Dream a Little Dream...
Genesis 28:10-19
Jacob left Beer-sheba and went toward Haran. He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And the Lord stood beside him and said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring. Know that 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 promised you.”
Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!” And he was afraid, and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” So Jacob rose early in the morning, and he took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up for a pillar and poured oil on the top of it. He called that place Bethel; but the name of the city was Luz at the first. (NRSV)
***********************************************************
There isn't much about Jacob that I like. So far, he has swapped (swindled) birthrights with his older brother for a bowl of soup, and tricked his father Isaac into giving him the blessing of the firstborn. As a result, his family doesn't like him much either. And in the part of the story that we don't get to see in our reading, tempers flare at the old homestead.
As one might imagine, neither Jacob's brother, nor his father are very pleased with him, (finding out you've being played is never easy to accept). But Mom, (Thank God for Moms!) Rebeka, through this whole episode, has never lost her cool.
There is a great line in the movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding that goes " the man is the head, but the woman is the neck."
And in our story 'Beck, the neck,' turns the head of her husband in another direction and convinces him that since the birthright blessing he gave to Jacob can’t be undone, the best course of action he can take is to secure the family line… and that means getting Jacob a wife. And, by the way, not one of those dreaded Hittite trash girls like his brother Esau brought home! Jacob will have a Canaanite- a woman from the Promised Land! And what better place to find a wife for the heir of the family fortune than at Rebeka's former homestead, now run by her brother Laban. (Why not keep thing in the family?)
So, in response to his wife's "suggestion," Isaac meets with Jacob and gives his cheating heir one final blessing; and he did it not bitterly or with resentment- what’s done is done. Isaac bestows the blessing in the act of a patriarch. He has realized perhaps, that things all of this is bigger than his feelings; bigger than his dreams for his family; bigger than his agenda. And Jacob, for the first time, receives a sincere blessing and with it, a charge. And in that moment, the promise is handed down to another generation.
So with the blessing of his parents, Jacob sets out to his Uncle's house to find a wife.
As night falls however, Jacob finds himself in the middle of the dessert without shelter. And he takes some stones, places them around his head, lays down to sleep, and has a dream.
He dreams of a ladder, or a ramp, or stairway, or something- and that something connects earth to heaven. And on it, there are some type of heavenly beings cascading up and down; and in the midst of all the' glory hallelujah!' music that is surely playing in the background, amidst the glitter falling and spotlights shining and disco balls spinning… GOD appears! And although the Hebrew translation is unclear as to whether God was standing over the ladder or over Jacob, it really doesn’t matter. The image is the same- God is present… and God is in control.
An important aside to note here, is that up to this point in the narrative, rebel Jacob hasn’t really bought in to all of this "God stuff"- he even called God, "Your God." when he had spoken with Isaac earlier... so in the dream, it makes sense that God starts speaking to Jacob by introducing himself:
“Jacob, I am the Lord" (God always has great opening lines) "I am the God of your grandfather Abraham, and the God of your father, Isaac. The ground you are lying on belongs to you. I am giving it to you and your descendants. Your descendants will be as numerous as the dust of the earth! They will spread out in all directions—And all the families of the earth will be blessed through you and your descendants. What’s more, I am with you, and I will protect you wherever you go. One day I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have finished giving you everything I have promised you.”(NLT, emphasis mine)
These words God spoke to Jacob sound a lot like the ones God said to Abraham. And God said them to Isaac as well. So (for those who may be counting) this is the third time (and the third generation) that God repeats the blessing of the covenant…
And Jacob wakes up with a revelation! “God is real and in this place… And I had no idea!” The 'Ah Ha' moment of a lifetime! Naturally, he was afraid, (or the Hebrew says, he was ‘overawed’… I love that word) and he said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”
So the next morning, he takes the stone that he had his head on and sets it up on its side and pours oil on it and makes it an altar to the Lord… some of you might recognize this from Abraham- (when Abraham heard God speak, or God would meet him at a place, Abe also would deem it as a 'holy place,' and set up an altar…) And for the first time in Jacob's journey, he follows in his grandfathers footsteps… and he names the place Bethel… house of God…
But here’s where our story takes a turn. Because as much as we would hope that our trickster Jacob would go on from this place being changed forever… much as we would like to hope that an encounter with the Almighty leaves us radically altered, and that such an encounter would cause us to lose all of our dishonorable traits and leave only the pious, loving righteous person… that isn’t the case.
And our friend Jacob wakes up from his dream; a dream where, in my estimation, he has glimpsed the divine; a dream that has made such a profound impact that he wakes up and is sure for the first time in his life that God is real… and he puts his fist up to the sky like Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With the Wind, and makes a vow: “IF God will indeed be with me and IF God will protect me on this journey, and IF God will provide me with food… and clothing… (lemme think if there is anything else I need…)… oh yeah…and IF I get back to my father’s house in one piece, THEN the Lord will certainly be my God.”
How about that? So Jacob isn’t denying the existence of God… that’s clear… but Jacob is not ready to jump into this thing with both feet… Jacob still wants to set up security measures for himself- and IF God delivers… THEN Jacob will respond by letting God be his God. And he goes on, now directing his comments toward the Almighty…
“This stone that I have set up as a memorial pillar will mark this as a place where God lives. And everything you give me, I'll return a tenth to you."
Are you liking Jacob yet? The great Patriarch of our faith? I know… I have trouble with him too. But I think the reason we have a problem with Jacob's attitude and his behavior, is because we see that kind of attitude in ourselves. Jacob represents, at least up until now, the parts of us that we like to pretend don’t exist… or at least the parts of ourselves that we are always trying to improve…
We would prefer to think of ourselves more like Abraham, that when God says "Go" we drop everything and go; despite the risks to ourselves, despite what people might think of us. We want to believe that if God asked us to do anything, that we wouldn’t act like Jacob-
And by now you may be thinking... ‘It’s different though... for us, isn't it? Jacob had a genuine encounter with God! God came to him and told him directly! If we had that kind of an experience…then surely we would be...(fill in the blank)’
And I would say to that, 'let’s look again at the text…' Because the text doesn’t say that God visited Jacob in a dream… the text doesn’t tell us that God even caused Jacob to have this dream… the text only says that "Jacob had a dream…"
Jacob had a dream, and when he woke up, he had to decide what to do with that dream, just like we do. He had the opportunity to interpret that dream any way he wanted to, just like we do. We are looking at his dream as outsiders, and we can put our own spin on it dependent on our own theology- and make it into anything we want.
Examples: “Oh… the ladder… yes… that obviously represents our journey toward spiritual perfection… and every rung represents another step in the journey…”
Or
"The ladder with God at the top and angels going up and down it represents the times when we are closer and farther away from God… but God is with us through it all”
Or
“The angels are obviously being sent out from God to do work on the earth and then after their mission is complete, they return back to the Lord for further instruction…”
And you know what? These are all valid interpretations. And we decide which one we like the best, and we can run with it.
And so does Jacob…
Jacob's actions, like all of our responses to dreams, or visions, or even the thought that God may be directly speaking to us, reflect not just the encounter, but the way he in which he filters the encounter. When we have such revelation, we take it; we take what God is saying to us, but then we put it through our own personalities- we put it through the filter of our own experience, our own knowledge, our own belief system… our doubts, fears, hopes, childhoods, experiences, etc ., and what comes out on the other end, our actions… are going to be somewhat short of where we “should be,” (at least in the eyes of those looking in.)
In the same way, Jacob’s personality- especially the part that wanted to make sure he was always taken care of- became a factor in how he was to respond to his encounter with the divine…
When we tell the story of Jacobs ladder, we often stop short of telling the ending, because we don’t like to see that Jacob acts... well, a lot like us. But when we don't tell the ending, we miss what I believe is the best part of the story: Who and what Jacob was on the inside… his flaws, his personality disorders, his strengths, weaknesses, fears, doubts, worries… God knew them all! And before Jacob was born, God knew everything that he would go through, everything that he would think, or choose, or accept or reject… God knew. And of all the characters God could have chosen…. God still chose Jacob.
And that’s why this is such a perfect ending… because so many times when we look at our own lives and we see the Jacob in us; the selfish, manipulative, self centered, self securing, scared, controlling things to make them go our way, parts of us (anybody?) we start to freak out!
And when we do get the courage to act on the call of God on our lives, it is often acted on with less commitment than we like to admit; or we act with strings or stipulations attached. And often when that happens, we think that we are in some way failing God… that we have disappointed God… we could have done better; we could have been stronger…
... and while that may be true, here is a bigger truth…
That before you heard God speak into your life… God knew all the things about you that you consider flaws… God knew the Jacob parts, as well as the Abraham, “OK God, I’m in!” parts… and guess what? God spoke to you anyway… God continues to communicate with you, anyway…. and God’s plan that works through you goes on, anyway…
Does that mean we stop trying to improve, or stop trying to work toward Shalom, or stop trying to deepen our relationship with God or with one another? Not at all- striving to be all that God has designed for us to be is always to the glory of God and to the benefit of the kingdom. But when we continually worry about the ways in which we fall short, and stress out about how we aren’t living up to everything God wants from us, or doing everything God wants us to do, or be everything God wants us to be… we waste valuable time and energy that we could be using for Shalom-building. And further…we make God into something or someone that is reliant or dependent on US and not the other way around!
I’ve told you this before (once or twice at least)… you are no secret to God. God created you! God knows everything about you- your strengths and your flaws- and guess what Jacob? God still loves you like the dickens! And God still uses each of us in a way that embraces every part of us to bring about Shalom. This journey of faith is just that…. a journey. Walk tall... dream big… be you! And may the God of grace hold you close, wherever you go…
For a look at the entire Jacob Sermon Series, click here
Jacob left Beer-sheba and went toward Haran. He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on the earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And the Lord stood beside him and said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring. Know that 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 promised you.”
Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place—and I did not know it!” And he was afraid, and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” So Jacob rose early in the morning, and he took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up for a pillar and poured oil on the top of it. He called that place Bethel; but the name of the city was Luz at the first. (NRSV)
***********************************************************
There isn't much about Jacob that I like. So far, he has swapped (swindled) birthrights with his older brother for a bowl of soup, and tricked his father Isaac into giving him the blessing of the firstborn. As a result, his family doesn't like him much either. And in the part of the story that we don't get to see in our reading, tempers flare at the old homestead.
As one might imagine, neither Jacob's brother, nor his father are very pleased with him, (finding out you've being played is never easy to accept). But Mom, (Thank God for Moms!) Rebeka, through this whole episode, has never lost her cool.
There is a great line in the movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding that goes " the man is the head, but the woman is the neck."
And in our story 'Beck, the neck,' turns the head of her husband in another direction and convinces him that since the birthright blessing he gave to Jacob can’t be undone, the best course of action he can take is to secure the family line… and that means getting Jacob a wife. And, by the way, not one of those dreaded Hittite trash girls like his brother Esau brought home! Jacob will have a Canaanite- a woman from the Promised Land! And what better place to find a wife for the heir of the family fortune than at Rebeka's former homestead, now run by her brother Laban. (Why not keep thing in the family?)
So, in response to his wife's "suggestion," Isaac meets with Jacob and gives his cheating heir one final blessing; and he did it not bitterly or with resentment- what’s done is done. Isaac bestows the blessing in the act of a patriarch. He has realized perhaps, that things all of this is bigger than his feelings; bigger than his dreams for his family; bigger than his agenda. And Jacob, for the first time, receives a sincere blessing and with it, a charge. And in that moment, the promise is handed down to another generation.
So with the blessing of his parents, Jacob sets out to his Uncle's house to find a wife.
As night falls however, Jacob finds himself in the middle of the dessert without shelter. And he takes some stones, places them around his head, lays down to sleep, and has a dream.
He dreams of a ladder, or a ramp, or stairway, or something- and that something connects earth to heaven. And on it, there are some type of heavenly beings cascading up and down; and in the midst of all the' glory hallelujah!' music that is surely playing in the background, amidst the glitter falling and spotlights shining and disco balls spinning… GOD appears! And although the Hebrew translation is unclear as to whether God was standing over the ladder or over Jacob, it really doesn’t matter. The image is the same- God is present… and God is in control.
An important aside to note here, is that up to this point in the narrative, rebel Jacob hasn’t really bought in to all of this "God stuff"- he even called God, "Your God." when he had spoken with Isaac earlier... so in the dream, it makes sense that God starts speaking to Jacob by introducing himself:
“Jacob, I am the Lord" (God always has great opening lines) "I am the God of your grandfather Abraham, and the God of your father, Isaac. The ground you are lying on belongs to you. I am giving it to you and your descendants. Your descendants will be as numerous as the dust of the earth! They will spread out in all directions—And all the families of the earth will be blessed through you and your descendants. What’s more, I am with you, and I will protect you wherever you go. One day I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have finished giving you everything I have promised you.”(NLT, emphasis mine)
These words God spoke to Jacob sound a lot like the ones God said to Abraham. And God said them to Isaac as well. So (for those who may be counting) this is the third time (and the third generation) that God repeats the blessing of the covenant…
And Jacob wakes up with a revelation! “God is real and in this place… And I had no idea!” The 'Ah Ha' moment of a lifetime! Naturally, he was afraid, (or the Hebrew says, he was ‘overawed’… I love that word) and he said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”
So the next morning, he takes the stone that he had his head on and sets it up on its side and pours oil on it and makes it an altar to the Lord… some of you might recognize this from Abraham- (when Abraham heard God speak, or God would meet him at a place, Abe also would deem it as a 'holy place,' and set up an altar…) And for the first time in Jacob's journey, he follows in his grandfathers footsteps… and he names the place Bethel… house of God…
But here’s where our story takes a turn. Because as much as we would hope that our trickster Jacob would go on from this place being changed forever… much as we would like to hope that an encounter with the Almighty leaves us radically altered, and that such an encounter would cause us to lose all of our dishonorable traits and leave only the pious, loving righteous person… that isn’t the case.
And our friend Jacob wakes up from his dream; a dream where, in my estimation, he has glimpsed the divine; a dream that has made such a profound impact that he wakes up and is sure for the first time in his life that God is real… and he puts his fist up to the sky like Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With the Wind, and makes a vow: “IF God will indeed be with me and IF God will protect me on this journey, and IF God will provide me with food… and clothing… (lemme think if there is anything else I need…)… oh yeah…and IF I get back to my father’s house in one piece, THEN the Lord will certainly be my God.”
How about that? So Jacob isn’t denying the existence of God… that’s clear… but Jacob is not ready to jump into this thing with both feet… Jacob still wants to set up security measures for himself- and IF God delivers… THEN Jacob will respond by letting God be his God. And he goes on, now directing his comments toward the Almighty…
“This stone that I have set up as a memorial pillar will mark this as a place where God lives. And everything you give me, I'll return a tenth to you."
Are you liking Jacob yet? The great Patriarch of our faith? I know… I have trouble with him too. But I think the reason we have a problem with Jacob's attitude and his behavior, is because we see that kind of attitude in ourselves. Jacob represents, at least up until now, the parts of us that we like to pretend don’t exist… or at least the parts of ourselves that we are always trying to improve…
We would prefer to think of ourselves more like Abraham, that when God says "Go" we drop everything and go; despite the risks to ourselves, despite what people might think of us. We want to believe that if God asked us to do anything, that we wouldn’t act like Jacob-
And by now you may be thinking... ‘It’s different though... for us, isn't it? Jacob had a genuine encounter with God! God came to him and told him directly! If we had that kind of an experience…then surely we would be...(fill in the blank)’
And I would say to that, 'let’s look again at the text…' Because the text doesn’t say that God visited Jacob in a dream… the text doesn’t tell us that God even caused Jacob to have this dream… the text only says that "Jacob had a dream…"
Jacob had a dream, and when he woke up, he had to decide what to do with that dream, just like we do. He had the opportunity to interpret that dream any way he wanted to, just like we do. We are looking at his dream as outsiders, and we can put our own spin on it dependent on our own theology- and make it into anything we want.
Examples: “Oh… the ladder… yes… that obviously represents our journey toward spiritual perfection… and every rung represents another step in the journey…”
Or
"The ladder with God at the top and angels going up and down it represents the times when we are closer and farther away from God… but God is with us through it all”
Or
“The angels are obviously being sent out from God to do work on the earth and then after their mission is complete, they return back to the Lord for further instruction…”
And you know what? These are all valid interpretations. And we decide which one we like the best, and we can run with it.
And so does Jacob…
Jacob's actions, like all of our responses to dreams, or visions, or even the thought that God may be directly speaking to us, reflect not just the encounter, but the way he in which he filters the encounter. When we have such revelation, we take it; we take what God is saying to us, but then we put it through our own personalities- we put it through the filter of our own experience, our own knowledge, our own belief system… our doubts, fears, hopes, childhoods, experiences, etc ., and what comes out on the other end, our actions… are going to be somewhat short of where we “should be,” (at least in the eyes of those looking in.)
In the same way, Jacob’s personality- especially the part that wanted to make sure he was always taken care of- became a factor in how he was to respond to his encounter with the divine…
When we tell the story of Jacobs ladder, we often stop short of telling the ending, because we don’t like to see that Jacob acts... well, a lot like us. But when we don't tell the ending, we miss what I believe is the best part of the story: Who and what Jacob was on the inside… his flaws, his personality disorders, his strengths, weaknesses, fears, doubts, worries… God knew them all! And before Jacob was born, God knew everything that he would go through, everything that he would think, or choose, or accept or reject… God knew. And of all the characters God could have chosen…. God still chose Jacob.
And that’s why this is such a perfect ending… because so many times when we look at our own lives and we see the Jacob in us; the selfish, manipulative, self centered, self securing, scared, controlling things to make them go our way, parts of us (anybody?) we start to freak out!
And when we do get the courage to act on the call of God on our lives, it is often acted on with less commitment than we like to admit; or we act with strings or stipulations attached. And often when that happens, we think that we are in some way failing God… that we have disappointed God… we could have done better; we could have been stronger…
... and while that may be true, here is a bigger truth…
That before you heard God speak into your life… God knew all the things about you that you consider flaws… God knew the Jacob parts, as well as the Abraham, “OK God, I’m in!” parts… and guess what? God spoke to you anyway… God continues to communicate with you, anyway…. and God’s plan that works through you goes on, anyway…
Does that mean we stop trying to improve, or stop trying to work toward Shalom, or stop trying to deepen our relationship with God or with one another? Not at all- striving to be all that God has designed for us to be is always to the glory of God and to the benefit of the kingdom. But when we continually worry about the ways in which we fall short, and stress out about how we aren’t living up to everything God wants from us, or doing everything God wants us to do, or be everything God wants us to be… we waste valuable time and energy that we could be using for Shalom-building. And further…we make God into something or someone that is reliant or dependent on US and not the other way around!
I’ve told you this before (once or twice at least)… you are no secret to God. God created you! God knows everything about you- your strengths and your flaws- and guess what Jacob? God still loves you like the dickens! And God still uses each of us in a way that embraces every part of us to bring about Shalom. This journey of faith is just that…. a journey. Walk tall... dream big… be you! And may the God of grace hold you close, wherever you go…
For a look at the entire Jacob Sermon Series, click here
Photo from jaci XIII
