Genesis 35:3

3 We will leave here and go to Bethel. There I will build an altar to God, who has helped me during my time of trouble. He has been with me everywhere I have gone."

Genesis 35:3 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 35:3

And let us arise and go up to Bethel
Thus prepared and purged, their tents clear of idols, their bodies washed with pure water, and their garments new, neat, and clean; all symbolical of inward purity, and of freedom from idolatry and evil works, as became those who go to the house of God, and are his worshippers, see ( Hebrews 10:22 ) .

I will make there an altar unto God;
as he has directed, and sacrifice to him, and worship him, and give the tenth unto him, and so make it a Bethel, an house of God indeed, as he had vowed, ( Genesis 28:22 ) ;

who answered me in the day of my distress;
on account of his brother Esau, from whose wrath he fled:

and was with me in the way which I went;
from his father's house to Padanaram; in which journey he was alone and destitute, and exposed to many difficulties and dangers, but God was with him, and preserved him, and directed and brought him to Laban's house in safety.

Genesis 35:3 In-Context

1 God said to Jacob, "Go to the city of Bethel and live there. Make an altar to the God who appeared to you there when you were running away from your brother Esau."

2 So Jacob said to his family and to all who were with him, "Put away the foreign gods you have, and make yourselves clean, and change your clothes.

3 We will leave here and go to Bethel. There I will build an altar to God, who has helped me during my time of trouble. He has been with me everywhere I have gone."

4 So they gave Jacob all the foreign gods they had, and the earrings they were wearing, and he hid them under the great tree near the town of Shechem.

5 Then Jacob and his sons left there. But God caused the people in the nearby cities to be afraid, so they did not follow them.