Genesis 28:10-19a
Proper 11 (16) – Year A
Why would one climb Jacob’s ladder if “the Lord” stood beside Jacob and the ladder?
There is a lot of archetypal stuff that has gone into this scene from outside it. Somehow it has become an image of a gateway to heaven, rather than a presence of G*D in a paradise of a present.
- - - - - - -
what’s G*D doing
at the bottom of a ladder
while angels climb
up and down down and up
angels are a diversion
while G*D sneaks up
as imagination soars
with the ladder
angels bring not messages
from above
but store promises
with the rain
together they fertilize
our present
to bring forth much future
growing up
promises spoken
are carried on high
to baptize tomorrow
resurrect a day after
As found in Wrestling Year A: Connecting Sunday Readings with Lived Experience
A mere tenth of the way into his journey to a foreign land (both geographically and the next stage of life, adulthood) Jacob came near Luz, a place of almond trees, and lay himself down to sleep, perchance to dream. In the midst of questions of being he finds a gift: “YHWH was standing over against him” (Everett Fox, The Five Books of Moses – do explore this phrase).
You may think you are journeying into a strange and distant land for a new and great adventure, only to find you are part of a still new and even greater adventure – finding G*D where you are.
Rather than having to take everything to G*D – G*D is already present.
How does this shift open up life for you?
The part we don’t hear because the storyline is cut here – Jacob bargaining with G*D and offering a tenth. Later, Jacob returns to Bethel for the confirmation of a new name of Israel. Before death he blesses the “twelve”, entrusts his whole future (not just a tenth). And after burial, what was here begun, ends with Joseph’s words, “You planned ill against me, but G*D planned-it-over for good in order to ... keep many alive. So now, do not be afraid! I myself will sustain you and your little-ones!” [Everett Fox] From divisions within family and stealing of birthrights comes a comfort that speaks to our hearts. May your journey lead you to living as though the enmity between us is “planned-over for good” and we can comfort rather than antagonize one another.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2002/july2002.html
How much sooner than Bethel might Jacob have recognized the presence of G*D with him was a freedom from compulsion to follow family stories? Having heard the story of his birth, how much programming was it going to take to move beyond one interpretation of a painful womb? How many times would Jacob need to experience again the wonder of Assurance Lost, Assurance Regained? How many cycles does it take to come to an understanding of Assurance as a Given?
What teaching would be helpful to move us beyond the limitation of family stories or curses around birth expectation so we might better receive and respond to continuing opportunities to decide for larger living. Unless we are going to posit unwitting actions under a grand plan, it is important to wonder how Jacob’s recognition of Solomon’s Wisdom of mercy for others instead of practical jokes or strength through mildness and forbearance might lead beyond a fixed future. This leads us to wonder about what would be different if we had learned that righteousness shows itself through kindness earlier than we did. [This is not to lay guilt trips, but to ask how our experience might be brought to bear to help others in their journey and to encourage us in our next steps.]
Hopefully we will hear in statements of our God being a top God, not so much an unchanging and immovable arrogance, but a willingness to walk the way of exile to a future different than currently expected. The choice of learning, “I’ll show you, for chasing me out – I’ll take over the land,” or to share the bounty, is always with us, even if unrecognized from time to time.
A result of the “gift” of repentance is a willingness to share life and resources. May we so repent that hope is set loose in our life and the lives of those around us.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2005/july2005.html
Yes, let the righteous shine – but not at the expense of those not yet righteous or deemed never to be righteous.
We have a long-standing tendency to idealism and utopia. Somehow or other, we yearn for days to come where all choice is taken from us so we won’t even consider an alternative because such might eventually, incrementally, lead us elsewhere, astray. Likewise, we dream of days of non-complicity wherein evil is externalized and we are implicitly innocent.
Truth be told, I hold invasive weed and intentional wheat in tension. Neither can be denied its present reality. So was a first garden and so a future garden already holding an unrepentant thief.
Beware enthusiastic righteousness (even G*D's) rooting out all but itself – it is unbalanced with only one leg to stand on.
- - - - - - -
what’s G*D doing
at the bottom of the ladder
while angels climb
up and down down and upangels are a diversion
while G*D sneaks up
as imagination soars
with the ladderangels bring not messages
from above
but store promises
with the raintogether they fertilize
our present
to bring forth much future
growing uppromises spoken
are carried on high
to baptize tomorrow
resurrect a day after
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_07_01_archive.html
Why would one climb Jacob’s ladder if “the Lord” stood beside Jacob and the ladder?
There is a lot of archetypal stuff that has gone into this scene from outside it. Somehow it has become an image of a gateway to heaven, rather than the presence of G*D in the paradise of the present.
So often it is true that G*D is present without our knowing it. So are people. Garnet Rogers has a song well worth the searching for – “Soul Kiss”. Online it is currently at the this link of the Morning Show on Minnesota Public Radio. When you open it slide the time line along to one hour (1:01.30) and listen. [Note: You may need to get a free download of Real One Player to hear this - Windows version or Macintosh version .]
His story about the song is available at a MySpace link:
Garnet Rogers
Carol | MySpace Video
vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=7674135.
[Note: You may need to get a free download of Real One Player to hear and see these. A Windows version is at www.real.com/realplayer and a Macintosh version at www.real.com/mac/realplayer.]
Jacob had a “soul kiss” while having his head on a hard rock. Isn’t that just the way it is in life?
What would you say constituted a soul kiss for you?
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2008_07_01_archive.html
Were Jacob to dream tonight he might not have a static ladder in the background, but a movie visual of a time warp. With all those once predictable stars or angels whooshing by there may still be a moment of foreground revelation that this particular instant is as important in hyperdrive as a starting and ending place.
In this moment there is assurance available - no matter what, we are not alone.
And so we bless the stones in our lives. No matter what form the blessing takes or by what name it is later known - once and forever, a blessing occurred. Whether speeding by or sitting zazen, blessings can be missed - both being recognized and scattered.
May you receive the assurance you need to mosey on to the next part of your journey, strewing blessings along the way, no matter what stone or weed might yet be stumbled over or need to be removed.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2011/07/genesis-2810-19a.html
Genesis 28:10-19a
Year A - Pentecost +6 or Community Practice 6
July 20, 2014
Genesis 28:10-19a
Where the “ladder” is set is a place of wheat and tares, seed and weed. It can be meta-geographical location—a previous Garden of Eden, a present Garden of Your Life, or a next Revelational Garden. Wherever set, it gives shape to the ascending and descending aspects of life.
What do you image as the work of ascending or descending such a metaphoric ladder? A usual response might entail something about sin or prayer, but for the moment consider a simpler and more complex dynamic of an on-going creation larger than sin or prayer.
You are invited to take this ladder with you wherever you might go—“Know a creative process we shorthand as G*D is with you wherever you go. It will not leave, no matter how we try to escape our part in it, and will continue to trouble us with a word or a sign.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-O5NoCyxg6c
Susan Werner - Did Trouble Me
Found on her CD: The Gospel Truth
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2014/07/genesis-2810-19a.html