Jacob Leaves Laban's Employ

Today I read Genesis 31 where Jacob leaves his uncle's house. Again we are left with just the barest of outlines about what has happened over the past 20 years of Jacob's life. Apparently Laban, his uncle, has not been the most fair of employers. According to Jacob, and Laban does not refute it, Laban has changed Jacob's wages ten times over the past 20 years, not to mention tricking Jacob into marrying his eldest daughter. I would hate to see how Laban treats someone who isn't family!

Laban starts treating Jacob even more poorly so Jacob takes his family and his belongings that he has earned and departs because he is afraid Laban will not let him leave if he tells Laban his plan. Frankly I think Jacob was right to be afraid of what Laban might do. Fortunately for Jacob, God was still with him and told Laban in a dream not to hurt Jacob. Laban listens and makes his peace with Jacob.

This chapter to me is a very good indication of what can happen when greed gets the best of you. Laban was a very wealthy man. Instead of being happy to share his wealth with his nephew, he tried to hoard it and tried to cheat Jacob when he had made a legitimate business deal with him. And instead of being happy that Jacob was doing so well for himself, he accused Jacob of stealing from him and came after him with who knows what intent. Now, his daughter, Rachel did in fact steal his idols and so I can understand Laban being upset about that. But otherwise, I agree with Jacob that if Jacob had come to Laban and told him that it was his intention to leave, Laban would have tried to prevent it or would have tried to take Jacob's cattle away from him.

Wealth is a huge stumbling block which I have seen in my own life as well as in the scriptures. I have read story after story of how much harder it gets to pay tithing when you have a lot more wealth. I had always thought that it would be so much easier to pay tithing if you had more money, but I guess it's the greed factor. When you start to get a lot of money, you just want more of it, but most people don't want more for the sake of doing good in the world. But rather they want it for the sake of having more money. This is not pleasing to God. Jacob, in the Book of Mormon, tells us that we should seek wealth, if at all, for the intent to do good and help those around us. Sadly however, most people do not seek wealth for this purpose. Imagine what the world would be like if all the wealthy people of the world used their wealth to bless the lives of others. We know from the scriptures that it would be a veritable paradise because the account in 4th Nephi tells us so.

We have to wait for the Millennium to find out first had what this like, because I can guarantee that the wealthy of this nation, and the world, will not share their wealth the way it would need to be shared for us to have all things in common. I sometimes wonder if the wealthy could tolerate not being "above" everyone else in some form or fashion. A lot of them seem to have a need to feel like they are elite for some reason. I guess we'll find out some day. Of course at that day we really will only see the humble wealthy so maybe we won't see after all. Time will tell. Until tomorrow.