Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

-When you were a kid you may have done this little saying that went with hand motions: here is the church, here is the steeple, open the doors and see all the people.

~From a very early age we connected the church building with the gathering of people for worship.

There is no doubt that our gathering together as the people of God during our regular services is an important time of Christian fellowship and growth.

But we should never tie our entire spirituality to a building, and we should not limit our worship to a place.

-Sometimes we call the building that we meet in THE HOUSE OF GOD.

The house of God is most definitely a place to meet God and to worship God, but the house of God is not tied to the building with the steeple.

It becomes the house of God when the doors are open and there’s all the people.

Wherever the people of God go, whether a group or individual, there is the house of God.

-Today we are looking at time in the life of the patriarch Jacob.

God calls Jacob to go to Bethel.

That Hebrew name BETHEL literally mean HOUSE OF GOD.

Jacob named that place HOUSE OF GOD prior to our passage because there he encountered God when he was fleeing from his brother Esau.

And now he is going to encounter God again, but it is going to be different this time.

-All those years before, Jacob didn’t really know God.

You see him refer to God as the GOD OF MY FATHER.

He didn’t claim God as his own.

But now, all these years later, through so much, Jacob finally got it.

Jacob finally understood who God was.

So now, after Jacob finally learned the character of God and trusted in the promises of God, he then learned the importance of worshipping God for himself.

-Worship is not a matter of place or mere liturgy, but is a special time of hearing from God, learning from God, growing in God, and demonstrating our trust in God.

-I want us to leave here today with a renewed passion for biblical worship.

I want us to have our own Bethel experiences wherever we decide to worship we are Bethel, we are the house of God.

-I want to consider four aspects of Jacob’s experience with God in worship at Bethel that are important for our own understanding and participation in meaningful, biblical worship:

1.

The command to worship

-In v. 1 Jacob is told by God to go to Bethel and make an altar, which means to make it a place of worship.

We have seen this with most of the patriarchs.

There was no specific place of worship at these times, so people like Noah and Abraham would build altars at various places and at various times to make sacrifices to God in worship.

-God most likely chose Bethel as a place for worship because it is there where Jacob had his first real encounter with God.

In fleeing from Esau, Jacob stayed the night in that area and had the dream of the ladder reaching to heaven.

Jacob was given a vision of God and heaven.

Jacob at the time did not take God very seriously, but maybe paid him some lip service.

But now, after the years of encountering God in different ways and seeing God at work, Jacob had a newfound appreciation for who God was, what God had done, and what promises God had passed down to him.

Bethel would be the perfect place of a new or renewed worship.

-So God commands: Arise, go, dwell, and make.

God calls for worship.

God expects worship.

God demands worship.

And why shouldn’t he?

He is God.

There is nothing and no one that exists that is as worthy of the recognition that He deserves.

God is great in character and attributes.

God is awesome in power and might.

God is filled with love and mercy.

God is perfectly holy and righteous.

Who else is there like that?

There is no one.

As the only eternal being who created all things and sustains all things, God has every right to call His creation to worship Him.

-And so, we have to remember that worship is a sacred duty as well as an awesome privilege.

We have turned worship into some sort of rote action that we go through every Sunday, and some will stick a Wednesday in there too, without any thought that we are coming before the eternal God of the universe to show Him His worth, because He deserves it and because He demands it.

-Worship is treated so lightly in our day.

Again, it’s not about the place.

But there are people who do not come to church or join the church online who do nothing else throughout the week to worship God.

I find it so ironic and frustrating that most of the people who argue that they don’t need to come to church to worship don’t worship God at all at any other time either.

No, you don’t have to be here to worship.

But you better be worshipping God somewhere at some time in some way, because God commands and demands worship.

2. The preparation for worship

-In v. 2 Jacob prepares himself and his family to worship by telling them to get rid of the foreign gods that were among them.

Some translations might call them household gods or some might even transliterate it to call them teraphim.

These were small idols considered to be sacred objects that were used for various divinations and other pagan spiritual rituals.

We almost might liken them to what we would call good-luck charms.

These things were carried around and sometimes worshipped or given sacrifice so that the individual or household would be kept safe.

-It reminds me a little bit of what I saw in Japan when there on some mission trips.

Many homes in Japan set up altars in their homes that have some sort of representation of ancestral gods and they would burn incense and pray to them.

And we also found these small altars out in the streets of the city.

In case you forgot to do your little ritual at home, you could do it on the way to work or whatever.

-What Japan did and what the people in Jacob’s time did was completely pagan and idolatrous.

It may sound strange for people in Jacob’s household to do this, but you have to remember that Abraham was called out of a polytheistic, pagan way of life.

The true God Yahweh was relatively unknown among the people, so some of their past habits of idol worship would follow with them.

-But now Jacob called his family and servants and everybody to get rid of them.

They did this physically by giving them go Jacob who then buried them away never to be found again.

But then they also had to do it mentally and emotionally.

Just because you don’t have the physical representation doesn’t mean that the idol or altar in the heart has been taken away.

-You see, the reason they did this is because you cannot serve two masters, and you cannot worship two gods.

God will have no rivals.

He alone is God.

Jacob’s household would not be able to properly fulfill the command to worship God if their hearts were still knit to the teraphim that they had.

True, biblical worship entails that God has center stage in your heart.

If there is something in your heart that takes even a smidgen of honor or glory away from God, that is idolatry.

God makes it clear:

Isaiah 42:8 (ESV)

8 I am the Lord; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.

-If your heart is so full of someone or something else, there is no room for God.

And God will not accept any worship where what is due to Him is given to another.

So, when we worship, we need to rid our hearts and minds of everything else to focus in on him.

In fact, because it’s sermon time, some of you are zoning out right now and thinking about something else.

Whatever you’re thinking about right now, if it isn’t God or His Word, that’s your idol.

Before you can truly worship, get rid of your foreign gods—get rid of your idols.

3. The reasons for worship

-In v. 3 Jacob tells his household that they are headed to Bethel to worship Yahweh God, and he gives the reasons for this worship.

He specifically says:

Genesis 35:3 (ESV)

3 [He is] the God who answers me in the day of my distress and has been with me wherever I have gone.”

-And if that were not enough, when God appears to Jacob in v. 9 and onward, God reiterates the promises and says they will be fulfilled in Jacob.

So, for Jacob, God is the one who walks with him, helps him in distress, and keeps promise.

Jacob lists these out as reason for worship, they are his motivations for worship, and they are the points he brings up when he worships.

These are reasons God is worthy.

-It’s interesting—in just a few short weeks it will be Valentine’s day.

And so for our loved ones (significant others, children, etc.) we get them cards that list out all the reasons we love them.

The cards will tell them that they are an inspiration, and thank them for their perseverance in the relationship, and speak of gratefulness for their loyalty and love.