“This is how life goes—we send our children into the

wilderness. Some of them on the day they are born, it

seems, for all the help we can give them. Some of them

seem to be a kind of wilderness unto themselves.” I love

these words from Marilynne Robinson’s novel Gilead.

They are written in the voice of an aging pastor writing

a letter to his seven-year-old son. Some of them are a

wilderness unto themselves. I think we know what the

pastor means.

Jacob. He is a man on the run. He’s been a conniver

since the day he was born, born clinging to his brother’s

heel. He convinces his famished elder brother Esau to

sell his birthright for a bowl of homemade stew. And

that’s bad enough, but this time Jacob has gone too

far. You see, a father’s blessing was a big deal in the

ancient world. And irrevocable. By impersonating Esau,

Jacob fooled their elderly father Isaac into giving him

the blessing intended solely for the firstborn son—that’s

Esau. And so, we’re talking family drama in the extreme,

and now Jacob is in serious danger. Rebekah warns her

favorite son that Esau plans to console himself by killing

his brother Jacob. And so, with his mother’s help, Jacob

flees home. His only aim at this point is to survive. That’s

where we find Jacob this morning—on the run, not only

from his brother but from God as well. At least, that is

what he thinks.

A safe distance away and exhausted from the rapid

retreat, Jacob finds a stone pillow (that sounds like an

oxymoron to me, but that’s what it says), and there on

that rock, he closes his eyes to rest. And that’s when

the unexpected happens—the very God from whom

he is running shows up. And, even more surprising,

this God speaks to a broken and terrified young man.

The divine words show no sign of anger or judgement,

no resentment or rejection. Just the opposite. At the

very lowest point of Jacob’s life, God climbs down into

the depths of Jacob’s despair and makes a promise.

“Remember, I am with you…I will not leave you.”

With this voice still ringing in his ears, Jacob wakes up.

And please note that nothing around him has changed—

the same dusty wilderness, the same stone pillow,

perhaps more importantly the same dire and deadly

circumstances. It’s all the same, and yet, for Jacob, it’s

all different now. We know this because of what he

says and because of what he does. He speaks out loud,

as if there is someone who can hear his words in this

deserted place, “Surely the Lord is here—and I didn’t

know it!” Didn’t know it? You hoped it wasn’t true! And

then he turns that pillow into a pillar, rooted in the earth

and pointing toward heaven, and he gives that place a

name. Bethel. The house of God.

In her wonderful book, An Altar in the World, Barbara

Brown Taylor writes, “The first time I read Jacob’s story

in the Bible, I knew that it was true whether it ever

happened or not.” I think she’s right about that. Jacob’s

story is true, true in the deepest sense of that word. True

to our experience. True to the realities of life. Family

dramas. Estrangement. Isolation. Fear. Despair. Jacob

is all alone in that deserted place in the middle of the

wilderness. He is filled with fear and uncertainty, and

as he examines the trajectory of his life to this point,

surely he wonders, “Will I survive? And do I even want

to? Is there any purpose left for me to pursue? Have I

finally squandered the gift of this life before I even had a

chance to live it?” Isolated and estranged, he must have

questioned, “Can anyone, even God, love me now?”

If these are the queries that occupy his troubled soul,

the answers do not arrive in the abstraction of ideas or

the rigidity of laws. Believe this and you will be loved.

Do that and you can be forgiven. No, no, no. Instead,

God just shows up. God enters the wilderness. This too

is true, that God climbs into your deepest despair. This

too is true, that God meets us in the wild within us, even

when we are a wilderness unto ourselves. What God

offers Jacob is no detailed plan or an intricate proposal.

There is no escape route from his brother’s wrath. God

offers presence. I will not leave you. The promise of

that divine presence is both unconditional and utterly

unrestricted. Bound neither by Jacob’s past sinfulness or

by the trappings of religiosity we humans construct.

When you are on the run from God, from an estranged

loved one, from yourself, what you need is not a

roadmap or a to do list because the wilderness is not

out there. The wilderness is in here. What you need

is an experience of holiness. What you require is the

promise that you are loved. What transforms Jacob

in this morning’s story is not some lesson learned or

training received—it is an unexpected encounter with a

holy God. God, who meets this troubled trickster in the

wilderness. The wilderness within.

This story boldly proclaims that the presence of God

is not limited to the places we construct or the time

we set aside to acknowledge it. Jacob named the

place House of God, not because he built a temple but

because God found him there.

And so, I wonder, have you experienced the presence

of God in an unexpected place? Or an unusual time?

Sometimes, those places are physical. Perhaps you’ve

experienced the presence of God in a hospital room,

or on a long car ride, or at a neighbor’s table, or a

public place. But often they are the wild places within

us. The places we most hesitate to go, the depths of

our souls we avoid. We find God in a place of grief

or a time of deep sadness. We experience God in

our anger at injustice. We discover God’s presence

when we are most aware of our own brokenness. God

meets us when we’ve stopped looking for God. Surely

the Lord is in this place…and I didn’t know it! You see,

the wonder of worship is that it happens anywhere

God shows up, any time we still ourselves long

enough to see.

So. You. You who are running from a past you cannot

change. You who have stopped believing in a love

strong enough to hold your broken spirit. You who

are filled with fear for the future. You who wonder if it

can ever be different. You who are weary and heavily

burdened. You for whom God has seemed so distant

for so long. You who need the comfort of a simple

promise. Listen. Here it is. You are loved by the one

who knows you to the deepest places of your heart.

You are held by a power beyond your imagination

and a strength that vanquishes all your fear. You are

precious in the sight of the one who created you. Do

not go in search for God. Do not run away from God.

Stay right here in those places of uncertainty and fear,

and let God come to you in the wilderness within.

Today, our younger son Benjamin turns seven years old.

I am not ready to release him into the wilderness. Never

will be. But that’s what we’ll do. We’ll do it time and time

again. Wilderness after wilderness. The same is true for

all of us. No choice in that. So, here is what I want my

son to know, and you can listen as well. Benjamin, you

never have to run away from God, or from me. Because

that’s what unconditional love means. I will not leave

you. The wild places within you belong to God. They are

filled with a beauty only God can fully see. The promise

is true. God will not leave you. When we stop running

and quit hiding, God will meet us where we are. And

that encounter will not be filled with fear or wrath or

punishment or resentment or anger. It will be grace. It

will be grace. All grace. Always grace. Grace washing

over us. Grace filling us up. Grace enough to carry on

and some to give way.

Because, believe this, God is not distant. Invited or not,

expected or unforeseen, the Lord is in this place, and in

every place where we find our hearts encouraged and

our souls lifted up. That ancient dream showed Jacob

something he could never discover on his own: that God

climbs down. God met him where he was. Jacob slept in

Bethel. He lived in God’s house. And so do you. Amen.