[podcast]http://www.revkwon.com/podcast/Bethel.mp3[/podcast] Last week we talked about the danger of trading our future for a bowl of beans in a sermon titled, Bean Bowl. I want to admit to all of you that Ive done that frequently and often this week. Ive traded my future and better things for the temporary things, for the momentary relief, for worthless solace. Im not going to get into who done it worse, but I will tell you that eating my bowl of beans this week, Ive stumbled upon another sermon in the life of Jacob. When I started this series, I didnt intend on gravitating on the life of Jacob for the entire series, but it looks like God isnt done teaching me from the life of the Biblical father of con-men. The sermon this morning is entitled, Bethel and I know for most, that means little to nothing, but it will mean something after this sermon. Lets open to Genesis 28, verse 10. 10?Jacob left?Beersheba and went toward?Haran.?11?And he came to a certain place and stayed there that night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place to sleep.?12?And he?dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold,?the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!?13?And behold,?the Lord?stood above it?and said,?I am the?Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac.?The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring.?14?Your offspring shall be like?the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and?your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.?15?Behold,?I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and?will bring you back to this land. For I will?not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.?16?Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, Surely the?Lord?is?in this place, and I did not know it.17?And he was afraid and said, How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. 18?So early in the morning Jacob took the stone that he had put under his head and set it up?for a pillar?and poured oil on the top of it.?19?He called the name of that place?Bethel,?but the name of the city was Luz at the first.?20?Then Jacob?made a vow, saying, If God will be with me and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and clothing to wear,?21?so that I come again to my father’s house in peace,?then the Lord?shall be my God,?22?and this stone, which I have set up for a pillar, shall be God’s house. And?of all that you give me I will give a full tenth to you. (Genesis 28:10-22) Jacob names this place, Bethel or in English, The House of God. I know its not that creative, but it is clear. In verse 17, Jacob was excited and scared and said, How awesome is this place! The place was awesome because Jacob, fleeing from the wrath of Esau, falls asleep on a stone and has a dream where God invades and speaks to him. I want you to see this scene for what it is. Jacob needed to find a place that gave him rest but he was literally in between a rock and a hard place. So he decided to use the rock as a pillow. The place was awesome because he slept wearily uncomfortable and God brought him comfort. Have you ever been in a place where life was so hard and difficult that you had to run away? Then when you run away from that difficulty you find yourself nowhere you can turn to. Then you fall asleep hopeless and abandoned in the middle of nothing. May be this nothing place is your career predicament. Maybe this nothing place is your school situation. Maybe this nothing place is the state of your relationships which is failing, at best. At worst, it is the chastisement and abandoning of everything you know and have held dearly. May be the reason you are running is no fault of your own. It is the circumstance that you have been dropped into by birth. There was no way you could survive and prosper because of who you are and where you are born intothe circumstances werent and arent working for you. This is exactly when we need to stop and rest at the house of God, or rather, at Bethel. Wow, Im just at the introduction and Im already at the punch line of our sermon this morning. What kind of circumstances are you in when and if youre using a rock as a source of comfort? Rocks arent comfortable, not in the very least. Yet, Jacob found that the rock he laid his head on belonged to the God of his fathers. The House of God is where we lay our head at night after suffering and after running and after were out of options. The House of God is where God is when we need God the most and cannot be found anywhere else. The house of God is the presence of God in the middle of nowhere. The certain place that the Bible is referring to is not an insignificant place. Yes, it was not named, but there is more to the place than he realized. It is a place where Jacob stopped because there was nothing he could do to go any further. This place was a place of destinyit is exactly where our wits ends. When we reach that place, a lot of us will not stop to rest in the House of God. Rather, we think we can rest up and go again in the morning. Gods house is where we stop for the night and lay our head knowing He is with us. God is in this place called nowhere because He intended for us to be there. The reason God intended us to be in the circumstance, the place, the situation, where we feel most hopeless and alone is because it is in that place that God promises us His blessings on our lives. We cant understand blessing and we cant understand God until God becomes our God. God cannot become our God until we need and want Him to. In Jacobs dream, God doesnt say He is Jacobs God. God says He is the God of his grandfather and father. Jacob doesnt make God his God until he comes to experience Gods presence when nobody elses presence is around. Gods house in your life is found when you are in the middle of nowhere, where nobody else can reach you. That is Gods house, where all hope is gone, God is there. Im not saying that you cant find Gods presence when things in your life is good, but I am saying that until you come to a place where you make God your God, He will never be your God. And I am saying that you only really make God your God when you recognize that God is the only one that will never fail you. Trust me, everybody fails you because everybody is a failure. God shows up when you are options. God appears to you so that He can bless you when you seem to be bless-less. You see, the House of God, or Bethel, is a place of revelation. It is at this juncture that Jacob finds a purpose for new life. When we believe in God, we know that He, as an infinitely ingenious creator, has a purpose for us despite how alike we might seem to the rest of the dumb masses of people out there. Jesus himself says that God knows every single hair of hair that youve lost in the shower drain. We are so important and so unique to God that He sent His one and only son to die so that we can believe in the revelation of our life. God gives us Jesus for the purpose of knowing why we were truly created. Bethel is not only a place where God reveals Himself to us in revelation; the House of God is a place we respond to God. Jacob responds to God by saying, God will be my God in my journey. I will offer God an offering on my journey that He is taking me on. We need to respond to God. We need to respond to Jesus in the presence of God. I know there is a calling on us all. I dont mean that all of you will be pastors or pastors wives. I do mean that God has you on a journey to go somewhere incredible. God met with you so that He can direct you, so that HE can be your God, so that Jesus can save you and lead you to places you never imagined. Your life is worth so much more when you are saved by God through the blood of Jesus Christ. You have so much more purpose when you can wake up and know that life is bigger than whatever outwardly thing that you see and experience. In Matthew 21, Jesus tells the people a parable about the stone rejected by the builders. He alludes to people who find themselves in the presence of God when the world has cast them outside. He was pointing to people who cannot catch a break in the world. Jesus was showing us that people that may not know what they are doing or where they are going because theyre so weary trying to survive and make it out alive with their lives that God is doing something different in their lives. Jesus says it is marvelous when these people are rejected because when Gods presence comes, when they accept Him as the savior redeeming them from the rejection of life that God is giving them blessings. This is the promise of God when we accept Jesus as our savior. He becomes the stone that moves and shakes and clears our path for the promises of God to come through for us in our lives. I want you to know that you were rejected by the world and you were rejected by God prior to the moment Jesus saves you through your faith in Him. So what am I saying here? Im saying this: the House of God is the presence of God in your life. It is a place where God reassures us and blesses us. If that is the case, then the House of God is a place we need to go back to often. Aside from the moment of salvation, how often do we meet with God? How often do find ourselves in the presence of God that leaves us awestruck and in wonder? When was the last time we sang, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with steadfast love and mercy? (Psalm 103:2-4) We need to go Bethel often so we can remember the promises of God, where God shows up in our lives and assures us of what He is doing. We need to be in awe of what God is doing when we find ourselves in the middle of nowhere. When I eat my bowl of beans and find myself regretting, I go back to Bethel. I dont need to remind you that eating a bowl of beans isnt that good. It is temporary, it feels satisfying until it is gone and over. Then, you dont go back for seconds because it wasnt that good to begin with. When I find myself in dire need of a pick me up because I hate everything and everybody in the world, I go back to Bethel. When I find myself looking at my life and not finding contentment with where I am and who I am, I go back to Bethel. Some of us dont have the drive we used to have in our lives when the promises of God were fresh in our lives because we dont back to Bethel. I will tell you right now that for some of us, the promises God made to us seem like fairy tale because we dont return to Bethel to find the presence of God. Some of us, when we do go back, it is so far removed from the last time that we dont believe in the promise God gave us in the beginning when we first went to Bethel, the House of God. Maybe, its not about wanting to go but the problem some of us have going back to Bethel is being unable to find it. For some of us, we dont even know how we ended up there in the first place when Jesus saved us. Weve been trying to go back, trying to find Bethel, but we cant. We cant because we dont remember the place God met us and meets with us because we have so much going on that the certain place is uncertain now. The place that used to have significance lost its meaning. We have to go find it again. I go back to my “certain place on the train. I go back to my certain place in the bathroom. I go back to my certain place when I am in solitude. I find myself running away from the world, retreating with my headphones one. I retreat from the distractions. I retreat from the things that go on. I retreat from the things and people chasing me. I find my certain place and open the Bible, I turn on a song of praise, I pray. It is in this place where I find Gods presence, in the nothingness. Where is your Bethel? It is time to go the House of God. He has promises for us in Jesus name. Lets pray.
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