Story 52 Jacob Vents
Jacob had escaped from his uncle with all of his wives and children, their servants, flocks, and tents. Ten days into their journey back to the Promised Land, Laban and the men of his household caught up with them. God had warned Laban in a dream that he could do nothing to harm Jacob. So when Laban arrived at Jacob’s camp, he questioned his son-in-law, pretending to be a generous and loving father-in-law.
“‘What have you done? You’ve deceived me, and you’ve carried off my daughters like captives in war.’” Laban was speaking in blatant half truths. His daughters were not captives. They happily and willingly joined Jacob in his scheme. He was their husband!
Then Laban told another half truth. “‘Why didn’t you tell me, so I could send you away with joy and singing to the music of tambourines and harps? You didn’t even let me kiss my grandchildren and my daughters good-by.’” Now, do you really think Laban would have let Jacob go with joy and music? He had cheated Jacob’s family for years. Was he truly worried about kissing his grandchildren good-bye?
Laban went on, “‘You have done a foolish thing. I have the power to harm you; but last night the God of your fathers came to me.’” Laban told Jacob how the Lord commanded him not to harm Jacob. Laban was not making threats, he wasn’t showing Jacob respect, either. In fact, he was trying to shame him. He was making it clear that if he wanted to, he could make Jacob his slave, and the only thing that stopped him was God himself. What a sneak his uncle was. He certainly was not acting like a generous and loving father and grandfather. He was far from being a kind and protective uncle!
Laban knew he could not harm Jacob, but he could demand that he give back the idols that had disappeared from his house. Jacob didn’t know that Rachel had stolen them, so he confidently told Laban, “‘…if you find anyone who has your gods, he shall not live. In the presence of our relatives, see for yourself whether there is anything of yours here with me; and if so, take it.’”
Wow. Now the future of the whole family was at risk. If the idols were found, Jacob would be called a liar and a thief. Up to then, he was the honest one, and it gave him power and protection against his scheming uncle. But if it looked like he had taken part in stealing idols that belonged to Laban, his uncle would be the one in the right. He would be able to enslave Jacob, and Rachel would be put to death. The foolishness of Rachel had put the whole family of God in terrible danger.
Laban searched Jacob’s tent and Leah’s. When he got to Rachel’s, he found her lying there as if she were sick. She had taken the stolen idols and put them in the saddle of her camel, and then she sat on them! As Laban searched her whole tent, Rachel said, “‘Don’t be angry, my lord, that I cannot stand up in your presence.’” She blamed it on her monthly period. Laban didn’t have any arguments for that, so he left her tent without finding what he was searching for.
When Laban returned to Jacob empty handed, Jacob was angry. He started to vent. He believed he had been falsely accused of stealing. He was chased down like a criminal for nothing! The more he said, the hotter he became. The rage of two decades of anger were finally venting themselves out loud:
“‘I have been with you for twenty years now. Your sheep and goats have not miscarried, nor have I eaten rams from your flocks. I did not bring you animals torn by wild beasts; I bore the loss myself. And you demanded payment from me for whatever was stolen by day or night. This was my situation: The heat consumed me in the daytime and the cold at night, and sleep fled from my eyes. It was like this for the twenty years I was in your household. I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times. 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. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.’”
Genesis 31:38-42
Wow. Jacob had spent twenty years learning what it was like to work for a man of greed, deception, and corruption. These were the ways of Rebekah’s family. As Jacob grew up, his mother’s manipulation and deception had always worked in his favor. Rebekah had used her cunning ways to help her favorite son, and he had learned her lessons well.
But now Jacob had suffered under the pain of those games and deceptions. He understood that they came at a terrible cost to those who had to live with them. Life under Laban’s leadership was a painful school for the leader of God’s future nation. Rebekah’s ways were not the ways of God, and they were not the ways of faith. Jacob was given a moment of stunning clarity…which way would he choose? Would he continue the family pattern of horribly deceptive behavior that completely destroyed trust in a family? Or would he choose to live by faith in the God of his fathers?
When Laban heard Jacob’s tirade against his corrupt leadership, his heart was far too hardened to grieve the destruction of his ways. He refused to see the harm he had caused. To him, all the years of Jacob’s loyal service counted as nothing. He showed no gratitude and no desire to change. And though he knew that it was the God of Abraham who had come to him in dreams and given him wealth and protection, he was still hard hearted against the ways of the Lord.
He said, “‘The women are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks. All you see is mine. Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine, or about the children they have borne? Come now, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it serve as a witness between us.’” Laban knew there was nothing he could to manipulate the situation in his favor, so he settled for a commitment of peace. But oh, doesn’t he make your blood boil? What a terrible man!
Jacob built a heap of stones. It would be a testimony to their agreement of peace. Then they ate a meal there together to seal the treaty. Jacob had to commit to treat the daughters of Laban well. Laban had to promise not to cross over into the land on the other side of the pillar and invade the life of Jacob. Jacob could not cross over to Laban’s side, either. A boundary was set between the two so that both could feel protected from the wily ways of the other.
Finally, after years of distress and tension, wisdom was set in place to protect the family from further chaos. Laban took his oaths in the name of the God of Abraham and his father Nahor. Jacob took his oaths in the name of the Fear of his father Isaac. Isaac’s fear of the Lord was a sign of his deep respect and awe of God, and it was something Jacob was learning. After the meal, the whole clan spent the night there. Early the next morning, Laban kissed his daughters and his grandchildren goodbye and was on his way.
In his terrible greed, Laban had cheated Jacob for years. But God is just, and he was watching over Jacob. As Laban and his sons left Jacob’s camp, the wealth of the family stayed with Jacob. Laban had lost his daughters and grandchildren, too.