October 12, 2025: Broken & Undeserving - Genesis 29:31-30:43

So a couple of Fridays ago, my wife Emily and I realized very

excitedly that it is October. So for us, that means a trip to

the great institution of seasonal vibes, Hobby Lobby.

We walk in and we immerse ourselves in the autumn

decorations all around. Some soprano saxophone version

of Come Thou fount of every blessing coming over the

loudspeaker and trying to avoid the Christmas section because

we're not there yet. Some of you maybe we're not

there yet, enjoying autumn. So we're walking and we're

meandering, and we come across that thing that Hobby Lobby is

also known for very well, at least in our minds.

And that is their witty signage. We were especially impressed

this year at the signs depicting family life.

For example, if you are feeling pretty good about your family

and yourself, you might pick up the sign that says best family

ever. There's an option for you.

But then there's the format that says it's basically a zoo in

here just to make sure your guests have accurate

expectations of what they're going to get when they're

entering the house, whether it's the pets or the people

themselves, you can decide. Then there's the sign saying my

housekeeping style is best described as there appears to

have been a struggle. Another one, please excuse the

mess. Our standards have lowered with

each child. And the last one, perhaps my

very favorite of them all, says as far as anyone knows, we are a

nice, normal family. That's the code.

That's the mantra. We've all lived in the chaos of

family at one point or another, whether it was years ago,

whether you're living it now, whether it's a family that was

very large or a family that was much smaller.

Sometimes it is pretty funny, and sometimes that chaos can dip

further and further away from it until it's so far from anything

funny. There are plenty of times, maybe

most obviously at the holidays or other gatherings, when it can

be downright painful. Our families have the ability to

give us the best support and encouragement and memories, but

it also has the opportunity to give us the deepest and most

lasting scars of our entire lives.

And yet God has designed families as building blocks of

society, beyond government institutions or book clubs or

schools, music organizations, sports.

The family has a special influence for forming and

shaping all of us, whether we want it to be that way or not.

And while family origins and genetics are not determinative,

there's no escaping the fact that they heavily inform our

concept of self. Our family influences what we

think about the questions that Pastor Dan keeps putting before

us. Who am I?

What am I? Why am I here?

If we're not careful, the family can also have too much influence

on these questions. There are two ditches, either

too much of an influence and we try to define ourselves

completely by our family, or not enough and we try to pretend

like it never existed. So we have to answer these

questions through a redemptive lens the way God would have us

answer them through a biblical worldview.

And this is where the corrective experience of the family of God

comes in through. Though the church itself is far,

far from perfect, no matter how great or how terrible your

experience, God has a way of using your family for His

purposes. Whether you feel like you're

rocking it, or if you feel like you're just barely getting by

with the people that God has placed you with, He has the

power and the ability to use the most dysfunctional families for

redemptive purposes beyond our wildest imaginations.

In today's passage, we're going to see this family of promise,

this legacy of blessing, get as messed up as it's ever been.

It's going to be weird. It's going to be dark, and in a

wild turn of events, He's also going to bless them in ways they

couldn't possibly deserve or make happen on their own.

This family is going to prosper in amazing ways, and it's

obvious that they don't deserve this at all.

But God sees the bigger picture, and He is going to work in spite

of their sin. God fulfills His promises in

unlikely ways, and in today's passage, we're going to see how

God fulfills His promises through broken families and

through undeserved grace. Through broken families and

through undeserved grace. 1st, through broken families.

So we have one man in today's chapter 4, women and twelve

children. One more son will come in

chapter 35. What could go wrong?

So let's jump in. We already read the end of

chapter 29. Leah is in the middle of this

horrible polygamy, and the text is clear.

When the Lord saw Leah was hated, He opened her womb, but

Rachel was barren. So here's a quick recap of the

kids so far. Leah first gave birth to Reuben.

This means see a son testifying that the Lord has seen her.

Then she gives birth to Simeon. This sounds like the Hebrew for

heard. God has not only seen but he has

also heard her. The situation sounds very

similar to Haggar, if you remember with me to last fall in

Genesis chapter 16, Abraham's servant Hagar, after being

Genesis 16 · chapter mention

misused horribly in order to bear children, calls her son

Ishmael, which means God hears in response to an encounter with

him. She also names the place where

she encountered the Lord that he is a God of seeing to

memorialize it. So no matter how messed up these

situations, no matter how messy the relationships, she is

testifying that God sees and God hears Hagar then and Leah today.

These children will always remind Leah of that blessed

truth. Then we have Levi.

This sounds like the Hebrew for attached.

And this is a prayer from Leah desperate for Jacob's love,

which she still doesn't have even after bearing these

children. And then fourth, she gives birth

to Judah. And this sounds like the Hebrew

for praise. And this is a beautiful

response. Even after going through all of

this, Leah says, this time I will praise the Lord, a heart of

praise in the midst of years of rivalry and suffering.

Now we pick up in Genesis chapter 30.

Genesis 30 · chapter mention

If you would read along with me verse 1, chapter 30.

When Rachel saw that she bore Jacob no children, she envied

her sister. She said to Jacob, give me

children or I shall die. Jacob's anger was kindled

against Rachel. And he said, Am I in the place

of God who is withheld from you the fruit of the womb?

Then she said, here is my servant Bilhah, go into her, so

that she may give birth on my behalf, that even I may have

children through her. So she gave him her servant

Bilhah as a wife. And Jacob went into her, and

Bilhah conceived and bore Jacob a son.

Then Rachel said God has judged me and has also heard my voice

and given me a son. Therefore she called his name

Dan. Rachel's servant Bill Hawk

conceived again and bore Jacob a second son.

Then Rachel said with mighty wrestlings I have wrestled with

my sister and have prevailed. So she called his name, Naftali.

Already we begin to see a character change in Jacob.

As Pastor Dan mentioned, it started last week when this

deceptive man found himself being deceived for once by his

uncle Laban. And we look how he immediately

attributes this event to God's hand.

He messes up a lot. But here there may be some

glimmerings, some showing that Jacob might be just starting to

get it right and beginning to see God's hand in his life.

And yet we also have an echo of ongoing generational sin.

Like grandfather, like grandson. It's just like Sarah and Abram.

If you remember with me again to last fall in Genesis chapter 16,

Genesis 16 · chapter mention

Sarah was supposed to be the one to give birth according to God's

promises, and she couldn't. She was barren.

So she took matters into her own hands, and she gave her servant

Haggar to Abram so that Haggar would bear children in Sarah's

place. In today's passage, Rachel is

the one Jacob chose as his wife, and yet she can't bear children.

So what does she do? She gives her servant Bilhah to

bear children instead. This is not OK, and it only

increases the rivalry. Bilhah has given birth to Dan.

This sounds like the Hebrew for judged.

Rachel is testifying to God's mercy in judging her servant

worthy to bear children for Jacob.

Then Bilhah gives birth to Naphtali, which sounds like the

Hebrew for wrestling. Rachel is not rejoicing in

praise to God, but an excitement that she has wrestled and won in

this rivalry with her sister, or so she thinks moving forward in

verse 9, when Leah saw that she had ceased bearing children, she

took her servant Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife.

Then Leah's servant Zilpah bore Jacob a son and Leah said good

fortune has come, so she called his name Gad.

Leah's servant Zilpah bore Jacob a second son and Leah said happy

am I for women have called me happy.

So she called his name Asher. So not a great moment for Leah

either. She's sinking down to Rachel and

Sarah's level. Here's her servant Zilpah being

used like a pawn in a game. Two more children come.

We have Gad, which sounds like good fortune, and Asher which

sounds like happy. These are pretty

self-explanatory. But as we move forward we see

another bonkers situation that comes up.

Verse 14. In the days of wheat harvest,

Reuben went and found mandrakes in the field and brought them to

his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, please

give me some of your son's mandrakes.

But Leah said to Rachel, Is it a small matter that you have taken

away my husband? Would you take away my son's

mandrakes also? Rachel said, then he may lie

with you tonight in exchange for your son's mandrakes.

When Jacob came from the field in the evening, Leah went out to

meet him and said, You must come in to me, for I have hired you

with my son's mandrakes. So he lay with her that night,

and God listened to Leah, and she conceived and bore Jacob a

fifth son. Leah said God has given me my

wages because I gave my servant to my husband.

So she called his name Yusakar. And Leah conceived again, and

she bore Jacob a sixth son. Then Leah said, God has endowed

me with a good endowment. Now my husband will honor me

because I have borne him six sons.

So she called his name Zebulon. Afterward, she bore a daughter

and called her name Dinah. So Leah gives birth again, first

to Isakar, which sounds like the Hebrew for wages or higher.

We see Leah is actually proud enough of what she did to get

another son out of Jacob that she memorializes it in a name.

Then we have Zebulun, which sounds like honor.

Now we see some of the motivation for Leah's ongoing

sadness, maybe even bitterness. Here is yet another son named as

a living prayer that her husband would honor her.

She's born six sons for him herself, plus two more by her

servant, and still that love that she yearns for is not to be

had. And then she has Dinah.

This is a female version of the name Dan from the Hebrew for

Judge. And this is perhaps a

disparaging taunt at Rachel. Rachel still hasn't conceived

herself yet. The first time Rachel gave her

servant to Jacob, she named him Dan.

Rachel saw that as the Lord's judgement in her favor.

Now Leah is saying to Rachel by naming her daughter Dinah.

Not only do I have an abundance of sons, but a daughter as well.

See how the Lord has judged on my behalf.

In terms of children, Leah has provided more than Rachel.

But here comes the turning point.

Finally, after all of this, including a final jabbing taunt,

Jacob's beloved Rachel gives birth to his son.

Verse 22. Then God remembered Rachel, and

God listened to her and opened her womb.

She conceived and bore a son and said, God has taken away my

reproach. And she called his name Joseph,

saying, May the Lord add to me another son.

After so much rivalry and shame and infighting, here His mercy

prevails, just like with Abram and Sarai, and with Isaac and

Rebecca, and later in the Bible with Hannah and her son Samuel,

or in the New Testament with Elizabeth and her son John.

The Lord provides. It is not always this way, but

praise God when it is streams in the desert and fruitful wombs to

the desolate. Thus Rachel exclaims in relief.

God has taken away my reproach. Just when the night was darkest

and the mockery was more than she could bear.

So she gives birth to Joseph, which means, may he add, and

sounds like taken away his name is an ongoing prayer for yet

another son, and also a living memorial to God's provision.

He has taken away Rachel's reproach.

So that's half the chapter and a whole lot of brokenness and

dysfunction throughout Genesis. We're going to see sibling

rivalry and parental favoritism cause so much pain.

But throughout all of it, God is working His purposes out.

He does not approve of these sinful ways.

It's very clear that every time polygamy enters the picture in

the Bible, everyone is having a terrible time.

And yet God will use this family line to bless the nations in

spite of themselves. What we have here is an

outworking of the people portion of God's promises to Abraham and

to his descendants. Abram went from no children to

two children, then eventually 8 total, but not by Sarai, but

only one through the line of promise.

Then Isaac, he went from no children to two children, and it

stops there. So what about this home?

More than the stars in the sky or the number of grains of sand

on the seashore? Promise.

We're not seeing a lot of fertility.

There aren't a lot of descendants from the promised

line. Then we have Jacob and his wives

and their servants. Through this broken family, God

is blessing the world with 12 children, soon to be 13.

And from 12 of these, we will find the 12 tribes of Israel, an

entire nation, a blessing to the world.

The ends do not justify the means, but God can redeem even

the worst of motives. It's like Joseph says later in

Genesis 50. As for you, you meant evil

against me, but God meant it for good.

This is Pearl. Many of you have either heard of

or read Nathaniel Hawthorne's classic novel The Scarlet

Letter. It includes this little girl,

Pearl, in 17th century America is born out of wedlock.

She is conceived in sin and shunned, being the very

embodiment and personification of the shame which her mother

bears for her sin. Pearl is a painful daily

reminder of her parents sin, and yet this child will be the

catalyst for redemption which her parents will experience.

Without Pearl's presence, her parents sin would be concealed

forever, perhaps forgotten completely, and never addressed.

Maybe the couple would continue to live an emotional torment and

perhaps never experienced the reconciliation that comes

through confession and repentance.

But Pearl's very existence will not let them hide from their

sin. It must be addressed.

And when it comes into the light, we see redeeming love

triumph over the darkness of evil.

How much more beautiful is God's redeeming grace once that sin

has been revealed and overcome? How much more powerful the

gospel when the sin hasn't just been forgotten, but is

confessed, forgiven, and redeemed.

So it is with Jacob's children. In this horrible, messed up

situation. God is going to redeem this

entire family and use them to show that He is God and they are

not, and that He can bring beauty out of an ugly mess.

Well, we might say, if that's true, should we just continuing

continue sinning in order that grace may abound and we echo

with the apostle Paul by no means.

And yet, where we see sin for the magnitude of what it is, it

makes God's redemptive power shine out all the brighter.

Again, the ends do not justify the means, but God can take our

worst mistakes and redeem them for His purposes far better than

we could possibly imagine. God will take the worst mistakes

of Jacob, Leah, Rachel, and Uncle Laban and use it to bless

the world. The Lord even chooses to

memorialize the names of Jacob's children forever.

They become the 12 tribes of Israel and they will be set

apart as a Kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

As he says in Exodus 19, this family, coming from friendless,

hopeless, helpless Jacob will be chosen to represent the world,

represent to the world God Himself, and to bless the

nations. So maybe your family feels

pretty messed up and maybe you're the cause, or maybe

you're mostly the victim. You are not beyond hope, and

neither is your family. The whole of Genesis, even the

whole of the Bible, is a testimony to that.

And we can consider the church, the family of God messes up over

and over again, and we will continue to.

There's so many times we get it wrong, and yet it is God who

turns our messes out for His glory.

It is God who uses our faltering efforts, even our twisted and

selfish motives, to bring everlasting blessing.

He works through us and in spite of us.

And God has more in mind for Jacob and for his family.

They're going to get help that they have not earned, Not by a

long shot. We've looked at Jacob's wives

and children, and now we're going to see a turn of the

tables with sheisty Uncle Laban. Yes, God fulfills his promises

through broken families, but now we're going to see how God

fulfills his promises through undeserved grace.

We're continuing in chapter 30, verse 25.

As soon as Rachel had borne Joseph, Jacob said to Laban,

send me away that I may go to my own home and country.

Give me my wives and my children for whom I have served you.

That I may go, for you know the service that I have given you.

But Laban said to him, If I have found favor in your sight, I

have learned by divination that the Lord has blessed me because

of you. Name your wages and I will give

it, Jacob said to him, You yourself know how I have served

you, and how your livestock has fared with me.

For you had little before I came, and it has increased

abundantly, and the Lord has blessed you wherever I turned.

But now when shall I provide for my own household also?

Laban said, What shall I give you?

And Jacob said You shall not give me anything.

If you will do this for me, I will again pasture your flock

and keep it. Let me pass through all your

flock today, removing from it every speckled and spotted sheep

and every black lamb and the spotted and speckled among the

goats, and they shall be my wages.

So my honesty will answer for me later when you come to look into

my wages with you. Everyone that is not speckled

and spotted among the goats and black among the lambs, if found

with me, shall be counted stolen.

Laban said. Good, let it be as you have

said. But that day Laban removed the

male goats that were striped and spotted, and all the female

goats that were speckled and spotted, everyone that had white

on it and every lamb that was black, and put them in the

charge of his sons. And he said a distance of three

days journey between himself and Jacob and Jacob pastured the

rest of Laban's flock. Things are not looking good.

Jacob is being deceived, this deceiving man.

It started with Laban giving Leah to Jacob instead of giving

Rachel, which began this whole mess that obligated Jacob to

stay and work for seven years for Laban in order for Laban to

give up his daughter Rachel, and then through trickery, an

additional 7 years for Leah. 14 years of Jacob's life gone.

But now when Jacob seems as if maybe he's trying to go

straight, he gets cheated out of his wages.

Laban says he can have all of the speckled spotted in black

livestock and then he goes through and he takes them all

away. Jacob is still getting a taste

of his own bitter medicine. Now he doesn't certainly doesn't

deserve fair treatment after the way he's lived his life.

But now even God is going to say enough is enough.

We're going to continue in verse 37.

Remember, Laban has left with the livestock that belongs to

Jacob. Jacob's taking care of it.

Verse 37. Then Jacob took fresh sticks of

Poplar and almond and plane trees and peeled white streaks

in them, exposing the white of the sticks.

He said the sticks that he had peeled in front of the flocks in

the troughs, that is, the watering places where the flocks

came to drink. And since they bred when they

came to drink, the flocks bred in front of the sticks.

And so the flocks brought forth striped, speckled, and spotted,

And Jacob separated the lambs and set the faces of the flocks

toward the striped and all the black in the flock of Laban.

He put his own droves apart, and did not put them with Laban's

flock. Whenever the stronger of the

flock were breeding, Jacob would lay the sticks in the troughs

before the eyes of the flock, that they might breed among the

sticks. But for the feebler of the flock

he would not lay them there. So the feebler would be Laban's

and the stronger Jacobs. Thus, the man increased greatly

and had large flocks, female servants and male servants, and

camels and donkeys. This is weird.

This is one of those passages of the Bible where if you're

reading through, whether in a Bible study or at home among

your family, and everyone kind of just goes, huh, isn't that

interesting? What do you think?

OK, we'll keep reading and then move on.

We don't always know what to do with strange stuff like this.

So how did this happen? There are a couple of ways that

Christians have handled this in the past.

First, some people think that maybe there was an ancient

understanding of genetics that we aren't aware of today.

Maybe there was a technique that Jacob applied and it worked

well. This position takes us to help a

humble posture toward our understanding of the world from

over 3000 years ago, recognizing that there could be a lot that

we don't know about. Or maybe it was an enacted

prayer. We see this elsewhere in the

Bible, such as in Numbers chapter 5 when we're going

Numbers 5 · chapter mention

through Levitical law. And in that passage, a woman has

the opportunity to receive vindication of her honesty

through drinking dusty water and showing that it doesn't harm

her. The dust would never actually

harm her unless God's hand is in it.

But by drinking it anyway, she is enacting a prayer of God and

a prayer to God in front of other people for her vindication

of innocence if it does harm to her.

That had to be God's hand alone. Dust in water doesn't hurt

people in the same way. Maybe Jacob knows that the

sticks aren't actually doing anything.

Maybe he places them in front of the troughs as a way of saying,

Lord, please act on my behalf injustice by making these

animals my own. I think the key to this passage

actually comes a chapter later in Genesis chapter 31 verse 7

Genesis 31:7

and following. Jacob tells Lee and Rachel some

of what has happened. And Jacob says your father Laban

has cheated me and changed my wages 10 times, but God did not

permit him to harm me. Thus God has taken away the

livestock of your father and given them to me.

And Jacob goes on to describe how God in a dream specifically

told him that the flock would made and produced striped and

spotted and mottled sheep that would clearly belong to Jacob.

So in perplexity, I took the liberty of asking a former

veterinary doctor I know who also used to be a pastor here,

and he confirmed that he's never heard of any legitimate reason

as to why or how this was supposed to yield the results it

did. No genetics or husbandry of

today can explain it, so we can assume the technique probably

isn't what yielded the results now.

At the end of the day, no matter which approach you take, it had

to be God who ultimately ordained for this to work.

God is putting Jacob in these dire situations where he can't

possibly save himself or weasel his way out of it.

The only one who can possibly turn this mess around is God

himself. And boy does God turn it around

in verse 43. Thus the man Jacob increased

greatly. Jacob's prosperity abounds far

more than he could have possibly imagined.

And it's grace because it's undeserved.

That's what grace is. It is undeserved favor from the

Lord, unmerited, unearned. It is a gift of grace.

So we ask, why would God prosper Jacob throughout all of this?

He does not deserve this. So what if Laban deceives him?

What goes around comes around. After all, Jacob and his family

are part of God's promise to the world, this legacy of blessing.

They will be the ones to mediate blessing as the nation of

Israel. Even more profound, God will use

this family line to bring the Messiah into the world.

So God provides for them, not just the blessing of a big

family, despite their sin, in an abundance of wealth and amazing

gift of undeserved grace to provide for them.

But let's look closer at the Messianic line.

As Pastor Jan has been challenging us to see Jesus

throughout the Old Testament, let's consider for a moment what

a messed up family Jesus has. He came from this family line.

These are his ancestors. Do you ever feel like you have a

family, either living or in the past that you should be ashamed

of? Look to Jesus and see how God

brought redemption through the most twisted family line

imaginable. Look and see how God turned such

brokenness for good. Think about how God blessed them

in spite of themselves, that He might use this family for a

purpose beyond their wildest imagination.

God used this broken family to give the world the most precious

gift of grace that they never could have deserved, and we

never could either. He has given it freely and in

the most unlikely way. God is not done with your story

yet, and He's not done with the story of your family.

No matter what you've come from, no matter what you're dealing

with now, He has a purpose for you, and it is meant for His

glory and for your good, and ultimately the spread of the

gospel. And no matter how messy, it is

the Lord alone who can bring redemption out of sin and deceit

and a resurrection life out of death and decay.

It was true for Jacob and his family, and it's true for you

and yours. God fulfills His promises in the

most unlikely ways through brokenness and undeserved grace.

Let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, we come

before you humbled by your great goodness and grace.

We see it everywhere in the Bible.

We can see so much of ourselves and Jacob and his family, and

yet, Lord, not only in their mess, but also in how they are

redeemed. And so, Lord, we pray that every

day you would help us to rest in your redeeming grace, walking

hopefully, trusting every day that You are the one who can

bring such glory out of darkness, who can bring the

brightest day out of the darkest night, who can bless the world

even through our mess. Father, thank you for making all

things well and for guiding us through these ups and downs.

Have your way in US and use us for your purposes.

The blessing of the nations and the spread of the gospel.

We pray this in Jesus name and by the Spirit, Amen.