Genesis 29

With the strength that came through his recent encounter with the God of heaven and earth, Jacob continued on his journey to Paddan-aram. There he almost immediately met the love of his life, Rachel, a shepherdess and the daughter of Laban, Rebekah's brother.

When Jacob arrived in Aram, he had nothing. By the time he left he would have two wives, two concubines, many children, and many animals and other possessions. Yet the time he spent in Laban's world would be a period of suffering and abuse at the hands of his kinsman. But God blessed Jacob, and God blessed others around him who were caught up in a web of serious trouble.

Everywhere we escape to in this world, we find that the world is still there when we arrive at our destination. The Hittites were not the only sinful people on the planet. The Arameans who were Jacob's relatives also were sinners, as was Jacob himself. God is leading His chosen flock to a better land than Canaan. In this world we will have tribulation, but the Lord is able to bless us greatly through all kinds of troubles despite all manner of sin both inside us and in the lives of those around us.

Jacob served Laban seven years in order to gain one woman, but her father deceived the deceiver who had forced a blessing out of Isaac. He received a less desirable sister instead. But it would be through that older sister, Leah, that Christ would come. The Rachel of his dreams would be his in exchange for seven more years of hard work, but she would not be able to bear children at first.

The conflict between the two sisters would lead them to give their servants to Jacob as concubines that they too might conceive, as each sister attempted to gain a more advantageous position in this family struggle. It is from this story of heartache, rejection, envy, and petty unbelief, that the tribes of Israel were born.

From Leah would come Reuben, Simeon, and Levi, the three oldest sons of Jacob. But it would be the fourth son, Judah, who would be the ancestor of David and all the kings following him, including Jesus. With the birth of Judah, Leah seemed to put away her strife and affliction that came from being the victim of her father's deception and her husband's rejection. She named her fourth son based on the word “praise,” saying, “This time I will praise the Lord.”

In all our troubles, we have an opportunity to do something that is not normal among men. We can praise the Lord. To even say such a thing seems inhuman, naïve, and unattractive. Perhaps this is because we imagine praise in a time of grief as an ugly show of hypocrisy or self-deception. It can be just that, a denial of the obvious that all can see. To praise the Lord rightly, and eventually to count it all joy when we meet trials of various kinds (see James 1), we must first acknowledge evil, injury, death, and abuse to be the truly bad things that they are. Anything less than this is dishonest and will not lead to spiritual victory but only pretense that must soon crash and burn or smolder in the depression of anger that turns inward.

First we must feel what is happening and give full weight to the evil of a father who treats his daughter as an object of his own prosperity and a husband whose resentment is obvious in every longing look he gives to another woman that he loves more than his first wife. First feel the pain and admit the evil of the facts, not only in others, but also in the collateral damage of our own semi-sanctified hearts. Once this is accomplished, then we can look at the rest of the story.

There is more here beyond what Leah feels from Laban and Jacob. There is the overwhelming fact of God who sees and knows. There is the fact of God who makes promises to His people, and who is able to take suffering and turn it into something much more fruitful than bitterness. Once we honestly admit the truth of grief and evil, we are in a far better position to feel the greater facts of God's power and God's heaven. Then the testing of our faith will produce steadfastness, and steadfastness will have its full effect, that we may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. We can learn, in trial, to praise the Lord.

This is impossible without faith. We must believe that God is, and that He will certainly hear those who diligently seek Him, especially in their darkest moments. Could it be that even we will be able to rejoice sincerely in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us? See Romans 5.

Jesus came into this world as the descendant of Judah, a man whose name has something to do with praising the Lord in the midst of honest suffering. If Jesus did not have perfect trust, we would still be in our sin. The trust of Jesus was not naïve. He was a man of sorrows who was well acquainted with grief. He knew what it was to be sold by men, betrayed by friends, misunderstood by family, and forsaken by His Father. He felt grief at the wounds and trials of others, and He pressed on to the end with love that was born in the perfect praise of faith. Let this mind of Christ, then, be in you, and may that good seed of heaven yield much fruit for eternity.