Genesis 35:2

"Strange gods"? Yes, there they were, and he knew it all along, but he never felt the seriousness of it until God summoned him to Bethel. His conscience is now awake to what previously made no impression on his mind. We easily forget what our heart does not judge as it is before God... Clearly it was so with Jacob. But now the presence of God brings light into his soul — not His power working through events, not His discipline of him, but the call to Bethel. The false gods must go.

These false gods came from his connection with the world... The thought of God's presence made him remember them. It awakens in his soul the conviction that these gods, the objects of this world's worship, can never be kept alongside a faithful God. Nothing else can awaken this conviction. No experiences can ever have the effect which the presence of God produces on a soul. Such experiences are useful to humble us; they are a means of stripping us of ourselves. Still, only the presence of God as light can make us condemn ourselves. Only it gives us power to purify ourselves from our deepest idols — the ones we know well but keep hidden.

In Genesis 31 we saw how Rachel had carried off from Laban the "gods" that he valued, and there is no record of Jacob taking exception to them at that time. But with God before him, he at once became alive to the evil of them. They were to be put away. There was to be personal cleanliness too, reaching even to the clothes they wore. The presence of God demands a cleansing that covers even what surrounds us — an important lesson we all need to take to heart.

At the call of God he sets out for Bethel; he leaves his field and his own altar for the place of God's choosing. He is going to worship. Before learning to do well he stops doing evil, and begins by purging his house... Now he hates even the garments spotted by the flesh. There must be self-abasement as well as cleansing, and he tells them to take off their earrings. It was an outward sign of repentance and humility. Jacob feels his sin in tolerating the idolatrous practices in his family... Christian parents sometimes allow things in their homes that they know are wrong. It is a sin to them.

This whole change stamps another pattern upon Jacob: the clothes they wore, the altar of their worship, the stripping off of their ornaments, the denial of the strange gods in their hands, and their burial "under the oak, which was by Shechem." "Be clean" is now his word. It was later the word of the priests, and then of the prophets whom God sent among His people. At last Christ came and did the work that enables God Himself to testify that "the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin."

Jacob felt that he could not bring false gods and defiled garments to Bethel: such things might pass at Shechem, but they would never do for Bethel.

The very thought of Bethel, where God had appeared to him, revived Jacob's soul. Once revived himself, he could lead others also in fresh power.

Jacob judges Laban's gods and says, "Be clean and change your garments"; but he holds with a greedy hand to unrighteous gains. He may hide the strange gods and their earrings under the oak by Shechem — but they go with flocks and herds to seek the Lord.