Stopped for the night, the sun suddenly set, he makes his
bed and envisions a ladder stretching from the ground to the sky. Angels flit up and down it. Surely, Jacob is invited to climb the ladder,
to take hold of a rung and soar to the heights – to dance with the angels and
achieve the ultimate bird’s eye view: the entire land and his entire life
stretched out before him. Jacob is
granted the most awesome, complete vision of all.
He doesn’t climb the ladder.We cannot know why Jacob doesn’t move from his spot. Perhaps it’s because the ultimate big picture is beyond our ken. As human beings, our scope is inherently limited. The master plan is not for us to know.
People regularly ask me why. “Why did I get hit by a car?” “Why did I get sick?” “I’ve been a good person -- why is God doing
this to me?” (We rarely ask why we got
the job of our dreams, why we are healthy, why our lives are bubbling with goodness
and blessing.) The simple, sometimes
painful truth is that we cannot know why. Human beings are finite, and we are denied
the bird’s eye view of our lives. We are
confined to living them moment by moment.
Travelers through life as Jacob was, we travel with a compass, but not a
map.
In fact, I think there’s rarely a why, only a what
– as in, “what will I do with this knowledge?
How am I to live knowing that the world isn’t fair, that pain is very
real, that life is brief, that I am not unique?” This is the true challenge and, simultaneously,
opportunity for growth.
The story of Jacob’s ladder has a fascinating twist. Even though Jacob doesn’t ascend the ladder
to heaven, he realizes nonetheless that “God is in this place” (Genesis 28:16).
God,
“standing up above it,” is the bird’s
eye view (Genesis 28:13). God is the master plan. And at the same time, God is right beside us,
allowing us glimpse the totality of life through this present moment, and also
to know that we are not alone.
God is both places, here and there.
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