DEVOTION
GENESIS
HE
WILL
Gen
30:22-28
22
Then God remembered Rachel; he listened to her and opened her womb. 23 She
became pregnant and gave birth to a son and said, "God has taken away my
disgrace." 24 She named him Joseph, and said, "May the LORD add to me
another son." 25 After Rachel gave birth to Joseph, Jacob said to Laban,
"Send me on my way so I can go back to my own homeland. 26 Give me my
wives and children, for whom I have served you, and I will be on my way. You
know how much work I've done for you." 27 But Laban said to him, "If
I have found favor in your eyes, please stay. I have learned by divination that
the LORD has blessed me because of you." 28 He added, "Name your
wages, and I will pay them."
NIV
We
have arrived at the time when God remembers Rachel. Did he forget about her? It
is strange how our language uses words we think of differently then what is
meant. God recognized her, he gave her attention, and he was attentive to her
prayers and opened her womb. We have to know he was the one who had kept it
closed all these years. Was he teaching her, or Jacob a lesson by keeping Rachel
from having any sons? If he was, then either they learned it and he now was
ready to allow her sons, or no lesson was intended and she was just being kept
from having sons for the right time. We know Rachel had been praying all along
as when she offered Jacob her maidservant and she bore Jacob a son, Rachel says
she knows God has vindicated her and listened to her plea. It is not as if
Rachel hasn’t been in contact with God that he would forget about her, but this
is now the timing of God for her to bear Joseph whom we know has some very
special purpose of God to fulfill. What we are seeing is the divine providence,
the divine sovereignty of God at work. As fractured this family of Jacob is, as
much as there are hard feelings, jealousy, competition among his two sister
wives, God continues to bless them, to accomplish he purpose, his plan for them
and their descendants. We can learn a lot from this, as we have been learning.
God does not depend on our perfection to accomplish his purpose for our lives.
Although we are weak, he is strong. We attempt to live an upright live, doing
the right things. We go to church, we pray, we try to do good deeds, we witness
when we can, we make efforts to serve him in some way. We also try for the most
part to keep from doing those things we should not do. That list seems larger
than the things we should be doing. But in all reality none of that matters
when it comes to God accomplishing his plan for our lives. Sure we should not continue
to willfully sin, just so his grace may abound. But at the same time all the
good deeds we do may not have any significance to his accomplishing his plan
for our lives. Jacob surely did everything right as far as keeping his word to
Laban, and working for all those years without a wage, except for having Rachel
as his wife of course. He served Laban and worked well as being over his flocks
and herds. Laban became a very wealthy man because of the labor of Jacob. But he
was not finished with his plan for Jacob and he was about to move on to the
next step as we will soon see, making Jacob very wealthy indeed. However the
point in all this is God is at work, not them, not us. We cannot make of ourselves
that which God desires for us to be. We cannot be the doers of righteousness
that is God’s work. We cannot accomplish his plan for us. That is only his
work. God needed Joseph to be the youngest of the eleven. We will see how much
favoritism Jacob shows Joseph and jealously again within the other brothers
which ultimately ends up Joseph right where God wants him, for his purpose.
Again and again we see God accomplishing his purpose in spite of the attitude
or behavior of people, or using that attitude or behavior to his purpose. What
we can be sure of is God will always fulfill his plans. We need to simply be
aware of his working in our lives. He will finish what he has started.
Phil
1:3-6
3
I thank my God every time I remember you. 4 In all my prayers for all of you, I
always pray with joy 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first
day until now, 6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you
will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
NIV
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