Bethany Dillon “Dreamer” 

Scripture
Then God said to Jacob, “Go up to Bethel and settle there, and build an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you were fleeing from your brother Esau.” Genesis 35:1

Observation
My dad is a creature of habit. I’m like him too. He’s like the milkman’s horse who knows the road so well that he needs never be directed. but change the road and he will be in trouble. That’s what happened when the city put in a new overpass through the familiar streets. It disturbed his mental map. The only way he knew how to get a sense of direction was to drive back to my grandmother’s house and find his way from there. When Grandma G saw dad’s car turning around in the driveway she knew he had lost his way home.

The road map of life can change. There are confusing twists and turns. Sometimes when we are hopelessly lost and cannot find our destination, the best thing to do is to return back to where our journey began. From the starting place we can get our bearings and find our way.

Jacob closed the circle of his life journey by going back to Bethel. Years before he had spend a tossing and turning night sleeping beside the road on a rock. There God had spoken to him with a dramatic dream of angels and a stairway to heaven. Decades later, now a widower with 12 sons he again needed to find his way. This time he was not running, he was following the Lord. The road was the same but he was a different man because of it.

The days before, his sons had picked a fight with the local residents. In fact they had committed genocide against an entire town. Jacob was scared and confused. So he went back to start, back to the place where angels came and God spoke to him.

Application

There are places on this planet that hold the marks of ladder feet where God descended from heaven and spoke to us. When confused we need to return there. My dear counselor friend, Larry Gillis, will always ask me in a time of confusion, “Phil, when was Jesus last real to you and what did he say?” It is a call back to start.

From Bethel Jacob would journey many places. In fact his family would not be together again for several more decades later in the land of Egypt under much different circumstances. It is unlikely that he would have found God’s way had he not returned back to “Go!”

Prayer
Father, returning back to Start is not a punishment; it is part of your guidance. Sometimes you lead me backward to take me forward. So this day to follow you I return back to where I started from and ask that you would show me your way. Amen.