Now Jacob went out from Beersheba and went toward Haran. So he came to a certain place and stayed there all night, because the sun had set. And he took one of the stones of that place and put it at his head, and he lay down in that place to sleep. Then he dreamed, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth, and its top reached to heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.Genesis 28:10‭-‬12 

*Jacob’s story is a testimony to divine, unexpected, unrequested, undeserved kindness.

Do you know such grace?

God’s grace isn’t only as good as you are. God’s grace is as good as He is.

God’s grace isn’t available just on Sundays. It claims every tick of the clock.

He set out from Beersheba to go to Mesopotamia (modern-day Turkey): 550 miles.

In the first two days he traveled forty-three miles from Beersheba to Bethel, a barren moorland that lay about eleven miles north of Jerusalem. 

Jacob turned his pillow into a pillar and renamed the place of his pain. The stone pillow, a symbol of all he lacked, became a holy pillar, a memorial to all he found. The land was a windswept badland no longer. It was a place of God.

What is your version of a stone pillow? What reminds you of mistakes you’ve made, things you’ve lost? 

What is your version of a desert? 

An empty house? A hospital room? Or loneliness? 

The promise of Jacob and Bethel is this: the Lord is in the wilderness, in the despair, in the misery, mess, and mayhem, and in broken hearts. 

God will meet you in this unwanted and unwelcome waypoint. With his help your pillow will become a pillar; your barren land will become a place of worship. God will speak, angels will come, and you will soon declare: “The Lord is in this place, and I did not know it."

When you are at your lowest, God is watching over you from the highest. 

May this day be a day of your encounter with God.. With prayers...... 

🎵🎵

Nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!
E'en though it be a cross that raiseth me,
still all my song shall be,
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

2. Though like the wanderer, the sun gone down,
darkness be over me, my rest a stone;
yet in my dreams I'd be
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

3. There let the way appear, steps unto heaven;
all that thou sendest me, in mercy given;
angels to beckon me
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

4. Then, with my waking thoughts bright with thy praise,
out of my stony griefs Bethel I'll raise;
so by my woes to be
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

5. Or if, on joyful wing cleaving the sky,
sun, moon, and stars forgot, upward I fly,
still all my song shall be,
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

*selected.. Max lucado