In Genesis 34, we have a bit of a family crisis, and that’s an understatement. Jacob’s daughter Dinah is raped. Her brothers exact brutal, disproportionate revenge for this and kill many men in the process. What must Jacob have felt about this? I don’t know exactly what, but it is likely he was grieving the pain of his daughter as well as the disappointing way his violent sons had turned out.

It’s interesting what happens next. In Genesis 35, God tells Jacob to “Go to Bethel at once, and live there. Build an altar there to me, the God who appeared to you when you were running away from your brother Esau.”

In a sense, God is telling Jacob to “go back to the beginning again”. Much earlier in Jacob’s life, when he first fled due to a family conflict he had created, God revealed Himself to Jacob at Bethel. Jacob then called “Bethel” the house of the Lord. Now, Jacob is to return to the place where God first revealed himself to Jacob. He is to worship God.

God can call us to do so as well. We can be tired, or worn, or battered from crises and disappointments in life.

But then: go back to the beginning again. Remember when God revealed Himself to you. Remember what He has promised. At Bethel, God told Jacob he’d be with him. In Genesis 35, Jacob affirmed that God has kept His promise.

When life disappoints, let’s look back at how God has kept His word to us over the years. He’ll do it again.

Let’s remember the love and joy we had in Jesus and His salvation, and ask God to give us that joy again. He is a God who renews us.