Genesis 29-31: Who Owns Who

The story of Jacob's time in Haran, the land of his relatives, is one of constant one-upmanship.  Laban pulls one over on Jacob when he sends Leah to be his bride after Jacob has worked seven years for Rachel, the one that he loved.

This fostered competition between Leah and Rachel over who had the greatest hold on Jacob by producing his heirs.  When they could not bear children of their own, they brought their maidservants, Bilhah and Zilpah into the mix.  No wonder, later on, there were jealousies between the children themselves.

Even though he recognizes that he has been blessed by Jacob's presence, Laban seems intent on extracting as much as he can from him and when Jacob asks to leave with his wives and children, Laban pleads with him to stay.  Jacob retaliates with his own cunning by promising to keep tending the flocks and take any blemished sheep or goats for his pay.  He then makes sure that there are more born with blemishes than without so that his herd increases even more so.

When he has finally had enough, he sneaks off without telling Laban goodbye and Laban would have chased after him in retaliation if it had not been for God telling him to not say anything.  When Laban catches up with them, Jacob explains his actions:  It was like this for the twenty years I was in your household. I worked for you fourteen years for your two daughters and six years for your flocks, and you changed my wages ten times.  If the God of my father, the God of Abraham and the Fear of Isaac, had not been with me, you would surely have sent me away empty-handed. But God has seen my hardship and the toil of my hands, and last night he rebuked you.”
 Laban answered Jacob, “The women are my daughters, the children are my children, and the flocks are my flocks. All you see is mine. Yet what can I do today about these daughters of mine, or about the children they have borne? Come now, let’s make a covenant, you and I, and let it serve as a witness between us.”  - Gen. 31:41-44 NIV

It's all mine, Laban says, never acknowledging that it was the hand of God that sent Jacob to him in the first place, it was God that blessed Jacob, this was all God's doing.  Jacob was the means through which God's promise to Abraham would be fulfilled, the one through whom a great nation would come.   It was all God's.