Exhortation – Guard Your Words

There is sad irony in the account of Jacob’s departure from Laban (Gen. 31). Jacob proposed to his wives that they leave Padan-Aram and return to the land of Canaan. They agreed but Rachel chose to take part of Padan-aram with her in the form of Laban’s household idols. Jacob knew nothing of this.

When Laban pursued and overtook Jacob, Laban was warned of God not to say anything good or bad to Jacob. Upon their meeting, Laban claimed someone had stolen his gods. Jacob, full of confi­dence and ignorant of Rachel’s action, utters a death threat upon the thief. Laban did not find his gods so all was well, or was it?

Dire consequence

Follow on with the story. When Rachel knew that her father was about to enter her tent, she very cleverly concealed her crime. She used her monthly cycle as an excuse for remaining seated, thus concealing the gods. This excuse was directly related to her child-bearing function.

Jacob journeyed on unaware of the unfolding drama. He had pronounced the fate of the thief; Rachel had drawn attention to the method by which the curse would be accomplished. Rachel became pregnant on the journey and never again would use the menstrual cycle to conceal anything. “And Rachel travailed, and she had hard labor…and Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem” (Gen. 35:16-20).

A lesson

Jacob may never have learned of Rachel’s thievery or of her excuse; we aren’t told. We are told the account, however, and when we link the ideas together, a powerful lesson emerges.

Have we ever felt totally confident that we were in the right? Have we ever uttered a dire consequence if a given folly were found true of us? Can we be so sure of ourselves that we dare to invite punishment on ourselves or our families or even on others?

We are always better off humbly looking for mercy rather than inviting judgment. Laban could not speak either bad or good to Jacob but Jacob’s own mouth pronounced the bad.

God will grant us our desires, therefore let our words be circumscribed with much caution and restraint