Genesis – First, God
PROVEN FACT: As believers, God will always tell us when to go and when to stay. Are we close enough to God to hear Him? Are we faraway enough from evil to avoid his advice? Will we obey God’s timing? Will we move when He says to move or stay where He has said to stay, no matter what the circumstances? Yes or no? Our response to His leading is up to us. Our yes or no will always be life altering and life changing. The measure of our faith in the God Who knows all and is in all will be tested and evaluated.
God’s part, we discover by his trusted behavior of Truth, is to love us unconditionally every minute of every hour of every day. He draw us to Himself for wisdom. He teaches and nourishes us in the wait between the go and the stay. He provides for all our needs, going and coming and in-between. God protects us in the journey with the ultimate promise, “I’ll go with you”. Evil’s advice leads to self indulgence of purpose which leads to destruction through hasty, rushed decision making. Jacob’s story of saying yes to God when God says to get up and move is personal. Randy and I have learned many lessons about God’s faithfulness and care in each of our major moves and in our tenacious “stays”. We have learned that He is God and we are not. God knows what lies ahead so He knows what is best for us. So, why wouldn’t we trust Him?
We have also learned, when in doubt, don’t. A move may be on the horizon, but God’s timing is not right.
Therefore, this story is more about God, His attributes, His character, and His timing. It is about God giving us what we need, at the right time, when we need it most, in going, staying or in the transition. It is about our God who never leaves us to fight our battles alone and will always bring resolution if we listen to Him. It is about God who always has and always will be our…
Way maker
Miracle worker
Promise keeper
Light in the darkness
My God
That is who you are
Genesis 31, The Message
1-2 Jacob learned that Laban’s sons were talking behind his back: “Jacob has used our father’s wealth to make himself rich at our father’s expense.” At the same time, Jacob noticed that Laban had changed toward him. He wasn’t treating him the same.3 That’s when God said to Jacob, “Go back home where you were born. I’ll go with you.”
4-9 So Jacob sent word for Rachel and Leah to meet him out in the field where his flocks were. He said, “I notice that your father has changed toward me; he doesn’t treat me the same as before. But the God of my father hasn’t changed; he’s still with me. You know how hard I’ve worked for your father. Still, your father has cheated me over and over, changing my wages time and again. But God never let him really hurt me. If he said, ‘Your wages will consist of speckled animals’ the whole flock would start having speckled lambs and kids. And if he said, ‘From now on your wages will be streaked animals’ the whole flock would have streaked ones. Over and over God used your father’s livestock to reward me.
10-11 “Once, while the flocks were mating, I had a dream and saw the billy goats, all of them streaked, speckled, and mottled, mounting their mates. In the dream an angel of God called out to me, ‘Jacob!’“I said, ‘Yes?’
12-13 “He said, ‘Watch closely. Notice that all the goats in the flock that are mating are streaked, speckled, and mottled. I know what Laban’s been doing to you. I’m the God of Bethel where you consecrated a pillar and made a vow to me. Now be on your way, get out of this place, go home to your birthplace.’”
14-16 Rachel and Leah said, “Has he treated us any better? Aren’t we treated worse than outsiders? All he wanted was the money he got from selling us, and he’s spent all that. Any wealth that God has seen fit to return to us from our father is justly ours and our children’s. Go ahead. Do what God told you.”
17-18 Jacob did it. He put his children and his wives on camels and gathered all his livestock and everything he had gotten, everything acquired in Paddan Aram, to go back home to his father Isaac in the land of Canaan.
19-21 Laban was off shearing sheep. Rachel stole her father’s household gods. And Jacob had concealed his plans so well that Laban the Aramean had no idea what was going on—he was totally in the dark. Jacob got away with everything he had and was soon across the Euphrates headed for the hill country of Gilead.
22-24 Three days later, Laban got the news: “Jacob’s run off.” Laban rounded up his relatives and chased after him. Seven days later they caught up with him in the hill country of Gilead. That night God came to Laban the Aramean in a dream and said, “Be careful what you do to Jacob, whether good or bad.”
25 When Laban reached him, Jacob’s tents were pitched in the Gilead mountains; Laban pitched his tents there, too.
26-30 “What do you mean,” said Laban, “by keeping me in the dark and sneaking off, hauling my daughters off like prisoners of war? Why did you run off like a thief in the night? Why didn’t you tell me? Why, I would have sent you off with a great celebration—music, timbrels, flutes! But you wouldn’t permit me so much as a kiss for my daughters and grandchildren. It was a stupid thing for you to do. If I had a mind to, I could destroy you right now, but the God of your father spoke to me last night, ‘Be careful what you do to Jacob, whether good or bad.’ I understand. You left because you were homesick. But why did you steal my household gods?”
31-32 Jacob answered Laban, “I was afraid. I thought you would take your daughters away from me by brute force. But as far as your gods are concerned, if you find that anybody here has them, that person dies. With all of us watching, look around. If you find anything here that belongs to you, take it.” Jacob didn’t know that Rachel had stolen the gods.
33-35 Laban went through Jacob’s tent, Leah’s tent, and the tents of the two maids but didn’t find them. He went from Leah’s tent to Rachel’s. But Rachel had taken the household gods, put them inside a camel cushion, and was sitting on them. When Laban had gone through the tent, searching high and low without finding a thing, Rachel said to her father, “Don’t think I’m being disrespectful, my master, that I can’t stand before you, but I’m having my period.” So even though he turned the place upside down in his search, he didn’t find the household gods.
36-37 Now it was Jacob’s turn to get angry. He lit into Laban: “So what’s my crime, what wrong have I done you that you badger me like this? You’ve ransacked the place. Have you turned up a single thing that’s yours? Let’s see it—display the evidence. Our two families can be the jury and decide between us.
38-42 “In the twenty years I’ve worked for you, ewes and she-goats never miscarried. I never feasted on the rams from your flock. I never brought you a torn carcass killed by wild animals but that I paid for it out of my own pocket—actually, you made me pay whether it was my fault or not. I was out in all kinds of weather, from torrid heat to freezing cold, putting in many a sleepless night. For twenty years I’ve done this: I slaved away fourteen years for your two daughters and another six years for your flock and you changed my wages ten times. If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not stuck with me, you would have sent me off penniless. But God saw the fix I was in and how hard I had worked and last night rendered his verdict.”43-44 Laban defended himself: “The daughters are my daughters, the children are my children, the flock is my flock—everything you see is mine. But what can I do about my daughters or for the children they’ve had? So let’s settle things between us, make a covenant—God will be the witness between us.”
45 Jacob took a stone and set it upright as a pillar.
46-47 Jacob called his family around, “Get stones!” They gathered stones and heaped them up and then ate there beside the pile of stones. Laban named it in Aramaic, Yegar-sahadutha (Witness Monument); Jacob echoed the naming in Hebrew, Galeed (Witness Monument).
48-50 Laban said, “This monument of stones will be a witness, beginning now, between you and me.” (That’s why it is called Galeed—Witness Monument.) It is also called Mizpah (Watchtower) because Laban said, “God keep watch between you and me when we are out of each other’s sight. If you mistreat my daughters or take other wives when there’s no one around to see you, God will see you and stand witness between us.”51-53 Laban continued to Jacob, “This monument of stones and this stone pillar that I have set up is a witness, a witness that I won’t cross this line to hurt you and you won’t cross this line to hurt me. The God of Abraham and the God of Nahor (the God of their ancestor) will keep things straight between us.”
53-55 Jacob promised, swearing by the Fear, the God of his father Isaac. Then Jacob offered a sacrifice on the mountain and worshiped, calling in all his family members to the meal. They ate and slept that night on the mountain. Laban got up early the next morning, kissed his grandchildren and his daughters, blessed them, and then set off for home.
You are hereTouching every heart
I worship you
I worship you
You are here
Healing every heart
I worship you
I worship you
You are here
Turning lives around
I worship you
I worship you
You are here
Mending every heart
I worship you
I worship you
Way maker
Miracle worker
Promise keeper
Light in the darkness
That is who you are…
Forever and ever, Amen
“Why aren’t you playing my girl for more than a few minutes?”, the mom shouts. I tried to explain, “With 70 girls on various teams we are going to rotate them in and out so everyone gets a chance to play.” With our stated goals, it sounds reasonable, doesn’t it? Not to the irrational mom who wants her girl to win at all costs.
When Rachel realized that she wasn’t having any children for Jacob, she became jealous of her sister. She told Jacob, “Give me sons or I’ll die!”
14 One day during the wheat harvest Reuben found some mandrakes in the field and brought them home to his mother Leah. Rachel asked Leah, “Could I please have some of your son’s mandrakes?”
22-24 And then God remembered Rachel. God listened to her and opened her womb. She became pregnant and had a son. She said, “God has taken away my humiliation.” She named him Joseph (Add), praying, “May God add yet another son to me.”
29-30 Jacob replied, “You know well what my work has meant to you and how your livestock has flourished under my care. The little you had when I arrived has increased greatly; everything I did resulted in blessings for you. Isn’t it about time that I do something for my own family?”
34 “Fair enough,” said Laban. “It’s a deal.”
The time had come for Jacob to move his large family to his own homeland and be on his own. He now had eleven sons and one daughter, and he had more than fulfilled his part of the bargain. He had earned the right to freedom. It was time to stop working for Laban and start building his own future security.
–Ask God what He wants and then do it.
Directed by God, Jacob has now arrived in the country of his kin. His eyes immediately fall on a shepherdess, the lovely Rachel. He can’t take his gaze from her. I’m sure she wasn’t “dressed to kill” at this first meeting. She probably had the odor of sheep, too. But it is love at first sight for Jacob.
1-3 Jacob set out again on his way to the people of the east. He noticed a well out in an open field with three flocks of sheep bedded down around it. This was the common well from which the flocks were watered. The stone over the mouth of the well was huge. When all the flocks were gathered, the shepherds would roll the stone from the well and water the sheep; then they would return the stone, covering the well.
21-24 Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife; I’ve completed what we agreed I’d do. I’m ready to consummate my marriage.” Laban invited everyone around and threw a big feast. At evening, though, he got his daughter Leah and brought her to the marriage bed, and Jacob slept with her. (Laban gave his maid Zilpah to his daughter Leah as her maid.)
31-32 When God realized that Leah was unloved, he opened her womb. But Rachel was barren. Leah became pregnant and had a son. She named him Reuben (Look-It’s-a-Boy!). “This is a sign,” she said, “that God has seen my misery; and a sign that now my husband will love me.”
We also see in this event the beginning of some positive changes in the character of Jacob. For one thing, look at his boldness as he confronted the shepherds, moved the stone, and introduced himself to Rachel. And look at his honesty as he told his story to Laban, Rachel’s father (29:18).
DECEPTION REVISITED
“…But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.”
The Lord promised to be present with Jacob in whatever circumstances lay before him. In those days, people had the idea that when you left home, you left your god behind you. (That happens today, it seems, more often than not!) But the Lord of all the earth promised to go with Jacob, protect him, and one day bring him back home. No matter what happened, He would accomplish His will in and through Jacob. 
10-12 Jacob left Beersheba and went to Haran. He came to a certain place and camped for the night since the sun had set. He took one of the stones there, set it under his head and lay down to sleep. And he dreamed: A stairway was set on the ground and it reached all the way to the sky; angels of God were going up and going down on it.
16-17 Jacob woke up from his sleep. He said, “God is in this place—truly. And I didn’t even know it!” He was terrified. He whispered in awe, “Incredible. Wonderful. Holy. This is God’s House. This is the Gate of Heaven.”
On awakening, Jacob’s first response was one of fear and surprise. God was in that place, and he didn’t know it! But “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge” (Prov. 1:7), so Jacob’s response was the right one. He discovered that he could find God in unlikely places and that any place is “the house of God” (Bethel) because God is there. 
His next act was to worship the God who had appeared to him. He turned the headpiece into a pillar to memorialize the great experience that had been his that night. By pouring oil on the stone, he consecrated it to the Lord. He didn’t use the stone as an altar or make a sacrifice; he simply set it apart as a memorial. In later Hebrew liturgy, the pouring out of liquid was symbolic of pouring one’s life out in devotion to the Lord (Ex. 29:38-41; see also Phil. 2:17 nkjv; 2 Cor. 12:15).
As we will read…Jacob didn’t have an easy life in the years that followed, for though God forgave his sins and was with him in his journeys, Jacob suffered the consequences of his sins. God in His grace forgives us, but God in His righteous government sees to it that we reap what we sow.
Let ev’rything that, ev’rything that
If we could see how much You’re worth
PSALM 145 (NIV)
The Lord is trustworthy in all he promises
17 The Lord is righteous in all his ways
In any group situation, family, church or work, when you scheme to get your own way, for your own benefit it will probably blow up in your face. God’s will and purpose will still be accomplished, because HE is God, but will we be blessed by how we behave in the process? Or will we face consequences that we never planned to encounter on our journey?
8-10 “Now, my son, listen to me. Do what I tell you. Go to the flock and get me two young goats. Pick the best; I’ll prepare them into a hearty meal, the kind that your father loves. Then you’ll take it to your father, he’ll eat and bless you before he dies.”
30-31 And then right after Isaac had blessed Jacob and Jacob had left, Esau showed up from the hunt. He also had prepared a hearty meal. He came to his father and said, “Let my father get up and eat of his son’s game, that he may give me his personal blessing.”
34 Esau, hearing his father’s words, sobbed violently and most bitterly, and cried to his father, “My father! Can’t you also bless me?”
41 Esau seethed in anger against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him; he brooded, “The time for mourning my father’s death is close. And then I’ll kill my brother Jacob.”
Had we been alive during patriarchal times, we probably would have predicted great success for Isaac and Rebekah. After all, Isaac was a dedicated man who had put himself on the altar in obedience to the Lord. He trusted God to choose his wife for him, and the wife God sent, Jacob loved. Both Isaac and Rebekah knew how to pray and seek the mind of the Lord for their home. What more could a married couple want?
JACOB – Jacob’s concern wasn’t “Is it right?” but “Is it safe?” He was worried about the eleventh commandment: “Thou shalt not get caught.” Interesting to note…“My son, let the curse fall on me” was her word of encouragement to Jacob, but little did she know what she was saying. For after Jacob left for Haran, she never saw her favorite son again.
In cooperating with the scheme, Jacob was only obeying his mother, but he could have refused and suggested that they just face the situation honestly and confront Isaac. But once Jacob donned Esau’s clothes and took the savory meal in his hands, the die was cast and he had to play the part successfully. See how one lie led to another, for deception can be defended only by more deception. Jacob was weaving the tangled web.
Not only did Isaac speak kindly to his son, but also he gave him an extra blessing as he left to go on his long journey to Haran. This time it was “the blessing of Abraham” that was important, the fulfillment of God’s promise to bless all the earth through Jacob’s descendants (Gal. 3:14).
Whew, and we think our families are messed up! Maybe they are in different ways. What we learn from this dysfunctional family is that scheming, deceiving, lying and manipulating are not characteristics that build family relationships. Put God first. Love, trust and obey God no matter what. Let HIM control the situation so HIS will is accomplished in ways that bring out the BEST in us, not the worst. Then love your family as God loves you, unconditionally, honestly, putting their interests above your own, like Jesus taught us.
We are not perfect, only perfectly forgiven by a gracious God who provides where He guides and blesses those who believe Him and obey His teachings. Our faith is not based on a feeling but on the very foundation of our being laid by our belief in the death and resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ. All that we are and all that we think, say or do must be built on this foundation. Do we mess up and stray from the building codes and plans from time to time? Yes! Does God leave us? No! He was, is and always will be with those who believe. He will help us to stop, rebuild and move on in the constant construction of our Faith.
Isaac, son of Abraham, faces the fear of powerful people in the land that God gave His people to possess. He repeats the lie his father told, telling the inhabitants of the land, that his wife was his sister. Didn’t he learn from the mistakes of his father? Apparently not. 
“I am the God of Abraham your father;
1. Fear cannot occupy the same space as Faith. You have one or the other. You cannot have both at the same time.
4. Obedience to God, because of Faith, opens the floodgates of God’s blessings.
16 Finally, Abimelech told Isaac: “Leave. You’ve become far too big for us.”
9-24 One day, as Isaac’s servants were digging in the valley, they came on a well of spring water. The shepherds of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s shepherds, claiming, “This water is ours.” So Isaac named the well Esek (Quarrel) because they quarreled over it. They dug another well and there was a difference over that one also, so he named it Sitnah (Accusation). He went on from there and dug yet another well. But there was no fighting over this one so he named it Rehoboth (Wide-Open Spaces), saying, “Now God has given us plenty of space to spread out in the land.” From there he went up to Beersheba. That very night God appeared to him and said,
28-29 They said, “We’ve realized that God is on your side. We’d like to make a deal between us—a covenant that we maintain friendly relations. We haven’t bothered you in the past; we treated you kindly and let you leave us in peace. So—God’s blessing be with you!”
Oh Lord,
21-23 Isaac prayed hard to God for his wife because she was barren. God answered his prayer and Rebekah became pregnant. But the children tumbled and kicked inside her so much that she said, “If this is the way it’s going to be, why go on living?” She went to God to find out what was going on. God told her,
27-28 The boys grew up. Esau became an expert hunter, an outdoorsman. Jacob was a quiet man preferring life indoors among the tents. Isaac loved Esau because he loved his game, but Rebekah loved Jacob.
Abraham’s “obituary” is found in verses 7-8. He died “in a good old age” as the Lord had promised him (Gen. 15:15). He had walked with the Lord for a century (12:4) and had been “the Friend of God” (James 2:23). 
He also died “full of years” (Gen. 25:8). This suggests more than a quantity of time; it suggests a quality of life. 
THE WILL
True faith is our obedient response to the Word of God. God speaks, we hear Him and believe, and we do what He tells us to do. Abraham and Sarah held on to God’s promises and God rewarded their faith.
The word “unanimous” was the key word for me. It would mean God was in this. It would mean that God led them to tell me that this was indeed God’s will for my life. 
Abraham was now an old man. God had blessed Abraham in every way.
26-27 At this the man bowed in worship before God and prayed, “Blessed be God, God of my master Abraham: How generous and true you’ve been to my master; you’ve held nothing back. You led me right to the door of my master’s brother!”
45-48 “I had barely finished offering this prayer, when Rebekah arrived, her jug on her shoulder. She went to the spring and drew water and I said, ‘Please, can I have a drink?’ She didn’t hesitate. She held out her jug and said, ‘Drink; and when you’re finished I’ll also water your camels.’ I drank, and she watered the camels. I asked her, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ She said, ‘The daughter of Bethuel whose parents were Nahor and Milcah.’ I gave her a ring for her nose, bracelets for her arms, and bowed in worship to God. I praised God, the God of my master Abraham who had led me straight to the door of my master’s family to get a wife for his son.
58 She said, “I’m ready to go.”
THINK ABOUT IT…
It is probably one of the hardest acts to do in life when you purchase enough land, from strangers, to bury your mom and then your dad. We live in Indiana. Ministry moved us here. We grew up in Oklahoma. 
Only a couple of years later, mom progressively lost strength. As she knew she was nearing the close of this chapter, she told Randy and I not take her body back to Oklahoma to be buried. “TOO expensive”, she said with a grin, even though the plot was paid for in Oklahoma by other family plots. “Purchase a plot of ground in a cemetery here”, she said. “I won’t really be there. I will be in a better place anyway, so it doesn’t matter.” 
-9 Then Abraham got up, bowed respectfully to the people of the land, the Hittites, and said, “If you’re serious about helping me give my wife a proper burial, intercede for me with Ephron son of Zohar. Ask him to sell me the cave of Machpelah that he owns, the one at the end of his land. Ask him to sell it to me at its full price for a burial plot, with you as witnesses.”
Sarah had been a good wife to Abraham and a good mother to Isaac. Yes, she had her faults, as we all do, but God called her a princess (Gen. 17:15) and listed her with the heroes and heroines of faith (Heb. 11:11). The apostle Peter named her as a good example for Christian wives to follow (1 Peter 3:1-6), and Paul used her to illustrate the grace of God in the life of the believer (Gal. 4:21-31).
Sarah died in faith (Heb. 11:11, 13), so Abraham knew that she was in the Lord’s care. In the Old Testament, very little was revealed about the afterlife, but God’s people knew that God would receive them when they died (Ps. 73:24).
My mom, dad and both sets of grandparents knew this. I know this. I cling to what Jesus said, 
