I Will Praise the Lord
Beloved People of God,
An amazing thing happened between the birth of Levi and the birth of Judah. It’s as if something finally clicked into place for Leah. For at least the first three to six years of her marriage to Jacob, Leah exhausted herself. She was the tradwife par excellence with nothing to show for it. We can hear the desperation in her prayers. Everything in her world revolved around her husband. Lonely in a patriarchal society, she did everything in her limited power to get him to see her, hear her, love her. If we slow down long enough, we can hear Moses' subtle critique against Jacob his forefather for his neglectful treatment of his foremother.
After three attempts to get Jacob’s love and attachment, Leah appears to be at the lowest point of her life. Every time she prays it’s a variation on, “now my husband will love me, now he’ll care, now he’ll hold me in love.” That may not be our exact story, but how many of us have bent ourselves out of shape desperate to be appreciated, cared for, loved. But something happens in her prayer life after the birth of Levi when Jacob fails to change (again). Her focus shifts. Her eyes are opened to the One who’s seen her all along, heard her every cry, and held her through every sorrow. I believe while she was carrying her fourth child in her womb she realized she was more than a womb. She was more than a second-class citizen. She wasn’t an ignored daughter in the house of her father or a neglected wife in the tents of her husband. She was loved. She was beloved.
No longer breaking her life, wrecking her soul, chasing after the impossible affections of others, she experienced the rich fullness of the Lord who loved her all along. We see this shift, this joyous relief, as she named Judah, praying: “This time I will praise the Lord” (Genesis 29.35).
Friend, if your story feels like a mirror image of Leah’s, I pray you would find the same reason to praise today. Allow God to shift your perspective. Trust Him to show you how His grace is sufficient for you, even if your circumstances don’t change (2 Corinthians 12.9). Leah was beloved by God and so are you.
For Christ the King,
Brett