Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #14 of Genesis 30, and we are going to read Genesis 30:19-21:

And Leah conceived again, and bare Jacob the sixth son. And Leah said, God hath endued me with a good dowry; now will my husband dwell with me, because I have born him six sons: and she called his name Zebulun. And afterwards she bare a daughter, and called her name Dinah.

Leah’s sixth son is Zebulun, and he is the tenth child of Jacob, including the four born to the two concubines.  And Leah said that she was endued with a good dowry from God.  The word “dowry” is Strong’s #2065, and it is only used here.  It comes from #2064, which is translated as the word “endured,” and that word is also only used here, and that word is said to come from a “primitive root,” and that means it is unknown what word it is derived from, so that stops us from a further search.  But we can gather an idea from the verse itself as Leah said, “God hath endued me with a good dowry,” and that she would now dwell with her husband because she has born him six sons.  Of course the Lord was the one who blessed Leah with those six children, as all children come from the Lord, so the “good dowry” would have to do with the children she has born.  But as far as carrying that any further, I do not know where we can go with that.

But we can see something else here, and that is that Leah has born six sons.  In order to tie that together regarding the fact that it is Leah (not Rachel) who has conceived and brought forth six sons, we need to remember that Jacob’s relationship to Rachel and Leah is a picture of Christ’s relationship to the elect, as typified by Rachel, and His relationship with those that are not His elect, the rest of the people of the world, as typified by Leah.  We saw this in the fact that Leah bore six sons, but claimed two others from her concubine, totaling eight, and Rachel would eventually bear two sons, and she also claimed two others by her concubine, totaling four.  So there is the “one-third/two thirds” relationship.  We also remember that it said in the previous chapter, in Genesis 29:30-31:

And he went in also unto Rachel, and he loved also Rachel more than Leah, and served with him yet seven other years. And when JEHOVAH saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb: but Rachel was barren.

Here, we find that Jacob loved Rachel, and God says that Leah was hated, and that definitely reminds us of what the Lord said concerning Jacob and Esau, twin sons: “Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.”  That identifies with God’s election program wherein God loves those He elected to salvation and hates the rest in the sense that He leaves them in their sins.  He does not show forth saving loving toward them and, therefore, “hates” them.  And Jacob’s marriage to these two women is a picture of the same thing, so that leads us to this point where Leah has born six sons, and she is continuing to desperately hope that through childbearing she will find favor with her husband Jacob, as she says, “Now will my husband dwell with me, because I have born him six sons.”  You see, with this expression of hope and desire on poor Leah’s part, we can see some of the spiritual meaning, especially when we look at Leah’s name. 

The name “Leah” is Strong’s #3812, “lê'âh,” which we would pronounce “lay-aw',” due to the vowel point.  But it comes from #3811, which is a word that is very closely related.  It has the same consonants, and the only difference is the first vowel point, but the second vowel point is the same.  The word #3811, we would pronounce as “law-aw'.”  Again, it is the same consonants, but just different vowel points. Instead of “lay-aw',” it is “law-aw'.”   And this word is found 19 times, and it is translated as “wearied” or “weary” most often.  It is also translated as “loathe,” as when the Egyptians loathed to drink of the river that had been turned to blood.  It is a word that is not often used in a very positive way, but it is a word the Lord tends to use of the unsaved.   For example, it is used in Isaiah 47, and the whole chapter is discussing the daughter of Babylon.  Therefore, it is discussing the kingdom of Satan and the unsaved that are part of that kingdom.  We read in Isaiah 47:12-14:

Stand now with thine enchantments, and with the multitude of thy sorceries, wherein thou hast laboured from thy youth; if so be thou shalt be able to profit, if so be thou mayest prevail. Thou art wearied in the multitude of thy counsels. Let now the astrologers, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, stand up, and save thee from these things that shall come upon thee. Behold, they shall be as stubble; the fire shall burn them; they shall not deliver themselves from the power of the flame: there shall not be a coal to warm at, nor fire to sit before it.

It is obvious from this context that God is pronouncing judgment on Babylon which has been wearied in the multitude of their counsels.  It was the counsel of the Scriptures and the Bible, but the counselors of Babylon are the astrologers, the stargazers, the monthly prognosticators, and everything but the Scriptures.  It is the wisdom of man and the wisdom of this world, which has caused them to be “wearied” because of the multitude of these counsels because no good comes of it.  And, certainly, no salvation has ever come from it.  It has left the one receiving such counsel in the same spiritual condition as before they received it, which is being under the wrath of God, and maybe even in a worse condition.  And that is the word “law-aw'.” 

Also, we read in Ezekiel 24:9:

Therefore thus saith the Lord JEHOVAH; Woe to the bloody city! I will even make the pile for fire great.

Here, the “bloody city” would be an apostate and unfaithful Jerusalem.  Then it says in Ezekiel 24:10-13:

Heap on wood, kindle the fire, consume the flesh, and spice it well, and let the bones be burned. Then set it empty upon the coals thereof, that the brass of it may be hot, and may burn, and that the filthiness of it may be molten in it, that the scum of it may be consumed. She hath wearied herself with lies, and her great scum went not forth out of her: her scum shall be in the fire. In thy filthiness is lewdness: because I have purged thee, and thou wast not purged, thou shalt not be purged from thy filthiness any more, till I have caused my fury to rest upon thee.

It is language of God’s judgment on Jerusalem, typifying the churches, which has wearied herself with lies, and the lies have to do with false doctrines, false gospels, and false salvation programs.  And this has been a weariness, even to themselves.  And this was Leah’s “weariness.”  With the birth of each son, she thought, “Now will my husband love me.  Now will my husband dwell with me.”  But it never happens.  It never happens because Jacob loved Rachel.  His desire was toward Rachel, typifying the elect.  He has a marriage relationship with Leah, but so does every human being to the Law of God, as Romans 7 reveals to anyone that looks carefully at the first four verses.  It says there: “…ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another.”  You cannot be married to “another” unless you had been married previously.  And, obviously, the previous marriage was to the Law, which the true believers have become dead to through the body of Christ.  Death ended the marriage, freeing them up to remarry.  That is the Law of God.  If a man has lost a wife or a wife has lost a husband through death, then the marriage is ended, and they are biblically and legally allowed to remarry.  And there is no sin because that is what Christ did when He bore the sins of His people at the foundation of the world, and He was smitten in death.  He died for those sins, ending the marriage relationship between the Law and all those whose sins He bore.  Now they were “dead” to the Law.  The Law had nothing further to say against them or to condemn them with, and that marriage with the Law of God was ended, freeing them to marry “another,” the Lord Jesus Christ.  He is the Bridegroom, and we are the bride.  God is a God of justice and of Law, and everything must be done according to Law.

And Leah was married to Jacob, just as was Rachel.  Both were legally married, but one was a marriage of love because it points to Christ and His eternal bride, the eternal church or company of the elect.  But the other wife, as we read in Genesis 29, is “hated” in her marriage just as is all mankind in their marriage relationship to the Law.  The Law is condemning the wife in that marriage.  So we can see that Leah is already married, so she is not desiring marriage with Jacob.  She is desiring his love.  She has the marriage, but she lacks the love, and that is the very sorrowful thing, historically, with their relationship.  But regarding the spiritual meaning, she is very fertile, and God is blessing her with children, and she is wearying herself to find grace and favor in the eyes of her husband that he would love her, but it does not happen.

Let us look at one more place this same word “law-aw',” in Genesis 19 where we read of the horrible situation in Sodom long ago when God came to visit in the form of two men that were said to be “angels.”  They were taken into Lot’s house, and we read that men of the city came to abuse them, and it says in Genesis 19:9-11:

And they said, Stand back. And they said again, This one fellow came in to sojourn, and he will needs be a judge: now will we deal worse with thee, than with them. And they pressed sore upon the man, even Lot, and came near to break the door. But the men put forth their hand, and pulled Lot into the house to them, and shut to the door. And they smote the men that were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and great: so that they wearied themselves to find the door.

This is a true historical happening that God reported and revealed to have truly taken place thousands of years ago.  But is also a historical parable, and we know that in the Bible the “door” is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ, according to John 10.  And we read concerning the door, in John 10:7-9:

Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.

Christ is the door.  If you are able to enter into the door, you will be saved, and can go in and out, and find pasture because He is also the Shepherd of the sheep.

But in Genesis 19, these men are abusive and violent, and they are forcibly trying to break into Lot’s house.  Who was Lot?  He was a righteous man, so it was a house of the righteous, so they were trying to break into the house of the righteous, and they were exercising their “free will,” were they not?  Yes, this is really a vivid illustration of what man’s “free will” is about in its violence and ugliness.  It is trying to force God to save you: “You must save me because I have grabbed hold of you.  I have accepted you.  I have made a decision for Christ.  I am claiming the Scripture that says to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved, and so I am saved!”  They do not say this part, but they are really saying, “I have done it.”  They may say thank you (to God) for making it available to them, but they are saying, “It is me.  I am the one that has grabbed hold of salvation and taken it to myself, and I have brought myself into the kingdom.”  What the free will gospel is all about is saying, “I have forced myself into the door.”  It is all about the proud, arrogant man trying to force his way into the kingdom of Satan by his own will, and not by the will of God.  He will not wait upon God.  He will not wait to see if it is God’s will.  He will not humble himself before the Lord and cry out, “O, Lord, have mercy, and if it be your will, may you save me and bring me into your kingdom.”  He refuses to be as the publican who would not so much as look up to heaven, saying, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”  No, they will have none of that waiting on God:  “Who knows what God will do?  Who knows how long it will take for God to act and respond?  And I am impatient, and I need to know right now.  I am a product of this modern world and its ‘instant pudding’ society, so I need salvation today.  So, Preacher, does not the Bible say to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved?”  And the Preacher responds, “Oh, yes, oh yes.”   Then he says, “Therefore I believe, and am saved.”  And they have tried to burst through the door.  

But actually, what has happened is that God has sent strong delusion to blind them spiritually.  They may think they have entered into the kingdom of God and come through the door.  They may think God is blessing them, but the reality is being shown right here as it says that God “smote the men that were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and great: so that they wearied themselves to find the door.”  The actual door to the kingdom of God is Christ, that portal and entry point.  But the churches and congregations of the world today have added and subtracted to the Word and developed other kinds of gospels by putting in a little of their own works, no matter how slight, with the grace of God, and they have perverted the ointment of the apothecary, as if a fly had flown into it and contaminated it.  It is no longer the pure Gospel of grace, but it is a perverted gospel that has added the works of men.  And that is the “weariness.”  These men are putting forth extreme effort to get into the house of the righteous.  They are doing everything they can to find that door, but they are unable to do it.  Nobody can come through the door into the kingdom of God unless God is the one who brings them, and God was determined to bring only certain ones, the few out of the whole of mankind.  The elect, alone, are brought along that narrow way, and with much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

So we see in the word “law-aw'”  that they wearied themselves, and it has everything to do with a works gospel, a false gospel, and that is what we see with Leah.  If we go back to Genesis 30, it tells us in Genesis 30:19-20:

And Leah conceived again, and bare Jacob the sixth son. And Leah said, God hath endued me with a good dowry; now will my husband dwell with me, because I have born him six sons: and she called his name Zebulun.

What does the number “6” point to in the Bible?  The number “6” is a word, and all words in the Bible have spiritual meaning because they are the words of God.  And the spiritual meaning of the number “6” is that of “work.”   How many days did God work to create the world?  He worked six days, and on the seventh day He rested, and that set the pattern as the Lord established the Sabbath of rest every week.  Every week man could work six days.  God allowed for that.  Six days is the number of “work.”

Leah was “wearying” herself having children.  And keep in mind what children identify with, as God likens children to “fruit.”  It is fruitfulness.  The fruit of the womb is like those that hear the Gospel and respond.  “… many are called, but few are chosen.”  And that could apply to Leah and Rachel.  There were many sons for Leah, but few sons for Rachel.  Jacob loved Rachel.  He did not love Leah, and Leah was living up to her name, “wearying” herself with her work to be accepted.

And now she has born her sixth and last son.  She will have a daughter, and we will talk about Dinah in our next study.  But as far as sons that she personally bears, this is it.  Zebulun would be the last son to be born.  Her “work” has been completed, and she thought, “This is a good dowry that will result in my husband finally dwelling with me.”  She would have the love and favor of Jacob.  Tragically, we know it did not happen.  It did not happen historically, and it has never happened, spiritually, with anyone trying to “work” to enter into the kingdom of God.