He was the father of the Twelve Tribes of Israel but Jacob was nonetheless a very slow learner. He has this amazing vision at Bethel in Genesis 28 but by his own admission, “the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it” (v. 16). Jacob had a hard time understanding how God could be a part of his life on the run. With a rock for a pillow and the canopy of the stars for a tent he could not see how God could be mixed up in all that.
Jacob would struggle in Laban’s house to see it was really the lord’s house and that God was painstakingly working in day to day details to accomplish His purpose in the Patriarch’s experience. Later Jacob would fail to see the unfolding of God’s presence in his reunion with Esau (33: 10). Late in life, Jacob is cynical and morose (37:35; 42: 36, 38; 43: 14; 45: 28; 47: 9). Jacob was a real slow learner, so not surprisingly, God selected an episode at the end of his life to illustrate his faith (Heb. 11: 21).
Do you ever feel like a slow learner? Do you ever think about how little progress you have made in your walk with God? We all do at times. How do we move it up to the next level? Well, one of the things which greatly helped Jacob was a trip back to Bethel (35: 1-15). What did the slow learner learn on this revisit? He learned that everything he needed to know was already available to him. He just needed to open his eyes to what God had for him. The farther you get from your conversion the more you will realize that everything you need was in your conversion.