Sibling Rivalry

Sibling Rivalry

Leah And Rachel

Read: Genesis 30:3-20

Cutting the price tag off her new dress, Janelle sighed. She would have worn her blue silk dress to the family wedding if Beth hadn’t recently bought one similar to it, only fancier. Her sister always had to one-up her by taking the most impressive dish to holiday dinners and buying the most expensive Christmas gift for their parents. She even compared their salaries and their children’s grades. Her parents liked to repeat three-year-old Beth’s comment after Janelle’s birth: “I’m Daddy’s girl, not her!” It didn’t seem funny to Janelle.

Leah and Rachel knew about sibling rivalry. Rachel’s grief over her barrenness was intensified by her jealousy at sharing her husband with a sister who had delivered four sons. In desperation, Rachel gave her maid to Jacob. When Bilhah had two sons, Rachel named the second one Naphtali to reflect her competition with Leah. Not to be outdone, Leah gave Jacob her maid, who also had two sons. After that, Leah gave birth to two more sons and a daughter, and Rachel delivered two sons. The need to keep score must have marred the normal joy and pride of motherhood for the sisters.

Competition can be a good thing when it pushes us to strive for excellence. It becomes destructive when spurred by jealousy or selfish ambition. Rivalry can make a home, a work environment, or a church a miserable place to be when people compete with each other rather than work together as a team. Jealous rivalry can take away our joy of accomplishment or even tear a family apart. Whenever we feel pressured to compare our performance with someone else’s, we need to remember that God’s opinion is the one that truly matters. When we focus on pleasing him, we no longer feel the need to keep score.

Wherever there is jealousy and selfish ambition, there you will find disorder and evil of every kind.

James 3:16