Genesis 28 – Honoring God, The Promise Keeper

Isaac called Jacob and blessed him (again).  He also told him not to take a wife from among the Canaanite women. He told Jacob to go to Padan Aram to Bethuel’s (Rebekah’s father) house and get a wife from among Laban’s (Rebekah’s brother) daughters. Isaac blessed Jacob by saying, “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.” Isaac refers to the blessing of Abraham which indicates to me that his earthly father, Abraham, told him of the promises of God, his heavenly father. What promises of God have you shared with your children? Isaac sent Jacob away and he went to Padan Aram to Laban, Bethuel’s son and Rebekah’s brother. Since Isaac sent Jacob away, I’m thinking that Rebekah must have had a talk with her husband about Esau’s intentions and they agreed that Jacob should leave to escape Esau’s wrath.  Esau saw that Isaac blessed Jacob and told him not to marry a woman from Canaan, but sent him to Padan Aram. Yes, Jacob was obedient to his father and mother. This is turning into another “Like Father, Like Son” moment. Isaac married his first cousin, Rebekah, and now they’re sending their son, Jacob to get a wife that is also his first cousin.

Esau saw that his Canaanite wives did not please his father. So, Esau went to Ishmael (his uncle) and took his daughter, Mahalath as a wife in addition to the two wives he already had. Yes, he married a first cousin. This is a part of the sibling rivalry. Even though Esau was his father’s favorite, maybe he sensed that this was changing because of Isaac blessing Jacob knowingly this time and his Canaanite wives were irritants to his parents.

Jacob left Beersheba and went towards Haran. He arrived at a certain place and stopped for the night. He took a stone there and placed it under his head as a pillow and went to sleep. He dreamed of a ladder that reached from earth to heaven with angels ascending and descending on it. At the top of the ladder, the Lord stood above it and said, “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.” The Lord also told Jacob that his descendants will be as the dust of the earth and they shall spread from the west to the east and to the north and south. God told Jacob’s grandfather, Abraham (Abram) in Genesis 13:16 the same thing by comparing the number of descendants to the dust of the earth.  In Jacob and his seed, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.  This was also told to Abraham in Genesis 22:18.  God promised to be with Jacob wherever he went and would bring him back to that land. He promised not to leave him until He had done what was spoken to him.  As I read this, it sounds like once the promise is fulfilled that God will leave Jacob. I think this is just an issue with transcribing this from the original language (Hebrew) into English. There are several scriptures where God says that He will never leave us nor forsake us (Examples: Deuteronomy 31:6, Joshua 1:5, Hebrews 13:5). Jacob awoke and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place and I did not know it.” He was afraid and declared that the place was awesome and called it the house of God and the gate of heaven!

Jacob rose early the next morning and took the stone pillow and set it as a pillar and poured oil on top of it. He called the name of the place Bethel (House of God). The name of that city was previously called Luz. 

Jacob made a vow saying that if God will be with him and keep him in the way he was going and give him food to eat and clothing, so that he can come back to his father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be his God.  Have you ever made a vow to God? Did you keep it? Jacob also declared that the pillar shall be God’s house and all that God gives him, he would surely give a tenth back to God.  Sounds like a tithe to me.

The next stop is Genesis 29.

To God Be The Glory!