rachel wannbes

We all want to be Rachels. Rachel ("little lamb") who Jacob worked seven long years for, then another seven when he was tricked into marrying ugly, weak-eyed Leah ("cow"). Rachel who was beautiful of form and face, the mother of Joseph and Benjamin. No one wants to be Leah--ugly and unwanted, unloved, always in the shadow. I can't imagine how she felt when treated so harshly.

Leah's main heart's desire was to be loved by her husband. Scripture tells us she even traded food with Rachel to "buy" a night with her own husband. Scripture also tells us that the Lord saw she was unloved. How beautiful--the Lord sees us when we are not loved, hurt, alone, frightened. He knows our every state and responds in love towards us. He blessed Leah with children while Rachel could not conceive. Leah, finally hoping she could win her husband's love, gave birth to three sons, naming them significant, symbolic names that reflected her hopes to win her husband's love. But, she didn't get it. He did not decide all of sudden that he would love her or that she was special. Her motherly radiance did not outshine Rachel's beauty and the power with which Rachel could draw Jacob's attention.

Finally, with her fourth son, Leah surrenders her desires to the Lord. Instead of sulking or growing bitter, she looks at the last son, and takes her life--so seemingly absent of love--and turns it into one of the greatest love stories of all time. She names her son Judah ("Let us praise God"), saying, NOW I will praise the Lord.

The result? The Lord took her offering of praise--her son--and with her heart of surrender, he gave her heart's desire. While Rachel died years later in childbirth and was buried on the side of the road, Leah lived a long life with Jacob who carried her back to the burial cave of Abraham, Sarah, Issac and Rebekah. When Jacob is dying, he tells Rachel's son Joseph, prepare my body for a journey, and bury me in the cave where I buried Leah. Bury me by LEAH. Not Rachel. It is Leah who has the place of honor, whose deep desire to rest with her husband is written of so tenderly in Genesis 49. Bury me with Leah, the loved.

God's love did not end there. Leah's legacy continued and resulted in the greatest love story of all time. It was not through the mighty and favored Joseph that Christ came. It was not through the line of priests (Levi) that Christ came. It was not through the oldest Rueben or the youngest, most beloved Benjamin. Christ is the LION of JUDAH! He came through the son of surrender--the one who's mother gave up everything she wanted, worked for, and thought about, to give her heart and her son to the Lord. Leah's faithfulness and act of courage in the midst of heartache is the line through which God brings Christ. Christ comes not from the beautiful Rachel, but from the ugly, unloved, "cow" of Laban.

How much God loves us! --the unlovely ones, spotted with sin, who He makes holy, pure, and white. Those desires and thoughts that we don't surrender (though we often see them as innocent) are really barriers that prevent us from being all the Lord wants us to be. I want to be so wholly surrendered that the kingdom of Christ can come through me...I want to know that love.