Unchanging Promise

While continuing Jacob’s story in the One-Year, one of the passages from Genesis 28 caught my attention. It is one of the restated promises God makes known to Jacob, in the same way that He repeated and reinstated His covenant promise with Abraham and Isaac. At the place Jacob will later call Bethel, in a vision, the Lord speaks to Jacob from heaven, and reminds him of that same promise to bless all nations through his descendants. Jacob is in uncharted territory; he has been forced to stay away from his family and find a future with his extended family, due in no small part to his own manipulation. His future likely felt uncertain, and sleeping on rocks in the middle of nowhere wouldn’t have helped matters.

But, despite these uncertain and wobbly circumstances, God tells Jacob:

“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 you.” (Genesis 28:15)

There is no uncertainty there — not even the smallest trace. The same God that was with his grandfather and his father visits him in a dream has His eye on Jacob (who probably needs to have someone to get him out of the trouble he gets himself into more than most). Wherever he goes, wherever his wandering and living takes him, the Lord is with Jacob and watching him. Jacob will not have to hide away from the land promised to him, because God will not only watch him or be with him (as if that wasn’t enough!) but will ensure his return to his family — even his estranged brother will be restored to him.

Then there’s the last part, the part that stood out to me the most: “I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” The Lord is still doing what He promised Jacob. He does not even associate Himself as having “left” Jacob, long after Jacob had already left this world:

“I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” (Exodus 3:6)

and again:

“But in the account of the burning bush, even Moses showed that the dead rise, for he calls the Lord ‘the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive.” (Luke 20:37–38)

The Lord is still in the act of blessing all nations through Jacob’s Seed. Jesus has fulfilled and is fulfilling and will fulfill. But it was this last part: “I will not leave you…” that caught my attention. Many (many…) years after Bethel, Jesus makes another certain, unshakeable promise. He says something very close to the promise made to Jacob and others in the past:

“And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:20)

He’s still with Jacob, as He promised. He still has yet to do all He has promised, even with all the uncountable good He has already done. Regardless of how stable your circumstances are or aren’t, He will not leave You until He has done what He said. Guess what?

That means He’ll never leave until YOU are with Him.

It means He won’t leave, period.