When we looked back in our lives, we would recognize that it was the Lord who first loved us. The Lord can use us in a mighty way if we truly repent and submit to His will. God will not allow His child to continue in his wayward ways, but will bring His own back to Him.

1. God calls His own by revealing Himself to us (Gen 28:10-15)

God spoke to His people through visions and dreams in the Old Testament. Today God speaks to His people through the Bible. God revealed to Jacob through a dream of the ladder that was set up on earth. On this ladder, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. The ladder signifies the entrance to heaven. Similarly, the Lord Jesus Christ taught in John 1:51 that through Him there is a bridge between God and man. We are ministered to by the Written Word and the Living Word. We believe in Jesus Christ because He first called us. God revealed Himself to Jacob by using His covenantal name, LORD, which told Jacob that He is the covenant-keeping God. Even though Jacob had not acknowledged, obeyed and submitted to God, God had loved him and given these blessings to him. Why did God love Jacob? It was out of His own good pleasure that God loved Jacob and chose him. Does Jacob deserve God's love? Definitely not, but God’s love for him is an unconditional love.

2. Jacob’s response to the Lord’s call (Gen 28:16-22)

Prior to this, Jacob had no fear of God. After this instance, he acknowledged God. His worship of God in that place was an act of consecration. That place (originally called Luz) was an insignificant place. After this incident, it was re-named Bethel (“house of God”). We too may be insignificant people, but God has chosen us and has given us the fear of God so that we can serve Him.

Jacob made a conditional vow to God. Only after God had met his condition, that he accepted the Lord as his God. God continued to work in Jacob through tribulations so that Jacob would have true unconditional faith in Him. Let us have a wholehearted consecration and trust that God will supply all our needs; let us take God at His word and submit to Him in all things.