Genesis-101 – Seven Years Like a Few Days, Part 1

Genesis 29:13–20 says:

 

"When Laban heard the news about his nephew Jacob, he hurried out to meet him. He embraced him and kissed him and brought him to his home, and there Jacob told him all these things. Then Laban said to him, 'You are my own flesh and blood.' After Jacob had stayed with him for a whole month, Laban said to him, 'Just because you are a relative of mine, should you work for me for nothing? Tell me what your wages should be.' Now Laban had two daughters; the name of the older was Leah, and the name of the younger was Rachel. Leah had weak eyes, but Rachel had a lovely figure and was beautiful. Jacob was in love with Rachel and said, 'I'll work for you seven years in return for your younger daughter Rachel.' Laban said, 'It's better that I give her to you than to some other man. Stay here with me.' So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed to him like only a few days because of his love for her.” Amen.

 

Jacob, the Temple of God

The biggest turning point in Jacob’s faith was the Bethel incident. For him, it was like a new beginning. He heard God’s promise to be with him and fulfill the Abrahamic covenant, and he immediately responded. In our journey of faith, when God bestows grace upon us, we don't try to repay Him, but rather we respond out of love.

 

Jacob's response was a commitment to become a temple of God, a dwelling place where God could reside, just as God had promised to be his temple, guiding and protecting him. He truly began his life as God's temple. His heart was filled with joy, and he made the precious confession that he wanted God to become his personal God.

 

His steps were light. As Genesis 29:1 describes his vigorous walk, he might have been humming a joyful song as he went.

 

A Personal Encounter with God

We are no different. There are moments in our lives, just like in Jacob’s, when we understand what a personal encounter with God truly means. We often mistake our faith for mere religious activity, living our lives or attending church services with a vague hope that God might take us to heaven someday.

 

We might think, "Now that I'm a Christian and I go to church, God will take care of everything," or even, "My pastor has great faith, so if I'm close to him, I might get into heaven." However, there is a decisive moment when we, like Jacob, realize that God has personally sought us out and met us. We may only understand it in hindsight, but just as God found Abraham and Isaac, there is a specific time for us as well.

 

Old Testament Figures Pointing to Christ

The book of Hebrews teaches us a crucial truth: it describes Jesus as a figure far greater and incomparable to Moses, calling Him the "last Moses" and the "last Abraham."

 

This is not just to teach us that these Old Testament figures had great faith. It’s to show us that their lives were a foreshadowing of Christ. We call Adam the "first Adam" and Jesus the "second" or "last Adam" because Jesus fulfilled what Adam failed to accomplish.

 

The same is true for Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Their lives were a testament to the coming Jesus Christ. Their history was a part of God's plan to reveal the image of the coming Christ. Eventually, Jesus Christ came and completed the covenant with Abraham and fulfilled the promises made to Isaac and Jacob. That's why we call Jesus the "last Jacob" and "last Abraham."

 

A Life Completed in Christ

The incredible truth we learn from Hebrews is that we are in Jesus Christ. Because of this, we can make this confession: The life of Abraham that Christ completed is also in us, and the life of Jesus Christ fulfilled in Isaac and Jacob is being fulfilled in us.

 

This completely transforms how we read and view the Bible. The Old Testament is no longer just a book of lessons. Instead of simply thinking, "This happened back then, so I should learn from it and apply it to my life," we realize that we, like Isaac and Jacob, have lived that life in Christ. We understand that the lives of Jacob and Abraham, the story of Moses, the exodus, and the Red Sea are all included in our lives through Christ.

 

The Bible Becomes Our History

We are no longer just people reading the Bible; we are people entering into the Bible. The stories of the Bible are no longer about other people but about us. The history recorded in the Bible is not just a past record but a living history—our history.

 

In Christ, when we read the Bible, we don't just see how Jacob lived; we see that we, like Jacob, were called to be a temple of God. Just as God promised to build a temple through Jacob’s entire life, He has already established a temple within us and is now building us up as His temple. Therefore, studying Jacob’s life is like looking at our own. We will now see how God built His temple through Jacob's life.

 

God Makes Us See Ourselves

In Jacob’s story, we will explore three things. The first is that the very first thing God did to build Jacob into His temple was to make him see himself. He was to become "Jacob who knows himself." The second is that He revealed Jacob as a "suffering servant," and the third is as a "beloved servant."

 

The Bible passage shows us the process through which Jacob realizes who he is and what he has done. Jacob was a "deceiver" who tricked his brother Esau and his father Isaac. Yet, in this passage, Jacob tells Laban, "I will work for you for seven years for your younger daughter Rachel." This wasn't Laban's demand; it was a testament to Jacob’s love for Rachel.

 

Seven years was a significant amount of time. The biggest dowry recorded in the Old Testament Law was 50 shekels, but a shepherd would earn at least 70 shekels over seven years. Jacob offered more than double the required amount. I also dated for seven years before getting married, and I can tell you that waiting seven years for the person you love is not an easy task.

 

Jacob Becomes the Deceived

After waiting seven long years, Jacob finally married. On the morning after his wedding night, he woke up to find Leah, not the Rachel he loved, next to him.

 

Jacob was dumbfounded and furious. He confronted Laban, "How could you deceive me?" While his reaction was understandable, Jacob was in no position to say such a thing. He was the one who had deceived his brother and father and had run away. After saying those words, he must have had an "aha" moment. He realized what his own life had been like. Jacob, the deceiver, became the deceived, and he began to understand his brother Esau's pain.

 

The Stubbornness of Sin and Repeated Realizations

God didn't just make him realize this once. Jacob was deceived by Laban ten times regarding his wages. Through all these events, God was making him see himself. Later, God used the Joseph incident to help Jacob realize the same thing. Jacob was deceived by his own sons, who presented a blood-stained coat to make him believe that Joseph was dead. When he was finally reunited with Joseph and realized he had been deceived, God was persistently asking Jacob, "Who are you?"

 

This was not God taking revenge, saying, "You deserve this." Through these events, God was continually speaking to Jacob, "Jacob, look at who you are, what kind of person you are." God was showing him how stubborn and terrible his sin was and how easily it could shake and destroy us.

 

The True Self Hidden Behind the Mask

We often live our lives wearing countless masks. Over time, these masks become so rigid that we don’t even realize we're wearing them. We forget our true selves, the person who truly moves us, makes us angry, and makes us act. We often mistake the masks we wear for our true selves.

 

Scholars have compared the stubbornness of sin to gravity and inertia. Even in the moment you believe in Christ and know you've been forgiven and made a child of God, you are still tempted by sin. You are no longer a slave to sin, but like someone who has been running at full speed and is told to stop, you are still carried forward by the inertia of sin. Or, as some call it, the gravity of sin continually pulls us back, which is why we must fight against it.

 

The Constantly Recurring Weakness

The story of Joseph reveals Jacob's persistent favoritism toward his children. It's a frustrating cycle. Jacob himself had suffered from his parents' favoritism and had caused family problems by loving Rachel more than Leah. Despite this, he still loved Joseph more than his other children. Jacob's greatest weakness kept repeating itself.

 

God never overlooks this part of us. He keeps exposing the areas where we are weakest and most inadequate. Sometimes we might feel, "God, do I have to go through this trial again?" But that is a natural part of the process. When teaching a child, you hire a tutor for the subject they struggle with, not the one they excel at.

 

Why does God keep addressing our weaknesses? Jacob might have thought, "God, please test me on something I'm good at, and I'll get a perfect score." But instead, God repeatedly brings up the areas where we are weakest—the issue of unforgiveness, the problem of hatred, the struggle with pride. This is because that is where we need to grow, and that is where the temple must be built. God keeps returning to that very spot.

 

The Me Who Hurts Others

God often uses the method of making the deceiver, Jacob, the deceived. Through this, Jacob came to understand what it meant to be a deceiver.

 

We often feel hurt by our family or others. This pain can become so deeply ingrained that it causes the same conflicts to repeat in our relationships. We think we are the ones being hurt, but consider this: Is the pain you're feeling a reflection of the pain you've caused others? Is God showing you that you are the one who inflicts wounds? We easily forget that this is a form of grace from God.

 

We think of ourselves as the wounded and the victims. However, according to the Bible, as God builds us into His temple, we are forced to see that we are the ones who hurt others, get angry, and cause pain.

 

The Grace of Knowing I Am a Sinner

Indeed, God bestows grace upon us at every moment. The Bible says that the greatest grace is the grace of knowing that I am the chief of all sinners. It is not just the grace of knowing that I have been hurt, but the grace of knowing that I am the one who gives that hurt.

 

A person shot by an arrow feels pain and bleeds, so they see themselves only as the one who was shot. But they are also the one who has shot others with arrows. In their pain, they fail to consider how much pain their arrows have caused others. This is why we fail to recognize our sins and why our hearts become proud and hardened.

 

When we face an injustice, we only feel our own pain. Yet, we are also the ones who have caused injustice to others. This is not about cause and effect. God is not taking revenge on Jacob by saying, "You did this, so you will suffer the same." If He did, no one would survive. Instead, God is showing us how terrifying and persistent sin is and that the pain we experience is often the same pain we have inflicted on others.

 

The Prayer in the Quiet Time Notebook

During my college years, I was part of a Bible study group. There was one younger student who would often interrupt me or make condescending remarks, which made me very uncomfortable. As my resentment grew, I felt I needed to address it. As an older, more mature believer, I decided to meet him for coffee. I told him, "I've been praying and I realized that I've been making a big deal out of a small flaw of yours, like a single black dot on a white paper. It's made me feel very uncomfortable around you."

 

I expected him to apologize. Instead, he quietly listened, then opened his backpack and pulled out his quiet time notebook. He showed me a page with a sentence written on it: "Please help me to forgive and love brother Sung-yoon."

 

I thought I was the one who had been shot by an arrow, but I realized I had shot far more arrows at him. The pain I felt was a reflection of the pain I had inflicted. We often hurt others unintentionally, but God reveals it to us. When someone we love hurts us and our pride is wounded, remember this message. It's not about the other person; it's about God teaching us, just as He taught Jacob, and building us into a holy temple. "Who am I?" God asks. "Am I the one who drives a knife into others' hearts? Am I the one who hurts others?" This is where Jacob's story truly begins.

 

The Grace of Facing Our True Self

Jacob eventually faced himself. He was confronted with the truth that he was a deceiver. The pain of being deceived probably led him to a place of tears and confession, "Lord, I was the deceiver."

 

Therefore, the greatest grace for a believer is the grace of truly facing our own self. I pray that you will experience this grace today. We often deceive ourselves, building walls and putting on armor to prevent others from getting in and to keep ourselves from getting out. I hope that you will look at the hurts and struggles you are praying about and ask, "Who am I?"

 

We must realize what it means to truly be a sinner, to live apart from God, and to defy Him. We must understand the severity of sin and its power to reveal our true selves. Even when we point fingers at others and think we are the most righteous, we need to realize how many arrows and how many knives we are shooting and wielding.

 

Grace and the Question for Myself

Recognizing what sin is—that is grace. It is grace because it leads us to repentance. It is also grace because it reminds us that we are God’s children.

 

When we get angry, we often think, "I must be sensitive because I've been stressed lately." While that may be true, we should also ask, "Could this anger be a reflection of the anger I have caused others?"

 

The same goes for despair. We must ask ourselves, "Is the very thing that is causing me to despair, in fact, me?" The difficulty we can't bear is not the problem; we are the problem. We are the ones who refuse to fully obey God and let go of our own will. We love and cherish our self-image, putting on a facade of following God's will. That 'self' is the very thing that makes us afraid, angry, and despairing. This is what we learn from Jacob’s story.

 

Rising Up and Clinging to Jesus Christ

As I prepared this message, my greatest concern was that we might become hardened and think this story doesn’t apply to us. Before you think, "My pain is different, my pride is not like that," I urge you to ask yourself, "Who am I? What is the sin that God talks about? What kind of person am I?"

 

This is because unless we face our true self, we cannot hold on to Jesus Christ who is with us in that moment.

 

In our despair, when we see ourselves as having no hope, loving God on the surface but secretly wanting to distance ourselves from Him, and constantly wanting to live our lives on our own terms—in that place of despair, we see Jesus who died for us. And in that place, we can cling to Christ and rise up.

 

We no longer despair or lose hope in ourselves, but we hold on to Jesus Christ, who became our life. We hold on to the One who says, "It is not you who live, but I who live in you," and who lives our life for us.

 

Meeting Jesus Christ When You Face Yourself

When you truly face yourself, every true believer will meet Jesus Christ in that very place. When you humbly look at yourself, you will realize things you never knew before—that you are a deceiver, a person who hurts others, and a person full of pride.

 

You will see that even as you say, "I want to believe in God," your heart is stiff, and you secretly want to do things your own way. And in that moment, you will meet Jesus Christ who died for that very person. It’s not a vague idea that Christ died for sinners. It’s the realization that Jesus died for you—the person who stubbornly clings to sin and can’t let go of it—in that very place.

 

Jesus Christ Becomes My Life

When you see that Jesus is truly in you, you can finally confess, like Paul, "By the grace of God I am what I am." In that moment, we realize we aren't fighting against sin alone; instead, we recognize that Jesus, who has already conquered sin, is living in us. We come to understand that it's not our faith, but the faith of Jesus Christ, who has become our faith, that lives with us.

 

Jesus died with our death and became our death. At the very moment our last breath leaves our body and we feel like we are nothing, we see that Jesus becomes our life and our resurrection. In that completely helpless place, where we feel bare and like a mere "blob of flesh" with nothing to hold on to, we see Jesus embracing that "blob of flesh."

 

The strength, hope, and life that we so desperately searched for but could never find now allows us to let go of our own lives without worry. This is because we finally understand the true joy of being able to confess, "I now live with this Person, He lives in me, and He has become my life."

 

Jesus Christ, My Life

The secret of the believer is that Christ lives in me. To understand this secret is to know the true meaning of salvation and the joy it brings. If you think you're saved but you don't long for the Lord, and you're not bothered by that lack of longing, you must face yourself again. If you simply attend church and sit in the pew, thinking you're a child of God, you need to re-examine your life. If you say, "If God is real, show me, and I will believe," then put your life on the line. Jesus put His life on the line for you. So you must put your life on the line too.

 

My dear friends, your life belongs to the Lord. All who say they believe in Jesus must follow His words because of Christ, who died for the deceiver within us. Jesus said, "I have died for you, I have appeared to you so that the joy I give you may be complete." It is about knowing the joy of living with Jesus.

 

Jacob learned what it meant to live with God and began to understand what a beloved servant is. When we meet the Lord, seven years feel like a few days. I pray that you will meet Jesus Christ, who loves even the deceiving part of you and becomes your life, and that you will love Him for seven years as if it were a few days.

 

Face Your True Self and Love the Lord

If you truly want to experience the best moment of your life, then do the following:

 

1.      Face the deceiving self within you.

 

2.      Know your true self.

 

3.      Meet Jesus Christ who is with you in that place.

 

4.      Hold on to Him and be filled with His love.

 

5.      Love Christ.

 

Prayer

Dear Lord, we confess that we thought our outward selves—as husbands, wives, or parents working hard for our children—were our true selves. But in reality, we were people who hated being judged, were hurt by comparison, felt constantly inadequate, and were so consumed with ourselves.

 

Please help us to know again that You died for people like us. Help us to truly understand the grace we have received and the love of God.

 

In Jesus Christ's name, we pray. Amen.