Audio recording Sermon manuscript: Let’s begin today by dealing with some history that takes place before our Old Testament reading. The Bible first introduces us to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12. That’s not too far into that first book of the Bible. Up to that point the history of the earth is laid out in a more general way, with a wide angle lens. In chapter 12 it focuses in on Abraham. God spoke several times to this man. He told him that he would inherit the land of Canaan for himself and his descendants. His descendants would be many and great. And through his seed all the nations of the world would be blessed. God gave Abraham the sign of circumcision as a seal of this covenant, to be done to all the baby boys when they were eight days old. Moses, the author of Genesis, says that Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. Isaac, Abraham and Sarah’s only son, was a long time coming. He was miraculously conceived and born to Abraham and Sarah when they were very old. Isaac married a woman named Rebecca. She was a distant relative of Abraham’s. Abraham and Sarah did not want him to marry one of the Canaanite women around them. Thereby he would be lured away from the true faith to worshipping the gods of the Canaanites. Rebecca, like Sarah before her, also had a hard time conceiving and bearing a child. No children came for a long time until Isaac’s prayer was finally answered with the birth of Esau and Jacob. Already, while the boys were in Rebecca’s womb, they were fighting with one another. Their mother went and inquired of the Lord, “Why is this happening to me?” The Lord said to her that two nations were in her womb. They will be separated from one another. One will be stronger than the other. The elder will serve the younger. And so it was that when Rebecca gave birth to the twins, the younger brother, Jacob, was holding on to the heel of his older brother, Esau. There is more that happened between Jacob and Esau that you can read about for yourself. For our purposes today, I will only speak about one more thing before getting into our Old Testament text. It happened right before our reading today. It is the reason why Jacob is alone in the middle of nowhere sleeping with a rock as his pillow. What happened just before our reading is that mother and son, Rebecca and Jacob, conspired against father and brother, Isaac and Esau, to get Isaac to bless Jacob instead of Esau. Rebecca had overheard that her husband was about to bless Esau after Esau provided a meal of wild game. So she and her favorite son, Jacob, went to work and tricked Isaac who was blind and old. Jacob, the younger, received the birthright. Esau did not. When Esau learned of this treachery he said that he was going to kill Jacob after his father, Isaac, had died. Rebecca found out about this and told Jacob. She wanted Jacob to go away, back to where she and Abraham, and their relatives were from. There was an additional benefit to Jacob going away besides avoiding his irate brother. He could also find a wife there. Jacob’s brother, Esau, had married two Canaanite women, which were a source of bitterness for Isaac and Rebecca. There’s nothing quite like marrying an unbeliever for derailing a person’s faith. So this brings us to our reading this morning. Jacob is on his way to his uncle Laban’s house. The sun had set, so he laid down to rest. When he fell asleep he had a dream where there was a staircase from earth to heaven with angels ascending and descending upon it. At the top of it was the Lord God. He declared to Jacob what he had already declared to his father and grandfather. Jacob and his descendants would possess this land. In his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. Plus he added that he would be with Jacob wherever he went, and that he would bring him back to this chosen land. God would not leave him until he had fulfilled all the promises that he had made. Before we get into the tremendously graciou