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After Laban has robbed Jacob of 14 years of his life. Jacob makes a deal with Laban that all the speckled and spotted cattle, brown sheep, and speckled and spotted goats will be his after 7 more years of service. The plain colored will belong to Laban. Sounded like a good deal since most sheep there are either white or black. All Laban could see was his wealth increasing because of Jacob so he heartily agrees to it.
Jacob set up a six-year breeding program that essentially stripped Laban of all of the best of his flocks. He peeled poplar, hazel and chestnut branches until the white wood appeared. He put these branches in the gutters around the water troughs. Gutters are the grooved out places around the troughs where the animals have been watering. These rods were used as a sort of temporary fencing so that Jacob could control the breeding. He bred the he goats that produced ringstraked, spotted and speckled kids with the stronger she goats. And he bred the rams that produced brown lambs with the stronger ewes.
Of course, he knew which rams and he goats would produce these because he had been with these flocks for 14 years. That way, no matter how Laban renegotiated their agreement, Jacob was guaranteed to get the best lambs and kids out of each year’s crop (Genesis 31:8).
Jacob is corralling the cattle—sheep and goats—as they come for water. By making sure a ram gets in with several ewes he’s going to get the ewes to go into heat. Jacob has shepherded Laban’s flocks for 14 years. He was a shepherd before then for 25 years.
Preparing for temporary separation (vs 37)
- Corral the spiritual traits you want.
- Prayerfulness
- Witnessing
- Bible study
Division (vs 40) Jacob did separate the lambs…
- Separation is preparation
- One of the first acts of wisdom is separation.
- Your standards of separation ought to produce a better 2nd generation. Jacob divides the cattle in a way that’s going to make his flock stronger in the future (vss 41-42)
Congregation (vs 40) put his own flocks by themselves…
- Be around who you want to be like. He set the faces of the flocks toward the ringstraked and all the brown in the flock…(vs 40).
- Accomplice in robbery that turned to murder who just happened to be in the car at the time.
- All the more as ye see the day approaching…
- Can’t worship God by yourself
Reproduction (vs 41) whensoever the stronger cattle did conceive…
