Fleeing for his life, young Jacob had travelled over the undulating road from Beersheva on the edge of the Negev. Skirting old Salem, he had made it about twelve miles further north before the sun slipped behind the hills and “the Supplanter” bedded down for the night at what the Scripture calls simply “a certain place” (Gen. 28:11).
The man who would some day receive from God “the land whereon thou liest,” as he would soon be told, made a pillow of stones and fell into a fitful sleep.
He dreamed. In the dream he saw a tremendous ladder reaching from where he lay all the way up to heaven. And “behold!” angels ascended and descended on its rungs.
Above the ladder stood the Lord Himself, and He began to speak to Jacob in his dream. “I am,” He said, “the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac…and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of” (Gen. 28:13-15).
Awaking from his slumber, Jacob cried, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not!” (v. 16). Calling it “the house of God” and “the gate of heaven,” Jacob turned his pillow into a pillar and named the place Bethel.
So we have God and His house, angels and the ladder, a pillar the patriarch raised up, and the ground on which Jacob lay–promised to him and to his seed.
Two New Testament passages shed light on this Genesis scene: John 1:51 and 1 Timothy 3:15-16.
John 1 introduces us to the Light that illuminates the darkness of sin’s interminable night and of a Word spoken in the stillness. Like Jacob’s confession–“Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not!”–so “He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not” (Jn. 1:10).
Verse 51 leaves us in no doubt as to the ladder linking heaven and earth: “And He saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.”
We have a stone in John 1 as well, one of many stones to be built into the house of God. When Andrew brought his brother to Messiah, Jesus said, “Thou art Simon the son of Jona: thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, A stone” (v. 42). Later this Stone would write: “Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ” (1 Pet. 2:5).
Paul no doubt was also thinking of this roadside scene when he wrote to Timothy: “…that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory” (1 Tim. 3:15-16).
If we are going to behave properly at Bethel, we will need to understand the following:
1. We are always in the presence of God, whether we are aware of it or not. Practicing the presence of God is one of the secrets of holy living.
2. The church should be known for its pillar, not a pillow. It is high time to awake, as Jacob did, and to catch a glimpse of the glory.
3. The pillar was anointed with oil as Jacob made a vow to remain true to God. He wandered far from Bethel, but when the Lord brought him back, he once again anointed the pillar and was restored in fellowship.
4. The word for “ground” might well be understood as the foundation of a pillar. But this was no Roman pillar. It was a cairn raised up on the ground Jacob had been promised. The Greek work used for ground in 1 Timothy 3 is from the same root as the word Paul used for the ground to which Paul fell on the Damascus road (Acts 22:7). The pillar was the memorial; the ground was the inheritance, like the ground on which Jacob lay, but now a spiritual possession of the people of God.
What do we need to see at Bethel if we are to behave ourselves in the midst of our crooked and perverse nations? Again 1 Timothy 3:16 describes the span from earth to glory, but now the angels are observers. It is the Son of God Himself who comes to us in incarnation and who has ascended for us in glory. Great is the mystery!