The Baby Wars and the Pursuit of Happiness Text: Genesis 30:9-13
Introduction: A Messy Providence
We come now to a section of Genesis that makes modern, tidy Christians a bit uncomfortable. We have sibling rivalry, polygamy, surrogate mothers, and a general atmosphere of domestic strife that looks more like a daytime television show than a chapter in Holy Writ. But the Scriptures are not given to us to provide sanitized, airbrushed portraits of saints who never had a bad day. The Bible is relentlessly realistic about the muck and mire of human sin. And it is in the middle of this very muck that the glorious, sovereign providence of God does its most stunning work.
The story of Jacob and his wives is a tangled mess. Jacob was tricked into marrying Leah, the woman he did not love, and then worked another seven years for Rachel, the woman he did. This was a deviation from God's created design from the beginning, which was one man for one woman. Polygamy is never presented in Scripture as the ideal; it is always shown to be a source of strife, jealousy, and sorrow. And yet, God, in His inscrutable wisdom, works within this broken framework. He does not approve of the sin, but He is not thwarted by it either. From this tangled, painful, and competitive family situation, God is forging the twelve tribes of Israel. He is building His covenant people.
We must not read this, therefore, as a "how-to" manual for family life. This is a "how-God-works" manual. It teaches us that God's covenant promises are not dependent on our flawless performance. He works through crooked sticks to draw straight lines. He brings His perfect will to pass through the imperfect, and often sinful, wills of men and women. In our passage today, the battle for children between Leah and Rachel continues, escalating to the point where their handmaidens are brought into the fray. Leah, having ceased to bear children for a time, sees Rachel gaining sons through her servant Bilhah, and she decides to counter with a move of her own.
This is a story about the human desperation for significance, for blessing, for happiness. And it is a story that shows us where we typically look for it: in our circumstances, in our status, in out-competing our rivals. But as we will see, true blessing and true happiness are found elsewhere entirely.
The Text
Then Leah saw that she had stopped bearing, so she took her servant-woman Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife. And Leah’s servant-woman Zilpah bore Jacob a son. Then Leah said, “How fortunate!” So she named him Gad. And Leah’s servant-woman Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. Then Leah said, “Happy am I! For women will call me happy.” So she named him Asher.
(Genesis 30:9-13 LSB)
Competitive Fruitfulness (v. 9-10)
We begin with Leah's tactical decision.
"Then Leah saw that she had stopped bearing, so she took her servant-woman Zilpah and gave her to Jacob as a wife. And Leah’s servant-woman Zilpah bore Jacob a son." (Genesis 30:9-10)
Leah's motivation is plain: "she saw that she had stopped bearing." Her identity and her sense of victory in this domestic war were tied to her fertility. When she bore Judah, her fourth son, she had reached a spiritual high point, saying, "This time I will praise the LORD" (Gen. 29:35). She had moved from focusing on her husband's love to focusing on God. But here, the ceasefire is over. Rachel has entered the proxy war by giving Bilhah to Jacob, resulting in Dan and Naphtali. Now Leah, seeing her own womb is closed for a season, retaliates in kind.
She takes her servant, Zilpah, and "gave her to Jacob as a wife." This does not mean Zilpah was elevated to the full status of Leah or Rachel. She was a concubine, a wife of a secondary status, but a wife nonetheless. The children born to her would be legally reckoned as Leah's. This was a common custom in the ancient Near East, as we saw earlier with Sarah and Hagar. It was a culturally acceptable way to build a family, but it was still a departure from the divine blueprint.
Notice the dynamic here. This is human maneuvering. This is Leah taking matters into her own hands. God had graciously opened her womb when she was unloved, but now that the production has stopped, she resorts to her own schemes. How often do we do the same? When God's provision seems to dry up, when His answer is delayed, our first impulse is often to engineer our own solution. We trust God's providence when it is convenient, and we resort to our own pragmatism when it is not. But God, in His mercy, condescends to work even through our scheming. Zilpah conceives and bears a son. Leah's plan, from a worldly perspective, has worked.
A Son Named "Good Luck" (v. 11)
The naming of the son is profoundly revealing of Leah's spiritual state.
"Then Leah said, 'How fortunate!' So she named him Gad." (Genesis 30:11 LSB)
The name Gad means "fortune," or "luck." Some translations render Leah's cry as "A troop comes!" which is another possible meaning, but the sense of "good fortune" is very strong. And this is a significant spiritual step down from her declaration at Judah's birth. With Judah, she praised Yahweh. Here, she praises "luck."
She has received a son, a gift that can only come from God, the author of life, and she attributes it to an impersonal, pagan concept of fortune. This is what happens when we fix our eyes on the competition. When our goal is to beat our rival, we will adopt the world's methods and the world's vocabulary. Leah is no longer thinking in covenantal terms of praise to Yahweh; she is thinking in secular terms of luck and circumstance. She is happy, but it is the fleeting happiness of someone whose horse just came in, not the deep joy of one who has received a blessing from the hand of a loving Father.
This is a standing warning for all of us. It is possible to desire a good thing, a biblical thing, like children, but to desire it for the wrong reasons and to pursue it with a worldly mindset. Leah wanted a son not primarily for the glory of God, but to score a point against her sister. And when she gets him, she doesn't see the hand of God; she sees the turn of the wheel of fortune. She has external success, but it is accompanied by spiritual degradation. She is winning the battle but losing the war for her own soul.
A Son Named "Happy" (v. 12-13)
The pattern continues with the birth of the second son from Zilpah.
"And Leah’s servant-woman Zilpah bore Jacob a second son. Then Leah said, 'Happy am I! For women will call me happy.' So she named him Asher." (Genesis 30:12-13 LSB)
This time, Leah's cry is one of pure self-congratulation. The name Asher means "happy" or "blessed." But we must look at the reason she gives for her happiness. "For women will call me happy." Her joy is not rooted in God, or even in the gift of the child himself. Her joy is rooted in her public reputation. She is happy because of the status this child will bring her. She is happy because she imagines other women envying her. Her happiness is entirely dependent on the opinions of others.
This is the dead end of all worldly pursuits of happiness. If your happiness depends on your circumstances, your success, or your reputation, then your happiness is as fragile as a house of cards. It can be blown over by the slightest breeze of misfortune or disapproval. Leah has now had six sons reckoned to her, far more than her rival, and yet her soul is still restless, still seeking validation from outside herself. She is looking for happiness in the horizontal dimension, in the esteem of her peers, and it will never be enough.
She says women will call her "happy," or "blessed." The word is significant. It is the same word that Mary, the mother of our Lord, will use in her Magnificat: "For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed" (Luke 1:48). But what a world of difference there is between Leah's statement and Mary's. Leah's boast is in her own maneuvering and the social status it brings. Mary's boast is in the Lord, who has regarded her humble estate and has done great things for her. Leah seeks happiness from the praise of women. Mary receives blessedness from the grace of God. Leah's happiness is self-referential. Mary's blessedness is God-referential.
Conclusion: The Fountain of True Happiness
This raw and honest story serves as a powerful diagnostic for our own hearts. Where are we seeking our fortune? Where are we looking for our happiness? Leah had a house full of sons, but her heart was full of anxiety, competition, and a desperate need for approval. She was rich in children but poor in spirit.
The names she chooses, Gad and Asher, are a cry from the human heart. We all want fortune. We all want happiness. These are not wrong desires in themselves. The problem is where we look for them. Leah looked to her fertility, to her schemes, and to her social standing. The world tells us to do the same. Look for fortune in the lottery ticket, the stock market, or the career move. Look for happiness in status, in possessions, in relationships, in being envied by others.
But the gospel redirects our search entirely. The gospel tells us that we have already been given the greatest possible fortune. "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you by His poverty might become rich" (2 Cor. 8:9). In Christ, we are heirs of God, joint-heirs with Christ Himself (Rom. 8:17). We are not subject to "luck." We are subjects of a King, living under the good, pleasing, and perfect providence of a loving Father. That is our Gad, our fortune.
And the gospel tells us that true happiness is not found in being esteemed by others, but in being loved by God. True blessedness is not having women call you happy, but having God call you His child. "Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered" (Psalm 32:1). The happiness Leah craved was a fleeting shadow. The happiness offered in Christ is a solid substance. It is the joy of being fully known and fully loved, of being reconciled to our Creator through the blood of His Son. That is our Asher, our happiness.
God, in His grace, would continue to work in Leah's life. She would go on to bear two more sons, Issachar and Zebulun, and in the naming of Zebulun, she would return to a focus on her husband, and ultimately, it is from her, not the beloved Rachel, that the line of Judah, the kingly line, the line of the Messiah, would come. God's messy providence would triumph. He took the tangled threads of this family's striving, sin, and sorrow, and wove them into the glorious tapestry of redemption. He took their desperate search for fortune and happiness and answered it, generations later, with the birth of the One who is our true fortune and our everlasting happiness.