and I come again to my father's house in peace -- then shall Jehovah be my God.
Jacob had just seen heaven opened above him. He had heard God promise land, children, protection and a safe return. His answer is a vow with an "if" in it. Commentators read verse 21 as a measure of how little Jacob knew the God who had just spoken to him.
Each part of Jacob's vow asks for something God had already promised. One writer sets the two side by side:
Vows do not belong to the age of grace we live in, but to the age before it. The first vow in Scripture is Jacob's, and it comes while God is bringing him up and disciplining him. Poor Jacob! God had just appeared to him and given him promises with no conditions. Again and again He said, "I will": "I will give, I will keep, I will bring you again, I will not leave you" (Gen. 28:13–15). But in taking a vow, Jacob stands on legal ground.
Jacob asks for food, clothes and a safe homecoming. One writer sets the vision beside what Jacob asked for:
Poor Jacob's heart cannot get beyond an "if." And in its thoughts of God's goodness it cannot rise higher than "bread to eat, and clothing to put on." These were the thoughts of a man who had just seen the magnificent vision of the ladder reaching from earth to heaven. The Lord stood above it, promising him countless descendants and a possession that would last forever. Jacob could not take in the reality and fullness of God's thoughts. He measured God by himself, and so missed Him completely. In short, Jacob had not yet come to the end of himself, and so he had not really begun with God.
The hardest word in the verse is "then." Jacob puts off calling the LORD his God until the promises are delivered.
He promises that, if the Lord fulfils all His promises, then, once that is done, the Lord will be his God. Who would be his God in the meantime?
The verse names God twice: "the LORD" and "God." Behind those two words stand the names "Jehovah" and "Elohim," which one writer explains:
Elohim is the One who holds the position of God. Jehovah is the personal name of the One who truly is God… When it says, "then Jehovah shall be my Elohim" (Gen. 28:21), we must go back to verse 13, from which Jacob drew what he said here, and to verse 16 as well.
Jacob's own later words test the vow. In a time of danger he prays — and the words of verse 21 are still missing:
All is Jacob here, and not Jehovah. He sets Jehovah's glory aside and thinks only of his own blessing… I, I, I fills the scene, and is the whole subject of his prayer. So in this hour of trial he fails to keep his vow. He acknowledges Jehovah only as the God of his father Abraham, the God of his father Isaac, the Jehovah who spoke to him — but not as his God.
Commentators do not leave the verse in condemnation. They say two things about how God treated this bargain. First, He honoured it and went past it:
The ground that he took in his vow was about as selfish as any to be found in a true saint of God. It came to this: if God will be with me, look after me, and do for me what I want, then He shall be my God. And I will give Him a tenth of all that He gives me. A bargain like this is barely above the level of a decent man of the world. Yet God bore with him, and clearly accepted his feeble vow, and did for him all that he wished, and more besides.
Second, God came back to that vow years later. One writer sees the reminder as love, not book-keeping:
God had not forgotten the original terms, and neither would He let His servant forget them. Is this legality? No; it is the display of divine love and faithfulness. God loved Jacob, and He would not let him settle for less than the old standard. He watched over the state of His servant's heart, and He gently reminds him with these touching, meaningful words: "I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed the pillar, and where you vowed a vow."
- Promise first. God spoke His "I will"s over Jacob before Jacob said a word; the vow is a reply, not a first move.
- "If" answers "I will." Jacob turns God's guarantee into a contract, and stands on legal ground where God had offered grace.
- Low expectations. A ladder into heaven shrinks to bread and clothing, because Jacob measured God by himself.
- "Then" delays God. Making the LORD his God at the end of the journey leaves the question open: whose God is He on the way?
- Grace outlasts the bargain. God accepted the feeble vow, gave more than Jacob asked, and years later called Himself "the God of Bethel" — holding Jacob to his best moment out of love.
And this stone, which I have set up [for] a pillar, shall be God's house; and of all that thou wilt give me I will without fail give the tenth to thee.
Jacob is running for his life when God meets him in a dream. God promises to keep him and bring him back — with no conditions. Jacob's reply is this vow: a stone set up as God's house, a tenth promised, and an "if."
The place had a name before Jacob renamed it, and both names carry meaning:
When Jacob poured the oil on the top of the pillar, he marked everything that happened that memorable night as sacred. The old name of the place was Luz, meaning a curve, and it indicated what Jacob's life had been — far from straight. But now for Jacob it was Bethel, the dwelling place of God. That place mattered greatly later in his life.
Jacob names two things at Bethel — a gate and a pillar. One writer explains what each stands for:
Jacob says, "This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." Then he sets up "a pillar, and poured oil on the top of it." The gate presents the thought of access to heaven. Through the gate we can get in touch with heaven for praise and prayer... The pillar, as we know from the story of Jacob's parting with Laban, carries with it the thought of witness (Gen. 31:52).
God had just spoken without conditions. Jacob answers with one:
Notice, "if God will be with me." Now the Lord had just said, emphatically, "Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land." And yet poor Jacob's heart cannot get beyond an "if." In its thoughts of God's goodness, it cannot rise higher than bread to eat and clothing to put on. Such were the thoughts of one who had just seen the magnificent vision of the ladder reaching from earth to heaven.
Yet the same low ground did not make God turn away:
But though Jacob did all this, the ground he took in his vow was about as selfish as any you will find in a true saint of God. It came to this: if God will be with me, look after me, and do for me what I want, then He shall be my God. And I will give Him a tenth of all that He gives me. A bargain like this is barely above the level of a decent man of the world. Yet God bore with him and evidently accepted his feeble vow, and did for him all that he wished, and more besides.
Jacob was not the first man in Genesis to give a tenth, and the comparison is unflattering:
How different Jacob's vow is from Abraham in Genesis 14! Abraham refused to let strangers make him rich. He gave tithes of everything, unasked, to Melchizedek, priest of God Most High, possessor of heaven and earth.
Did Jacob ever pay what he promised?
He vows too that he would surely give to God one tenth of all that God gave to him. Did he seriously think he was being very generous? God had said, "I will," but Jacob said, "I will surely." Of course God keeps His promise perfectly. But there is no record that Jacob ever carried out his promise to give God one tenth of all.
Commentators weigh the vow differently: one sees God bearing with Jacob and accepting it, another finds no record that he ever paid it.
The tenth is not carried forward as a rule for believers today:
In Christianity everything we have is sometimes viewed as belonging to God. We are only stewards of what God has given us (Luke 16:11-12). But our present possessions are also viewed as our own (Acts 5:4), and we are responsible for using them rightly. Those who are rich are not told to give a tenth, but are to "be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share" (1 Tim. 6:18).
Later God introduces Himself to Jacob by this very vow. That is not God driving a hard bargain:
God had not forgotten the original terms, and He would not let His servant forget them. Is this legality? No; it is the display of divine love and faithfulness. God loved Jacob, and He would not let him stop short of the old standard. He jealously watched over the state of His servant's heart. In case it should remain below the Bethel mark, He gently reminds him with those touching and significant words: "I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and made a vow to me."
- Bethel — the crooked place, Luz, gets a new name from the man who had lived a crooked life: the house of God.
- Grace first — God promised with no conditions. The vow was Jacob's response, not God's price.
- The "if" — Jacob answers "I am with you" with "if God will be with me," and shrinks God's promises down to bread and clothing.
- The tenth — a bargain barely above a decent worldly man's. Abraham gave his tithe unasked; no record says Jacob ever paid his.
- The God of Bethel — God remembered the vow, not to condemn Jacob but in love. He would not let His servant stay below Bethel.