Reading: Genesis 29-30

Jacob had 2 wives - Leah, whom he was tricked into marrying, and Rachel, whom he loved. They both bore him sons, either them or their proxy, ie their maidservant. And that's we get the 12 tribes of Israel, which are Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Napthali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph (perhaps the most famous one of all), and Benjamin.

It kind of reminded me of those chinese shows I watched, set in ancient times. You know in the Imperial Palace when the concubines would vie with one another for the favour of the Emperor. Of course Jacob was no king, but his wives still vied for his favour. I just couldn't help but wonder, with that kind of environment growing up, how were the 12 brothers going to live harmoniously together? It'll be like, "dad loves MY mum more", and so on and so forth.

Anyway, chapter 30,

³⁷ Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane trees and made white stripes on them by peeling the bark and exposing the white inner wood of the branches. ³⁸ Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so that they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink. When the flocks were in heat and came to drink, ³⁹ they mated in front of the branches.

Quite the biologist Jacob was! And what follows is more interesting, verse 39 continues.

And they bore young that were streaked or speckled or spotted. ⁴⁰ Jacob set apart the young of the flock by themselves, but made the rest face the streaked and dark-colored animals that belonged to Laban. Thus he made separate flocks for himself and did not put them with Laban's animals....

⁴³ In this way the man grew exceedingly prosperous and came to own large flocks, and maidservants and menservants, and camels and donkeys.

So Jacob now had flocks of his own, any ewe that was speckled, streaked or dark-colored was rightfully his, per agreement with Laban. Wow, such a smart breeder! Thing is, I recall my basic biology, Medellian genetics, and it's quite fascinating...

Usually speckled, spotted, dark coloured traits tend to be recessive. Meaning for it to be expressed physically, it requires both parents to have it. So if you took a speckled sheep, and mated it with another speckled sheep, the result is a speckled ewe. No doubt about that. And that's why I said Jacob was quite the biologist. And he prospered with many sheep...

Reading: Matthew 9

¹Jesus stepped into a boat, crossed over and came to his own town. ²Some men brought to him a paralytic, lying on a mat. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, "Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven."

I remember hearing a recording of a sermon by a local methodist pastor (not from my church). I'm not sure if she preached on a different gospel, but reading these verses made me recall her sermon, or at least bits of it. What she highlighted was this paralytic had friends to care for his well-being, that would care for his health, his life, care for him enough to carry him to Jesus. She preached on the passage where they actually lowered him from the roof. This passage, this man was "lying on a mat", he didn't do any of the walking - of course he couldn't. But that's the point, he needed to be helped. Somehow he sought helped, or his friends just came to help. But he received their help, he didn't stop them from helping, gosh he was lying on the mat, not kicking and screaming. I'm picturing a man placidly lying on the mat, perhaps slightly embarrassed, but still allowing his friends to see him in such a state, and help him.

And the result? He was healed. Apparently, his physical infirmity had something to do with the consequence of his sins.

And note, it didn't write "when Jesus saw his faith (the paralytic)", Matthew wrote "when Jesus saw their faith". Somehow or other, I think the paralytic's friends played a part in his healing. It wasn't just the faith of that one man, but his friends too. I just finished reading "90 minutes in heaven", and Don Piper (the author) shared how he learnt how to let people help him. Being a pastor, he had no qualms about ministering to others, but struggled to allow others to help him.

I think it's something I can definitely improve on, letting others help me. It takes humility to allow others to help, something contrary to our "self-help" society. Maybe we need to debunk the myth that by allowing yourself to be helped, you're lousier, weaker, worst-off that the helper. Perhaps so, but not necessarily, or even to look at it that way. I think for us Christians, we know we can receive help because indeed we are weak, indeed we have nothing to boast of but Christ. And like how so many have shared, if we fail to allow people to help us, we're actually robbing them of their ministry to us. We're robbing them of exercising their gifts (spiritual gifts or natural talents God has given them).

I guess sometimes we think we don't want to bother others. But is that really the reason? Or is it our pride that we turn away people who have genuine hearts to help?

This has been a lesson to me recently. And I do admit, the next time help comes along, I'll be sure to consider the help seriously.

Labels: bible reading