assured of their fulfillment in their season: “I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you” (1c).

God showed Himself and His favor to Jacob when he was asleep and purely passive; for the spirit, like the wind, blows when and where it wills, and God’s grace, is like the dew, neither of which can we control. “The remnant of Jacob will be in the midst of many peoples like dew from the Lord, like showers on the grass, which do not wait for anyone or depend on man” (Micah 5:7). But Jacob applied himself when he woke up to use the visit God had made to him to advantage. We may well think he awakened with feelings similar to Jeremiah’s as recorded in Jeremiah 31:26, “At this I awoke and looked around. My sleep had been pleasant to me.” Undoubtedly after such a dream Jacob’s sleep was sweet to him. 

Verse 16 says, “When Jacob awoke from his sleep, he thought, ‘Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.’” Jacob expressed his great surprise at the indications he had of God’s special presence with him in that place. God’s manifestations of Himself to his people carry their own inward spiritual evidence along with them. God can give undeniable demonstrations of His presence, such as giving abundant satisfaction to the souls of the faithful that God is with them of a truth, satisfaction not communicable to others, but convincing to themselves. We sometimes meet with God where we little thought of meeting with Him. He is where we did not think He had been, is found where we did not ask for him. No place excludes divine visits. It happened too for Hagar in the wilderness after being put out of Abraham and Sarah’s tent. “She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: ‘You are the God who sees me,’ for she said, ‘I have now seen the One who sees me’” (Genesis 16:13). Wherever we are, in the city or in the desert, in the house or in the field, in the shop or in the street, we may keep up our conversation with Heaven if we want to.

Jacob’s experience struck an awe in him, he was afraid, probably with a good kind of fear. “He was afraid and said, ‘How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven’” (17). So far was he from being puffed up, and exalted above measure, with the abundance of the revelations that he was afraid. The opposite reaction is also possible and God sometimes has to bring us down a notch. “. . . or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me” (2 Corinthians 12:17). The more we see of God, the more cause we have for holy trembling and blushing before him. Anyone to whom God is pleased to show Himself is thereby laid, and kept, very low in their own eyes, and have good reason to fear the Lord and His goodness “Afterward the Israelites will return and seek the Lord their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the Lord and to his blessings in the last days” (Hosea 3:5).

Jacob said, “How awesome is this place!” As though to say, ‘The appearance of God in this place is never to be thought of, but with a holy awe and reverence. I will have a respect for this place, and remember it by this memory, as long as I live.’ This was probably not that he thought the place itself any nearer the divine visions than other places; but what he saw there at this time was, as it were, the house of God, the residence of the divine Majesty. Then he added, “this is the gate of heaven,” that is, the general meeting place of the inhabitants of the upper world, as the meetings of a city were in their gates; or the angels ascending and descending were like travelers passing and re-passing through the gates of a city. God is in a special manner present where His grace is revealed and where His covenants are announced and sealed, as of old by the ministry of angels. This is true today too by our own personal memories of meetings we have with God. Where God meets us with His special presence we ought to meet Him with the most humble reverence, remembering His justice and holiness, and our own meanness and vileness. I can still remember the place where I confessed Jesus as my Savior at age 7, made a life-time missionary career decision at age 6, first felt so close to God that I called Him, “Dad” and also where years later I first felt comfortable calling Him “Daddy.” Those, to me are special places and memories, like the house of God.

Jacob took care to preserve the memorial of his experience two ways. He set up the stone for a pillar. “Early the next morning Jacob took the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil on top of it” (18). This was, not as if he thought the visions of his head were in any way credited to the stone on which it lay, but that he would mark the place so that when he came back, he could erect a more lasting monument of God’s favor to Him. He did not have time now to build an altar here, as Abraham did in the places where God appeared to him. Remember God’s first visit to Abraham recorded in Genesis 12:7?, “The Lord appeared to Abram and said, ‘To your offspring I will give this land.’ So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.” Jacob therefore poured oil on the top of this stone, which probably was the ceremony then used in dedicating their altars, as a physical sign or pledge of his building an altar when he would have the ability, as afterwards he did when he returned in gratitude to God for this vision. Later he did build an altar there as recorded in Genesis 35:7, “There he built an altar, and he called the place El Bethel, because it was there that God revealed himself to him when he was fleeing from his brother.” Grants of mercy call for returns of duty, and the sweet communion we have with God ought ever to be remembered. He gave a new name to the place. “There he built an altar, and he called the place El Bethel, because it was there that God revealed himself to him when he was fleeing from his brother.” It had been called Luz, an almond-tree; but he will have it from now on called Beth-el, the house of God. This gracious appearance of God to him here put a greater honor on the place, and made it more remarkable, than all the almond-trees that flourished there. Jacob could not control the fact that many years later Jeroboam would set up a calf idol there and try to lead Israel astray with it. For now, in Jacob’s time, on his watch, it would be the house of God. Other generations will make their own decisions. 

He then made a solemn vow recorded in verses 20-22, “Then Jacob made a vow, saying, ‘If God will be with me and will watch over me on this journey I am taking and will give me food to eat and clothes to wear so that I return safely to my father’s household, then the Lord  will be my God  and this stone that I have set up as a pillar will be God’s house, and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.’” By religious vows we give glory to God, acknowledge our dependence on Him, and lay a bond on our own souls to engage and urge our obedience to Him. Jacob was now in fear and distress; and it is appropriate at such times to make vows. We make vows in times of trouble, or when we are in pursuit of any special mercy. The men on Jonah’s boat did this as recorded in Jonah 1:16, “At this the men greatly feared the Lord, and they offered a sacrifice to the Lord and made vows to him.”

Jacob had now had a gracious visit from heaven. God had renewed His covenant with him, and the covenant is mutual. When God ratifies His promises to us, it is proper for us to repeat our promises to Him. Now in this vow we can see Jacob’s faith. God had said, “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” Jacob takes hold of this promise, and infers in his response, “Seeing that God will be with me, and will keep me, as He has said, which is implied in that promise, that He will provide adequately for me, and seeing He has promised to bring me again to this land, that is, to the house of my father, I depend upon it.” God’s promises are to be the guide and measure of our desires and expectations. Jacob’s response also implies that Jacob hoped his father would still be alive when he returned. Jacob is so different from Esau who longed for the days of mourning for the death of his father so he could kill Jacob.

We can see Jacob’s modesty and great moderation in his desires. He will cheerfully content himself with bread to eat, and raiment to put on; (“food to eat and clothes to wear”) and, though God’s promise had now made him heir to a very great estate, yet he does not ask for soft clothing or dainty meat. Agur’s wish in Proverbs is: Feed me with food convenient for me; and notice the idea is repeated in 1 Timothy 6:8, “But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.” Nature is content with a little, and grace is content with with even less. It is the wealthy who feel they need more. Those that have most have, in effect, no more for themselves than food and raiment; regarding anything more than that they have only either the worry of keeping it or the responsibility giving of it, but not the enjoyment of it. If God gives us more, we are bound to be thankful, and to use it for Him; if he give us just this, we are bound to be content, and cheerfully to enjoy Him in it.

Jacob’s good character, and his regard to God appears here. In what he desired, that God would be with him and keep him. We need desire no more to make us easy and happy, wherever we are, than to have God’s presence with us and to be under His protection. It is comfortable, in a journey, to have a guide in an unknown way, a guard in a dangerous way, to be well carried, well provided for, and to have good company in any way; and those that have God with them have all this in the best possible way.

Notice what Jacob designed. His resolution is to cleave to the Lord, as his God in covenant: Then shall the Lord be my God. Not as if he would disown him and cast him off if he should need food or raiment; no, though He slay us, we must cleave to Him; but “then I will rejoice in Him as my God; then I will more strongly exert myself to remain with Him.” Every mercy we receive from God should be improved as an additional obligation for us to want to walk more closely with Him as our God.

In particular, that he would perform some special acts of devotion, as an indication of his gratitude. First, “This pillar will mark my commitment to this place until I come back in peace, and then it shall be God’s house,” that is, “an altar will be erected here to the honor of God.” Secondly, “The house of God will not be unfurnished, nor his altar without a sacrifice: “of all that you give me I will give you a tenth” (22). This was to be spent either on God’s altars or His poor,” both altars and the poor are God’s receivers in the world. This commitment of financial gifts may well have been Jacob’s response to some special revelation from God or perhaps only because he had heard that his grandfather, Abraham, had given one tenth to Melchizedek. At any rate, God is be honored with our estates, and we should give Him His dues out of them. When we receive some financial or material blessing from God we should think about how we may give something back to Him in gratitude. The tenth is a very fit proportion to be devoted to God. It is a practice encouraged in both Testaments. Paul taught systematic giving in 1 Corinthians 16:2, “On the first day of every week, each one of you should set aside a sum of money in keeping with your income, saving it up, so that when I come no collections will have to be made.” Paul also taught joyful giving in 2 Corinthians 9:7 “Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”

Jacob received a special revelation from God regarding God’s companionship, protection and care. And Jacob responded with his own commitment to God which he later kept.