Jacob and redemption

Jacob is a complicated character in the Old Testament - God uses him and
he comes out as a hero - but some of his behaviour might make us take a
deep breath. First of all he brazenly steals his brother's birthright,
then he is sent away and is mistreated by the man who becomes his
father-in-law. So he sneaks away in the night
<http://bible.oremus.org/?ql=132720680>.

So does God allow lying under certain circumstance - is lying a part of
the plan? We have all lied at some time or another - children often lie
and get siblings in trouble - the lies are big and bold. Adults lie in
more subtle ways - we pretend we like people we do not, we allow things
to be said which we do not believe to be true and then sometimes, we
outright lie.

When Jacob steals his brother's birthright I do not picture God sitting
on the sidelines cheering him on - what I do think is that God can enter
into a bad situation, a situation created by human sin, and redeem it
using human hands.

This still leaves us with the second event where the Bible clearly notes
that Jacob lied by running away - yet he was blessed by God. Is the
moral imperative of the situation - that Jacob get away from a bad
situation, more important than him telling Laban that he is leaving?

Are we to assume that he has done everything in his power to resolve the
situation and then lies? I hope so.

In my experience when we lie or manipulate the truth it ends up with a
level of relational destruction which we would rather not cause. Lies
and up having to be repented of and laid to rest. Having said this,
would I lie to save a life in certain situations - probably, depending
on the lie, would I sometimes lie to remove someone from suffering -
again, probably. Would I take my family and run from oppression and not
say anything - most people would. Does that make it right - I am not
sure it does. Would the grime of the lie stick - yes and only God can
redeem that.

Perhaps I am wrong - I certainly struggle with these Jacob passages.But
avoiding them is not the answer - there is a fundamental question of
truth and permissible action for the truth which makes us recoil at a
Biblical hero with lies on his lips. But we too are heroes of Christ and
we all face he same dilemmas, temptations and sin.