Have you read the story of Jacob running away from home? It is amazing! It is possible to find yourself somewhere in it, or maybe something similar that you have experienced. I will not tell you the story here and now, you better read it yourself. (Here is the whole story)
But recently I came across a beautiful comment on a certain passage from the life of Jacob, which I really would like to share with you. It comes from the book “Patriarch and prophets” by E.G.White. Hopefully you will not only like what you read in the following lines, but also made you think.
But first the original:
Genesis chapter 28, verse 10- 22
Now Jacob went out from Beersheba and went toward Haran.
So he came to a certain place and stayed there all night, because the sun had set. And he took one of the stones of that place and put it at his head, and he lay down in that place to sleep.
Then he dreamed, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth, and its top reached to heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.
And behold, 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.
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.”
Then Jacob awoke 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!”
Then Jacob rose early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put at his head, set it up as a pillar, and poured oil on top of it.
And he called the name of that place Bethel (House of God); but the name of that city had been Luz previously.
Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “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.”
The vision
“In the vision the plan of redemption was presented to Jacob, not fully, but in such parts as were essential to him at that time. The mystic ladder revealed to him in his dream was the same to which Christ referred in His conversation with Nathanael. Said He, “Ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” John 1:51. Up to the time of man’s rebellion against the government of God, there had been free communion between God and man. But the sin of Adam and Eve separated earth from heaven, so that man could not have communion with his Maker. Yet the world was not left in solitary hopelessness.
The ladder represents Jesus, the appointed medium of communication.
Had He not with His own merits bridged the gulf that sin had made, the ministering angels could have held no communion with fallen man. Christ connects man in his weakness and helplessness with the source of infinite power. All this was revealed to Jacob in his dream.
Although his mind at once grasped a part of the revelation, its great and mysterious truths were the study of his lifetime, and unfolded to his understanding more and more. Jacob awoke from his sleep in the deep stillness of night. The shining forms of his vision had disappeared. Only the dim outline of the lonely hills, and above them the heavens bright with stars, now met his gaze. But he had a solemn sense that God was with him. An unseen presence filled the solitude. “Surely the Lord is in this place,” he said, “and I knew it not…. This is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.”