The book of Genesis is punctuated by key moments in which God reconfirms his covenant promises to his people. This is what happens in Genesis 28 and this covenant reconfirmation is accompanied by a graphic picture. Jacob sees a vision of a stairway reaching to heaven, with angels ascending and descending upon it. In Scripture, ‘heaven’ indicates God’s special dwelling place. God is present everywhere but there are places where God dwells harmoniously with people. The Garden of Eden was a kind of heaven on earth in this sense. From the fall onwards heaven is envisaged as a realm separate to the earth. Revelation 21:3 points to a day, however, when God will make the earth his special dwelling place once more. Here in Genesis 28, Jacob encounters a kind of portal, a gateway, to heaven. This vision is a foretaste of what the temple would symbolise to Israel, which is why he calls the place Bethel, meaning ‘house of God’. Like Jacob’s encounter at Bethel, the temple would function as a kind of connection point between the realms of heaven and earth. There is still a temple, a portal, in the world today but it is not made of wood and stone. It is made up of people and it is called ‘the church’ (Ephesians 2:19-22). We are the special dwelling place of God and the portal through which the kingdom of heaven comes on earth. We are the ‘house of God’. When we gather, therefore, we should come with great expectancy for where God’s people unite “there the Lord bestows his blessing” (Psalm 133).
Think about how you can be a part of implementing God’s will on earth ‘as it is in heaven’.
Read Genesis 28:10-21 along with Ephesians 2:19-22
