Jacob’s Shrewd Plan Completed

Jacob’s Shrewd Plan Completed

Genesis 30: ³⁷ Now Jacob took for himself rods of green poplar and of the almond and chestnut trees, peeled white strips in them, and exposed the white which was in the rods. ³⁸ And the rods which he had peeled, he set before the flocks in the gutters, in the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink, so that they should conceive when they came to drink. ³⁹ So the flocks conceived before the rods, and the flocks brought forth streaked, speckled, and spotted. ⁴⁰ Then Jacob separated the lambs, and made the flocks face toward the streaked and all the brown in the flock of Laban; but he put his own flocks by themselves and did not put them with Laban’s flock.

⁴¹ And it came to pass, whenever the stronger livestock conceived, that Jacob placed the rods before the eyes of the livestock in the gutters, that they might conceive among the rods. ⁴² But when the flocks were feeble, he did not put them in; so the feebler were Laban’s and the stronger Jacob’s. ⁴³ Thus the man became exceedingly prosperous, and had large flocks, female and male servants, and camels and donkeys.

 

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Laban agreed to Jacob’s proposal of separating blemished animals, keeping the perfect ones for himself. He used Jacob for years, adjusting his pay to benefit himself. Jacob used the knowledge he received during the fourteen years of serving Laban to get Rachel.

 

My Observations:

• Jacob acquired skills of managing flocks, herds and crops while serving Laban.
• Jacob used the skills he acquired to take Laban’s wealth, little by little.
• Laban had used Jacob so long, that he took his eyes off of what Jacob was doing.

 

Grabbing Laban’s wealth was easy for Jacob. He did his job as he always did for decades. His plan was to take as much wealth from Laban as he possibly could, leaving Laban with weak animals that could not breed.

 

Jacob became “exceedingly prosperous.” He had a great number of people working for him and large numbers of animals under his care. Laban, the deceiver, was deceived. This act would later haunt Jacob. GOD allowed Jacob to be prosperous.

 

Challenge

• Why does GOD give Moses this detailed description of Jacob’s plan?
• Have you given your plans to GOD so HE can remove anything that HE doesn’t approve of?
• What are the parts of your plan that need to be adjusted by GOD?