God is mentioned many times as the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,” so Jacob played a major part in God’s great scheme of things – but what did God do in Jacob’s life that means anything to us today?
Well, for me, Jacob is an illuminating example of God making himself real gradually, because trust in God came slowly to Jacob. There were great swathes in his life spanning many years when it seemed as though God didn’t rate much at all in his mind. Like the fourteen years Jacob spent working for his uncle to finally “get Rachel” (Genesis 29:20, 27). No mention of God at all during those years, and no trusting God to sort out the mess with Laban either.
Which is odd, because one chapter earlier God had made himself real to Jacob in a dream, and in it a wonderful promise that “I (God) am with you and will watch over you wherever you go….I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you,” Genesis 28:10-15.
And was God ever real to Jacob then, because on waking up “he thought, ‘Surely the Lord is in this place and I was not aware of it’” (16). “Not aware,” note, suggesting God really hadn’t been that real to Jacob so far. But he certainly was aware now, because “Jacob was afraid,” verse 17, “and said, ‘How awesome is this place. This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.’” It was suddenly very real to Jacob that God’s right here with us, and we can be with him. And he vowed there and then that “the Lord will be my God” (21).
But how much did he then trust God to sort out his family woes, with his two wives competing for bearing his children (29:31 to 30:24) and each of them believing God was with them (Leah 30:20, and Rachel 30:23), while Jacob just bumbled along not involving God at all?
Or so it seemed, because on his escape from Laban, Jacob tells his family that God “has been with me wherever I have gone” (35:3). So he did believe that God was involved.
His trust in God took on three forms, then: times when God wasn’t real at all, times when God was very real, and times when he knew God was always bubbling away in the background looking after him. Did God give us Jacob, then, to show us that growing in trust involves all three for us too? But also taking into account that “God revealed himself to Jacob” too….(next blog)
Buck To Basics 