Father, thank you for your goodness
towards us. Thank you that we can so freely
take from you, hear from your word, listening to it, reading
it, and claiming your goodness as ours, as sinners, because
of the Lord Jesus Christ who said, come unto me, all you who
labor and are heavy laden, I will give you rest. And here we come,
Lord, coming to your word, dependent upon you for our life, and our
spiritual life especially. We pray, Lord, that you would
speak to us, cause us to see your goodness in saving such
as we are. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
In Genesis chapter 28, just to refresh your memory, Jacob was
instructed by his father Isaac to go to the place of Haran,
or Padon Aram, and to take a wife from there. And you know what
happened. On his way there, God appeared to Jacob. Jacob was
sleeping. He had his head on a stone and
God appeared to him. It was entirely God's initiative. It was entirely by God's will,
God made himself known to Jacob. And if you remember the account
there of the ladder reaching from earth to heaven, and at
the top of the ladder the Lord himself stood. And Jacob saw
the angels of God ascending and descending upon that ladder.
And of course in John chapter 1 verse 51, the Lord Jesus said,
that was Him. He is the Son of Man on whom
the angels of God ascend and descend. Because of the mediation
of our Savior, because of His atoning work, God's blessings
come to His people here on earth. The Son of God came into this
world, He humbled Himself as the Son of Man, and took on the
body of His people, their human nature, and their sin, and bore
their punishment in order that God might be gracious to us through
Him. That's the latter. Now God made
himself known to Jacob in this way, and yet Jacob, for all of
this, seems to have been mostly ignorant of God's true character. And I want to show you that from
the end of chapter 28 before we read on. It says in verse
16 of chapter 28, Jacob awaked out of his sleep and said, Surely
the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. And he was afraid
and he said, how dreadful is this place. This is none other
than the house, but the house of God. And this is the gate
of heaven. So Jacob was not comfortable
in the house of God. It was a dreadful place to him. And he evidently had not heard
from the Lord up to this time, even though he dwelt in the tent
of his grandfather Abraham and in his father Isaac. And we know
that God was their God. But God hadn't revealed himself
to Jacob up until this point. At least there's no record of
it. And his reaction here shows that he did not yet know the
Lord as he truly was. Even though he didn't, he set
up this pillar, poured oil on the rock, and called the name
of that place Bethel, which means house of God. And then it says
in verse 20, Jacob vowed a vow saying, Now understand Jacob's
character. Jacob's name came before... I mean, when he was just born,
he was the second one born. They were twins. Esau was first
delivered, and then Jacob. And when Jacob was being born,
he grabbed a hold of Esau's heel, and that's the way he got his
name. The name Jacob means supplanter, which means someone who trips
up another one and takes advantage of them. And that's what Jacob
did. He lived his life that way. And
you remember what he did the first encounter after that. Esau was hungry and Jacob was
cooking and made some kind of a soup. And Esau was so hungry
he said he had to have a bowl of it. So he asked Jacob for
it and Jacob took advantage of that situation. And he tripped
up his brother. I'll give you the soup if you
give me the birthright." So he traded, he sold the soup in exchange
for the birthright. Esau discounted the birthright,
didn't think much about it. But that was another example
of Jacob's wit and wile, his trickery. It didn't seem like
trickery at the time to Jacob. It seemed like he was getting
what he really wanted, which was the blessing. And that has
a double meaning there. On the one hand, he was striving
for and hungering after the blessing that came from being the firstborn,
which was a good thing because that blessing would have been
the blessing God gave to Abraham and to his father Isaac. So in
that sense, we can see the spiritual benefit of what he did. But on
the other hand, he did it in a sly sort of way. And then later,
You remember how he deceived his father. It was plain deceit. He lied to his father in order
to take the blessing that he intended for Esau for himself.
Isaac meant it for Esau. Jacob got it. But it was all
according to God's will. Nevertheless, Jacob did it in
a way by his own grasping and striving and wit and wile in
order to get what he wanted. And this is the character of
his life. And so when the Lord says this, all these things God
said to him. I'm going to bless you. I'm the
God of Abraham, your father, and of Isaac. And I'm going to
bless you. I'm going to multiply your seed.
I'm going to give you the land. I'm going to be with you. I'll
go with you where you are. And I'll bring you back to this
place. I'm going to keep you. And all these things. And Jacob
heard all that. All spoken by God of his initiative. All of
grace. And this is what Jacob said.
If God will be with me and keep me in this way that I go, and
give me bread to eat and cloth to put on, so that I come again
to my father's house in peace, then shall the Lord be my God."
Now, it might be that Jacob was thinking, well because he said
this, then I can depend on him to do that. But I think it's
different. I think he spoke here as Jacob,
in his own character. Because he's saying, if God will
do this, then he's going to be my God. In other words, Jacob
was someone who bargained. You could never out You can never
have a better bargain than the one that Jacob got. He was good
at this. And so, without realizing it perhaps, this is just what
he said, expressing out of his own nature, I'm going to do this.
He's basically taking the unconditional promises of God's grace and turning
them into something that he can bargain with. And he sets his
sights so low that he speaks about clothing and food when
God promised him eternal blessings. He didn't see the significance
of God's blessings. It says in Ephesians 3.20, the
Lord is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we
ask or think. You can never imagine, you can
never ask for a blessing greater than what God will give you if
he gives it to you of his own design and his own will and his
own grace. You can never fathom what God
will give you. And so Jacob had set his sights
so low that he was thinking of earthly things. He still had
not yet seen God as the God of all grace. And that's what the
next 20 plus years are going to teach Jacob. And we're going
to see that in several ways here. And I'm not going to re-read
this, but remember in chapter 29, Jacob travels. He travels,
I don't know, he must have gone about 50 miles in one day. And
he lands on his place at Bethel, and then he went the rest of
the way. We don't know how far it was. He went to Haran, and
there he saw, he met with the family that was connected to
Rachel Laban, his mother's brother. Now, it was his mother who instigated
the deceit with Isaac. She was Laban's brother. Rebecca
was Laban's brother. And Jacob was a man who was crafty
too. He must have gotten it from his
mother. by her instruction, maybe unwittingly, and also because
it was in their bloodline, and Laban was just like this. He
was a crafty fellow. And so what God is going to do
here, is he's going to bring Jacob down in his own opinion
of his own abilities. In order to teach him that everything
in his life is going to be by God's grace. If he learns this,
then he'll learn who God is. Unless he learns this, he's only
going to see himself. He's only going to see what he
can get by his own wit. By his own strength and his own
wily ways. And so, he goes to Haran. And he has, by God's grace, according
to God's purpose, there's a hook. that attracts Jacob, and it's
Rachel. And he wants her. He loves her.
Immediately, as soon as he sees her, I have to have this woman.
And Laban was Rachel's father. And so Laban recognizes this.
He knows that Jacob is smitten by his daughter. Laban is a crafty
guy. He's a good car salesman. He
says this in verse 15. And Laban said to Jacob, after
he had been there a month, Laban waited for Jacob for a month.
You can imagine what was going on in Jacob's mind all that time.
How can I talk this man into giving me his daughter? He was
thinking, planning, scheming, looking for an opportunity. Laban
was on the other side of the table. He's planning, scheming,
thinking, how can I take advantage of this man? He knows he has
him. And so he says, Laban said to
Jacob, because thou art my brother, shouldst thou therefore serve
me for nothing? I always find that amusing. He
suggests something about service, but he admits he's his brother.
Do you make your brother serve Remember how God brought a wife
to Isaac. Remember how Abraham's servant
went to the same place. Even spoke to Laban and his father,
Bethuel. And they talked about many things. But remember that whole transaction.
I'm going to refer to that in a minute. But listen to the way
this unfolds. Laban said to Jacob, Behold, because thou art my brother,
shouldst thou therefore serve me for naught, tell me, what
shall thy wages be? You suggest the amount." Now
he knew that Jacob wanted Rachel and so Jacob is so at a disadvantage
here. He's like Esau needing a bowl
of soup and ready to trade anything for it. Jacob wants Rachel more
than anything and he's willing to trade anything for her. And
so Laban had two daughters. The name of the elder was Leah
and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah was tender-eyed. The word tender means weak. Weak-eyed. I don't know if she had poor
vision or if her eyes just didn't look attractive. Didn't make
her look attractive. But whatever it was, she had
a physical disadvantage to her sister. And so she was tender-eyed,
but Rachel was beautiful and well-favored, which means that
Leah was not beautiful and was not favored, even though she
was the oldest. Keep these things in mind as
we go through this. God's going to teach Jacob about himself
so that he can learn about God, and he's going to use these three
people, Laban, Rachel, and Leah. And so it says, Jacob loved Rachel.
This is verse 18, and said, I will serve thee seven years for Rachel,
thy younger daughter. So that was the agreement. And
Laban said, it is better that I give her to thee than that
I should give her to another man. Abide with me. And Jacob
served seven years for Rachel. And they seemed to him but a
few days for the love he had to her. Now don't forget when
we went through this, this really is a picture of the Lord Jesus
Christ and his love for his people. And how this is a tender expression
of Christ's intense love for his people that drove him to
do all that he did and consider it a small thing, because of
the joy that was set before him. He endured the cross, enduring
the contradiction of sinners against himself, and even the
separation that occurred when he bore our sins in himself.
Separation from God. Verse 20, And Jacob said to Laban,
give me my wife after he had served for seven years he said
give me my wife for my days are fulfilled that I may go in unto
her and Laban gathered together all the men of the place and
made a feast and it came to pass in the evening that he took Leah
his daughter and brought her to him and he went into her so
it's the wedding day Jacob is anticipating marriage to Rachel. He loves Rachel, all he can think
about is Rachel, and after seven years he expects Laban to fulfill
his end of the bargain, to give Rachel to him. And so there's
a feast, Laban makes a feast, and it's night time. They didn't
have street lights and other lights in those days, so in the
commotion, Laban tricks Jacob and sends in his older daughter to Jacob, who full well expected
Rachel to be there. Now imagine what Leah experienced
in this. She was not considered beautiful.
She was not favored. She was her father's daughter,
but he treated her no better than something to bargain with
for another man's labor. What did Laban think of Leah?
What did he think of her more than a slave? Actually someone
he could sell. Laban was not the kind of guy
that you would find, that you would want to be with. And Leah
was at the receiving end of all this mistreatment. Think about
Leah, because God's going to teach Jacob about his grace through
Leah. And he's going to teach Jacob
about himself through Laban. Because Laban deceived Jacob. Exactly like Jacob in his heart
lived his life as a deceiver. And so, in this time, at this
night, the wedding night, it came to pass in the evening that
Laban took Leah his daughter and brought her to Jacob, and
he went into her, and Laban gave unto his daughter Leah Zilpah
his maid for a handmaid. And it came to pass in the morning,
behold, it was Leah, and he said, Jacob said to Laban, What is
this thou hast done to me? Did not I serve with thee for
Rachel? Wherefore then hast thou beguiled
me? Now you can see in this how God
is making Jacob see himself in his uncle Laban. And it's a painful
thing to experience living with yourself. When we see what we are and the
behavior and the words of others, it's like, oh man, I didn't realize
I was so rotten. But this man Laban was the epitome
of what Jacob was, only he was older and more crafty at it,
and so he did this thing unscrupulously. Traded Leah for Rachel at this
time. Think about Leah's case here.
She goes into this man, given to him by her father, sold to
him for seven years of his labor, and she can't even tell him that
it's her. She knows that in his mind, he
is thinking she is her younger sister. That she is the beautiful
one. That she is the one that he loves.
And she doesn't tell him that. This is Leah. What would you
do if you were Leah? You would probably hate your
father. You would probably also hate this man, Jacob. Because
look what happened next. Because he said, what have you
done? You've tricked me. So obviously he didn't appreciate Leah at
all. And Laban said in verse 26, So
now Laban is saying, you're going to have to serve me seven more
years for Rachel, but at least for one week just be married
to Leah and then after a week I'll let you have my other daughter
Rachel. So Leah now is going to be married
to Jacob for just one week by herself. And then in comes her
little sister, the beautiful, favored one, and steals her husband
from her. This is Leah. The name Leah means
weary. And I already said her eyes,
tender eyes, means she had weak eyes. She was weary and she was
weak. She was ill-favored. And she
was sold for nothing, and her husband didn't love her. In fact,
it says, and Laban gave next, it says
that after he fulfilled that week with Rachel, Laban gave
Rachel, his daughter, to wife also, to Jacob, to wife also. And Laban gave to Rachel his
daughter Bilhah, his handmaid, to be her maid. Each of these
girls of Laban, first Leah and then Rachel, were given a slave
girl, Zilpah for Leah and Bilhah for Rachel. And verse 30, Jacob
went in also to Rachel, and he loved Rachel more than Leah and
served with him yet seven other years. And when the Lord saw
that Leah was hated, He opened her womb, but Rachel was barren."
Now here's where we want to pause and think about this a little
bit more. I think we should take time to
think about Leah because God is going to teach Jacob about
his grace through her. He could not understand this.
It took Jacob a long time with Leah. He hated Leah, actually. It says here he hated her. It
says first he loved her less, but what kind of love is that? What kind of love is the love
of a man to a wife when his love is divided and loves another
woman more than her? That's called hatred. That's
why God said that a man shall leave his father and mother and
cleave to his wife. Just one. Just one wife. And Moses anticipated the fact
that a husband married to two wives would hate one and love
the other. And said you can't give the blessing of the firstborn
to the wife that you love if the firstborn is actually born
to the wife that you hate. So Moses understood that and
God knew that this was going to happen. Throughout time, men
would marry more than one woman, or in their heart they would,
and their true wife would suffer. So Leah is suffering. She was
not becoming to man, not beautiful to others, and in herself, she
knew herself to be not beautiful. And she wasn't favored by man.
Her father Laban sold her, just for seven years of labor, from
another man, taking care of his sheep. although he did give her
a slave girl. That was the only distinction
I can see here between her and a slave, the way Laban treated
her. And she was given to Jacob in
marriage, but on the night of their marriage she couldn't tell
him who she was. She had to remain silent that entire night knowing
that her husband thought she was another woman, her younger
sister Rachel. Always favored above her, always
considered more beautiful. She was married for only one
week before Jacob also married her younger sister. And later
in chapter 30, Leah asked Rachel, her sister. Leah's son, Reuben,
had gone out and found these things called mandrakes, and
Rachel wanted those mandrakes. She coveted them. And so she
said, I want your mandrakes, your son's mandrakes. And Leah
said to her, is it a small matter that you have taken my husband,
and now you want my son's mandrakes? So here, Leah understood Rachel
had stolen Jacob from her. But like every believer, and
as all the church of God, she was a woman, forsaken. In Isaiah
54, it says that about the church of God. Look at this in Isaiah
54. Leah was like this woman, forsaken. Isaiah 54. He says this in verse, we could
read the whole chapter, I just want to read a couple verses.
He says in verse 5, I'm sorry, let me back up. Verse 4. Fear not, for thou shalt not
be ashamed, neither be thou confounded, for thou shalt not be put to
shame, for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt
not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more. For thy
maker is thine husband, the Lord of hosts is his name, and thy
Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, the God of the whole earth, shall
he be called." This is describing the marriage of Christ to his
people, the church. For the Lord hath called thee
as a woman forsaken, grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth,
when thou wast refused, saith thy God. And then he applies
the lesson. For a small moment have I forsaken
thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a little
wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, but with everlasting
kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer. For this is as the waters of
Noah to me, for as I have sworn that the waters of Noah should
no more go over the earth, so have I sworn that I would not
be wroth with thee, nor rebuke thee. For the mountains shall
depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart
from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed,
saith the Lord, that hath mercy on thee." This is talking about
the church. When was the church forsaken?
Well, never really, but it seemed like she was. And that occurred
when the Lord Jesus Christ bore our sins. All the time before
Christ came, we were, as a woman, forsaken. And when the Lord Jesus
bore our sins, then God forsook Him in His wrath because of our
sins. Then we were forsaken. Jesus
cried, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? So we knew
this in some sense, and God is saying, now you're married to
your Maker, the Lord, thy Redeemer, the One who Himself shall be
called the God of the whole earth. And it's as the waters of Noah.
Because the waters of Noah passed over in judgment, and the ark
lifted up Noah and his family and all living creatures that
were in the ark, so God's people are saved in Christ. And God's
wrath is remembered no more against them. But now, what we see here
is a woman, Leah, ill-favored, not beautiful in herself, not
beautiful, weak-eyed, and weary by name. And hated by her husband. And despised by her sister too.
And yet, notice here what we see. In Genesis chapter 29. And it says, And when the Lord
saw that Leah was hated, He opened her womb, but Rachel was barren.
You see what God did for Leah? He saw that she was mistreated. He saw that she was as a woman
forsaken. A woman who in herself was nothing.
And yet He had grace upon her. Leah never seemed to complain
to her husband. She never despised her husband.
And that's an amazing thing, I think. That she never spoke
evil against her husband. She never spoke against God in
all this. She didn't even speak against her father. And the Lord
opened her womb. This is grace. This is God's
blessing on this weary, weak-eyed, ill-favored, not beautiful, unloved,
hated woman. This is God's mercy on the church
of God. And this is what God is teaching
Jacob through Leah. Grace, grace, grace. It's all
going to be by grace. And so God opened her womb. You
know what Leah wanted more than anything? Listen to what she
says in verse 32. And Leah conceived, and bare
a son, and called his name Reuben. For she said, Surely the Lord
hath looked upon my affliction. Now therefore my husband will
love me." What did Leah want more than anything? Her husband
to love her. And what was she deprived of?
Her husband's love. That was her affliction. And
so God looked upon her and gave her a son. And she called the
name of that first son, Reuben. Which said, the Lord has looked
upon my affliction. He sees. The words actually mean,
see a son. But she applied it as from the
Lord. She saw all that came into her
life as from the Lord. And so she trusted in the Lord.
This is what God's people, on whom He has grace, do. They trust
Him. Everything that came into her life, she said, this is God's
goodness towards me. And so she called her son by
a name that reflected her trust in God. Surely the Lord hath
looked upon my affliction. Now therefore my husband will
love me. And then in verse 33, and she conceived again. She
is blessed again. And she bare a son and said, because the Lord
hath heard. So this name means heard. God has heard. And she
said, God has heard that I was hated. He hath therefore given
me this son also, and she called his name Simeon, heard, God heard. He heard that I was hated, and
he answered me with this blessing of a son. And she conceived again,
verse 34, and bare a son and said, Now this time will my husband
be joined to me. See what she wants more than
anything? Oh, that my husband would love me and be joined to
me and that I might receive from my husband, through God's grace,
the blessings that he promised to my husband. She wanted the
promises. And she lived on independence
upon God for those promises. And God was blessing her. He's
blessing her because she was weary, weak, unbeautiful, ill-favored,
hated, despised. So Levi was called joined or
she was referring that to her being joined to her husband now.
He will be joined to me. And then 35, listen to this. And she conceived again and bare
a son. And then she said, now will I
praise the Lord. Therefore she called his name
Judah, which means praise, and she left bearing for a while.
She's going to have more children, but not till later. What is this
last son? She gives God all the praise.
This son is from the Lord, and I'm going to praise the Lord.
Who is Judah? Isn't the Lord Jesus the one
who came from the tribe of Judah? And isn't all of our praise to
God in the Lord Jesus Christ? So doesn't she see in Judah,
even though it doesn't say the words here in scripture that
she saw Christ in Judah, isn't that what the Spirit of God is
telling us through this prophecy? That in Judah, God's people would
praise Him for His grace. This is what God did for Leah,
and this is how Jacob was going to learn about God's grace. He had already appeared to Jacob,
but he didn't seem to get it yet, because his own character
prevented him. It's almost as if Jacob was indistinguishable
from Laban in a lot of ways. He lived scraping and grasping
and scheming and trying to get things in his life. And he comes
up against Laban and meets his equal, his superior in his evil.
And the appearance of God to him almost didn't seem to impact
him until God brings him down. And his own preference of Rachel
to Leah resulted in all this blessing coming upon Leah so
that God would show him it's going to be by God's grace. The
one who is afflicted, as Jacob now was by Laban, the one who
is ill-favored, the one who has nothing, is given everything
from God. And she saw that this was from
God in Christ. And now, Jacob is going to learn
something from Rachel about himself. He's going to see himself in
her. Look at chapter 30. And when Rachel saw that she
bared Jacob no children, Rachel envied her sister. The girl who
had everything all this time, now she's envying her sister.
Because the Lord had blessed her. And she said to Jacob, listen
to what Rachel said, give me children or else I die. Why didn't
Rachel ask the Lord? Why didn't she take her, like
Leah must have done, her affliction, her barrenness, a sign of her
reproach, as we learn later, why didn't she take that to the
Lord? Because Rachel also, like Jacob, walked in this way of
self-confidence in what she was in herself. She was beautiful,
well-favored. You have no need of God when you're like that.
Everyone praises you. And so Jacob, seeing this reaction
of hers, becomes angry with her. Verse 2, "...and Jacob's anger
was kindled against Rachel, and said, Am I God? Am I in God's
stead, who hath withheld from thee the fruit of the womb? God
has done this to you." He's learning something now through Rachel.
Rachel is his wife, his loved wife, and yet she's acting, first
envious, and now in unbelief, blaming him for her own lack. Because God withheld from her.
And notice what she does. She's sneaky and conniving. And
she goes, aha, I know. Behold, my maid Bilhah, go into
her, and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have
children by her. So she wants her slave to bear
a child by her husband. So she gives her slave girl to
Jacob and says, go into her. And her child will be my child.
I'll claim it, and I'll name it." And verse 4, And she gave
him Bilhah her handmaid to wife, and Jacob went into her. And
Bilhah conceived, and bare Jacob a son. Notice in all this God
is multiplying Jacob's seed. But doing it in a way that's
full of strife and struggle in his family because he still doesn't
see God's grace. What if Jacob would have come
to Laban the first time and did what Abraham's servant did when
he came for a wife for Isaac? What did Abraham's servant do?
All the way there, he's praying to the Lord. Lord, guide me in
the way. Lord, show me the woman. Lord, if it's this woman, she'll
do that. Show me that this is her. And
then when he gets her, he explains to her everything that God had
done. I'm the servant of my master Abraham. The God of Abraham is
his God. And he's done all these things
for my master, blessed him and so on. Then he goes to Bethuel
and Laban and he explains the case. He lays it all out. This
is what God has done. He's prospered me in the way.
He gave me his word, he made these promises to my master,
and then in Providence he led me to you." And then he says,
now I want to take her home to Isaac. So they said, well what
can we say? God has led you here. And they
gave him Rebecca. He didn't have to work seven
years, he didn't have to pay a big dowry. He gave them gifts,
and they wanted to keep her for a while. He said, no I need to
go, let me go, and they let him go. See how God worked in that
man? Through that man, he was completely dependent upon God.
He knew he couldn't do this. He had to have God do this, and
he was completely dependent. But Jacob comes there, trusting
in his own strength and his own wit, and he gets himself in a
whole bunch of trouble because he still doesn't know the Lord
in His grace. And so, we see this happening
here. God is blessing Jacob now, but it's coming the hard way.
He's hard-headed, and the blessings come the hard way. His lesson
comes the hard way. We can either do this the easy
way or the hard way. Depending on how hard-headed
you are, and full of pride in yourself, it's going to take
a while. It took him over 20 years. And so Bilhah bears a
son. And Rachel said, notice how Rachel
interpreted this. God judged me, and hath also
heard my voice, and hath given me a son. Therefore she called
his name Dan. Judged me? She interpreted the son by her servant as God's judgment,
that what she did in giving her maid to Jacob was a good thing. And Bilhah, in verse 7, Bilhah
Rachel's maid conceived again and bared Jacob a second son.
And Rachel said, with great wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister.
You see what Rachel's doing? She sees the whole thing as a
competition, a strife, a struggle. There's no peace in this family.
No wonder Jacob said later when he saw Pharaoh at 130 years old,
he says, few and evil have been the days of the years of my life. My wives are fighting. They're
competing with one another. Rachel, the one I love, is envious.
She blames me when she should be going to God. She, when she
has a son, she calls him Judgment, as if God has judged her as righteous. And then she goes on and says,
in this one, she says, with great wrestling, so she named his name,
called him Naphtali, and I've prevailed. She was thinking about
her competition against her sister for her husband's love. And this
is Rachel. And you can see how Jacob could
see himself in her, couldn't you? And so we see this. Now, both of these wives both
wanted their husband's love. And both of them wanted the blessing
that came that God promised would have a multitude of seed. This
is with a fulfillment. And yet, we see them struggling
over this because they weren't resting in God's promise. In
verse 9, And when Leah saw that she had left bearing, she took
Zilpah her maid, she learned from Rachel now, and gave her
Jacob to wife. And Zilpah, Leah's maid, bared
Jacob a son. And Leah said, A troop cometh.
And she called his name Gad. And Zilpah, Leah's maid, bared
Jacob a second son. And Leah said, Happy am I, for
the daughters will call me blessed. And she called his name Asher.
It doesn't seem to me that Leah took the names of her sons and
made them arrows towards her sister like it does seem Rachel
did in the other direction. Verse 14. And Reuben went in
the days of wheat harvest and found mandrakes in the field
and brought them to his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah,
give me, I pray thee, of thy son's mandrakes. So Rachel now,
I don't know how old Reuben was, but he found these things called
mandrakes. And Rachel wanted them. Then what is that? They
weren't hers. That's covetousness. She coveted
Leah's son's mandrakes. Whatever they were, flowers,
a special kind of herb, something that was desirable in those days.
It says in, what I've read is that it says that they thought
in those days it was some kind of superstitious thing that made
somebody bear children, so it made them
fruitful. And so perhaps Rachel was thinking,
if I get these mandrakes, I'll be able to bear children. So
what does it say about Rachel? She was not only envious, not
only acted in unbelief, blamed her husband for her problems,
was vindictive towards her sister, but she was also covetous and
superstitious. Remember later when they were
leaving here and Laban comes to find them? Somebody has stolen
Laban's idols. Guess who? Rachel. And this is
the one Jacob loved. Don't you see what's happening
here? The wife that Jacob loved most was the worst of the wives. And here again we see the grace
of God, don't we? Who was the one that the Lord
Jesus loved? Wasn't it the one who were the
greatest sinners? You see how salvation is all
of grace? The despised one is given grace.
The hated one is the loved one. The hateful one is the one that's
loved. Just like God's love to Jacob,
He says, before the children were born, Jacob have I loved. Look at Numbers chapter 21. We have to learn that God's grace
towards us does not depend on us. It depends on God's goodness. That's the only thing. Learning
that is the only way we'll know God. The only way we'll fall
on our face before Him in worship. In Numbers chapter 21, He says
this. This is a beautiful scripture. It says in Or 23, sorry. Numbers 23. Remember, Balak hired Balaam
to curse Israel. And so, in verse 14, Balak brought
Balaam into the field of Zophim to the
top of Pisgah and built seven altars and offered up a bullock
and a ram on every altar and said to Balak, and this is Balaam
speaking to Balak, stand here by the burnt offering while I
meet the Lord yonder. And the Lord met Balaam and put
a word in his mouth and said, go again to Balak and say thus,
And so when Balak, when he came to him, behold, he stood by his
burnt offerings, and the princes of Moab with him. And Balak said
to him, What hath the Lord spoken? And Balak took up his parable
and said, Rise up, Balak, and hear. Hearken to me, thou son
of Zippor. God is not a man that he should
lie, neither the son of man that he should repent. He doesn't
take back his blessings. Hath he said, and shall he not
do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall
he not make it good? Behold, I have received commandment
to bless, and he hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it. He hath
not beheld iniquity in Jacob." Jacob? who couldn't find iniquity
in Jacob. The Lord says, I have not beheld
iniquity in Jacob. Neither hath he seen perverseness
in Israel. The Lord his God is with them,
and the shout of a king is among them. That's the shout of the
Lord Jesus Christ when he rose from the dead and took the throne
for his people. God brought them out of Egypt
He hath, as it were, the strength of a unicorn. Surely there is
no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination
against Israel. According to this time, it shall
be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought? Isn't
that amazing? This is what it'll be said of
God's people. What has God done? Look at the work that God has
done. Look at the love He had for them.
Look at the grace He has showed to them. Look at the unchanging
blessings of eternal salvation and glory in Christ that he has
given them. What has God wrought? And so it goes on in chapter
30. So Jacob came out of the field
in the evening and Leah went out to meet him. and said, Thou
must come in unto me, for surely I have hired thee with my son's
mandrakes. And he lay with her that night,
and God hearkened to Leah, and she conceived. You see how Leah
had been praying? He hearkened to Leah. She had
already been praying before Lord. She laid out her prayers, and
the Lord blessed her. And she bared Jacob the fifth
son, and Leah said, God hath given me my hire. because she
paid... And the thing of it is, Leah
understood that Rachel was now at a disadvantage. She couldn't
bear children, and she wanted those mandrakes because she thought
something superstitious and magical was going to happen with these
mandrakes. She didn't trust in the Lord. But Leah did. And Leah had learned a page or
two, so she took advantage of her covetousness, and said, I'll
trade you your husband for my son's mandrakes. And God blessed
her, gave her a son, and she called him Issachar, which means
my higher. And Leah conceived again, and bare Jacob a sixth
son. And Leah said, God hath endued me with a good dowry.
Now will my husband dwell with me, because I have borne him
six sons. And she called his name Zebulun,
which means dwelling. Here Leah is looking for one
thing, my husband, his children, God's promises. She's dependent
upon him and God was gracious to her who was unloved, unfavored,
not beautiful in herself, afflicted because of the lack of love from
her husband and she sought it and she was no more forsaken.
Do you know who was buried with Jacob? Who was buried in the
cave of Machpelah with Abraham and Sarah and Isaac and Rebekah?
With Jacob, it was Leah. It wasn't Rachel. She was buried
along the way. She died in childbirth bearing
Benjamin. And I see here the love of the
Lord Jesus Christ for his people, whether they be Jew or Gentile,
bond or free, male or female, from every kindred and family
under heaven, the Lord Jesus Christ loves his people. Jacob
serves as a type of Christ both in a contrast and a comparison. He loved Rachel, he would do
anything for her. Christ loved his people and would
do anything for her. She was a sinful woman, he loved
her anyway. And he bore all the pain of her
sin. But the Lord Jesus, in contrast to Jacob, actually loved the
woman that Jacob hated. He loved his people even though
they were hated because of their sin. And he laid his life down
for them too. And it was from these women that
Jacob had all these children to God. They were called the
children of Israel. And the true Israel of God are those who are
born by the Spirit of God through the preaching of the Gospel.
Because Christ has sent his Spirit into this world. The seed of
the Spirit of God through the Word of God gives birth to God's
people through the Gospel. It's all about Christ, isn't
it? It's all about His eternal love for His people, His service
to bear our sins and to see us in our affliction and to save
us in God's grace towards us because of Him. And so Jacob
learns about this. He learns about himself through
Laban and through Rachel. He bears Rachel's wickedness
in his own trouble. And he receives blessings from
Leah, this forsaken woman. And all in this I see the Lord
Jesus Christ with his people in God's grace. Jacob, we're
going to see later, he learns something about himself and he
begins to depend upon the Lord. And at the end of, I think it's
chapter 32 or 33, All the time that Jacob is going
along, he calls, he refers to the Lord as the God of Abraham
and the fear of my father Isaac. He says this two or three times.
And finally, after Esau, remember that re-encounter with his brother
where he thought he was going to lose his life and his wives
and his children? After he, the Lord delivered
him from that, you know he called the Lord? He said, he built an
altar and he called on the name of the Lord, he said, El Elohi
Yisrael, which means God, the God of Israel. Now he claimed
the Lord as his God. May God give us grace to see
that we're saved by grace and to stop striving but be still
and know that the Lord is God. Let's pray. Dear Lord, we pray
that you would give us grace to see that all of our salvation
is in the Lord Jesus Christ out of your free and sovereign and
irreversible grace. You have set your heart to save
your people. You put your love upon them and
you put them in Christ and you love them with an everlasting
love and in spite of their sins you save them for your namesake,
for your eternal purpose. Lord, let us fall down in our
face and worship you. Help us to know something about
the evil of our own heart, this reluctance in ourselves to find
a need for grace. Show us our absolute necessity
for it. Show us our absolute necessity
to be found in Christ and to be humbled for what we are in
this life. I know it's going to take a long
time. All through our life, Lord, help us to be distinguished by
your saving grace. and distinguish us by conforming
us to the image of your Son, so that we might find Him to
be all of our praise and our worship, and worship God because
of Him. Our praise, in Jesus' name we
pray. Amen.