Sisters

So I have been reading about Rachel and Leah. The devotional book I am reading puts them in that order. Rachel was the youngest daughter of Laban, Leah the older. Jacob met up with Rachel at a well close to her house when she came out to water her father's flocks. He was so smitten with her that he came up and kissed her and decided right then that he was going to marry her. (should have checked with her father first). Laban liked the idea of giving his daughter to a kinsman, but the culture in that time was that the older daughter married first.

So here comes the deceit on the deceiver. Laban promised to give Jacob Rachel after 7 years of service. Which he did, he just gave him Leah first.

Jacob did not love Leah, did not want to be married to Leah, he only wanted Rachel.

Thank goodness there is only one wife per husband in this culture.

Reading about the sisters, and last Wednesday we talked about watching our words and this started me thinking about what comes out of my mouth and what comes out of others mouths.

It also started me thinking about what kind of words would have been exchanged between Leah and Rachel. Rachel had the love of her husband and she knew it. There are times recorded in scripture where you can tell the words that were recorded between Rachel and Leah were probably just the tip of the iceberg.

Instead of Rachel empowering her sister and using the power of her husbands love to make her sister feel loved she used it to push a wedge between herself and her sister.

Rachel had the love of her husband but no children. Leah did not have the love of her husband but gave her husband 6 sons and a daughter.

The sisters were using what the other did not have to make the other sister jealous. I am not sure if Leah was doing it at first to make her sister jealous or to grab some love from her husband. In the scripture after the first son was born it was recorded that Leah said maybe my husband will love me know that I have given him a son. It did not work.

Jacob ended up living with Leah longer than Rachel. Rachel died in childbirth with Benjamin, Leah lived on to see Benjamin and Joseph grow up.

Our words are powerful. We need to make sure that we lift others up instead of tear them down.