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rescue and warned Laban not to interfere with
Jacob. In the same way, trusting in God, Jacob
was delivered from his fear of Esau. God
rewarded his trust, which also fulfilled Jacob’s
request to God in his vow.
So Jacob reaped deception and protection in
his life. The fact that ‘Jacob’ transformed into
‘Israel’ and gave up his deceptive ways did not
change the fact that he had to bear the
consequences of his deception
throughout his life. The seeds he
sowed early in his life grew and
bore fruit. Certainly he learnt his
lesson and changed for the better,
but he still had to suffer for the
bad seed he had sown.
Jacob’s mother, Rebekah, is
another example. She knew the
prophecy about Jacob – that the
older would serve the younger. This suited her,
because Jacob was her favourite. Her mistake
was in thinking that God needed her help to
bring about His will. So she engineered Jacob’s
receipt of the blessing of Esau in an act of
deception at its worst. But she did not get
away with her sin.
She had not foreseen Esau would want to kill
Jacob, so she was forced to send him away for
safety. As far as Scripture records, she never
saw Jacob again. By trying to bring about the
exaltation of her favourite, she reaped sepa-
ration from him. Instead she spent the
remainder of her time with Esau. There is a
certain justice about this. She reaped what
she had sowed throughout her life.
We have only looked at one person’s life yet
we have seen the sow-reap principle very
clearly. When we look at the lives of others in
Scripture, we see this principle working out
repeatedly. Let us not fool ourselves and
pretend it no longer operates. Even today we
reap what we sow as a general principle.
Let’s consider this principle in a little more
detail. If we reap what we sow, then we need
to be very careful about what
seeds we plant in our lives, both
early on and at every stage of our
life. If we receive back what we
ourselves have done, we need to
think twice about what we do. It
makes sense to sow kindness,
generosity and love, so that we
can receive them back. As James
says; “Peacemakers who sow in
peace reap a harvest of right-
eousness” (Jam 3:18). However, if we sow
arguments, division, jealousy and anger, we
will receive them back in due course. It is only
a matter of time.
This is not the only issue – it is also true that
seeds tend to increase. Whatever we sow will
probably come back in greater measure. We
may reap 2-fold, 3-fold or even more-fold.
Since this is the case, we need to be extremely
wise about what we sow during our lifetime.
Since we are followers of God and his
commands, we should have no fear about what
we will reap.“But now that you have been set
free from sin and have become slaves of God,
the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the
result is eternal life.” (Rom 6:22).
“Also unto thee,
O Lord, belongeth
mercy: for thou
renderest to every
man according
to his work.”
Psalm 62:12