Deo Gloria
Sermon for February 28, 2021
Pastor Martin Bentz
Text: Genesis 28:10-17
Theme: Have No Fear for the Future!
- Recognize that the LORD is with you.
- Rely on the precious promises he has given you.
Will you still have a job next year or won’t you? Will the company you work for still be around 5 years from now or will it have been bought out by some other company, combined with their operations and then eliminated completely? You don’t know, do you? Will you still be in good health 6 months from now or will an accident or serious illness rob you of your health? You don’t know, do you? What about your children? What does the future have in store for them? Will they get a good education? Will they go to college? Even if they do, will they be able to find a good job once they get out? What about a marriage partner? Will they be able to find a good, Christian spouse, someone who will love them and care for them and be faithful to them all their lives? You don’t know, do you? I don’t either. Fact is none of us does. We don’t know what the future has in store for us and for our families. And I don’t know about you, but that makes me uneasy. Sometimes when I think about the future and the fact that I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future and that I have no control over what’s going to happen in the future, it bothers me. Sometimes I have to admit I even become a little scared.
That’s what I find so comforting about the story we have before us this morning. Here we find assurance, assurance from God himself that we don’t have to be afraid of the future. After all, the LORD our God is with us. And he has given us some very precious promises to rely on. Let’s take a closer look at this story, shall we? We read from Genesis, ch. 28, beginning at v. 10.
Jacob was leaving home. He wasn’t going away to school, however, or moving to a new city to start a new job. No, Jacob kind of had to leave home, for his own safety. His brother, you see, was rather angry at him, angry enough to kill him. Perhaps you remember why. It all started a few years back when Esau sold his birthright to his younger brother for a bowl of lintel stew. After hunting all day long and not getting anything, Esau was famished and would have given practically anything for something to eat. Jacob probably could have charged him $10 for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and Esau would have paid it; but Jacob didn’t ask for $10. Instead he requested that Esau sell him his birthright. And Esau did. It was a decision he later regretted.
But that wasn’t the worst of it. Now his younger brother had even cheated him out of the blessing. Father Isaac had summoned his favorite son, Esau, and told him that he was going to bless him. But while he was gone, Jacob snuck in and tricked Isaac into giving him the blessing instead. As you might expect, Esau was angry. Esau was furious. He planned to get even with his brother some day. He planned to kill him. His mother, Rebekah, however, found out about his plan to take revenge and warned Jacob to leave.
With little more than the clothes on his back, Jacob hastily left home and set out for Haran, a land about 600 miles to the north, northeast. Haran was the place where Abraham and Lot and their families had lived for a while. In fact, some of their relatives still lived there. Being so far away and in a whole different country, Jacob would hopefully be safe there.
It was on his way to Haran that this incident took place. Jacob was now several days from home. He had traveled about 70 miles, like from here to Owatonna. No doubt he was tired. He had to be if he could actually fall asleep using a rock for a pillow. He was obviously alone. And he was probably more than a little afraid.
As I mentioned, he had left home. He had left behind everything that was familiar to him. In light of the circumstances surrounding his leaving, Jacob more than likely was looking over his shoulder, wondering if Esau was following him, afraid that Esau might catch up with him. In addition, Jacob was traveling through strange country, land that was unfamiliar to him. And he was headed for a foreign country, a place he’d never been before, to stay with people he didn’t know, people he’d never seen before. No doubt, Jacob wondered about his future. Would he make it safely to Haran? If he did, would the people there be friendly to him? Would they accept him? Would he fit in? Would he be able to make a living there or would every day be a struggle just to survive? Would he find a spouse there, a God-fearing wife? Would he ever return to Canaan again? Would he ever be able to come home? Jacob had good reason to be a little uneasy, a little afraid about the future. Things certainly didn’t look very good.
With such thoughts running through his mind, Jacob pulled up a rock and went to sleep. That night he had a dream, an incredible dream, a dream he never forgot. In his dream he saw a gigantic stairway, one that reached from the earth all the way up to heaven. In addition, he saw angels ascending and descending on that stairway. And there, at the top of the stairway was God himself. “I am the LORD,” he said, “the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. … I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you…”(vv. 13+15). Contrary to what Jacob might have thought, he wasn’t alone after all. The LORD was with him. Yes, he was leaving home, leaving behind his family and friends. Yes, he was traveling on unfamiliar turf. Yes, he was headed for a strange land and was going to be living with a bunch of strangers; yet he was not alone. The LORD, his God, was with him. And he would stay with him wherever he went. The LORD would watch over him, and the LORD would keep him safe. There was no need for Jacob to be fearful of the future.
Like Jacob, you and I are on a journey too. As much as we might like to think otherwise at times, this is not our home. As it says in that familiar hymn, we are but strangers here; “heaven is our home”(CW #417). As we journey through this life, we too at times look over our shoulders and wonder about our safety. With all the murders and shootings and accidents that happen day after day, we can’t help but wonder about our safety. And we wonder about our future too. Where are we going to be a year from now, five years from now, ten years from now? Where are we going to be living? What are we going to be doing? We don’t know.
One thing we do know, though: Like Jacob we are not alone. The LORD our God is with us. The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob is with us. He assures us of that. No, he may never have spoken to you in dream as he did here to Jacob; but he certainly has spoken to you in his Word. Listen to just a few examples:
Psalm 23 – “The LORD is my Shepherd. I shall not want. … Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil. For you are with me; your rod and your staff–they comfort me”(vv. 1+4).
Isaiah 41 – “But you, O Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, you descendants of Abraham my friend, I took you from the ends of the earth, from its farthest corners I called you. I said, ‘You are my servant’; I have chosen you and have not rejected you. So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand”(vv. 8-10).
Hebrews 13 – “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you”(v. 5).
Matthew 28 – “Surely I will be with you always, to the very end of the age”(v. 20).
Just like Jacob, the LORD our God is with us too.
And so are his angels. In his dream Jacob saw God’s angels ascending and descending on the stairway. Here we see a beautiful picture of what angels actually do. They ascend to God, conveying to him our needs. They return from God, bringing with them strength and help for us.
Not only that, but we are also told in the Bible that God sends his angels to watch over us and protect us from harm. Psalm 91 is a prime example: “He will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone”(vv. 11-12). Guardian angels are not just fanciful figures found in children’s story books. Guardian angels are real. They are with us all the time, watching, protecting, even when we’re sleeping. What a comfort it is to know that!
Even though we don’t know what the future has in store, you and I don’t have to be afraid of the future either. For one thing, we know the LORD, and his angels, are with us.
Secondly, we also have his very precious promises to rely on. When I was little, I can remember being afraid and even crying sometimes when mom and dad went out for the evening and left us with a baby-sitter. But you know, they promised that they would come back. And they always did. So, after a while, it didn’t even bother me anymore when they left. They said they would be back and I knew they would. I knew I could count on their promise.
In the dream Jacob had that night, God gave him some very precious promises. In fact, they were very similar to the promises God had given to his grandfather, Abraham, and to his father, Isaac. For one thing, he promised that Jacob would have many descendants, so many that they would be like the dust of the earth. Secondly, the LORD promised that he would give this land, the land on which he was lying, the land of Canaan, to his descendants. And thirdly, the LORD promised that through him and his offspring all nations on earth would be blessed.
As usual this last promise was the most important one of all. Contained in these words is the promise of the Savior. One of Jacob’s descendants, one of his offspring would bring blessing not just for one group of people or one nation, but for all people, for every nation. That offspring would be the one who would reconcile a wayward world to God. That offspring would be the one who would pay the penalty for all people’s sins. That offspring would bring the blessings of forgiveness, life and salvation for all people. He would bring them peace and hope and joy, some of the blessings Paul talked about in Romans, ch. 5. That offspring, of course, was Jesus Christ, our Savior.
Indeed, the LORD had given Jacob some very wonderful promises. And Jacob knew he could count on those promises. He knew that the LORD his God was faithful, that he was reliable. If he made a promise, Jacob knew he would keep it. He always did. That’s the kind of God he is. Listen again to what he told Jacob in v. 15: “I will not leave you,” he said, “until I have done what I have promised you.” Here was another reason Jacob could rest assured about the future: He knew he could rely on the precious promises the LORD had given him.
God has given us some very precious promises too, hasn’t he? God has promised that he will provide for us and for our families even if we lose our job or our company folds up its operations here and relocates to Indonesia. And he will keep that promise, won’t he? God has promised that he will cause all things to work out for our good. And he will keep that promise, won’t he? God has promised to forgive our sins, every single one, for the sake of Jesus Christ, our Savior. And he will keep that promise, won’t he? God has promised that when it comes time for us to leave this life, he will take us to live with him in heaven. And he will keep that promise too, won’t he? You bet he will. The LORD, our God, is not about to renege on his promises. He is faithful. He always keeps his promises. He kept the promises he made to Jacob, did he not? He kept his promise and sent a Savior to rescue us from our sins and reconcile us to himself. In the same way, we can be sure that God will keep all the promises he has made to us as well. In them he has given us something we can count on, something we can rely on, even in the face of an uncertain future.
You and I don’t know what the future holds. And yet at the same time, we don’t have to be afraid of the future either. We know the one who holds the future. He is the LORD, our God. As you look ahead at the future, remember that the LORD your God is with you, not to mention his heavenly angels. In addition, rely on the precious promises he has given you. Trust in them with all your heart. The more you do, the more you’ll come to realize that the future isn’t quite so scary after all. Amen.