Feb. 1, 2012 - Genesis 32

Jacob sent messengers ahead of him…

He’s not going to risk just showing up, since there’s no telling what Esau’s first reaction will be, or how he’ll be received. Instead, he sends notice in advance that he’s on the way, and begs for favor from his brother.

“We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him.”

Uh-oh. He’s bringing an army. And he’s totally still mad and coming to kill everybody. It’s not looking too good.

Then Jacob prayed, “O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, O LORD…Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother…”

I know I don’t deserve it God, but save me! For the first time recorded, Jacob is asking for help. So far he’s just been scheming his way out of tough situations, but now something is different.

…he selected a gift for his brother Esau…

Well, just because he asked for help doesn’t me he shouldn’t try, right? I mean, who can stay mad when they keep getting presents? Anyways, we’ve got bunches of groups of gifts now, and everything else split up and spread out, and Jacob is sorting everything out until eventually they’re headed out.

So Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him till daybreak.

How did this start? Maybe God walked up and put Jacob in a headlock. Or maybe not. It seems more likely to me that Jacob initiates this in some way. He’s alone. Suspicious and on edge thinking his brother is coming to kill him. Mind racing going over all his property and which things are in what group, making sure he didn’t miscount something. And then a figure approaches. And somehow they become locked in a struggle. And it continues until dawn is approaching, and God very simply throws out Jacob’s hip, making the point that he could have easily won at any time. That no matter how hard Jacob tries to fight, this isn’t something he could ever win. But Jacob hangs on. Not trying to win now, just hanging on with everything to receive a blessing.

JacobàIsrael

“…because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome.”

Did he really ‘overcome’ God? Not so much. Then what did he do? What did he overcome? What was this whole thing about anyways? Humility, maybe. Remember, this is just after Jacob asked God for help. For really the first time in his life, he turned to God to help him solve a problem, instead of just trying to do it all by himself. But he also sent some gifts, just in case. And then God shows up. And this wrestling match embodies everything Jacob is fighting to understand. Jacob doesn’t trust that God is enough. He doesn’t know if God really cares about his future. And he’s not the kind of guy to just let stuff go. He’s a quick thinker, a deceiver, not going to take things at face value. He wants to understand, to dig deep. And he’s willing to fight to get to the bottom of this. And so he wrestles with God, trying to hold him down, to wrap his mind around everything. And with a simple touch, God wrenches his hip out. No matter how much Jacob wants to control the situation, he just can’t do it with God. God is in control, and Jacob just has to learn to accept it. And he overcomes himself, his nature. He submits to God, and begs for his blessing. And God gives him another name. And although he will continue to be called Jacob, he also will be called Israel as the story continues. He doesn’t lose his old nature, but he overcomes it.

…and he was limping because of his hip.

Just as Abraham was given circumcision, Jacob/Israel has a physical thing to remind him that God’s promise is no dream. It’s not make-believe, or imaginary, but constantly with him, just as his limp is.

Jan. 31, 2012 - Genesis 31

And Jacob noticed that Laban’s attitude toward him was not what it had been.

It wasn’t exactly great before, so I can only imagine what is going on now…

“Go back to the land of your fathers and to your relatives, and I will be with you.”

Jacob was going to leave earlier with nothing but his family. Since he stayed, though, he has accumulated a great amount of wealth(because of God), but it’s finally time to go ahead and move on.

“You know that I’ve worked for you father with all my strength, yet your father has cheated me by changing my wages ten times…So God has taken away your father’s livestock and has given them to me.”

Laban tried to cheat me, and got out-played. There’s nothing left for you here, so come with me as I leave go back home.

…Rachel stole her father’s household gods.

Why? Does Rachel want these gods to have for herself? To sell? Just to annoy Laban? Well, I don’t know, but it’s possible she was simply taking them so that Laban wouldn’t be able to use them. He did learn by ‘divination’ that God was blessing Jacob, so there is at least the possibility that they do have some sort of power(there are plenty of demonic powers and whatnot, especially when dealing with fortune-telling stuff). Maybe Rachel takes them in the hopes that Laban won’t be able to use their help to learn which way Jacob is heading. Or maybe she’s just trying to take them so that he won’t have them to worship anymore. Or maybe she just wants to sell them. Whatever the case, she takes them.

Moreover, Jacob deceived Laban the Aramean by not telling him he was running away.

Ah-ha! More trickery! Wait till he’s busy, then make a break for it! And again we see that instead of sitting down and trying to talk things out, Jacob thinks his best plan is to simply try to outsmart and outmaneuver his ‘opponent.’

“Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad.”

No curses allowed, but no blessings either. It’s time for Jacob to be split off from Laban, and the less connecting them the better. Also, God has plenty of blessing for Jacob, and doesn’t need Laban trying to add to it. Because by now we know Laban well enough to see that if he could, he might very possibly give Jacob his ‘blessing,’ and then take all the credit for everything.

“You’ve deceived me…Why did you run off secretly and deceive me?”

“I was afraid, because I thought you would take your daughters away from me by force.”

You tricked me! Why would you do such a terrible thing to poor innocent and unsuspecting me? Ha. This whole relationship is built entirely on trickery, deceit, and trying to outdo each other, which is probably a very good reason for some of these trust issues we have here.

If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed.

I’ve got a trump card – God. That’s why I came out ahead, and why you are going to leave me alone.

“All you see is mine. Yet what can I do…”

After everything, Laban just needs to get the last word in. It’s really all mine. That work you did doesn’t really cover it. I kept changing your wages to try to keep it fair, but you kept cheating somehow. You don’t deserve any of it. But, since I can’t do anything about it, let’s just make a deal to leave each other alone. I won’t go on your side, and you don’t come on my side.

Jan. 30, 2012 - Genesis 30

…she became jealous of her sister. So she said to Jacob, “Give me children or I’ll die!”

Drama queen much?

“Here is Bilhah, my maidservant. Sleep with her so that she can bear children for me and that through her I too can build a family.”

Oh right, this trick again. Also, it’s clear that this isn’t one happy family. We have Leah’s family, and Rachel’s family. Jacob just happens to be caught in the middle.

Anyways, through Rachel’s servant Bilhah we get:

5 – Dan – “God has vindicated me; he has listened to my plea and given me a son.”

6 – Naphtali – “I have had a great struggle with my sister, and I have won.”

So far Leah has 4 sons, and Rachel’s servant has 2. Now I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that Leah is still “winning” despite Rachel’s claim that she has “won.” Somebody is acting like a whiny little brat…

When Leah saw that she had stopped having children, she took her maidservant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife.

Anything you can do, I can do better…

Through Leah’s servant Zilpah:

7 – Gad – “What good fortune!”

8 – Asher – “How happy I am! The women will call me happy!”

“Wasn’t it enough that you took away my husband? Will you take my son’s mandrakes too?”

“Very well, he can sleep with you tonight in return for your son’s mandrakes.”

“You must sleep with me, I have hired you…”

Hey look, Jacob is just a prostitute in his own house, with his wives buying and selling time with him between themselves. Ridiculous.

And of course, Leah has a couple more sons:

9 – Issachar – “God has rewarded me for giving my maidservant to my husband.”

10 – Zebulun – “God has presented me with a precious gift.”

And then finally Rachel has her first son:

11 – Joseph – “God has taken away my disgrace.”

“Send me on my way so I can go back to my own homeland.”

It’s been 14 years. I’ve put up with your schemes and I’ve worked hard for you. Now it’s time for me to leave, so I can actually start working for myself. I have no wealth to show for these years of work, just my family. I need to start working to provide something for them.

“I have learned by divination that the LORD has blessed me because of you.”

Divination? Really? “My gods said your God is the one giving the blessings, so could you stick around with him for awhile?” This just seems like the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.

“Let me go through all your flocks today and remove from them every speckled or spotted sheep, every dark-colored lamb and every spotted or speckled goat. They will be my wages.”

That same day [Laban] removed all the male goats that were streaked or spotted, and all the streaked or spotted female goats…Then he put a three-day journey between himself and Jacob…

Wait a minute, did Laban just steal all his ugly stuff so Jacob wouldn’t have anything to start? That’s sure what it sounds like to me. I mean, Laban gets all the speckled and spotted animals, gives them to his sons, and drives them three days away to be separated from the rest of the flock, which Jacob then continues to tend. Now maybe there’s some part of the deal that we don’t quite get in the passage here, and Jacob’s payment was only going to be newborn animals from this time onwards, or something like that. But whatever is going on, obviously Laban isn’t about to make it easy for Jacob, and isn’t going to give him freebie animals. In fact, he’s specifically keeping the already speckled animals separated so Jacob’s chances of getting such animals is as low as possible. It’s all about who can come out ahead between these guys, both trying to out-trick the other.

Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane trees and made white stripes on them…Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink.

Well Laban may have thought he was smart to separate out all the spotted animals, but Jacob has a plan! Make the animals see striped things, and they’ll have striped children! Of course! And while you’re sitting there laughing at how stupid he is, his plan just goes right ahead and works. And we continue to see God blessing this screwed-up, deceitful, superstitious mess of a guy, no matter how much stupid stuff he does. This blessing is so powerful that it just keeps on working regardless of how hard the family tries to screw everything up. They literally can’t avoid getting blessed.

So the weak animals went to Laban and the strong ones to Jacob.

And Jacob wins this round. 

Jan. 29, 2012 - Genesis 29

There he saw a well…

Same well where Rebekah was found? Possibly. Same area, at least.

“…it is not time for the flocks to be gathered. Water the sheep and take them back to pasture.”

Get out of here so I can talk to the pretty girl…

…he went over and rolled the stone away from the mouth of the well and watered his uncle’s sheep.

Well, it’s probably a good bet to say that Jacob has heard the story about how his parents met. Or rather, how the messenger figured out that Rebekah was the woman he was after, to bring back to Isaac. Also, he would know that Laban’s family, and thus Rachel, would know the story as well. And with what we already know about Jacob’s sly and devious nature, it seems to me that not only is this an act of ‘oh, let me move this giant boulder for you’ showing off, but also a sneaky ploy to relate back to his parents experience. How did God reveal that Rebekah was the right woman? She came, and freely offered to water the messenger’s camels. What does Jacob do? Freely waters Rachel’s sheep(possibly even at the same well). If Rachel is paying attention, maybe she’ll see the hand of God at work, and fall hopeless in love with this perfect man that has been sent to her. And of course, moving a giant boulder surely can’t hurt his chances either, right?

…Jacob told him all these things. Then Laban said to him, “You are my own flesh and blood.”

So Jacob gets welcomed, and gets a chance to tell his story. About how he’s the best salesman ever, and got his brother to trade his birthright for a meal. About how he straight up duped his father, and stole the family blessing from under his brother’s nose. About how he came seeking a wife, and then…here he is. And Laban leans back in his chair, smirks a bit, and thinks about how much of his own slickness he sees in Jacob.

“Tell me what your wages should be.”

Hey look, Laban’s offering to pay him, that’s so considerate. And yet, instead of looking to help Jacob start a life of his own, what he’s actually doing is just turning him into another hired hand. Get some cheap labor out of the old family.

“I’ll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel.”

Since Jacob really doesn’t have anything of value, he offers his service to earn the lovely lady. Of course, this means that after seven years, he still won’t have anything of his own, except a wife. Not exactly the best way to start building wealth, but hey, get the woman first, right?

Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife.”

When morning came, there was Leah!

Oops. And here we learn a valuable lesson. On your wedding night, take a minute or two to actually look at your partner, maybe even try to talk with them for a couple seconds or something, just to make sure you know who they are. Because if you’ve got some sneaky relatives, you never know what kind of shenanigans they might try to pull on you…Anyways, Jacob gets a taste of his own medicine and realizes what it feels like to be on the other side of a trickeration scheme.

“Why have you deceived me?”

“It is not our custom here to give the younger daughter in marriage before the older one.”

Where you come from, you may be able to steal your older brother’s birthright, blessing, and whatever else, but that’s not how we do things here. The eldest comes first. Deal with it. You just got duped with your own scam in reverse. Isaac was blind, and his sons got switched, Jacob was…something, and the girls got switched.

“Finish this daughter’s bridal week; then we will give you the younger one also, in return for another seven years of work.”

Can’t turn back now, so just go ahead and finish Leah’s ‘honeymoon’ week, and then you can have Rachel also. If you stay and work for seven more years, of course. Now, he doesn’t have to wait those seven years, but gets Rachel after that week. He just can’t leave until he finishes the extra work.

Jacob lay with Rachel also, and he loved Rachel more than Leah.

Aww, poor Leah, right? Pretty much every time I’ve heard this story taught, everybody feels sorry for poor Leah with the weak eyes, that nobody wanted. And while that’s all well and good, and she certainly must have faced some serious rejection issues, I simply don’t see her as helpless and innocent in all this. I mean, come on. While Laban might have been the one with the idea to switch the daughters, or even the one who really carried it out, Leah went right along with it. She played her part, and managed to trick Jacob through an entire night, and get him to accept her when she was obviously of a different statue than her sister. She had her own share of trickery and deceit in all this. And as we’re about to see, she’s not just going to sit by and let Jacob get taken away, but stand up to her sister and fight to earn her place in the family.

When the LORD saw that Leah was not loved, he opened her womb…

And so it begins. Time to build a family. So let’s start a list of sons, with their corresponding quotes concerning their birth.

1 – Reuben – “It is because the LORD has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.”

2 – Simeon – “Because the LORD heard that I am not loved.”

3 – Levi – “Now at last my husband will become attached to me…”

4 – Judah – “This time I will praise the LORD.”

For the first three, Leah’s focus is all about winning the affections of Jacob. And then for the fourth son, she stops and simply give praise to God. As it happens, this fourth son, Judah, is the son through whom the blessing will continue. Coincidence? Hmmmm. Interesting, at least.

Jan. 28, 2012 - Genesis 28

So Isaac called for Jacob and blessed him…

Although Jacob has just stolen the blessing, and Isaac was furious about his deception, Jacob is still his son. And if this family knows anything, it’s about how much they screw up, and how God keeps forgiving them and blessing them anyways. Welcome to the family Jacob. Blow it, get blessed anyways.

May he give you and your descendants the blessing given to Abraham, so that you may take possession of the land where you now live…

It’s official, Jacob gets THE family blessing. Isaac realizes that despite his plans, God meant what he said when he declared that Jacob would continue the family, and it would be through him that they would take possession of the land. Eventually.

Esau then realized how displeasing the Canaanite women were to his father Isaac; so he went to Ishmael and married Mahalath, the sister of Nebarioth and daughter of Ishmael son of Abraham, in addition to the wives he already had.

Apparently he just now figures out how much trouble his marriages brought to the family. Maybe his parents never voiced their displeasure strongly enough, or maybe he just wasn’t listening, or simply ignored them. However, he certainly knew it was wrong in general, and that he wasn’t keeping his house focused on God, even if he didn’t realize the scope.

Anyways, to fix it he just marries a cousin as well. That fixes everything, right?

“I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

God appears, repeats Abraham’s blessing to Jacob, and promises that it is now his. And that Jacob will not be forgotten, but watched over.

“…and of all that you give me I will give you a tenth.”

Official promise to tithe. To give back some of these promised blessings.

Jan. 27, 2012 - Genesis 27

When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he could no longer see, he called for Esau…

Even though Esau has married poorly, and God has already said that the blessing will be given to Jacob, Isaac is going to bless his firstborn anyways.

What if my father touches me? I would appear to be tricking him…

I would appear to be tricking him. Ha! Yeah, it probably would appear that way, since that’s exactly what would be happening.

Isaac trembled violently and said, “Who was it…I blessed him – and indeed he will be blessed!”

Obviously Isaac isn’t exactly thrilled about being deceived, but there’s no taking it back. This blessing is a pretty big deal, and it doesn’t come with do-overs.

“Bless me – me too, my father!”

“Your brother came deceitfully and took your blessing.”

While Esau will get his own sortof-blessing, that’s all he’s going to get. Similar to Ishmael, he simply isn’t the chosen one, and will only get a ‘secondhand’ blessing. Which, of course, isn’t exactly terrible in itself. Blessings of any kind are cool.

“Isn’t he rightly named Jacob? He has deceived me these two times: He took my birthright, and now he’s taken my blessing!”

Well, while the birthright sale was certainly a devious scheme by Jacob, it wasn’t exactly deception. Esau was completely aware of the terms, and freely agreed to them. Now that he’s had time to think it over, he realizes he got cheated, but he’s trying to retroactively shift the blame onto Jacob when it was really his own fault. Of course, the blessing deal is a different matter, and the straight-up deception is pretty obvious.

Esau held a grudge against Jacob…

“Your brother Esau is consoling himself with the thought of killing you.”

Well somebody has anger issues. Maybe Esau is tired of all this running away from fighting. Maybe he wanted to punch somebody the first time they tried to start a fight over the whole well-digging business, and he’s been holding back all that anger. Or maybe this one thing is just too much. He knows what that blessing means, and that it was supposed to be his. His father was going to give it to him. And then that little wimp Jacob stole it from right underneath him.

Then Rebekah said to Isaac, “I’m disgusted with living because of these Hittite women.”

Ta-da! An excuse for Jacob to leave. Not to mention the keeping pure of his line.

Jan. 26, 2012 - Genesis 26

…and Isaac went to Abimelech…

Hey look, Abimelech again. Now, it’s probably a different Abimelech than the one Abraham dealt with, but it could possibly be the same guy, just some hundred odd years older or so.

When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister…”

Really? Not exactly the most creative thing I’ve heard, if I do say so myself. Well, at least he was sort of paying attention to Abraham’s bedtime stories, right? That, or it’s a genetic issue the family suffers with.  Whatever. So, how will things turn out this time?

“Why did you say, ‘She is my sister’?”

“Because I thought I might lose my life on account of her.”

Oh, right. Exactly the same. Why would you do this? I thought you were going to kill me.

This is Isaac, who Abraham almost sacrificed, but then was stopped by God. Isaac saw God save his life, he knows the promise that rests on him, and God has just finished directly speaking to him. And yet, he still doesn’t trust God to protect him, and thinks he needs to come up with some deception to keep himself safe.

Isaac planted crops in that land and the same year reaped a hundredfold, because the LORD blessed him.

And he’s still getting blessed, despite his best efforts to screw things up.

“Move away from us; you have become too powerful for us.”

Because of his lies, he isn’t trusted anymore, and thus his wealth isn’t that of a friend, but a possible enemy. You don’t want rich neighbors that you can’t trust.

Isaac reopened the wells…

Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and discovered a well…

Then they dug another well…

He moved on from there and dug another well…

People try to pick a fight? Leave. What if you put in a lot of work/energy/time into digging a well? Leave anyways. Dig another one. More fighting? Leave.

Isaac built an altar there…and there his servants dug a well.

Need to find God’s people? Follow the altars. These guys specifically set aside the time to search and listen for God. They work hard at it. They build things. When was the last time you physically exhausted yourself in your search to know God better? Or put effort into it at all? If you really wanted to hear from God, how far would you go?

Meanwhile, Abimelech had come to him from Gerar…

I know we chased you off and everything, but I was just thinking maybe we should nail down a treaty so that God of yours doesn’t kill us. Because, it’s pretty obvious that he’s actually affecting your life and doing stuff for you.

When Esau was forty years old, he married…They were a source of grief to Isaac and Rebekah.

Esau intermarries with the Hittites, outsiders, and contaminates his family line. Shame shame.