September 14, 2025

Indianola Presbyterian Church, Columbus

“"In your wildest dreams"

Sermon by Rev. Trip Porch

September 14, 2025                                                                                                                     Based on Genesis 28: 10-17

The very first time we meet Jacob in the Bible is a story involving him grasping at something out of reach, but in the worst way. 

It was in the womb, before he was born where he wrestled with his twin brother Esau, and when they were born Jacob came out clutching Esau’s heel. They named him Yacob or Jacob which is a name literally meaning heel-grabber — trickster, supplanter.

The twins grow up to be very different. Esau becomes a rugged hunter, favored by his father Isaac. Jacob stays near the tents, sharp and cunning, favored by his mother Rebekah. The two twins pitted against each other, only causing the tension to build and the rivalry to grow. And then it gets worse…
First, Jacob swindles his brother out of his inheritance which, as the firstborn, was his birthright, all in in exchange for a bowl of stew. Later, with his mother’s help, he dresses himself in Esau’s clothes, covered his arms with goat hair, all to trick his blind father into giving him the blessing reserved for the firstborn.

That betrayal was the final straw that splits the family apart. 

Esau’s rage boiled over, and Jacob flees for his life. That’s where we find him in Genesis 28. Jacob has runaway in desperation, and now he finds himself alone in the wilderness, stripped of everything familiar,  no home, no family, no mother to protect him, no wealth to comfort him, no roof over his head. He lies down to sleep with only a stone for a pillow. It is literally rock bottom, no place lower for him to go. Imagine for a moment, what that feels like. 

He’s messed up. He knows it. And now he’s suffering the full weight of the consequences of his actions.

When you are in a place like that, when you are at rock bottom, your world feels uncertain, tenuous, and all you feel is despair, and fear. This is what the wilderness in scripture is all about, it’s never just the scenery or landscape. Whenever wilderness is mentioned in the Bible, it’s also a wilderness of the heart and soul. 
It is the crucible where people are tested, but it’s also the place where more often than not, the heavens open up and people meet God. The people of God fleeing slavery in Egypt wandered forty years in the wilderness and but it was in the wilderness they learned to depend on God’s provision. 

Elijah collapsed in despair in the wilderness and there found God in a still, small voice. 

And later Jesus would fast forty days there and come out ready to proclaim the kingdom.

But here in our scripture Jacob, the liar and the thief, the last person we’d expect to receive a blessing from God, lies down all alone in his wilderness despair and he dreams. 

He sees a great stairway reaching from earth to heaven, with angelic messengers ascending and descending upon it. He glimpses a world connected: earth not abandoned, heaven not sealed off, but a traffic of life and light bridged between the two.

And God speaks:
“Know that I am with you, and will keep you wherever you go.”

All alone, at rock bottom, as low as he could Go, God gives Jacob a dream.

Dreams are a wilderness gift. They come when our illusions of control are stripped away. They lift our eyes from the desolation of the dirt beneath us to the possibilities above us. They remind us that God’s presence is not confined to safe places but shows up in the very places we feel most alone.

Jacob’s story reminds us that God doesn’t wait for perfect people or perfect circumstances. God meets us in the wilderness — in our uncertainty, our failure, our disorientation — and dares us to dream.

When I look around our country today, I still see a lot of sibling rivalry, I see a lot of feuding and warring and undercutting one another. I see a lot of despair, and fear. You know what I don’t see a lot of? Dreaming.  Dreaming of what could be. 

And it’s fair right? When we face the barrage of daily headlines that deepen our fear and despair at our political division, climate crisis, and violence, it’s like somewhere in the midst of all this we have started to believe that this is all there is for us and we stopped believing that God might still have big dreams for us.

But the God of Jacob is the God who met him when all he had was a rock for a pillow. The God of Jacob comes to him when he was at his lowest. The God of Jacob breaks into this wilderness nights with visions of heavenly connection.
The God of Jacob is the God who tells him, “Surely I am with you.”

The question is not whether God is dreaming.
The question is whether we can dare to dream with God in the midst of our wilderness. 

History has shown us just how powerful wilderness dreams can be.

Sixty years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The very real wilderness of hate, racism and segregation surrounded him. There was every reason to despair and be afraid. Martin had a good speech prepared — but not the one history remembers. Behind him stood gospel singer Mahalia Jackson, who called out in the middle of his speech to : “Tell them about the dream, Martin!” So he did.
“I have a dream…”

A dream of justice rolling down like waters.
A dream of children of every race walking hand in hand.
A dream of freedom ringing from every corner of the land.

That dream did not erase the wilderness of racism and violence. But it lifted their eyes up from the hard stone they had made as their pillows and gave people a vision of something larger than fear, larger than hatred, larger than despair. And While martin’s dream has not yet been fully realized.. It still shapes us today.

Dreams are powerful, they are not just wishful thinking because they stir hope in us and motivate us towards change. They are God’s way of pulling back the veil between heaven and earth and giving us courage to live toward a new reality.

There is so much wilderness despair dominating our world today… So what might it look if we the church could bear witness to God’s dream? What are the wilderness places around us that are crying out for vision?

Housing insecurity is a wilderness place our city has identified. We live in a city where rents are climbing, and homelessness is rising. What if God’s dream is a community where every neighbor has a safe place to lay their head — not a stone for a pillow, but a proper home?

What about Gun violence. If this week has taught us anything it is how far we are from resolving this issue in our country… But it’s not just national news, our neighborhoods are scarred by shootings and gang violence. What if God’s dream is a city where children can walk the streets without fear, where peace is not just a prayer hoped for but a lived reality, where swords and weapons of war, are turned into plowshares to grow food and feed people. 

How about the Loneliness epidemic and the real isolation people are experiencing today. Even in the digital age, people are aching for belonging. What if God’s dream is a church that becomes a true family for students far from home, for immigrants searching for welcome, for anyone who wonders if they matte

Maybe our biggest wilderness is creation groaning under the weight of exploitation. Climate change threatens our future, storms and wildfires disorient us. What if God’s dream is communities that care for the earth as holy ground, where sustainability is not just a greenwashing slogan but a continued practice of faith?

It’s clear one of the biggest aches of our world is Division and despair. Our nation is fractured, our public life marked by suspicion and hostility. What if God’s dream is that the church becomes a house of reconciliation — not uniformity, but a space where God’s love bridges the divides, and hard conversations can be held in love?

These are not small dreams. They are wilderness-sized, impossible without God. But they are the kind of dreams that lift up our eyes and remind us that heaven and earth are connected, even here, even now.

When Jacob wakes up from his dream in the wilderness, he says “Surely the Lord is in this place — and I did not know it!” He says that God is in the wilderness… what if we were to believe that God was in our wilderness too, dreaming impossible dreams, and inviting us to share and live out that dream for all.

Jacob wakes up, and he takes the stone that had been his pillow, sets it upright as a pillar, and gives the wilderness place a name… he calls the place Bethel — House of God.

Friends, what if we did the same? What if we looked out at the harsh wilderness we occupy in 2025, our neighborhood, our city, our nation, and dared to say: “Surely the Lord is in this place, even in the wilderness — and we did not know it.”

God’s house is still in the wilderness, and God is still dreaming here. The invitation is before us: will we dare to dream with God?

Amen.

WE GATHER IN AWE AND PRAISE

PRELUDE                                                                    “Prelude IV for Piano”                                                  Mark Andersen

INTROIT                                   “Be Joyful in the Lord”                                                        Donald Moore                          

WELCOME                                                                   

One: This is the day that the Lord has made

All: Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

*CALL TO WORSHIP

One: Surely the Lord is in this place!

Many: And we did not know it.

One: God meets us in the wilderness, in our uncertainty and fear.

Many: God opens the heavens and shows us a dream of life and hope.

One: Come, people of God, awaken to the presence of the Holy.

All: Let us worship the God who is still dreaming among us. 

*HYMN 401                                    “Here in this Place”                                                    GATHER US IN

*PRAYER OF CONFESSION                                                                                                                           Rebekah Gayley

God of Jacob, we have fallen short. We confess that we are slow to dream your dreams. We cling to what we know, afraid of what might change. We close our eyes to the wilderness places where you are already at work. We confess that our visions are too small, and our faith too timid. Forgive us, Lord. Awaken us to your presence. Give us courage to dream with you of a world made whole on earth as it is in heaven. Amen. 

*ASSURANCE OF PARDON

*RESPONSE OF PARDON 752            “Dona Nobis Pacem”                        DONA NOBIS PACEM

*PASSING OF THE PEACE                                       

     One:   The peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all,

     All:      And also with you.

WE LISTEN FOR GOD’S WORD

ANTHEM                                     “Grant Us Thy Peace”                                  Felix Mendelssohn

CHILDREN’S RECESSIONAL 175      “Seek Ye First” vs. 1

   Children: May God be with you here

   Congregation: May God be with you there                                             

PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION

SCRIPTURE   Genesis 28:10-17  CEB

Jacob left Beer-sheba and set out for Haran. He reached a certain place and spent the night there. When the sun had set, he took one of the stones at that place and put it near his head. Then he lay down there. He dreamed and saw a raised staircase, its foundation on earth and its top touching the sky, and God’s messengers were ascending and descending on it. Suddenly the Lord was standing on it and saying, “I am the Lord, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac. I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying. Your descendants will become like the dust of the earth; you will spread out to the west, east, north, and south. Every family of earth will be blessed because of you and your descendants. I am with you now, I will protect you everywhere you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done everything that I have promised you.”

When Jacob woke from his sleep, he thought to himself, The Lord is definitely in this place, but I didn’t know it. He was terrified and thought, This sacred place is awesome. It’s none other than God’s house and the entrance to heaven.

SERMON                                                                                                                                                               Rev. Trip Porch

WE RESPOND TO GOD’S WORD

*HYMN 49                               “The God of Abraham Praise”                                                                           LEONI

PRAYERS OF THE PEOPLE  

Time of Offering   online giving is available at  www. indianolapres.org/give  

OFFERTORY                                     “Morning Prayer”                                                 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky                      arr. Juliano Molteni                                                                      

*OFFERTORY RESPONSE 709            “God We Honor You”                               ABUNDANT BLESSINGS

*PRAYER OF DEDICATION

God of abundance, we offer you these gifts as signs of our love and gratitude. Take them, bless them, multiply them, and use them to build your dream of justice, peace, and compassion here in this neighborhood, in this city, and in this world. Amen.

*HYMN 765                           “May the God of Hope” (Song of Hope)                                 ARGENTINA

TIME OF COMMUNITY SHARING

CHARGE & BENEDICTION

CHORAL RESPONSE                       “Amen”                                                             Peter Lutkin

POSTLUDE                             “The Spirit of God”                              arr. Linda Hartman 

Acknowledgments: Unless otherwise indicated, all texts and music are printed and broadcast under OneLicense.net license #A-702452