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16 Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, "Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it." 17 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!" 18 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. 19 And he called the name of that place Bethel; but the name of that city had been Luz previously. 20 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, 21 so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God. 22 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." ~ Genesis 28:16-22
Today, we close out our study of Genesis 28 where Jacob has just experienced his first encounter with the God of the Bible. Jacob's encounter with God came through a dream of a ladder reaching from heaven to the earth. As we pointed out in our last study, the Lord Jesus identified Himself as the ladder. Through his dream Jacob learned that the greatest antidote for our fear is our worship of God.
In v.16 of today's passage we read, "Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, 'Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.'"
When Jacob awakened from his dream, he was fully aware that he had been in the presence of the Lord. God is everywhere at all times, but His presence can be, and is, more expressed in some places than in others. He dwelt between the cherubim above the ark and His glory was seen by many prophets. Every believer in the Lord Jesus has been sealed by the Holy Spirit. The believer has all of the Spirit that he will ever receive at that moment. However, the Spirit can obtain more of the believer. His presence fills the obedient soul in a passive way which is displayed in an active presentation of His revealed glory.
In v.17 of today's passage we read, "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!'"
There are two types of fear: one drives us away from God and the other drives us to Him. There is a fear that God commands and a fear that God forbids, a fear that builds up and a fear that tears down, a fear to gain and a fear to lose. Jacob's fear was the result of him seeing the Lord and His holiness. Jacob saw himself differently that day because he saw God in a way that he had never seen Him before. Overwhelmed by God's power and holiness and a deep awareness of his own sinfulness and fragility, a worshipful fear emerged in Jacob. Jacob's fear provoked him to worship God. According to Proverbs 9:10, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom."
In v.18 of today's passage we read, "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."
As soon as Jacob awakened, he took the stone that he had used as a pillow during the night and he made of it an altar and then poured oil on it as an act of consecration. We are not told that he understood that this was the same spot where Abraham many years earlier had also built an altar. His anointing the stone was a demonstration of his faith in the vision he had seen and the promises the Lord had given him. Just as the ladder did, the altar points us to the Lord Jesus. The words for "the stone that he had put at his head" are also found in the Psalm 118 speaking also of the Lord Jesus as the rejected cornerstone.
Jacob poured oil on the stone to consecrate it as the entry point to the House of God. The High Priest of Israel, the prophets, and the King of Israel were all anointed with oil on their heads. Like them, the Lord Jesus is our High Priest, our Prophet, and our King. The Lord Jesus was the long prophesied Messiah who would die for our sin and He would be raised from the dead as a clear sign that His death was enough to conquer sin and death.
In v.19 of today's passage we read, "And he called the name of that place Bethel; but the name of that city had been Luz previously."
Jacob named the place "Bethel" which means "the House of God." The name of the city had been previously "Luz" which means "to turn away" such as turning away from what is really real. Luz had been named after a "crooked and perverse people" who had lived there. This is the reason Jacob didn’t enter the city because of it was wicked.
This Stone had been rejected by this wicked city and yet it became the cornerstone of Bethel, the House of God, picturing the Lord Jesus who is the doorway to heaven. Instead of entering Luz Jacob slept in the field and he had a vision of the glory of the Lord who would come to this wicked earth, leaving the glory of the House of God, to redeem all humble enough to received His free gift of rightness with God.
In v.20-22 of today's passage we read, "20 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, 21 so that I come back to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God. 22 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.'"
This was the second time someone gave a tenth of his possessions, the first was in Genesis 14 after Abraham defeated the 4 kings of the east and he gave a tithe to Melchizedek. The concept of tithing is mentioned in only two contexts in the New Testament. The first was the Lord Jesus speaking about the wrong intent of the scribes and Pharisees in the giving of their tithes. The second is found in Hebrews 7 which informs us that the giving of tithes under the Law was to demonstrate the greatness of Melchizedek, not as any sort of a requirement for the believer in Christ.
As a result of being defined by the Lord, Jacob worshipped God. Worship is treasuring God above all things. In John 4, the Lord Jesus said, "The hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth."
Worshiping in spirit is not contrasted with worshiping in the body, instead, it is put alongside worshiping in truth. Truth fuels worship, and Jacob recognized the truth about God and he therefore worshipped Him. Jacob's fear rendered worship. And, it was at that point in his life that Jacob became determined to be defined by the Lord.
