Bible Readings
Reading 22: Jacob’s dealings with Laban
Read Genesis 31:17–55.
Jacob took all the people, animals and things that belonged to him and ran away from Laban without telling him.
When Laban found out, he immediately started chasing after Jacob.
Earlier, Yahweh had appeared to Jacob to tell him to leave Laban’s household.
Now, while Laban was going after Jacob, Yahweh appeared to Laban in a dream. It was to tell him to leave Jacob alone. So when Laban finally caught up with Jacob, Laban pretended to be hurt that Jacob ran away. Laban pretended that he would have given a farewell party to Jacob if he had known he was leaving.
But then he immediately told Jacob that he had the power to harm Jacob if he wanted to. Laban probably would have! The reason why he didn’t attack Jacob is because Yahweh had told him not to do anything with Jacob.
But Jacob didn’t know that Rachel stole Laban’s household gods. Laban was an idol-worshipper and he probably believed that his idols protected him. But with the idols gone, he was possibly afraid that he had now lost his protection.
The Bible doesn’t tell us why Rachel stole Laban’s household idols but it does indicate that just being in Laban’s idol-worshipping home had impacted or influenced Rachel negatively.
The reason why God spoke to both Jacob and Laban was to separate both men from each other. God did not want Jacob’s family to have more pagan influence especially since He was going to work with Jacob’s family to build the nation of Israel.
Without the protection of the household gods, Laban was afraid that in the future, Jacob might decide to attack him. After all, Laban had consistently broken his promises made to Jacob for 20 years. He had not been nice to Jacob at all!
So Laban asked to make a contract with Jacob. The contract was mainly to say that both men agree they will not cross over to each other’s land. This was like a border treaty.
As a sign of the treaty and the border, Laban built a pillar with stones to mark the location that separated each man’s area. And then ironically, Laban called on Yahweh, Jacob’s God to watch between them. Even though Laban was an idol-worshipper, he did not call on his own “gods”.
Sometimes, people have the idea that Yahweh will only work with those who already know Him or worship Him. But here, we see that God intervened in the situation to talk to Laban, who was an idol-worshipper. Whether a person believes in Yahweh or not, God is able to work things so that His plans will be fulfilled.
If we are having problems with people who don’t believe in Yahweh, we can still pray to ask God to intervene and to help us. Yahweh really is God of all people and the whole universe, regardless of whether people recognise Him or not.