Isaac called Jacob and gave him his blessing and instructed him (v 1-5) “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padan Aram, to the house of Bethuel your mother’s father; and take yourself a wife from there of the daughters of Laban your mother’s brother.” The words of Isaac’s blessing on Jacob were, “May God Almighty bless you, And make you fruitful and multiply you, That you may be an assembly of peoples; And give you the blessing of Abraham, To you and your descendants with you, That you may inherit the land In which you are a stranger, Which God gave to Abraham.”
This was the blessing given to Abraham and now passed on through Isaac to Jacob, the promise of a land to him and his descendants and he sent Jacob away to this mother’s family in Padan Aram.
Meanwhile Esau, having seen that Jacob received the blessing and was not to marry Canaanite women, had already married two Canaanite wives seeming to be determined to go against his parents took another wife, maybe thinking it was better to marry in the family, as it were, but went and took Mahalath, his cousin, the daughter of Ishmael, his uncle. (v6-9)
So Jacob sets out on his journey (v10-15) towards Haran. Leaving Beer-Sheba he arrived at a place called Luz (see v 19). Here he lay down to sleep using a stone for a pillow, hardly the most comfortable! He dreamed of a ladder from earth reaching to heaven with angels ascending and descending on it. The LORD stood above the ladder and spoke to Jacob saying, “I am the LORD God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and your descendants. Also your descendants shall be as the dust of the earth; you shall spread abroad to the west and the east, to the north and the south; and in you and in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed. Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you.”
This was a significant event in the life of Jacob, God was now speaking to him. I’m sure his father Isaac and grandfather Abraham had relayed the events of God speaking to them, now God was speaking to him, personally with the same promise given to them many years before. The promise of the land to him and his descendants, and that God would be with him wherever he went and would bring him back to the land, which he was now leaving for fear of his brother Esau.
Jacob was in awe and terribly afraid. It was not every day that The LORD spoke to people. He came to the realisation that God was in this place, he said that it was the house of God and the gate of heaven. Jacob rose early in the morning and took the stone (pillow) and set it up as a pillar and poured oil in top of it and called the place Bethel, previously Luz (v19).
Bethel became an important place in Israel’s history. Sadly, it became a place of idolatry (see 1 Kings 13:32, Amos 4:4)
In the euphoria of the moment, Jacob made a vow to God saying, (v20-22) “If God will be with me, and keep me in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on, so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the LORD shall be my God. And this stone which I have set as a pillar shall be God’s house, and of all that You give me I will surely give a tenth to You.”
His response has been interpreted in various ways. I don’t really see why he needed to make this; God had already promised that he would bring him back to his father’s house and be with him wherever he went. It seemed that God’s word was not enough, all he needed to do was believe it. He is bargaining with God. God could have said that He would go back on His promise, but He didn’t. He never does. He is true to His word. God wasn’t really interested in his bargaining. Jacob wasn’t always submitted to God’s will as we shall see in further chapters.
Likewise, we must trust God’s word and not doubt. He has said that He will never leave us, nor forsake us, “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:19)
