Hello, my ‘Walking with Jesus’ friends,
All of us have had “Defining Moments” in our lives which ended up being so significant they actually shaped the course of our lives. In some cases, those critical moments or events might have been prolonged and were a season of time, you might even call it a ‘chapter of your life’, which not only shaped your life but your family heritage. That is the story of Genesis 29 & 30 for Jacob and today, let’s step into that season of his life and watch it happen.
Yesterday we saw Jacob run for his life, away from his brother Esau and his parents Isaac and Rebekah. Why? Jacob’s mother had helped Jacob deceive his father Isaac into giving Jacob Esau’s firstborn inheritance and blessing. Esau was so upset he was planning to kill his brother Jacob!
That first night on the run Jacob had a powerful dream encounter with God, as recorded in Genesis 28:10-15, in which God re-affirmed that the family Covenant Abraham had received from God was first passed to Isaac, would now be passed down to Jacob, not Esau! It did not seem fair because Jacob was a deceiver, a thief, a liar, yet God is Sovereign and was working His larger purposes.
Jacob’s life would be a picture of both God’s MERCY and REDEMPTION and Jacob would become a very important part of God’s story “The Grand Narrative”. How often have you found yourself in a situation where God was doing something outrageous and you couldn’t understand or even imagine what God was doing, yet God was asking you to trust Him and take great steps of faith with God?
When Jacob awoke the next morning, he was so impacted by the significance of that ‘defining moment’ dream that he raised up a stone pillar, anointed it with oil, and called that place “Bethel” saying: “Surely the LORD is in this place and I was not aware of it. This is none other than the house of God…” (Gen. 28:16-19)
That statement challenges me, how about you? How often has God been at work in our circumstances and we were not aware of it? We have very little record of what Isaac and Rebekah had done to teach their sons Esau and Jacob about the God of Abraham, but clearly Jacob had some understanding and deep respect for the God of his grandfather Abraham.
This encounter with God and this place he named “Bethel” was for Jacob a life changing ‘defining moment’. It was so powerful it launched Jacob into a 20-year refining season of his life which would shape his life, his legacy and an entire nation of people, Israel. Over the next few weeks, we’ll see that statement fulfilled as we walk God’s “Grand Narrative” story.
From that place, ‘Bethel’, Jacob continued his journey to Harran nearly 500 miles to the north. Upon arriving there Jacob did in fact meet his uncle Laban, brother to his mother Rebekah. (Gen. 29:1-14) Laban took Jacob in to live with his family and immediately Jacob began working alongside Laban’s daughters in caring for their flocks of animals. In that process Jacob fell in love with Laban’s younger daughter Rachel and an agreement was made between Jacob and Laban that Jacob could marry Rachel in exchange for 7 years of working for Laban as one of his shepherds. (Gen. 29:15-20)
After those 7 years of work, on the wedding day, deceiver Jacob was himself deceived by Laban and instead found himself married to Leah, Rachel’s older sister! Angry, but with little recourse, Jacob could only agree to work an additional 7 years for Rachel’s hand! (Gen. 29:21-30)
Pause… do we see how Jacob is going through a significant refining process with God? God’s mercy and blessing met Jacob in that dream at Bethel as Jacob was running away from his moral failure. And God’s kind provision (grace) met Jacob when Jacob arrived in Harran and Jacob was taken in and provided both housing and employment by his uncle Laban.
God’s further blessing met Jacob when Jacob fell in love with Rachel, but with Jacob being deceived by his uncle Laban and forced to work 14 years as a dowery for the love of his heart Rachel, and also be stuck with two sisters as his wives, oh my, do we see God’s discipline of Jacob as God was dealing with Jacob’s deceiving heart? For the rest of Jacob’s life he lived in the painful consequences of his deception of his father and the shattering of his family!
One of the remarkable, consistent works of God as He deals with our human race, is how God can make wonderful things out of the mess we’ve made in life. Have you found that to be true? Jacob found himself married to two sisters, Leah and Rachel, both of whom discovered they were barren and unable to bear children!
Normal sister/wife rivalry became jealousy driven chaos! In those times, particularly in that part of the world, polygamy was an accepted practice as a means for women to be cared for by responsible husbands. Jacob would have had two ‘homesteads’ of several tents each. One for his wife Leah and her servants and the other for Rachel and her servants.
In some parts of our world today, which I have visited, this is normal life. When both Leah and Rachel were unable to bear children, they did as Sarah had done and offered their servants as ‘surrogate mothers’, to bear children for them.
Genesis 29:31-30:24 is the remarkable story of Jacob fathering 11 sons and 1 daughter by four different women! God opened Leah’s womb first and she actually gave birth to four sons with Jacob, his firstborn son Reuben and then three more sons: Simeon, Levi and Judah. (Gen. 29:31-35) Rachel, of course, was deeply jealous so offered her servant Bilhah as a surrogate mother and Bilhah bore Jacob two sons Dan and Naphtali. (Gen. 30:1-8)
When Leah realized she had stopped conceiving, she offered her servant Zilpah to Jacob as her surrogate mother and Zilpah bore Jacob two sons Gad and Asher. (Gen. 30:9-13) In His kindness, God opened Leah’s womb again and she bore Jacob two more sons Issachar and Zebulun and one daughter Dinah. (Gen. 30:17-21)
And finally, God opened Rachel’s womb, and she bore Jacob one son, Joseph. (Gen. 30:22-24) Do the math my friends, that’s 11 sons and 1 daughter, from four different women!! Oh my, is your head spinning? Can we even begin to imagine what life was like for Jacob and this chaotic clan of people!?
Now why would I spend a portion of this edition of “Walking with Jesus” leading you through the chaos of Jacob’s family? Because the entire nation of Israel traced their heritage back to Jacob’s sons, because each son became the head of an entire tribe of people! As you may know not long after Rachel gave birth to Joseph, God blessed her with one more son and sadly Rachel died giving birth to that son. Jacob named him Benjamin. (Gen. 35:16-20) Yes, this is the son after whom the current Prime Minister of Israel is named more than 4000 years later!
After the birth of Joseph, Jacob felt it was time to take his wives, his large family and all his flocks and separate from Laban his father-in-law. The remainder of Genesis 30 is the account of how Laban and Jacob practically negotiated and came to terms with that decision.
Sadly, as you read through those verses, we see the evidence that down deep inside Jacob was still a deceptive man as he bred his animals to be a much better genetic line than the flocks of Laban. Oh, while Jacob apparently had a desire to be a God honoring man that desire was often overruled in his heart and practical choices by his selfishness, his pride, his desire to manipulate circumstances to his own advantage.
Does that sound familiar in our world today? So how does God accomplish God’s holy purposes when God has to work with selfish people? We’ll see that tomorrow as we continue traveling with Jacob and his family in God’s “Grand Narrative”.
For today here’s a worship song that helps us reflect on what we see God doing in Jacob’s life, and I’ll meet you here tomorrow…
Today’s Scripture: Genesis 29, 30.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Genesis 30
Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.
Pastor Doug Anderson
“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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