Jacob left Beersheba and set out for Haran. When he reached a certain place, he stopped for the night because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones there, he put it under his head and lay down to sleep. He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. There above it stood the Lord, and He said, "I am Yahweh, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. Your descendents will be like the dust of the earth, and you will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring. 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 until I have done what I promised. (Genesis 28:10-15).
Yesterday as I drove home from the Denver airport I saw a beautiful display in the sky. Normally one can see rays of light, especially near the time of sunset, that seem to come from out of the clouds and reach down to the earth. They are usually brilliant white rays, and it is easy to imagine that angels are descending from heaven upon that "stairway." But yesterday the vision was opposite. The rays were the same deep, dark blue as the mountains in the west, and they seemed to go upward instead of white rays coming down from the clouds. These deep blue rays were perfect in form and seemed to have their beginnings in the top of the mountain, reaching upward toward heaven. "These angels are ascending," I thought to myself. Perhaps their assignment here is completed!
Then I thought of the horrific tornado and storms that had passed over this part of northern Colorado on Thursday. While I was in the Seattle for the past five days, the tornado struck 1/2 mile from where my parents live, turned west just before touching the small town where my kids and grandkids and I live, and though it damaged much property in the small community of Windsor, a day-care center with 130 children was kept safe through the center of the storm! Surely angels were assigned there. Yet what does Yeshua say about this vision we often refer to as "Jacob's ladder?" In John 1:51 He says, "I tell you the truth, you shall see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."
This is a thrilling statement! The "stairway" or "ladder" of Jacob was the same Man Jacob wrestled with in the night! It is Adonai Tzava'ot, Captain of the Angel Armies, Jesus our Lord, who commands the angels and commands the winds and the storms to obey. And it is He who was being revealed to Jacob in that place where the stairway appeared, for it was the very message of the Gospel being proclaimed to Jacob! "All peoples will be blessed through you and your offspring." Through the seed of Jacob and Isaac would come forth the Messiah who would bring salvation to the world.
But it is also critically important to remember that God also made a promise about the Land: "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 until I have done what I have promised." What had God promised? He promised that all of that Covenant Land would belong to Jacob and Isaac and their descendants forever; and that He would bring all their people back to that Land where the Messiah would restore all things and establish His Kingdom there forever!
Until this comes to pass - until the nations of the world stop pressuring Israel and the Jewish people to give up their Covenant land and until we repent, and search the skies for the coming of the One who will descend again with the angels in great power and glory - the world will continue to groan and shake and reel. Wars will continue to escalate and famines and plagues will increase - and all because Yahweh watches over His promise - His Covenant - to faithfully keep it!
