30. When I came, you had little. Now you have much, much more. Every time I did something for you, the Lord blessed you. Now it is time for me to work for myself—it is time to do things for my family.”
31. Laban asked, “Then what should I give you?” Jacob answered, “I don’t want you to give me anything! I only want you to let me do this one thing: I will go back and take care of your sheep.
32. But let me go through all your flocks today and take every lamb with spots or stripes. Let me take every black young goat and every female goat with stripes or spots. That will be my pay.
33. In the future you can easily see if I am honest. You can come to look at my flocks. If I have any goat that isn’t spotted or any sheep that isn’t black, you will know that I stole it.”
34. Laban answered, “I agree to that. We will do what you ask.”
35. But that day Laban hid all the male goats that had spots. And he hid all the female goats that had spots on them. He also hid all the black sheep. Laban told his sons to watch these sheep.
36. So the sons took all the spotted animals and led them to another place. They traveled for three days. Jacob stayed and took care of all the animals that were left.
37. Then Jacob cut green branches from poplar and almond trees. He stripped off some of the bark so that the branches had white stripes on them.
38. He put the branches in front of the flocks at the watering places. When the animals came to drink, they also mated in that place.
39. Then when the goats mated in front of the branches, the young that were born were spotted, striped, or black.
40. Jacob separated the spotted and the black animals from the other animals in the flock. He kept his animals separate from Laban’s.
41. Any time the stronger animals in the flock were mating, Jacob put the branches before their eyes. The animals mated near those branches.
42. But when the weaker animals mated, Jacob did not put the branches there. So the young animals born from the weak animals were Laban’s. And the young animals born from the stronger animals were Jacob’s.