by Chuck Ness
We are told by the world that if we have good looks, great qualifications, special talents, good experience, practice good wisdom, and if we work hard, then we will always come out on top by winning life’s race by getting the jobs we desire and one day we will live to a ripe old age. Yet we read in Ecclesiastes 9:11, that “The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong…”
I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.
Well, In this situation we see Jacob’s wife Leah, not Rachel gaining the most blessings from GOD. Oh we know that Jacob loved Rachel more, and God almost compensated for Leah’s lack of love from Jacob by opening up her womb. So much so, that 5 of the 12 sons of Jacob were with Leah, whereas Rachel had only 2. Jacob loved Rachel from the day he met her. So much so he picked her up and kissed her. Yet, we know that GOD looks at the heart, not the exterior package we come in.
God chose Leah to bless Jacob with more, and even the promised One, Christ Jesus, would come from Leah’s son Judah, and the Priesthood would come from Leah’s son Levi. In this scenario, we even learn that Rachel did not love Jacob’s GOD, because she stole her fathers idols.
Then one day she would die giving birth to Benjamin after Jacob hurriedly fled Shechem because his sons, by Leah, committed gienocide of all the men of Shechem. The journey was hard on Rachel, that she died giving birth to her second son Benjamin.
After her death, she was buried in a roadside grave, without so much as the embalming that was traditional. Then to make things worse, the location of her grave is lost to history.
Yet, Leah, the one Jacob had to be tricked into marrying, would die at a ripe old age. She would even be buried with her husband Jacob in the family plot tomb Abraham, Sarah, Issac, and Jacob. Seems a case of GOD seeing the heart of Leah while rejecting Rachel. Thus Leah is remembered by GOD, and Rachel is left in a forgotten grave.
So, true to form, the race did not go to the pretty one, the most loved, nor the one most favored, but rather to the one whose heart GOD could see was good.
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