Climbing the Right Ladder

Genesis 28:10-19a

How do you define success? Oliver Wendell Holmes at age 90 said, “The secret to my success is that at an early age, I discovered I was not God.” Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “To leave the world a bit better, to know that even one life has breathed easier because you lived, that is to have succeeded.”

We catch up with Jacob, today about 50 miles from home. Tricky Jake, with a little help from his mother, has successfully stolen his brother’s inheritance from their blind father. Now he is running for his life. At this place called Bethel, with a pillow made of stone, Jacob dreams about a ladder stretching all the way from earth to heaven.

Rabbi Harold Kushner suggests the ladder represents the distance between “who we are” and “who God intends us to be.” If you study the text closely, you will see that Jacob neither constructs the ladder nor climbs it. Therein lies a critical point in our consideration of success.

Jacob has been climbing a ladder all his life. The problem is that the ladder is one of his own making. Jacob’s ladder is a ladder of greed. Grab what you can while you can. Success for Jacob, like for many of us, meant getting the better of the other person before they have a chance to get the best of you. After all, is life not the survival of the fittest?

George Lucas, the creator of the Star Wars movies, was once asked why Anakin Skywalker became the evil Darth Vader. George Lucas replied, “He cannot let go of things. That makes you greedy. When you are greedy you are on the path to the dark side.” Jacob’s ladder was a ladder of greed and competition. DO whatever it takes to win. In Jacob’s view, somebody had to win and somebody had to lose, and he was going to be a winner. A sign seen at the Olympics said, “You don’t win the silver medal, you lose the gold medal.” Such is the life of competition. That is the way we like it, and that is the way we live it.

It was Jacob’s ladder all right. He had been climbing it since he was born. It is a ladder of greed. It is a ladder of competition. It is a ladder of isolation. He winds up fifty miles from home, by himself and scared. On this night with a stone for a pillow, Jacob is between a rock and a hard place. Someone once said there are two great disappointments in life. One is not getting what you want. The other is to get it and find out it was not worth the effort in the first place.

When I was a teenager my grandmother shared this little poem with me:

When you get what you want in your struggle for self and the world makes you king for a day.

Just go to the mirror and look at yourself and see what that man has to say. For it isn’t your father or mother or spouse whose judgment upon you must pass. The fellow whose verdict counts most in your life Is the one staring back in the glass.

Here, alone, Jacob finds himself in ultimate isolation, having been climbing a ladder that was going nowhere. Maybe you are tired of climbing such ladders. If so, you may be in the very spot to find the wondrous resources of a God who doesn’t fail us. God views things totally differently than we do. If your ladder climbing has left you out on a limb of isolation, I have good news for you. God does not desert us. Jacob missed the mark. He didn’t understand his calling. He hasn’t grasped the notion of the blessing that is his. God comes to him anyway. Here the Lord builds a ladder all the way to Jacob. The Scripture says, “The Lord stood beside him.”

When the Lord comes, Jacob moves from achieving to receiving. And the Lord stood beside him 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 your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring;” (Genesis 28:13-14)

Jacob, Why do you have to grab for that which is already yours? When will we learn? The best gifts in life are free: the beauty of the earth, the air we breathe, the life we live, the sun that shines, the birds that sing. We may earn a living, but in a reflective moment, know that we are given a life. In a moment of introspection, Jacob is forced to understand that God had already given him the blessing.

That night, Jacob moved from achieving to receiving. Some of us are tired of climbing. If you want to stop, recognize that all I have needed God already has provided. Jacob ran into a ladder that night. It was not Jacob’s ladder; it was the God’s ladder stretching from Heaven to earth. It was a ladder that moved Jacob from achieving to receiving.

It was a ladder that took Jacob from power to presence. God says to Jacob, “Know that 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.” Then Jacob woke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place— and I did not know it!” then he said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven.” (Genesis 28:15-17)

Maybe for the first time in his life, Jacob met somebody bigger than himself. Maybe the only way to deal with our own narcissism is to come face-to-face with a power that is greater than our own. Listen to what God says to Jacob that lonely night in Bethel.

I am with you. That is compassion. I will watch over you. That is protection. I will bring you back. That is guidance. I will never leave you or forsake you. That is companionship.

That night under the stars, Jacob recognizes that it is not by power that one finds the grace of God; it is by acknowledging the presence of the One who comes in the night. That night Jacob moved from power to presence.

That night Jacob moved from getting and grabbing, to giving. Then Jacob made a vow, saying, “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and give me bread to eat and clothing to wear, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God, 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 surely give one tenth to you.” (Genesis 28:20-22)

When you are stranded in a tough place of your own making, God will extend the ladder all the way to where you are.