WOODSTOCK TO JACOB'S LADDER

JESUS FEEDS 5,000

Imagine the 5,000 in John 6:5-14, a sprawling crowd, weary and wanting, seeking freedom from oppression, clustered around Jesus on a grassy slope. He takes five loaves and two fish, blesses them, and feeds every soul. “And Jesus took the loaves; and when he had given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down; and likewise of the fishes as much as they would.” John 6:11

Twelve baskets overflow with fragments. It’s a marvel, simple yet vast, and the people whisper, “This is of a truth that prophet that should come into the world.” John 6:14

God steps in, turning a hungry throng into a fed flock, and thereby converting many who witnessed the miracle.

THE WOODSTOCK FESTIVAL 1969

Now see Woodstock 1969. Half a million souls gathered together, a tide of long hair and patched jeans, washing over a farm in Bethel, New York. They came for rock and roll, and freedom from oppression, and they got the Jesus Movement.

“And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy.” Acts 2:17

God stepped in, turning what some called the forsaken, and reaping believers from the chaos, as God does repeatedly throughout history and the Bible.

TRUMP RALLY

Then a Trump rally. Thousands upon thousands, many Christian, red hats as banners, packed tight with chants and cheers. Drawn to promises of peace, and freedom from oppression by a government that no longer works for the people. Romans 13:1 speaks to it: “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.”

Like Woodstock’s seekers, this crowd is alive with longing. Is God moving here too, shaping something unseen, just as He has done many times before?

Heavenly Father, thank you for Your Son, Your Word and Your Spirit. May the world seek You. Amen.

Recently, there has been a lot of chatter by some Christians on X claiming that other Christians have damned themselves by voting for Trump, so this has been on my heart for a while. I wrote about some of it previously in my blog titled, “RNC 2024,” which you can read here, so I will not repeat what I wrote there. This morning, however, out of the blue, my husband started talking about the Woodstock Festival in 1969, and questioning how so many people, 400,000 +/- souls, all assembled in one place, could have, for the most part, maintained a peaceful gathering? This led to scripture from Holy Spirit, Jacob’s Ladder, and then to this blog.

When you hear "Bethel," you might think of the ladder to heaven Jacob saw in his dream in Genesis 28:11-19, a ladder to heaven, angels climbing up and down, and God’s voice: “I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest… I will not leave thee.” Jacob awakens, stunned: “Surely the LORD is in this place; and I knew it not… This is none other but the house of God,” and Jacob named it Bethel, meaning “House of God.”

In August 1969, a different Bethel, Bethel, New York, became its own ladder to heaven. The Woodstock Music Festival turned Max Yasgur’s dairy farm into a cultural and spiritual pivot, shaped by Jewish hands: Michael Lang, Artie Kornfeld, Joel Rosenman, and Yasgur himself. What was by all accounts a debauch three-day party, God turned into a Spiritual Revolution known as “The Jesus Movement,” climbing a modern ladder, from mud to grace.

ALL ROADS LEAD TO GOD

Bethel, New York, formerly a part of the larger city of Lumberland, became its own city in 1809, and was named "Bethel" by the Puritans specifically related to the Biblical Jacob's Ladder. Further, The Woodstock Festival was never intended to take place in Bethel, New York. The Festival’s name is derived from Woodstock, a town 40 miles away, where the four organizers first dreamed of a music-and-art fair. But permits in Woodstock fell through, the locals balked at the idea of having half a million people descend on their town, and the clock was ticking for the organizers. They searched diligently for somewhere to hold the festival, and finally, late in planning, received a “yes" from Max Yasgur, a 49-year-old dairy farmer with 600 acres in Bethel, New York. 

The Woodstock Festival would go down in history as a free-for-all: naked hippies, marijuana smoke clouds, free love preached like the gospel. Christians saw it as a war on Christian values, the nuclear family, and law-and-order America. Some tied it to a “Jewish agenda,” a trope claiming cultural Marxism aimed at toppling Western norms via sex, drugs, and rock and roll. With Lang, Kornfeld, Rosenman, and Yasgur, all being Jewish, conspiracy whispers swirled: Was this a calculated move to break America’s moral spine? Lang, a 24-year-old dropout turned counterculture guru from Brooklyn, pushed “peace” as rebellion. Kornfeld, a Long Island music executive tied to Capitol Records, had the industry clout to amplify it. Rosenman, an Ivy League-polished Manhattan lawyer, bankrolled the chaos with the only Gentile in the group, partner John Roberts. Yasgur, a Russian-Jewish farmer in conservative Bethel, New York, opened the gate, literally, to the flood, leasing his 600 acres for $75,000, despite his neighbors’ fury.

Their Jewish roots fueled the narrative, echoing Moses smashing the golden calf in Exodus 32:19, a break from tradition, intentional or not. Yasgur told the 400,000-strong crowd, “I’m a farmer… You’ve proven something to the world: half a million kids can get together for fun and music and have nothing but fun and music.” But was that all it was?

Woodstock was far from a Church. Yet, it thrummed with 400,000 souls hungering for escape from the death of the Vietnam war, chasing transcendence through psychedelics, Eastern mysticism, open sex, and Hendrix riffs. Despite their intent, whatever it was, all of that “seeking” bore fruit. By 1971, the Jesus Movement erupted. Ex-hippies like Lonnie Frisbee, a Woodstock-era drifter turned evangelist, hit California beaches preaching a raw, long-haired, loving Jesus, unbound by pews. “Jesus Freaks” baptized thousands of "born again" John 3:3 Christian converts in the Pacific Ocean and rivers, strumming “Amazing Grace” on guitars, turning Woodstock’s communal, free-spirited vibe into Christian zeal. Time magazine’s 1971 “Jesus Revolution” cover traced it all back to Woodstock’s wake, from muddy ladder to Spiritual revival.

This was Bethel, New York’s, legacy as a modern Jacob’s ladder: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” John 1:51. At Woodstock, that ladder was chaos: mud, music, open sex, drugs, a generation’s cry. The Jesus Movement climbed the ladder out of the mud, finding Christ where others saw only ruin. Like Jacob, those 400,000 souls did not expect God to be in that place, that weekend. Yet, He was there. Other seeds grew from Woodstock as well: New Age mysticism, back-to-the-land dreams, but the Christian revival stood the tallest and boldest.

Whether or not the Woodstock Festival was a deep, dark conspiracy to debauch America, or just four free spirits who wanted to flip the middle finger at the establishment, God took what men meant for evil and turned it for His good. Genesis 50:20. In other words, God bends human plans to His Will: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.” Isaiah 55:8. “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose” Romans 8:28. What was sinful for those 400,000 souls became salvation for many of them, and more, because of them.

Max Yasgur didn’t live to see the full Spiritual fallout of Woodstock. He died of a heart attack in 1973, but his farm remains a reminder. Today, the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts sits there, a testament to that summer of 1969. His Jewish identity adds a poetic twist. Like Cyrus, the Persian king who unknowingly served God’s will in the Bible, Yasgur became an accidental vessel. His field, in a place named “House of God” by chance, hosted a generation’s search for meaning. They all found sex and drugs that weekend, and then a vast majority of them subsequently found Jesus. Bethel, New York, named a “House of God” by fluke, became one for real.

By all accounts, Lang, Kornfeld, Rosenman, and Yasgur did not plot salvation for the masses that summer. Yet, their roles mirror, “Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus… For Jacob my servant’s sake… though thou hast not known me.” Isaiah 45:1-4

So, conspiracy buffs say Lang and the others meant to fracture America, 400,000 souls as pawns.

History tries to portray that they just threw a party for three days in August, 1969.

Bible prophecy hums otherwise: a farm, a festival, and a ladder to the cross for a multitude.

Let’s take a quick look at King David, God’s greatest king, and probably one of His most flawed.

King David is one of the Bible’s most celebrated figures, a man after God’s own heart 1 Samuel 13:14, a shepherd turned king, and the author of countless psalms. Yet, his story is far from spotless. One of its darkest chapters begins with a single, fateful glance from a rooftop. David, seeing Bathsheba bathing, succumbed to the lust of the flesh, and committed adultery with her 2 Samuel 11:2-4. What followed was a cascade of sin: deception, betrayal, and murder. When Bathsheba became pregnant from the affair, David orchestrated the death of her husband, Uriah, a loyal soldier, by sending him to the front lines of battle, where he was killed. With Uriah gone, David married Bathsheba, perhaps thinking he had covered his tracks.

But God sees all. Through the prophet Nathan 2 Samuel 12:9-24, God confronted David, saying, “Why have you despised the word of the LORD, to do what is evil in his sight? You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and have taken his wife to be your wife." The consequences were severe, as the firstborn child of this union became ill and died, a judgment that broke David’s heart. Yet, in that grief, David turned to God in private, fasting and pleading for mercy, and God heard him. David and Bathsheba later had another son, Solomon, whom the LORD loved, and blessed with great wisdom, and Messianic lineage. As Matthew’s genealogy records at Matthew 1, “David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, and Solomon the father of Rehoboam," placing him in the direct lineage of Jesus, the promised Christ.
 
This messy, painful, story reveals a profound truth: God doesn’t require perfect vessels. David was a rough one, flawed, impulsive, and capable of grave sin, but he was also a man who, when faced with his failures, turned to God in private humility. At the height of David’s sin with Bathsheba and Uriah, he stood as an unrepentant king, caught in pride and deceit, hiding his guilt behind his power. Scripture declares, “The thing that David had done displeased the LORD” 2 Samuel 11:2, and God’s judgment came swiftly. When Nathan confronted him, David’s repentance was in front of God and Nathan, and he confessed, “I have sinned against the Lord," and he sought God’s face. Psalm 51 is a personal cry to God, penned by David after Nathan’s rebuke, and lays bare his soul: “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions… Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me” Psalm 51:1, 10. 

Psalm 51 reveals a humbled heart, broken and bent, not for show but for God, proving the LORD weighs what man cannot see:

“But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the LORD sees not as man sees; for man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.” 1 Samuel 16:7

God’s choice to use David, and to bring Solomon through this imperfect lineage, to Jesus Christ, shows that His purposes are not thwarted by human weakness. As Paul later wrote, “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.” 2 Corinthians 4:7. David’s life reminds us that our failures do not disqualify us from God’s plan; rather, they can become the raw material for its very fulfillment. Like clay in the Potter’s hands, it is not the vessel’s perfection that matters; it is the One who shapes it.

​Jump to February 2025, and X is ablaze with Christian chatter. Some say voting for Trump has damned their brethren. They point to his scandals, lawsuits, and words, crying, “Ye shall know them by their fruits,” seeing a wolf in sheep’s clothing, where “Beware of false prophets” seems to fit too well. But God's faithful fire back: “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.” They see a flawed tool in Trump, like Woodstock, not a false god. If Woodstock’s chaos could be turned into a ladder to heaven, a vote, or a flawed man, could be redeemed too. So, there are whispers of hope where some would have us believe damnation looms: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.”

His supporters say, Donald Trump, like David, is a rough vessel, a leader forged in battles, marked by flaws, yet chosen by God for a purpose, like each one of us. Far from the proud and brass caricature his foes portray, his friends and associates say he carries a quiet humility unseen by the world. He surrounds himself at the White House by spiritual advisors, who pray with him daily, and by a cabinet of openly Christian warriors, whose faith burns bright. In private, with his Christian cabinet and advisors, he seeks God’s face, as David did. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” 1 John 1:9. God alone sees this, and God alone shapes the vessel.

Trump’s cabinet picks, from Pam Bondi to Kristi Noem to Marco Rubio to Sean Duffy to Karoline Leavitt, and many others, all are bold believers, echoing David’s court of loyal, God-fearing men. These are not polished saints but rough clay vessels, shaped by faith, not perfection.

His supporters stand as a faithful remnant, like Israel under David’s reign. They see in Trump, and his Christian cabinet, a team after God’s heart, not flawless but fervent for righteousness. They have watched him honor God’s name, proclaim Jesus Christ, fight to end wars, protect the unborn, and fight for the American people, while still maintaining compassion for foreigners, children, and those affected by wars. They trust the scripture, “The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the LORD; he turns it wherever he will” Proverbs 21:1. His supporters believe, like Yasgur’s field at Woodstock, Trump is a rough vessel, a tool, not a saint. God’s plan was for sinful Woodstock to turn to revival. Who is to say that His plan is not to bend the Trump saga to His glory as well? 

Are Trump's supporters damned for voting for him? No. How could they be? Scripture says, God blesses those who align with His purposes. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD” Psalm 33:12. Their loyalty flows from faith in God, not folly in man, backing a leader and a cabinet who, like David, stumble but seek God’s will. Romans 8:28 stands firm, “All things work together for good to those who love God.” Scoffers mock Trump’s humility, his dignitaries, blind to God’s work through rough clay. His supporters are vessels too, shaped by the Potter’s hand, bearing a nation’s hope, a world's even, before God, despite the scoffers’ scorn. Trump’s presidency, like David’s rule, mirrors a biblical truth: God uses rough clay for His glory, the fulfillment of His Will, and his good pleasure. "Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created." Revelation 4:11

So, Bethel’s echo lingers: From Jacob’s Ladder to Woodstock’s muddy fields, God is still flipping chaos to grace, and saving the oppressed. Woodstock waved a peace flag, and proved the world could gather in peace; the Jesus Movement raised a cross, and proved it could kneel there too, all on Bethel’s sodden turf. Trump, his cabinet, and his supporters, stand on this ground, a chaotic world seeking peace, a faithful remnant lifting the cross. Like Woodstock to the Jesus Movement, and David’s humbled turn yielding Solomon, their rough faith may birth a legacy of peace, order and grace, shaped by the Potter’s unwavering hand.

"And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” Romans 8:28
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Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. Amen.