Focal Passage: Genesis 30:25-34, 41-43
Patience is a virtue. But try as I might, I am not very patient. I do not like long lines. I do not like waiting almost anywhere. But I try. Even as I get older, I continue working on it. However, patience is a characteristic of value and worth. It means tolerance, persistence, fortitude, perseverance, and unflappability — those things we strive for yet may not achieve.
Patience was something new for Jacob. In the beginning, he was not a patient man. As the deceiver, he had tricked his father and brother in a moment of opportunity and then ran for his life. He was in a hurry. He tricked Isaac and Esau out of Esau’s birthright as the eldest son. He had received his father’s blessing, which was meant for Esau. He wanted. He took. He ran — quickly.
Jacob arrived at his mother’s brother’s home and Laban received him. Then something very unexpected happened. He became a patient man. Over the next 20 years, as the deceiver was deceived when Jacob fell in love, God worked on his heart and changed him. Through learning patience, Jacob became a blessed man.
Jacob met Rachel, Laban’s younger daughter, when he arrived at Laban’s home. He asked Laban for permission to marry her. He granted him permission with a twist — work for him for seven years. Jacob worked hard for his wife-to-be.
After seven years, the wedding day came. The morning following the wedding, after the wedding veil had been removed, Jacob found that he had been tricked and had married Leah, Rachel’s older sister.
Lloyd
Incensed, he went to Laban, who told him the custom of the day was that the oldest sister was to be married first. Laban pushed his deception further by permitting him to marry Rachel one week later for another seven years of work. Jacob received no income for working for Laban for those 14 years, only the promise to marry Rachel.
Finally, after 14 years, Jacob was ready to return home to his father. Although Laban had never paid Jacob, Laban did not want Jacob to leave. Because of Jacob’s work, Laban had become a prosperous man.
Laban was willing to pay any amount of money for Jacob to stay and continue his work. Business was very profitable. Yet, Jacob was insistent. It was time to head home with his family.
But there was still the matter of payment. Laban had become wealthy. Jacob was not. Jacob proposed a settlement for his 14 years of labor. He would cull from Laban’s flock the less desirable spotted lambs and dark goats and take them as his own. But it would take him another six years to build his flocks of sheep and goats from the undesirables to a prosperous flock. In the process, the Lord blessed him.
Jacob matures from a young man stealthily cheating his brother and his father to a man willing to work hard enough that his boss, Laban, acknowledged that he had prospered because of the work Jacob did and was willing to pay any price to keep him, and long enough to get what he wanted — Rachel—the woman that he loved. Then, he worked another six years to provide for his family.
Because of Jacob’s growing passion for patience, the Lord blessed him and all his family. B&R
