FRIDAY 06 August 2021 “The Deceiver Deceived” Genesis 29

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Good Friday to you my “Walking with Jesus” friends,

Let’s begin today with this question: ‘what price, what value do you place on LOVE?’ Depending on the culture in which you live, grooms may have to pay a high ‘bride dowry’ price before their wedding, or in other cultures, the bride’s family pays for the majority of the cost of the wedding ceremony and celebration. I wonder what the customs are where you live? How do those customs reflect the value of LOVE?

Yesterday in our journey, we were with Jacob as he resumed his journey to Haran hoping to find a bride from his mother’s family. Jacob had experienced an encounter with God during the night! He’d had a dream in which God had extended to Jacob the Covenant promise He’d made to Abraham many years before, even though Jacob was a cheater, a liar and a thief! Does God sometimes surprise you? Jacob’s behavior had destroyed his family and he was running for his life. Today in Genesis 29, Jacob finally arrives in Haran, having traveled about 400 miles, probably on one of his camels. He finds his way to the town well, where shepherds have gathered their sheep to water them. Being a shepherd himself, he feels right at home, engaging them in conversation, and he discovers that they know Laban, Jacob’s uncle, and brother to his mother Rebekah.

While they are talking, a young shepherdess arrives with her family’s sheep. Jacob discovers her name is Rachel and she is Laban’s daughter, therefore his cousin! Similar to how Abraham’s servant first encountered Rebekah when she came to the well to draw water, so two generations later, Jacob first encounters Rachel at this well. After Jacob explained to Rachel that he was family, the son of her aunt Rebekah, Rachel ran home to tell her father about this remarkable, unexpected, rendezvous. Laban hurried out to meet Jacob and of course invited his nephew home for dinner and the night. So what do you suppose they talked about as they ate dinner together, and sipped tea long into the night? Oh they had so many questions for Jacob and he had so much to tell them…and NOT tell them about the family Rebekah had mothered with Isaac. And let’s be honest, Jacob had many things he probably kept silent about! Is that also true of you and me, my friends?

The record says “After Jacob had stayed with Laban for a whole month, Laban said to him, ‘just because you are a relative, should you work for me for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.” (Gen. 29:15) A whole month passed of Jacob getting to know his mother’s family, and learning how Laban and his shepherds raise their flocks here in Haran. But something else was happening during that month… Jacob was falling in love with Rachel!

The record says: “Now Laban had two daughters, the name of the older was Leah, and the younger was Rachel. Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel was… beautiful. Jacob was in love with Rachel, and said to her father Laban, ‘I’ll work for you for seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel.” So all you men who are with me in this “Walking with Jesus” journey, what do you think about that? What price have you paid or would you pay, for the woman you deeply love? Laban agreed, and the record says: “So Jacob served Laban seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him, because of his love for her.” Wow…seven years of labor to earn a wife! 84 months, 364 weeks of labor for Rachel. I imagine Jacob had some system of calculating the weeks, months, and even days… and as those last few weeks approached, oh my can you imagine his excitement, his anticipation of their wedding?

Laban threw a huge festival and wedding ceremony. Many guests were invited. The food and wine and music were all wonderful, I’m sure. The bride would have had a veil covering her face with only her eyes showing, only adding to the anticipation for Jacob. Finally their wedding night arrived and Jacob took his bride into his tent after 7 long years of working to earn her hand in marriage. But Jacob the deceiver was about to experience a bitter taste of his own type of deception. The record says: “When morning came, there was Leah! So Jacob said to Laban, ‘What is this you have done to me? I served you for Rachel, didn’t I? Why have you deceived me?’ Laban replied, ‘it is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older one. Finish this daughter’s bridal week, then we will give you Rachel, the younger daughter also, in return for another seven years of work.’ And Jacob did so. . .” (Gen. 29:25-28)

Did I just hear some of you say ‘serves Jacob right! He deceived his father, and stole both the firstborn inheritance and blessing from his brother Esau. This is justice being served on Jacob’! But have you found people who mistreat others don’t like it when they are equally mistreated? I wonder if Jacob took a long walk, looked up into the sky and said something like this: ‘God, I deserve this don’t I? I deeply hurt my family with my deceitfulness and it’s only right that I feel some of their pain. But now God, what kind of life will I have being married to two sisters? My heart loves Rachel, but I’m also Leah’s husband, even though I don’t love her and she was deceitfully forced upon me. God, am I really obligated to stay married to Leah even though I don’t love her and it was a deception marriage?’

Have you ever heard someone tell you they are thinking of divorcing their spouse because they don’t love them anymore, or they’ve grown apart, or they simply have different goals and values in life? While I don’t know where Jacob & Laban’s family rooted their marriage values, it appears everyone involved felt the marriage between Jacob and Leah was legitimate and should be honored for the rest of their lives, even if it was entered into deceitfully and they didn’t love each other!! The record says “Jacob finished the week with Leah, then Laban gave him his daughter Rachel to be his wife….Jacob lay with Rachel also, and he loved Rachel more than Leah. And he worked for Laban another seven years.“ (Gen. 29:28)

Now let me ask you my friends, what emotions, what attitudes, do you suppose describe what was going on with this threesome of Jacob, Leah and Rachel? In their culture Jacob would have had two different ‘family tents’, one for he and Leah, and one for he and Rachel. He would have shared his time, his possessions, and his intimacy with both, in their own tents as he tried to be husband to both. But we can’t hide or fake our love can we? Therefore we can assume it was abundantly obvious Jacob loved Rachel but was a ‘husband of obligation’ to Leah.

The Genesis record makes a profound statement here: “When the LORD saw that Leah was not loved, He opened her womb, but Rachel was barren. Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, “It is because the LORD has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.” (Gen. 29:31) My friends, this verse helps us remember how EVERY pregnancy is a miracle, right? It also shows me that Leah had a strong belief that the God of Abraham called ‘the LORD’, was her God, and she believed God was watching all that was going on here, AND God understood her misery! That’s important friends… do you believe that? Does God see and understand your pain? Finally I see Leah had the same hope millions of women around the world have today. She hoped her willingness to share herself sexually with her husband Jacob, and now finally give him a son, would earn his love for her.

In fact in the next three verses, we find Leah became pregnant by her husband Jacob three more times, and gave birth to three more sons… Simeon, Levi and Judah. With each, she gave praise to God and hoped now her growing family of sons would draw the love of her husband Jacob. But while Leah was having babies, Rachel, who had the love of her husband, was barren and can you imagine the jealousy between the two sisters? Can you also hear the noise of four little boys running around these tents, and can you imagine Jacob’s life now? Working hard all day out with the animals, and coming home to two tents, two wives, four little boys… two very different families, and how much regret?

Jacob had grown up as a twin, remember? But we also remember Jacob and his brother Esau were each very different and each loved more by one of their parents, and each felt distant from the other parent. I imagine Jacob had many, many conversations with God about how similar the pain of his adult family was to the pain of his childhood family. It’s true isn’t it my friends… we bring the dysfunction and pain of our childhoods into our adult years, and if we aren’t very careful, we duplicate the dysfunction in our adult families! That’s called generational sin and only Jesus can break that problem as He sets us free from our sin shackles and transforms our hearts, minds, and attitudes.

So in closing today, may I invite you to look at your adult family and compare it to the family of your childhood… what do you see? What light does Genesis 29 shed on your families? What have you brought from your childhood family experience into your adult family? How much pain has that caused? Now I urge you to spend some time talking with Jesus about that and maybe the Holy Spirit will show you some changes that need to be made, as you ‘walk with Jesus’ today!

Today’s Scripture is Genesis 29.

Choose below to read or listen.

Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.

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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)

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