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Now, Jacob had not been sleeping long, before he began to dream, and in this case the dream was sent to him by God.

As Jacob was to inherit "the blessing," God would now take notice of him, and tell him again of the promises which belonged to him. It was very kind of the great God to take notice of such a man. It was very kind to give him the faith which both he and his mother wanted. Ada. What did God say, papa?

P. God showed him a picture. Jacob looked, and behold, there was a great ladder close to him. He noticed that it rested upon the earth, and then looked up to see where it leaned against. Perhaps he began to count the rails, but he would soon leave off, for, as he looked up higher, and higher, and higher, and still kept looking up, it was some minutes before his eye saw the top; then, he saw that the sky was opened, and that the ladder rested against heaven.

Ada. What was it for?

Ion. I know! It was that the angels might come down to him. P. True; for we read that he saw the angels of God ascending and descending on the ladder-bright-winged angels going up and down But, oh! there was a brighter sight still, a very bright sight when Jacob looked up to the highest point! There stood the Almighty, JEHOVAH. How must his soul have trembled and shrunk up, when he saw that God was going to speak. What will the angry God say? Listen!

"I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth; and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee, and in thy seed, shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of."

Ada. God was not angry!

M. No! What kind words from the God whom he had offended! True, "God is love!" He is the God of mercy-"slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy."

When Jacob awoke out of his sleep he was at first afraid. He said, "How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." Then there came upon him a better feeling-the fruits of God's love! There came the good feeling of gratitude. The Bible tells us

"Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. And he called the name of that place Beth-el; but the name of that city was called Luz at the first.

"And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God will be with me, so that I come again to my father's house in peace, then shall the Lord be my God: And this stone which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house: and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto thee."

L. Are you going to make a "lesson" for us, papa?

P. Yes. Do you not see in this history of Jacob what beautiful lessons there are?

1. How faithful is God!-God never forgets His promises. The kindness which God had promised to Abraham's seed he faithfully bestowed.

W. Whether they deserve it or not?

P. Yes.

God would not ask, "Does Jacob deserve kindness?" but "What have I promised?"

God does so now-think of that, dear children. If God were to say suddenly, "I will only show you the kindness you really deserve," what would become of you?

Here is another lesson:-2ndly, How merciful is God! God knows that mercy brings forth good fruit.

L. Yes; it brought forth gratitude in Jacob-new love. I dare say he went on the rest of his journey delighted.

P. Then learn, Lucy and all of you, to be delighted too. Take God's Holy Word, that you may see into heaven as Jacob did. Then, when by His Holy Spirit He has enabled you to see-then will you go on the rest of your journey-delighted!

Cwenty-seventh Sunday.

JACOB'S MARRIAGE.

"Then Jacob went on his journey, and came into the land of the people of the east. And it came to pass, when Laban heard the tidings of Jacob his sister' son, that he ran to meet him, and embraced him, and kissed him, and brought him to his house. And Laban said to him, Surely thou art my bone and my flesh. And he abode with him the space of a month. And Laban said unto Jacob, Because thou art my brother, shouldest thou therefore serve

me for nought? tell me, what shall thy wages be? And Laban had two daughters: the name of the elder was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah was tender-eyed; but Rachel was beautiful and well-favoured. And Jacob loved Rachel; and said, I will serve thee seven years for Rachel thy younger daughter. And Laban said, It is better that I give her to thee, than that I should give her to another man: abide with me. And Jacob served seven years for Rachel; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her."—GEN. xxix. 1, 13-20.

P. We heard last Sunday that Jacob stopped at Bethel, and was visited by God in a dream.

L. And you said, papa, that he went on his way more delighted. P. Yes. On he went, full of hope. If you had looked at him, you would have seen that his countenance was glad-very glad he looked, and very light was his step; for he thought, I dare say, "God is my friend; I can always be happy now." So will everybody always be happy when God is his friend.

In the afternoon of the day, he saw that he was getting near to Padan-aram, and soon he found himself sitting outside the famous well of CHARRAN. This, you may remember, was the very well where Eliezer stopped when he went to fetch Rebekah for Isaac.

As he sat near the well, he was rather surprised that there were several flocks of sheep around it, with their shepherds, and that there was still a great stone on the well's mouth. I dare say that he thought to himself "I wonder that you do not give your sheep some water, without waiting;" so he asked the shepherds. In reply to his question, they said that the well belonged to different flocks, and that they did not use it until all the flocks had met.

So we find that as it was the custom to wait until "all the flocks were gathered," before they rolled the stone from the well's mouth, that the men still waited, and new flocks came in every now and then, but all still waited.

Jacob, no doubt, sat very near, and watched all the men and the sheep who were lying on the grass all this time. As he looked, he would say to himself, "I do not see my uncle Laban. I cannot see any of his family. There is nobody like him." So he thought again, "I'll ask!"

"And Jacob said unto them, My brethren, whence be ye? And they said, Of Haran are we. And he said unto them, Know ye Laban the son of Nahor? And they said, We know him. And he said unto them, Is he well? And they said, He is well; and, behold, Rachel his daughter cometh with the sheep."

L. I should think, papa, that he would be pleased that Laban's daughter should have coine. He would rather have seen her than Laban's son, because, you see, he had come to find a wife.

P. That was the case. And we read that Jacob was much pleased with Rachel. So he thought that he would try and please her, even before he had spoken to her; and in order to be polite, he ran up to the well before she had reached it, and rolled away the stone from its mouth, and gave water to her flock of sheep.

W. I should think that the old sheep would stare at him, and

wonder who he was, that was so polite to them! for the sheep always know their own shepherd.

P. I cannot say whether they would, but Jacob would attend to them properly; for it seems that he was an excellent shepherd, and well understood all his duties.

L. I like Jacob for being so polite. Poor fellow, he had no handsome presents to offer her, such as old Eliezer his grandfather's servant had offered Rebekah; so he offered her-kindness. P. Which was a very good offering. We read that

"Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice, and wept. And Jacob told Rachel that he was her father's brother, and that he was Rebekah's son: and she ran and told her father. And it came to pass when Laban heard the tidings of Jacob his sister's son, that he ran to meet him, and embraced him, and kissed him, and brought him to his house. And he told Laban all these things. And Laban said to him, Surely thou art my bone and my flesh. And he abode with him the space of a month."

Then Jacob had a comfortable home again; a place where he might live and serve God, and try always to do what is right. Oh, that is a very comfortable and a very pleasing thing to look forward to!

At the end of the month, Jacob began to think that he should very much like to have his good cousin Rachel for his wife; but, then there came the sad thought, "I have not any money to buy her with." It was, you know, the custom of that country for wives to be bought with money; and if any poor man wanted a wife, and had not any money, then he would have to earn her by giving labour instead.

This was Jacob's case. It happened at the end of the month that Laban found that he was a good shepherd, and therefore wished him to stop. So he said to him, "Because thou art my brother's son, shouldest thou therefore serve me for nought? tell me what shall thy wages be ?"

Now, as Jacob loved Rachel, he immediately answered, "I will serve thee seven years for Rachel thy younger daughter. And Laban said, It is better that I give her to thee, than that I should give her to another man: abide with me. And Jacob served seven years for Rachel; and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her."

The history of Jacob during the remainder of his stay with his uncle Laban, is not, I am sorry to say, a very pleasing one. When the time came for Jacob to have his dear Rachel for a wife, his uncle Laban cheated him, and gave him his other daughter-Rachel's elder sister, called Leah. Leah had a disorder in her eyes, and was not so beautiful as Rachel; she was perhaps a very pleasant and sensible woman, but did not please Jacob so much as her sister did.

This was a terrible blow to Jacob; and his crafty uncle only excused himself for his dishonesty by saying, that "it was not the custom of the country to give the younger daughter to be married before the elder." At the same time he said that if Jacob liked to serve him seven years longer, he might then also have Rachel for his wife.

L. Then he would have had two wives!

P. That was not considered wrong in those uncivilized times. Jacob

gladly agreed to the proposal, and a week after Rachel also became his wife. Thus Jacob lived on, being the servant of Laban for fourteen years; and at the end of that time he had eleven sons and a daughter.

At the end of this time, Jacob began to think that he would return home to the land of Canaan with his wives and children; but Laban had found him to be so serviceable that he did not wish him to leave. It was therefore agreed that Jacob should have a part of Laban's sheep and cattle, and set up in business for himself as a farmer.

In his farming business Jacob was prospered by God; and, indeed, succeeded so well, that the sons of Laban became rather envious. We read that he had much cattle, and men servants, and women servants, and camels; so that Laban's sons were heard to say-"Jacob hath taken away all that was our father's." Laban also, when he found that his own riches did not increase so fast as Jacob's, looked less pleasant than formerly.

In this uncomfortable state Jacob lived for about six years longer, and had thus been with Laban altogether about twenty years, when he thought again, it would be better for him to go home. He had some fears, perhaps, about meeting his brother Esau, whom he had not seen all this time; but his doubts were at last removed by a command given to him by God, saying, "Return unto the land of thy fathers, and unto thy kindred, and I will be with thee."

At the same time he remembered the jealousy of Laban's family toward him, and thought to himself, "If they see me removing, and taking away such great riches from their land, they will certainly try to prevent me." Accordingly he consulted his two wives on the subject, and they all agreed to go away without mentioning it to their relations, or without even saying "Good-bye!"

It so happened that soon after Laban and his sons were absent, having gone some distance for the purpose of sheep-shearing. Jacob immediately seized the opportunity. He rose up, and set his sons and wives upon camels, and carried away all his cattle, and all his goods, which he had gotten in Padan-aram.

Ion. I should think that he made haste. He would make just as much haste as he had when he was going to Padan-aram, and was running away from Esau.

P. Yes. We shall hear, in the next lesson, how Laban discovered his departure, followed after him, and overtook him.

Twenty-eighth Sunday.

THE RECONCILIATION OF JACOB AND ESAU.

"And Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him.

And Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, the

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