Jacob’s Fears
Genesis 28:18-12 (Orthodox Jewish Bible)
18 And Ya’akov (Jacob) rose up early in the boker (morning light), and took haeven (the stone) that he had put for his pillow, and set it up for a matzevah (pillar), and poured shemen (oil) upon the top of it.
19a And he called the shem (name) of that place Beit-El (Beth-el);
20 And Ya’akov (Jacob) vowed a neder (vow), saying, If Elohim will be with me, and will be shomer (a guardian) over me in this derech (way, journey) that I go, and will give me lechem (bread) to eat, and beged (clothes) to put on,
21 So that I return to bais avi (the house of my father) in shalom; then shall Hashem (a reference to God without using God’s name, YHWH) be for me Elohim (my God).
22 And this even (stone), which I have set for a matzevah (pillar), shall be Beis Elohim (the House of God): and of all that Thou shalt give me I will surely give the aser (tenth) unto Thee.
If you study the lives of the heroes of the Bible, you may notice a pattern. They all have some kind of gift given them early in life. Abraham and Jacob were promised to be the fathers of a “Great Nation.” Joseph had the gift of interpreting dreams. David was blessed with song and courage. Solomon with wisdom.
But with those gifts came the responsibilities of living with them. Living with them meant that each had a “tiger by the tail” that proved difficult to manage. Abraham couldn’t seem to believe in the the promise God had made to him to the point that he kept trying to pass off his wife as his sister just to save his own neck. David let his success as a warrior and king go to his head and ended up with that whole Uriah/Bathsheba scandal that lost him his life-long dream of getting to build God’s Temple in Jerusalem. Solomon had wisdom for everyone in his kingdom but not enough for his own sons who ended up so messed up that they would eventually betray him and the kingdom God had given him.
And then we have Jacob. God made a universal and eternal promise to him and all the future generations of Humanity and the first thing he does is propose a counter offer to God’s blessings. He basically says, “OK, God. That sounds wonderful, but let me ad an addendum to that covenant. I will let you be MY God if you agree to be MY protector and provider of good things during MY life’s journey…good food…nice clothes…oh, and do not forget to make sure that when I get back home, everything will be peachy-keen with my family. He even offers to make God a junior partner in his life but offering a 10% commission on everything God gives him. I envision him trying to keep one eye on the monument he had just built and the other eye on a mirror.
I also imagine God’s head shaking in bewilderment and God thinking, “This boy is going to take some serious work.” But God does not reply with any chastisement for Jacob’s immaturity in faith. He allows Jacob to continue on his life’s journey knowing full well all of the trials and difficulties that will fill the next 20 years of Jacob’s life. And Jacob continues on his naive wife-quest with a whole new attitude toward his future but with no idea of how challenging it will be.
In the lives we live today in service to God’s Kingdom we have all the same weaknesses and temptations Jacob had. Over the course of the next 20 years Jacob will be tricked as he tricked his brother and he will be deceived by others as he deceived his father Issac. His family life will be filled with jealousy amongst his wives as well as his son. The story would make for interesting “reality TV”…perhaps it would have been named, “The Real Wives and Sons of Hebron!” And perhaps we live the lives of “The Really Messed Up But Still Blessed Christians of Cobb County.”
Just as we have the same pitfalls in our lives as were in Jacob’s, the same is true of the promises God made to Jacob. We too have our inheritance through Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit. There are no promises of easy paths or an abundance of wealth or prosperity. Yet Jesus told us that His yoke was “easy” and the burden we would be called to carry in His name would be ‘light.” (Matthew 11:28-30) The yoke and burden we are called to bear in the name of Christ looks foolish, senseless and a waste of time and effort to the world. But we can have confidence that each brick we lay in service to Christ builds His Kingdom higher and stronger.
My prayer for you, my brothers and sisters in Christ, is for you to journey, not carrying the burden of your fear, but with your pockets full of God’s promises. I pray that you remember that we are at the head of line of the faithful stretching back thousands of years. Thousands of years of God’s commitment to go before us…walk beside us…and, yes, even clean up after us in all that we do and in all places we travel.
Blessings and Joy,
Jim McGrath
