Daily Lesson for February 14, 2014

Today's Lesson is from Genesis 28, the story of Jacob's ladder:

16 Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it.” 

Jacob is on the run. His brother Esau is looking for an opportunity to kill him because Jacob has stolen Esau's blessing. So the boys' mother comes up with a plan to send Jacob off - purportedly to find a wife, but really to save his hide.

For all Jacob knows, this is the end. In his mind he will never be able to return home. He is afraid of his brother and ashamed of himself. His father he cannot bear to look at again. It is hard to say which is a worse burden to carry - the sting of his father's rejection or the guilt of what he did in response to that rejection. Jacob's only ally is his mother, who is cunning and manipulative in a Victoria from Revenge kind of way. 

This is the end; Jacob has left home and will never be able to go back. And just to underscore the point the scripture says, the sun went down. Yesterday was no more and tomorrow was totally dark.

And that's where it happened. As Jacob slept, with his head upon a rock, he dreamed of a ladder stretching up into heaven with angels ascending and descending. And then the voice of the LORD, "Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go."

Jacob awoke from the dream and made an altar, saying "Surely the LORD is in this place and I did not know it."

There are people reading this who are on the run. Your yesterday, with its deception and lies and terrible relational consequences, has run out and tomorrow is unknown and uncertain. This Lesson comes to you today to say, "Build an altar." 

Right where you are, stop and pray on this revelation: if God can be in a place without our knowing, then God can be any place without our realizing it. God can be in this place. Not only can God be in this place, God is in this place. The Psalms say there is no place we can run to where God is not. God is with us on the journey today, and God stays with us into whatever places we might go tomorrow. 

Surely, God is in this place right here today. And surely He is sending His angels descending the ladder from heaven to go with us and watch over and protect us in our tomorrow. Surely these things are true, because this is the story not only of Jacob's ladder, but also of ours.

So let us build the altar.