Our Daily Bread Today Genesis 28 ++

Scripture selections are taken from the Rock Church Daily Bread Reading schedule for each month. “Lena’s Journalin’” are Lena’s comments on the specific passages from her Daily Journal.

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Genesis 28:1-22
1So Isaac called in Jacob and blessed him. Then he ordered him, "Don't take a Caananite wife. 2Leave at once. Go to Paddan Aram to the family of your mother's father, Bethuel. Get a wife for yourself from the daughters of your uncle Laban.
3"And may The Strong God bless you and give you many, many children, a congregation of peoples; 4and pass on the blessing of Abraham to you and your descendants so that you will get this land in which you live, this land God gave Abraham."
5So Isaac sent Jacob off. He went to Paddan Aram, to Laban son of Bethuel the Aramean, the brother of Rebekah who was the mother of Jacob and Esau.
6Esau learned that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him to Paddan Aram to get a wife there, and while blessing him commanded, "Don't marry a Canaanite woman," 7and that Jacob had obeyed his parents and gone to Paddan Aram. 8When Esau realized how deeply his father Isaac disliked the Canaanite women, 9he went to Ishmael and married Mahalath the sister of Nebaioth and daughter of Ishmael, Abraham's son. This was in addition to the wives he already had.
10Jacob left Beersheba and went to Haran. 11He came to a certain place and camped for the night since the sun had set. He took one of the stones there, set it under his head and lay down to sleep. 12And he dreamed: A stairway was set on the ground and it reached all the way to the sky; angels of God were going up and going down on it.
13Then GOD was right before him, saying, "I am GOD, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac. I'm giving the ground on which you are sleeping to you and to your descendants. 14Your descendants will be as the dust of the Earth; they'll stretch from west to east and from north to south. All the families of the Earth will bless themselves in you and your descendants. 15Yes. I'll stay with you, I'll protect you wherever you go, and I'll bring you back to this very ground. I'll stick with you until I've done everything I promised you."
16Jacob woke up from his sleep. He said, "GOD is in this place--truly. And I didn't even know it!" 17He was terrified. He whispered in awe, "Incredible. Wonderful. Holy. This is God's House. This is the Gate of Heaven."
18Jacob was up first thing in the morning. He took the stone he had used for his pillow and stood it up as a memorial pillar and poured oil over it. 19He christened the place Bethel (God's House). The name of the town had been Luz until then.
20Jacob vowed a vow: "If God stands by me and protects me on this journey on which I'm setting out, keeps me in food and clothing, 21and brings me back in one piece to my father's house, this GOD will be my God. 22This 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."

~Lena’s Journalin’ Today~
Isaac sent Jacob off when he was still known to everyone as Jacob. Jacob was who he was at this time, an unchanged man, a man of the earth, a naturally born man, as each of us are, a man who was “born in sin” and his sin nature was his evident nature. He was who he was naturally born to be. His father was more than naturally minded, his father knew God, but he didn’t yet know God himself. He knew his father knew God, but he didn’t know Him himself. Is that where we have found ourselves today? Do we know people who know God and it looks like something we might like to do also, but we’re not sure we have the inward desire and power to go as far as they have gone in their faith-walks and the call they feel on their lives?
We see others as so “spiritual”, so relational with God, as if that is their special “call “ in life and we don’t share that call, at least we’ve not heard it made to us yet.
The only reason we would not have heard that call yet is deception, spiritual blindness and deafness, because everyone alive is called into the Fatherhood relationship of God. Abraham knew that, but Isaac and Esau did not know that yet. They “went to church” with their dad for years, but now it was their time to know for themselves that God was real in their lives personally. How does one make that transition of thought? Abraham had set him up to know it, as any great natural or spiritual father will. He set him on a pathway where he could find God and meet His maker before he passed on to another life. Have you ever done that for someone? That is our responsibility before God, to help Him set the stage, so to speak, for others to see and know Him personally. I bet Abraham’s heart leapt for joy when he heard of Jacob’s encounter with God and what God had shown him.
I like when Jacob says, this is where God is and I didn’t even know it! The light had come on. The doors and windows of the spirit became visible to him. Does that mean they finally appeared, or were they already there? They were there, his father before him had seen then, in a different way, but they were the same visions. They saw visions of salvation, of eternity, of the spirit realm of God, their Father.
Notice when he finally saw what God had already revealed to his father before him, he was excited, motivated, made alive, he began responding. Lack of response, is evidence of blindness to God. If one sees God and the things of His kingdom coming to earth and the place He’s set them in, inside of the picture to bring it to pass, a response is automatic. He became glad to go to the house of the Lord, he became interested in everyplace he goes, sleeps etc, being the place for God also.
If God has been calling you, somehow someway, He’s been bringing people across your pathway that represent Him, that know Him and they are at least stirring up your curiosity for God, listen a little more intently, tune your ear and your heart to the call of God. I can guarantee He has been calling you to Himself. If you aren’t hearing you either don’t want to yet, or you’re letting things distract you. I want to warn you, ignoring God is never beneficial to anyone at all ever. God knew the length of your days left on earth, the # of chances you have to receive Him before He ever sent that messenger your way. It would be a horrid tragedy for you to pass on from this life and not have your Jacob experience. Many of us somehow buy time thinking by our actions that we are as god and know all things about the time of life. We do not know when we are here and a moment later we are gone from here. Seriously. We are in such the urgent time, please do not take a whole lot of time in making the decision God has already been prompting you to make concerning Him and leaving your old life that is leading you to death and hell. Make a turn around of residences, of eternal addresses. Change citizenships and who your father is, Today is not too late. Every consideration should be made for Christ, for God, for His body.
Another response of Jacob, when he met God was to give Him a piece that really represented giving God permission to bless all of what he had, it was called a tithe, though it is was only 10%, it represented the whole thing. Jacob really got saved, when he did he said I’m not holding any part of my life back from following after You, Lord, and being who You created me to be from the very beginning of my life here. He realized he was here to live for God’s plans to happen through men, heavenly plans were supposed to come to pass on earth and he was a part of that. He had a part, we have a part in bringing heaven and earth together. Isn’t it funny how when one understands it, it is so? Was it not so before that? YES it was, yes it is! But when we know it, when we know Him, we join in with what is. Let’s join in while we still have time to. Our work to do with God is not left or heaven, there’s no work in heaven, the work is to be accomplished here!


Proverbs 27:17-19
17 You use steel to sharpen steel, and one friend sharpens another. 18 If you care for your orchard, you'll enjoy its fruit; if you honor your boss, you'll be honored.
19 Just as water mirrors your face, so your face mirrors your heart.
Psalm 122:1
1 When they said, "Let's go to the house of God," my heart leaped for joy.