Genesis 30:37–38: “Now Jacob took for himself rods of green poplar and of the almond and chestnut trees, peeled white strips in them, and exposed the white which was in the rods. And the rods which he had peeled, he set before the flocks in the gutters, in the watering troughs where the flocks came to drink, so that they should conceive when they came to drink.”

October 15th, 2022 by Pastor Ed in devotional

We have to wonder how long it took for it to dawn on Jacob that his expanding flocks was the work of God and not anything he was accomplishing through his own efforts in the flesh. His success had nothing to do with the hours he spent peeling poles. It had absolutely nothing to do with carefully placing them by those animals that were breeding and carrying offspring. The offspring of his uncle Laban’s flocks were striped, speckled, and mottled because God caused the striped, speckled, and mottled males to mate.

Jacob’s prosperity was not the work of his own hands; in fact, all of his pole peeling was a useless superstition, a waste of his time. Jacob prospered because God caused him to prosper. It is not surprising that God changed Jacob’s name to Israel. This man, Jacob, became the forefather and namesake of the nation Israel, which often proved in the years ahead to be much like their forefather. They too tried their hand at various forms of “pole-peeling” in an effort to manipulate the blessings of God and bring prosperity on themselves. But then we have done a bit of poll-peeling ourselves, haven’t we?!

“LORD, we don’t want to be guilty of trying to manipulate Your hand in anything this day, but we do want to walk with You. LORD, bless our lives today so that we can be a blessing to others around us.”