Genesis 29 God Kharma and Uncle Dads

Opening Gratitude for the New Venue and Ministry Transitions

Welcome to the podcast of Recast Church in Madawan, Michigan, where you can grow in faith, community, and service. This message is by lead pastor Don Filsack and is a part of the series Beginning with God, Walking Through the Book of Genesis.

If you would like to contact us, please visit us on the web at recastchurch .com. Here's Pastor Don. Hey, welcome to church! Is this crazy or what? I'm feeling good. This is crazy good. I'm seeing a lot of people here, man.

We got the whole family together. Again. Man, we are so excited guys, and thank you for coming out. You are the smart ones because you can set your clocks the right way. So good job, and be gracious to those who come a little bit later.

Just smile, give them a hug, right? But we really are glad that you guys are here, and as we kick off this very first Sunday in Madawan L., we have some business to take care of. We have some people to thank, and as you can see, you know, maybe you just came in and it's like, oh, chairs.

Oh, the donuts made it over. Look at the stuff on the stage. That's great. All of this stuff was put here by people, right? People who had to plan and think and come up with schedules, all that good stuff.

And the first thing I want to do is just acknowledge all of the effort, and the work, and the time, and the energy that has been spent in getting this transition to happen, and I think we just need a big round of applause.

I only have 10 minutes here, so there's no way that I can get through a whole list of names, but we just have some crews. Jeremy Thompson and the setup crew has just been busting tail making this happen, and Jeremy's even like designed like schematics, right?

I mean, he like did CAD drawings for like where tables go, and it's been incredible, so Jeremy, thank you for all your work. We have the Recast kids, which we're going to get to here as well. I'm Kerry Canold, and just a whole bunch of people making that happen.

Who else? Hospitality, Craig and Janae, Mitchell, making that happen. Thank you, and Coffee and Donuts. We can't, just can't do church without that. So, and then in the back there, we have these guys, these humble servants, the tech team.

Marty Russin has helped with the transition. Brian Frank's been on the sound tech, and just a whole bunch of guys. Nate Gamble has been helping out, and they've put in a lot of time, technical work, making this happen, even like making their own cables.

That's how legit they are. And then, of course, the band. Not there. They disappeared, but Josh back there, just making this happen, having to figure out new places to practice. So, anyway, and then, obviously, Don and the crew in the office, just a whole bunch of people making things happen.

So, how about another round of applause? Just thank you. Yep. Now, we also have someone, a special guest here this morning that we just want to give a huge thank you to. Joanna Tullis. If you could kind of come up with Carrie, make your way up here.

If you don't know Joanna, Joanna is the owner of Kitty U, and if you guys don't know, since Recast got in the Red Arrow facility, we have been using Kitty U free of charge. Recast could not, for five years, which is simply out of love and grace of Joanna here to help us grow as a church, and we could not have grown to this size to make this transition without a space for kids like we've had, and she has just opened, she's been so pleasant to work with, and it's like we, I wish we could do more for you, but you don't take it, so it's like, well, thank you so very much, and we do have a small token for you, just to say thank you for the five years.

We have gift cards for you and all of your staff, and we just want to thank you again, and we are gonna miss getting in there and and seeing all this stuff every week, but really, thank you for all the all the blessings that you've given us for these past five years, so yeah.

Awesome, and then speaking of Recast kids, Kitty U is where we hold our kids program, and Carrie Canold here, come on over, Carrie, Carrie also has been director for five plus years, and she, that's worth an applause.

She has labored tirelessly coordinating volunteers, making sure supplies have been there, loving on kids, set up dealing with me and registration ideas, right, just all these kinds of things, and she has just been wonderful and faithful, and we want to celebrate her today.

It's also, today is her transition, the beginning of your transition, because I'm sure we're gonna need your help for a little bit, but she is officially done as Recast kids director. That's a little bit sad.

But, not going anywhere, and she serves a ton of people all over our church, and she's gonna keep serving, but she's just making a transition, and we want to thank you, Carrie, for all of the work that you've put in, and for the example that you've set for all of us as volunteers and staff and leaders, and we really do appreciate it, and and we have we have a little gift here.

Krista, would you like to say something to your friend, Carrie?

Overwhelmed this morning, looking through this book before we brought it up to you, and I looked up meeting minutes last night, and from 2008, you started researching curriculum, and from the very beginning, I thought you had the hardest job of any of us.

You've been a tireless leader. I have always seen a smile on your face, and it's not an easy job what she does, and just want to thank you from everybody at Recast, and thank you for taking care of me, my Recast kids, from the beginning.

So here's a scrapbook of some thank-you mementos from our kids and from our parents, and then a token of our appreciation from Recast Church to her favorite restaurant here in Mattawan. So we love you, and we know you'll continue to bless and serve our church in different ways, okay?

In Carrie stepping down, we just want to give you a heads up on how we're going to move forward with Recast kids, and as you can see, I'm wearing the green, all right? So actually, I'm going to be the elder who's overseeing Recast kids.

I am not going to be a director like Carrie was. She was doing a ton, and Don has said for a while now, it's taking us five people to replace her, and so that's what we're doing. We're forming a team, a Recast kids team with head teachers and people over registration department and in each of the different age groups, and I will be overseeing that team and working with them, but that's how we're going to move forward, and we're excited.

It's a great point to transition. Things are looking a little bit differently because we're in the school, and we'll be able to do some new things there. So if you have questions or are looking to volunteer, Linda is our recruiter, and she will be hounding you to help out in Recast kids, and feel free to say yes to her.

All right, let's pray, and then we'll hand it over to Don. Heavenly Father, we come here today so grateful for the way that you've provided for us, Father, and man, this church has grown, and people have come to Christ through Recast, and people are growing in faith and community and service, and Father, there's a lot of work that people have put into this, and we thank you for them, but we acknowledge, God, that our very breath comes from you.

Our very life is from you. Our strength and our energy and all of these pieces that are falling into place to make this happen is from you, and so we show up here today happy and excited and just full of fellowship and love for one another as we do this thing together, God, but we we acknowledge you first and foremost that this is your party, that this is your church, that we exist because of you and by you.

Father, we pray that you would get glory today, and that you'd be pleased with the worship that's going to happen and with Don's sermon, and God, we're just going to keep going. We're going to keep faithfully preaching the word.

We're going to keep communicating the gospel of Jesus Christ, and we're going to sing your praises loud and bold, and we're going to lift you up, Father, and we pray for your help, and we pray that you would bless this next venture, that you would lead us into this next phase of Recast, not for our glory and not so that we can get bigger signs, but so that we can continue to reach people for you, so that they would know your love, they would know your grace, they would be excited to live their lives for you, God.

So be with us now as we continue, God, and as we get back to church, and again, we thank you for Jesus making this all possible, his death on the cross, his grace that he has extended to us through the work that he did here on planet Earth, and it's all for you, and it's in Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

Providence, Trust, and Gratitude in the Life of Jacob

Thanks a lot to Kyle for leading us in that. Wow. Take a look around. I want you to just kind of turn around, feel free to look at each other. This is Recast Church. We're here. Praise God with me for that.

We're in a new venue, but we are the same church, and we have the same God. I'm also grateful for everybody who's put time and energy into the new setup, and all this transition, and one person didn't get thanked in that process.

I don't know if you noticed that, but it was Kyle, and so let's give Kyle a hand for his project management over this program and the transition. He's done a great job. He really has been the point man that everybody's kind of been reporting to and filtering everything through to the board, and I'm very appreciative of you, so thank you, Kyle.

Please continue to be patient, though, and I would ask for this as we as we continue to make this school fit our needs. There's going to be adjustment. There's going to be things that need to happen. I hope that you'll take advantage of the connection cards over the next, I hope we get a lot of those over the next couple of months.

There's a place for you to put comments, suggestions. There might be things that we've overlooked, but I'd also love it if you would use that as an opportunity to encourage those and say what is working as well as what's not working, and to be honest, we've put things together in a way that we thought was best, but there might be something that we've overlooked, and so feel free to communicate with us.

The black box is still back there. If you would turn any cards in there, any connection cards that you fill out, and if it's your first time here this morning with us, that means awesome to you because you navigated the time change, you navigated our location, and you found us, and so if it's your first time here, and you turn in one of those connection cards, we have a free coffee mug for you as well, and then there's a place to recycle any offering envelopes, offerings still go in that same black box back there, everything just like normal there.

We're going to be continuing on in the book of Genesis, so we're carrying right forward with a series where we left off, and this morning we come across a pretty well-known story, a story that probably many of us are familiar with to some degree, and one of the problems that I find with well-known stories, if you were raised in the church, or you've been kicking it around church for a while, then you, then you're familiar with this, maybe you remember the flannel graphs or something to that effect, and one of the issues with that is that with these stories that we know, we can sometimes lose track of what's going on, we can lose a little bit of the awe, we can lose a little bit of the wonder, a little bit of the surprise, a little bit of the emotion of the text, are you getting what I'm saying?

And so you read about David killing Goliath, you go like, who doesn't know that story? Or, you know, and you can miss a little bit of the awe and the inspiration of that, and I'm hoping that we actually see that this morning, because we're going to be following, once again, the life of Jacob, and continuing forward in Genesis chapter 29 with his life, and I want you to remember that this is a guy who swindled and cheated his brother out of his birthright by deceiving and lying to his father.

Sound like a good guy? What do you think? Good guy? Thumbs up, thumbs down to what he did and how he acted. Pretty rough guy. He had tricked his father into passing along the family blessing to him, tricked this blind old man.

But last week, we saw that God met with Jacob in a dream and confirmed that he would honor that blessing and follow Jacob wherever he goes. That even though he had deceived and swindled his father out of the blessing, that God was saying, I was in all of that, and I am blessing you, and you will be blessed indeed, and I will follow you wherever you go.

And so we get the privilege now, moving forward in the book of Genesis, to see what a life looks like that God is following. A life with God in it. And it might look a little different than some of us assume.

What does a life look like when God is in it, when God is following you, when God pledges to be with you wherever you go? What does that imply for our lives? Some might think that being blessed by God means a nice warm beach house with everything provided for us.

How many of you that sounds good about right now? A beach house? Does that sound good? Has this been a long winter? This has been a super long winter for all of us. But Jacob, as God's chosen dude, finds a life of toil.

He finds a life of work. He finds a life that incorporates hardships. A life that incorporates discipline. And even some measures in our text this morning of an ironic payback. So let's open to Genesis chapter 29 and read about the crazy twists and turns of a life lived with God.

I encourage you, by the way, to all bring your own Bibles. There are Bibles on the table back there. So if you don't bring your own Bible, you can grab one of those off the table. We don't have them anymore.

Obviously, there's no seat backs. But I would encourage you all to bring your own Bible or use an app or whatever you can. And if you don't own a Bible, you can take one of those and use it. If you use it during the service and you already have one, you can just return it over there.

And we'll use them week in and week out. But if you don't own one yourself, take it home with you. Genesis chapter 29, we'll read in its entirety. He said to them, Now, as soon as Jacob saw Rachel, the daughter of Laban, his mother's brother, and the sheep of Laban, his mother's brother, Jacob came near and rolled the stone from the well's mouth and watered the flock of Laban, his mother's brother.

Then Jacob kissed Rachel and wept aloud. And Jacob told Rachel that he was her father's kinsman and that he was Rebekah's son. And she ran and told her father. As soon as Laban heard the news about Jacob, his sister's son, he ran to meet him and embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his house.

And Jacob told Laban all these things. And Laban said to him, Surely you are my bone and my flesh. And he stayed with him a month. Then Laban said to Jacob, Because you are my kinsman, should you therefore serve me for nothing?

Tell me what your wages will be. Now Laban had two daughters. The name of the older was Leah and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah's eyes were weak, but Rachel was beautiful in form and appearance.

Jacob loved Rachel and he said, I will serve you seven years for your younger daughter, Rachel. Laban said, It is better that I give her to you than that I should give her to any other man. Stay with me.

So Jacob served seven years for Rachel and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her. Then Jacob said to Laban, Give me my wife that I may go into her for my time is completed.

So Laban gathered together all the people of the place and made a feast. But in the evening he took his daughter Leah and brought her to Jacob and he went into her. Laban gave his female servant Zilpah to his daughter Leah to be her servant.

And in the morning, behold, it was Leah. And Jacob said to Laban, What is this you have done to me? Did I not serve you for Rachel? Why then have you deceived me? Laban said, It is not done in our country to give the younger before the firstborn.

Complete the week of this one and we will give you the other also in return for serving me another seven years. Jacob did so and completed her week. Then Laban gave him his daughter Rachel to be his wife.

Laban gave his female servant Bilhah to his daughter Rachel to be her servant. So Jacob went into Rachel also and he loved Rachel more than Leah and served Laban for another seven years. When the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb but Rachel was barren.

And Leah conceived and bore a son and she called his name Reuben. For she said, Because the Lord has looked upon my affliction, for now my husband will love me. She conceived again and bore a son and said, Because the Lord has heard that I am hated, he has given me this son also.

And she called his name Simeon. Again she conceived and bore a son and said, Now this time my husband will be attached to me because I have borne him three sons. Therefore his name was called Levi. And she conceived again and bore a son and said, This time I will praise the Lord.

Therefore she called his name Judah. Then she ceased bearing. Let's pray. Father, I rejoice in this transition, in this new place. And just to see all of the faces gathered together and the people that you have brought here to this place.

And to gather together as your church as a whole again is a beautiful thing. Father, I recognize that there's many potential distractions. There's a new building. There's writing on the wall. This is a school cafeteria.

There's all kinds of potential and the nuances of the sound and the echo and all those kinds of things that could become a distraction for us. But Father, I pray this morning that you would let all those distractions melt away.

And that we would genuinely come before your throne in worship of you. You are indeed the God who sees. You indeed are the God who hears. And you are indeed the God who is worthy of our praise. And so Father, I pray that we would lift up our worship to you as those who are redeemed by the blood of your son Jesus Christ.

And it's in his name that we pray. Amen. Thanks a lot to the band for leading us in worship. Awesome to hear voices singing out to God here in this place. I encourage you to get as comfortable as possible.

And recognize that you can get up at any time. I mention this all the time to get up and get more coffee or donuts. I know we just took a break. But also, if these chairs get uncomfortable, which is possible, you can stand up in the back and stretch out if that helps you to keep focused.

I'm guessing that maybe by the end there's going to be a couple of people standing back in the corners just kind of getting your back stretched out or whatever. But don't hesitate to do that. I don't want you sitting there uncomfortable with your lower back giving you problems.

I'm just trying to grit through. So feel free to get up at any time. But let's dive into this text. And I remind you where we were before. There was an encounter last week with God at Bethel. Jacob continued from that place though on his journey towards the people of the east.

And that's what we see in our very first verse. Then Jacob went on his journey and came to the land of the people of the east. Now remember that Jacob hasn't had a chance to e-mail ahead or to call and let his family know that they're coming to let his mom's family know that he's on the way.

Not only that, but he doesn't really have directions. So his iPhone was out of signal probably. Or he might have downloaded and been trying to use the Apple Maps app instead of Google Maps, which some of you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Either way, he's undertaking a journey of 550 miles to get to his mom's family looking for her brother Laban. So that's the direction he's going. He's actually heading a little bit north and a little bit east from the area of Bethel.

And there is nothing that I can relate this to in the sense of any type of modern travel or any type of travel that you've ever undertaken. Now some of you have been stuck at the airport for a while and it's felt a little bit like you were trying to travel 550 miles on foot.

But nothing really compares to the undertaking that this would have been over a month-long journey at least. To say he's on foot might be a stretch. Maybe he's got some camels or something like that.

But regardless, this is not a comfortable way to travel. And as he's going, so he's on this 550 mile journey and somewhere just off the path he sees some flocks. There's three flocks and there's a well and some shepherds standing off there.

And so he takes an exit and goes over to check it out. What's going on over here? He's been traveling for days and days and days with his entourage. They pull over, go and interact with these shepherds.

Jacob's first concern, as you might imagine, is like, hey, where am I? And so he asks the question and he finds out he is close to Haran, his destination, where his uncle is supposed to be residing. In this conversation, he also finds out that these shepherds know his uncle Laban.

And many scholars were pointing out as I was reading this week that the conversation is kind of stilted between him. Do you notice that in the text? He has to keep kind of pulling stuff out of the shepherds.

It's not like they want to really divulge much information. And so he keeps asking questions to kind of keep them engaged and answering what he wants to know. But he finds out that they do indeed know his uncle Laban.

Then he's still got to ask, well, how is he? Like, do you know Laban? Yeah. How is he? And so he asks that and finds out that he is well. And then not only that, but the conversation culminates in the recognition that Rachel, his cousin, Laban's daughter, is coming across the field.

And so the shepherds point out, hey, there she is right there. She's on her way with the sheep right now. And we find out that Rachel is indeed a shepherdess. And so she's on her way. Now, it's not wrong for our minds to turn to the idea of the providence of God, God's guiding hand.

God is working in the circumstances of everyday life, a routine trip across the desert here. And he is working so that Jacob shows up at a well just a little while before Rachel, his cousin, shows up.

Now, he's been on a month-long journey, and he spies this well off to the side of the road, shows up there. And who comes next? His future wife, which is also his cousin, I know. I mentioned that last week.

We're not going to go there again. God has guided Jacob to the right place in the right time. Now, how many of you have had times where you could identify the timing of God in an event or circumstance in your life?

Go ahead and raise your hand high. If you've been there where you've been able to look back and say, I see how God orchestrated events. Most of us, if we're honest, you can just think back to a decision or two that would have meant not meeting your spouse.

Right? For those of you that are married here, can you relate to that? One decision, I remember making a decision one weekend to go be a counselor at Camp Barakel. One of my best friends was kind of trying to get me to go up there, and that's where I met my wife.

If I had just said, no, I really have to work at a factory for the summer, or I have to make ends meet, or I have to do this or that, I don't know that we would have met. And so you can look back at your life, and can you see the providence of God?

You can see his hand. You can see the things that he has done to lead you to significant decisions. But the problem with understanding the providence of God, I think for many of us, is trying to make it happen in advance.

So many of you would admit that you've got a bunch of doors open in front of you right now. There's all different kinds of things that you could do with your week. Do you have a lot of different things you could be doing?

And so now the question comes down to, which one do I do, God? Which one is the choice of you for me? Have you ever been stymied with those kinds of decisions? Whether it's going to college, or which classes to take, or what to study, or what to do in life, or what occupation?

Should I stay in this one? Should I move on? There's all different kinds of decisions, and all different kinds of open doors in front of us. And the question that presses in on us is, God, which one is yours?

As if there is only one that God could bless. Could God bless you wherever you go to college? If you're walking with him, if you love him, if you're honoring him? Do you see what I'm saying? I mean, is it really that big of a deal?

And I mean, I would suggest that you give that over to God, and you talk with him about it. But then there comes a decision point, right, where we have to make some decisions and move forward. As cheesy as this sounds, the providence of God is best seen in the rearview mirror.

That's where we encounter the majority of the providence of God in our lives, where we can actually see it and make sense of it. So if you're tooling around, just picture yourself driving in the car, you're on your way, you're moving through life.

Sometimes you take a glance in the rearview mirror, you see what's already going on behind you, and that's the place where you see the hand of God orchestrating these events, right? Would you agree with me on that?

You see the providence of God in the rearview mirror, you see his hand, you see the way that he has worked, and the things that he has done. But his providence, his providential guidance is something that we do indeed keep looking out the windshield for as we're moving through life.

And let me explain this to you real quick. I would call this forward look. When you are, in essence, looking forward out the windshield, moving, looking for the providence of God, there's a word I want to call that.

It's trust. Trust in God. That is what the forward look of providence, when we understand that God is indeed in our everyday, then the thing for us moving forward is trust. And then there's another word that I'd like to apply to that look in the rearview mirror.

When we look backwards, I would like to call that gratitude. Thankfulness in looking back and seeing the past and the way that God has indeed worked in our history. And how many of you can identify that not everything that you see in the rearview mirror that has been beneficial to you felt good at the time?

Would you agree with me on that? Some of the things that you look back in that rearview mirror and you say, God was in this, but man, I don't want to do that again. I don't want to have to go through that again, God.

But it's gratitude nonetheless. Thank you for bringing hardship to my life. Thank you for bringing difficulty that has made me a stronger person as a result. And I can see your hand in it now in the rearview mirror.

When I was driving through that mess, I didn't know where I was going. I didn't know what was happening. All I could do was, it was all the work I could do to just try to keep steering and keeping things moving forward.

Then we look back and we see God's hand. Rachel arrives with her father's flock. We discover that she is indeed a shepherdess, as I mentioned before. In verse 7, Jacob proves that he has some insight in tending flocks.

This is going to be significant moving forward in his life. He obviously already has some experience in this. These shepherds, they're waiting, by the way. You've got to have the picture in your mind.

She's across the field. She's on her way with the flocks. It's been identified, but he's just chewing the fat with these shepherds. And I think in part he wants to get them out of the way. So he basically is giving them some instructions in verse 7.

The shepherds are not efficient. And here at a time when the flock should be lazily sitting in the shade, grazing in the heat of the day, they are sitting around the well, out in the open in the heat of the day, waiting for a drink of water.

Not a very healthy place for sheep and goats to be at the high point of the sun in the middle of the day. And so Jacob says, dudes, just water them and get them out of here. It's not time for them to be gathered near the sheep pen yet, so what are you doing?

Now some have indicated that it was usually youths and less skilled, think less buff, individuals who were shepherds. And so you get a case where Samuel comes to anoint one of Jesse's sons to be king, and one of the youngest one isn't even there because what's he doing?

He's out tending the sheep. His name is David. But he's a shepherd. Well, he's the youngest. It's assigned to him. And so even here with Rachel, you see a woman that is a shepherdess. You would have a lot of youths, individuals who are not quite as skilled.

And so the implication is they've gone over the top to explain that there is this huge rock that is over the mouth of this well that is there. And so he is working to—they were waiting, these shepherds are there waiting to remove the rock.

Why would they be waiting? Because not a single one of them is strong enough in and of themselves to remove the rock, and so they need help. They wait for all the shepherds to show up and remove that rock.

It's interesting to note how at the first meeting of the beautiful Rachel, Jacob mentions nothing about her beauty. There's not really much talk about her at all in this initial meeting. We don't get any pickup lines here at the well.

Nothing like, come here often, or wow, nice sheep, or hey, we're cousins, let's get married. No real catchy pickup lines at all in the text. Just instead, verse 10 goes into an over-the-top talk about her father Laban.

There has been one name on the mind of Jacob his entire journey for over a month. He has been going to where? Laban's house. That's what his mom told him to do. Mommy said go to Laban's house. He's been trying to find Laban.

That's been his goal. That's been his destination. With that one name, Rachel is identified as not beautiful. Nothing is really said about her except that she is Laban's daughter. The sheep are Laban's in the text.

Jacob, in a feat of strength that some have equated to Samson, he single-handedly rolls the heavy stone from the mouth of the well and waters Laban's flocks. There is no question that the Hebrew language in this text is trying to point to this as a show of impressive strength.

It is impressive strength that these shepherds have to all gather together to stand around this rock and lift it and pull it off and then put it back on again, and he just does it himself. And not only that, but he actually breaks with their social convention.

He's showing himself to be a doer, and he's going to get things taken care of. These sheep shouldn't be sitting out in the sun anyways. He's going to take care of his uncle's flock for him, and so he removes the rock.

This is not a move of impressive love for Rachel yet. This is not Jacob flexing for the ladies, you know, and picking up the rock and throwing it on his shoulder and, hey, which way's the gun show, or something like that.

You know, it's a dramatic act of service to Laban that he is doing here. This is about his uncle, about impressing his uncle with his labor and about doing a favor for him and getting himself in the good graces of his uncle.

Now, you might remember, some of you have been through this series and you've seen somebody meeting a wife at a well before. It may very well be this same well. His grandfather had sent a servant to find a wife for his father, Isaac.

And Abraham's servant brought with him a lot of wealth. You guys remember the nose ring that the servant brought along, and he brought along gold and bracelets and all kinds of wealth in order to impress Laban's family.

But here it appears that Jacob has nothing to offer. There's no indication that he brings wealth. There's no indication that he's got gold or silver or any significant things of value to offer, except for one thing.

What does Jacob bring to offer? His labor, his work, his muscles, his back. And so he shows himself in this part of watering Laban's sheep. He shows himself powerful to work, and that's the start of a theme that we're going to see as the guiding principle between Jacob and Laban.

What is their relationship like? It's based on Jacob's work ethic. He gives Rachel a family kiss of greeting. He weeps for joy at the completion of his very tough, very tough journey. He is exhausted from the road and after explaining things to Rachel.

By the way, I think that's probably why he weeps. It's been a significant ordeal to get to this location. Again, I think we can't just compare it to any kind of transportation you've undertaken, but it's been a huge ordeal.

He's just delighted, elated in the providence of God and leading him to the right place at the right time and all of that. And Rachel runs basically to get her father. He comes back and greets Jacob and welcomes him into the family.

Laban's welcome of Jacob into the family is actually one of flesh and bone relative. You see that in the text that he actually says, You're my flesh and bone. You're one of my kin. You're with me. And so Laban invites Jacob to live there with him for a month.

He stays there. He works. And he proves to be a great worker for Laban. And so because he's been such a good worker, Laban drives to make the relationship more formal. Having someone like Jacob working for him could be very beneficial to him.