Finding God

Then Laban said to Jacob, “Because you are my kinsman, should you therefore serve me for nothing? Tell me, what shall your wages be?” Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the elder was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah’s eyes were lovely, and Rachel was graceful and beautiful. Jacob loved Rachel; so he said, “I will serve you seven years for your younger daughter Rachel.” Laban said, “It is better that I give her to you than that I should give her to any other man; stay with me.” So Jacob served seven years for Rachel, and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her.

Then Jacob said to Laban, “Give me my wife that I may go in to her, for my time is completed.” So Laban gathered together all the people of the place, and made a feast. But in the evening he took his daughter Leah and brought her to Jacob; and he went in to her. (Laban gave his maid Zilpah to his daughter Leah to be her maid.) When morning came, it was Leah! And Jacob said to Laban, “What is this you have done to me? Did I not serve with you for Rachel? Why then have you deceived me?” Laban said, “This is not done in our country—giving the younger before the firstborn. Complete the week of this one, and we will give you the other also in return for serving me another seven years.” Jacob did so, and completed her week; then Laban gave him his daughter Rachel as a wife.  Genesis 29:15-28 (NRSV)

I am Leah. Daughter of Laban. Daughter-in-law of Isaac and Rebekah. Wife of Jacob. The oldest of two daughters. Sister of Rachel, like me, also a wife of Jacob.

You remember me, don’t you? The wife that Jacob didn’t love. The daughter with weak eyes. Your translation of the story doesn’t tell the truth. My eyes were weak, which meant they lacked lustre. They didn’t sparkle. Between my sister and I, I was the plain one, unattractive. My sister, Rachel, she was was graceful and beautiful. It was Rachel who first caught Jacob’s attention at the well that day.

Another well romance, you say? Yes. Because it was the only place where we could come into contact with men. With our potential future husbands.

When Jacob met Rachel that day at the well, he’d been there for awhile talking with the shepherds. Bragging really. He asked them why they waited to gather all of the sheep at the well before they removed the lid--suggesting it would be more efficient for them to water the sheep as they arrived and then continue to graze them as others arrived and were watered. The shepherds, well, I’m sure they rolled their eyes at this newcomer, this stranger. Who seemed to know everything. 

They explained to Jacob why they did this--that the stone covering the well was so heavy that they needed several men to remove it, so need to wait until shepherds gathered and could do it together. No one shepherd could lift the stone by himself.

It was about this time that Rachel approached the well with her flock. The shepherds who were there told him who she was--that she was the daughter of his uncle. Cousin of Jacob. Then, Jacob felt the need to display his own strength. For the shepherds. But, mostly, I think for Rachel. Jacob rolled the stone covering off the well, entirely on his own. He watered Rachel’s flock. It was, then, that Jacob told Rachel who he was. That he was our kin. He kissed her. And he wept, as was often customary. 

Rachel ran to tell our father, who then ran to meet Jacob at the well. There, my father embraced Jacob, kissed him, and invited him into our house, where Jacob told his story. Everything. The story you heard last week--how he had tricked his brother, Esau, out of his birthright and his blessing. How Esau had become so angry he vowed to kill his brother, Jacob. How Rebekah their mother, who favored Jacob, sent him away for a few days to escape Esau’s wrath. How Jacob had traveled the long distance to our homeland. And how, during his trip, he had seen God and been blessed by God.

Everything that had happened to him he shared with my father. Hearing it, my father acknowledged that Jacob was indeed our flesh and blood. And he welcomed Jacob into our household.

It was about a month later, after Jacob had been working beside my father for no wages, that my father approached him. My father told Jacob that, even though he was our relative, there was no need for him to work for free. He asked Jacob what he would like to be paid. 

It was then that Jacob named his price. He had fallen in love with my sister. My younger sister, Rachel. Jacob told my father that he wanted to marry Rachel. My younger sister. 

You know how wrong this is, don’t you? It was our custom that the oldest daughter would be married first. That I should have been the first to be married. That if any sister were to marry Jacob, it should have been me. 

Yet, I had no voice in the decision. Neither did Rachel. My father agreed with Jacob that he could marry my sister. But, because, Jacob was destitute and had no property or belongs, he could not offer my father the bride price. And so, in exchange for it, my father told Jacob that he would have to work for my father for seven years. 

What could Jacob do? He had no leverage against my father. He had nothing to offer him for my sister. So, Jacob agreed. It was a handsome bride price for my father, who knew Jacob had nothing else to offer and who was so shrewd in negotiating the agreement.

Time passed. Seven years. I think, though, for Jacob it felt like only a few days. He was so enamored with my sister. Finally, the time came for the two of them to be married.

It was a week-long celebration in our custom. A week of festivities and rituals that brought our entire family and community together to celebrate the joyous occasion. Of the marriage of Jacob and my younger sister. The wedding that should have been my wedding.

It customary that at the end of the week, the marriage would be consummated. The wedding night. 

It was on this night that my father came to me. He directed that I put on my veil--one that would cover my face fully. And, then, he led me into the wedding chamber. Into the room that was to have been the room where Jacob and my sister would consummate their marriage. Instead, he told me that I would be a substitute for Rachel. 

I had no say in the matter whatsoever. Neither did Rachel. I knew this would cause hard feelings--harder feelings--between my sister and I. And, yet, what could I do? It was not my place to disagree with my father.

I’ve never fully understood why he did this. Why my father tricked Jacob. Perhaps, he understood how much he had flaunted tradition by agreeing to give Rachel, his youngest, away. Rather than me first, as his oldest. Perhaps he understood how upset I’d been.

Or, perhaps, he knew that, as soon as Jacob married Rachel, he would be leaving to return to his homeland. To be with his family in Canaan. To take Rachel away from us. So far away that we would likely never see her again.

Or, perhaps, it was simply because he had seen how hard Jacob worked. Harder that most of his other men. And that it had cost my father little, except for his daughter. Perhaps his plan all along was to get another seven years of free labor out of Jacob.

Whatever the reason, I became Jacob’s first wife. Head of his household. In the dark.

When jacob awoke the next morning and saw it was me in his bed instead of Rachel, he was furious. He ran to my father. “What have you done to me?” he said. “Didn’t I work for you to have Rachel? Why did you betray me?”

Do you see the irony here? The trickster tricking the trickster. What is the saying you have? “What goes around, comes around.” It was as though God was teaching Jacob a lesson for all of the ways in which he had tricked his own brother. That Jacob was reaping what he had sowed.

What messiness there is in our families! Tricks and deceit. Sibling rivalry. Brokenness.

And lest you sit there comfortably on this Sunday morning and condemn my family and our actions or our culture, you might look in the mirror yourselves. If you did, you might see that you and your families are no different. There is no “them” here. We are you. You are us. We are all far from perfect. Messy. Broken. We hurt each other intentionally and unintentionally. We act in our own best interest and against the greater good of others in our families. We fail to ask those who have no power about decisions that impact their lives. 

To look into the midst of our family--and of your family--is to look straight into human brokenness. To look on our culture negatively is to hold up a mirror to your world that still judges individuals on their appearance and treats women as less than men.

So, where--where in the midst of this messiness and brokenness--are we to find God? To find the Good News? The Gospel? Where is it to be found?

The Scriptures tell of the story of my husband’s ancestors--Abraham and Sarah--warts and all. It isn’t cleaned up to impress anyone or to give you impossible and unattainable role models for moral living. We are all faithful and sinful. We are all blessed by God and cursed by our own actions. We are all saints and sinners.

In Psalm 105 earlier, you read that “God remembers his covenant forever, the word he commanded to a thousand generations, which he made with Abraham, the solemn pledge he swore to Isaac. God set it up as binding law for Jacob, my husband, as an eternal covenant for Israel.” 

In our stories--yours and mine--God continues to work. To move God’s plan forward. God is present because God keeps God’s promises to a sinful humanity. God is faithful when we are busy managing our lives. Even if we don’t see it at first or have a hard time finding it, God is there. God loves us--the broken families of the world. God loves us so much that God will send his son to “the sons of Israel” and, by extension, to you and to all people. 

This is the good news. For you and for me. And for all people. Of all time. And all place. 

“O give thanks to the Lord,” the psalmist writes. “Call on his name, make known his deeds among the peoples.” 

May this be our response. For all time. Amen.

Power Struggle

These are the descendants of Isaac, Abraham’s son: Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac was forty years old when he married Rebekah, daughter of Bethuel the Aramean of Paddan-aram, sister of Laban the Aramean. Isaac prayed to the Lord for his wife, because she was barren; and the Lord granted his prayer, and his wife Rebekah conceived. The children struggled together within her; and she said, “If it is to be this way, why do I live?” So she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said to her,

“Two nations are in your womb,
    and two peoples born of you shall be divided;
the one shall be stronger than the other,
    the elder shall serve the younger.”
When her time to give birth was at hand, there were twins in her womb. The first came out red, all his body like a hairy mantle; so they named him Esau. Afterward his brother came out, with his hand gripping Esau’s heel; so he was named Jacob. Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them.

When the boys grew up, Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the field, while Jacob was a quiet man, living in tents. Isaac loved Esau, because he was fond of game; but Rebekah loved Jacob.

Once when Jacob was cooking a stew, Esau came in from the field, and he was famished. Esau said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stuff, for I am famished!” (Therefore he was called Edom.) Jacob said, “First sell me your birthright.” Esau said, “I am about to die; of what use is a birthright to me?” Jacob said, “Swear to me first.” So he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank, and rose and went his way. Thus Esau despised his birthright.Grace and peace to you from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.  Genesis 19:25-34 (NRSV)


Who of you grew up in a family with more than one child or had more than one of your own children? Then you have, I would suspect, experienced something called sibling rivalry. I can see by your faces that you’re familiar with this!

I am, too. I was the youngest of three children in our family. My older sister and brother were a little over 2 years older than I was. The two of them were born ten (10) months apart. (My mom used to talk about that time and what it was like to have three children in diapers!)

My sister was the oldest. My brother was next. And, because of the way that their birthdays fell, they ended up being placed in the same grade all throughout elementary, middle and high schools. Because he was the only boy in our family and was my dad’s helper on our ranch, he was given responsibility earlier and at much greater levels than my older sister. Even though she was older than he.

He got his driver’s license earlier than she did. He got his own car sooner than she did. And, then, to make things even more challenging, he was incredibly smart and athletic. An “A” student without even really trying. And All-American in football. In contrast, my sister, although she was incredibly smart in her own way, was a “B” student and not nearly as athletic, although she could sprint.

You can imagine the difficulty this caused in our family. The rivalry that existed between them. They always seemed to be at odds with each other over something. And, although, sibling rivalry existed between all three of us, it was at a much higher level between the two of them.

Sibling rivalry. It’s a power struggle. A struggle between sisters and brothers to decide who is better? Who is smarter? Who is stronger? And on and on.

That’s what we have in our story today of Jacob and Esau. 

At the opening of our story, Abraham is dead at age 175. We learn in preceding verses that, after Sarah died, he married another wife. A woman named Ketura. He had six more children with her. Before his death, he gave “everything he owned to Isaac.” Everything. And to his sons with Keturah? Well, he gave them gifts and then sent them away to live in the east. Away from Isaac. Does that sound familiar? Remember Ishmael?
As we heard last week, Isaac married Rebekah at age 40. For twenty years, she was barren, unable to conceive. How difficult that must have been for her! And, yet, on her behalf, Isaac prayed to God. And his prayers were immediately answered. Rebekah become pregnant.

This wasn’t an easy pregnancy. Unknown to her, she had twins. The fetuses pushed against each other inside of her, causing her great discomfort. So much discomfort that she regretted getting pregnant and even questioned why she should go on living? How difficult this must have been.

So, she, like Isaac, went to inquire of God. To search out God and to find out what was going on. God responded in an oracle through which she learned she had twins. She also learned that each twin would be the leader of two nations. That two different peoples would emerge from her pregnant body. And, even more, that the younger would be stronger than the older, and that the older would serve the younger. 

This is some serious sibling rivalry. 

At the end of her pregnancy, Rebekah delivered and discovered she had fraternal twins. The first and oldest was ruddy--a healthy red--and also full of hair. Rebekah called him Esau, which means red. The second-born twin came out immediately and was holding onto Esau’s heel. His mother named him Jacob, which shares the same root as the word that means heel. It can also mean to cheat.

As they become young men, our story tells us that Esau became an outdoorsman, who knew how to hunt. Rough and ready, who loved the open country.

Jacob? Well he was more of a momma’s boy. Our text says he stayed at home, that he liked to cook. It also says he was quiet. A better translation of this, though, is that he was “whole” or “complete.” A person of integrity. 

One can only imagine the rivalry between these two, very different, brothers. To make matters worse, our story tells us that Isaac and Rebekah each played favorites. Isaac loved Esau. Rebekah loved Jacob. 

Besides the sibling rivalry that added to the family drama, in this time period, having twins introduced another special situation. At the time, the firstborn--the oldest--was eligible for the birthright. This meant that the inheritance Esau would receive would be twice as much as Isaac’s. In addition, in this particular family, there was the blessing of Abraham to consider. This blessing from God (You remember it, don’t you? That Abraham would be a great nation, on his own land, and that he would be blessed so that he could be a blessing to others?). This blessing from God had been passed down to Isaac and would be passed down to Isaac’s oldest son.

So, in this family, not only was Esau up for a double share of the inheritance, it was also expected that he would receive God’s blessing, mediated through the blessing of his father, Isaac.

And yet we know, if nothing else from the stories of Abraham we have already heard over these past weeks, that God operates in a way that is anything but ordinary. It’s almost as if Jacob was so obsessed with obtaining both Esau’s birthright and God’s blessing that he will stop at nothing to obtain it.

In our story today we heard that he essentially bribed Esau to gain his birthright. And in the next few chapters, we learn that Jacob, led by Rebekah, tricks Isaac into giving the blessing to Jacob instead of Esau.

It seems unfair, doesn’t it? That Jacob should gain both the birthright and the blessing from Esau through such trickery and cheating. 

And, yet, Esau isn’t as innocent as we’d like to make him out. Esau wasn’t dying of starvation. He’d been out hunting and came home hungry. And, in exchange for a bowl of lentil soup, Esau sold his birthright. For a bowl of soup. Our story reads that he ate, drank, got up, and left. Showing just how little he thought of his birthright. 

There is really nothing in the behavior of either one of them that deserves God’s favor, is there? Neither one seems deserving of anything in the midst of their rivalry and dysfunction.  

It’s important to remember that this story is not just the story of two brothers. But, it is the story of two nations. Two nations that would be in conflict with each other for over a millenia. Two nations that would be in a power struggle with each other over generations, just as Jacob and Esau struggled with each other. No nation or brother who was really deserving of God’s favor.

Yet, God is generous to both brothers. Both would become ancestors of a multitude. Both would be blessed with abundance to care for the needs of each family. And, in their final reunion, Jacob would recognize the “face of God” in the face of his brother, Esau, because of the gracious way in which Esau would greet him. Eventually, the story of both would end with reconciliation and blessing.  

This is a message for us, too. That, in the midst of our family dysfunction.  In the midst of our dysfunction in the church. Or in our community. Or our nation. Or the world. In that conflict that just never seems to end, God is there. Right there. 

In the midst of our dysfunction in the church, especially as we stand in this 500 anniversary year of the Reformation, an event that tore the universal, catholic (small”c”) church apart and that pitted Roman Catholics and Lutherans against each other until just these last few decades, God has been there.  

Just as God broke in and upended the world through the gracious act of our Savior, Jesus Christ, God continues to be present. Right here and right now. In the midst of all of the messiness. In the conflicts between individuals and families and countries and churches. In our struggles with each other and with God, God continues to be present. Working. Involved. Never giving up. 

And showering mercy upon mercy and extending blessing upon blessing to us and to all people. Everywhere.

Let the people of God say, “Amen.”