Sat.’s Devo - Family

Genesis 28:1-29:35; Matthew 9:18-38; Psalm 11:1-7; Proverb 3:11-12
God chooses sinful men and then molds them into what he wants them to become - what he intended for their lives. God chose Jacob to be the father of his twelve tribes even though he was sneaky and conniving. The way he chose to break him of his bad habits was to send him to a man that was even more sneaky and conniving than himself - Laban.
Isaac sent Jacob to Paddan Aram which means “their ransom is high”. It surely cost Jacob a lot. He worked for fourteen years for a wife he didn’t love and one he did. Poor Leah was the unloved one so God poured his love on her and opened her womb. Each son was the expectation of her husbands love but not the fulfillment. She had Rueben, Simeon, Levi and Judah, then stopped baring.
God lets us see into the family of Isaac and Jacob more than any other family in the Bible. We see right away that there are no perfect mothers or fathers and that sibling rivalry was just as strong then as now. Families are messy and heart-breaking at times but God chose the family to train us for our destinies. We can reject them or learn to love them in all their shortcomings and selfish ambitions. They are the mirrors to our own soul.
In Matthew, we see a Roman ruler who loved his daughter so much he was willing to humble himself before Jesus. He was desperate, but so was the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. God cared for the high and mighty and the low and humble. He healed her and brought the girl back to life. I would say he brought them both back to life!
Then, Jesus did a most important thing. The Jewish leaders had determined long ago that the criteria for the Messiah would be three miracles: he would heal a man born blind, a Jewish leper and a mute. He had already done the first two so when he the mute man spoke (vs. 33) the people all looked to the Pharisees to see what they would say. They couldn’t deny he had done all these things so they declared that he didn’t do them by the power of God but by the power of Satan. That marked a shift in Jesus’ ministry. That was the dividing line. He rejected the Jew and started ministering to the Gentiles also and his teaching went from public to more private.
Lord, thank you for our families. Help us to love and honor the place they play in our lives.