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9 When Leah saw that she had stopped bearing, she took Zilpah her maid and gave her to Jacob as wife. 10 And Leah’s maid Zilpah bore Jacob a son. 11 Then Leah said, "A troop comes!" So she called his name Gad. 12 And Leah’s maid Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. 13 Then Leah said, "I am happy, for the daughters will call me blessed." So she called his name Asher. ~ Genesis 30:9-13
Today, we continue our study of Genesis 30 which early on is about the sibling rivalry between Rachel and Leah. This true story pictures for us the civil war that resides in all believers in the God of the Bible. This civil war pits the Spirit against the sinful desires that are yet in us even though we have been forgiven and we have been born again. This civil war is between the believer and the unbeliever in our soul.
In v.9-11 of today's passage we read, "9 When Leah saw that she had stopped bearing, she took Zilpah her maid and gave her to Jacob as wife. 10 And Leah’s maid Zilpah bore Jacob a son. 11 Then Leah said, 'A troop comes!' So she called his name Gad."
It matters less what Rachel did, seeing as how she was barren, but what Leah did here reveals the civil war which was taking place in her. Sadly, Leah gave in to her own streak of jealousy. Leah stopped bearing for a time and Bilhah, Rachel's maid, bore two children for Rachel. And so Leah decided that she could do as Rachel, so she sent her maid, Zilpah, to lie with Jacob. As a result, Jacob now had a fourth wife and another son. There could have been daughters born during this period, we are not told. We are told of the birth of one daughter of Jacob, and on several occasions in Genesis we are told of his daughters in the plural. These daughters are not mentioned by name because in that day the family line traveled through the father, not the mother.
Jacob and Zilpah conceived a son named Gad which means "troop." Sadly, Leah named him this because she was putting her hope in numbers. Leah didn't know of the great lesson that God would later teach Gideon that God demonstrates His strength in our weakness. We always want to be as strong as possible in facing any challenge; we prefer to have as many resources as possible at our disposal. We have no problem if the odds are on our side; in fact we prefer that to be the case. But God does not always see it this way for He has been known to cull an army down to 300 from 30,000 and in that context win.
Desperation in weakness is not a comfortable place for us, but it is not intended to be comfortable. Our personal salvation from the bondage of sin must involve the diminishment of self. Our deliverance from the domain of darkness always comes from the Lord. But, the flesh is always out to steal the show away from the Lord. When we get sucked in by the flesh, we lose sight of the power that the Holy Spirit desires to impart into our lives. The problem with this is that God's power shows up in our lives in ways we do not desire. This is so because only God can wage these types of battles. Our battles have been too tainted by the flesh which always leads us to be overly concerned with self. The Lord will always lead us to the place of death to the self life.
In v.12-13 of today's passage we read, "12 And Leah’s maid Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. 13 Then Leah said, 'I am happy, for the daughters will call me blessed.' So she called his name Asher."
Zilpah gave birth to her second and last son, just like Bilhah. Between the two of them are four sons of Israel and some unnamed daughters. Leah's last son was named Asher which means "happy." Leah found herself happy at the birth of this son, saying, "the daughters will call me blessed." One way that we know that we are walking in the flesh is that we are overly concerned about the opinions of others.
Leah neither mentioned her husband nor the Lord. She was a lady who had turned to the wrong place for definition. Leah started out well, but when things turned wrong for her, she began to get envious and took actions into her own hands, not including the Lord. And, even though he was her last son born, with the birth of Asher, there was no note of gratitude or thanks to the Lord.
When we zoom out from this chapter, we see that Jacob and his girls are all walking by sight and not by faith. They each resorted to the self rather than prayer. This chapter is full of scheming, manipulation, envy, and surrogate competition. Sin continued to disrupt the harmony God intended for Jacob’s family. We are all like Rachel, Leah and Jacob. One part of us wants to serve God and love people and the other yet loves sin. The comparison describes the civil war taking place within all believers in the God of the Bible.
In Romans 7 the Apostle informs us that the truth was not given to the believer in order to solve our problem with sin. In fact, we are unable to solve our problem with sin. This is why the Lord sent us His Son, so that we could be delivered from the penalty, the power and the presence of sin. At the cross the Lord Jesus rendered the penalty of our sin null and void. It is through our sanctification that God is training us to be delivered by the power of our sin. One day, we will be delivered from the presence of sin when we are translated into heaven for eternity.
As believers in Christ, we struggle with the fact that there are certain reoccurring sins in our lives that we have never been able to overcome. This is caused by the civil war that is waging within us. In Romans 7 the Apostle Paul said he desired to do good but the good that he wanted to do, he could not do. All believers in Christ struggle with this. This is a normal part of the process of our sanctification whereby God is changing our hearts and our minds one day at a time. The answer to all of this is the life of the Lord Jesus being lived in us, to us, and through us. As we grow in our personal relationship with Him, we will realize that if anything good comes out of us, it is Him. This is the life He has called us to, a life whereby we are learning to resist the flesh and to follow the leading of His Spirit.
