“The God Who Sees”
Genesis 16:1-15
Mother’s Day; May 10, 2009
Introduction: On this Mother’s Day, we think about moms, and children, and wanting good things for our kids. It is amazing how unique children are. Tyler and Tiffany are very different from each other, not just because they are boy and girl, but in who they are. Tyler is more reserved and school comes easy for him. Tiffany is more outgoing and has to work harder to do well in school.
As parents we try to notice all that our kids are doing without comparing one to the other. We try and let them be who God created them to be. And mothers are wonderful at caring for their kids and wanting the best for them. They are there for their kids, and notice what they do. They encourage them, and challenge them, and help them to be all that they can be.
Our scripture reading this morning is about 2 women, Sarai and Hagar, the struggle between them, and the God who sees all.
I. A Human Solution- (Genesis 11:30, 12:1-3, 15:4-5, 16:1-2)
a. The Problem- Most of you are probably familiar with this story,
but let me give you a little background to help us with our understanding. When Abram was 75-years-old, and his wife Sarai was 65-years-old, God called Abram to leave his family and his home to follow God to a new land; a land that God would give him. The blessing that God would give for this would be that all the families of the earth would be blessed through him, and that through him God would make a great nation.
But Sarai was barren, not having any children at this point, we are told in Genesis 11:30. In Genesis 15:4 God makes a promise to Abram that He was going to give Abram an heir, “one who would come forth from your own body…” And even more, in Genesis 15:5 God continues the promise: “Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them. So shall your descendants be.” So these promises are given to Abram, and Abram believes God.
Another ten years pass, Abram is now 85, and Sarai is 75, and still they have no son. They were feeling some pressure, since they were advanced in years and didn’t have an heir. They were getting nervous that God hadn’t answered His promise. So they decide that they need to do something about it on their own. They need to seek to come up with a solution to the problem at hand.
b. Solving the problem without God- So Sarai comes up with a plan
of her own. Let’s read Genesis 16:1-2 again… “Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; so she said to Abram, ‘The LORD has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her.’ Abram agreed so to what Sarai said.” Ten years is a long time to wait for a promise to be answered, especially if you are 75-years old, and the promise is that you will have a baby. You too might want to come up with your own plan to make this promise come a little faster.
If we look a little closer at the text, we can see some hints that this is not a good plan from God’s perspective. Hint #1- Sarai observes that she has a problem,
barrenness, and that she has a maidservant, Hagar. Sarai sees Hagar as a solution to her problem. She is old, Hagar is young. But in seeing Hagar in this way means that Sarai doesn’t see Hagar as a person, just as an answer to her problem. We can see this even more when we see that Sarai never calls Hagar by her name; she only refers to Hagar as “my maidservant.”
Hint #2- Sarai recognizes that the Lord is the one who is keeping her from having children, as she says to Abram, ‘The Lord has kept me from having children…’ Instead of talking to the Lord about this problem, about her confusion, about her frustration, she decides to act without the Lord’s help. Hint #3- The third hint is that Abram listened to Sarai. How I’m not saying here that husbands shouldn’t listen to their wives, but rather that Abram should have led himself and Sarai to seek the Lord before making a decision like this.
And we have the same problem that Abram and Sarai do; we don’t like to
wait on the Lord either. Even though we claim to be people of faith, children of God, we have a tendency to come up with “solutions” of our own, instead of seeking God for the solution, or continuing to be patient and waiting on the Lord. We desire to have the problem resolved, the pain to be done away with, the issue taken care of, so much so that we are vulnerable to the sin of ‘going it alone.’
But meeting our deepest needs with quick fixes often causes unpleasant circumstances in our lives, and in some cases we can make the problem even greater. And we see this happening in the story of our text here.
II. Feet of Clay- (Genesis 16:3-6; Romans 3:23)
a. Plodding along- Continuing on in the text, verses 3-6: “So after
Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, ‘You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my servant in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the LORD judge between you and me.’ 6 ‘Your servant is in your hands,’ Abram said. ‘Do with her whatever you think best.’ Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.”
The word “despised” used here for what Sarai was feeling towards Hagar means to “make light of.” Hagar is hoping that by going along with what Abram and Sarai are wanting her to do, have a child, will build her up and give her a greater status with them. What it ends up doing is bringing her down. No one comes out well in this story. It is a reminder of Romans 3:23, that tells us: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Sarai’s plan causes her to feel anger towards Hagar. Even more, she begins to blame Abram, as she says, ‘You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering…’ Hagar goes from maid, to wife, and then back to maid again, and in the end she is mistreated by Sarai. Abram doesn’t take charge in any way, allowing Sarai to mistreat Hagar. So Hagar runs away.
None of the players come out looking good in this story. This reminds us that the people in the Bible are just that, people, and that they are not perfect. In essence they have feet of clay, meaning that they are no better than you are me; they plod along through life trying to fulfill their dreams. But without God they stumble.
b. Not saved by our goodness- Have you ever had an experience like
this, where you think that your plan will make things better? EXAMPLE: I remember how a few years after Tami and I were married, we decided to try to have kids. A few months went by and Tami wasn’t getting pregnant. It’s funny, because so many people think that once they decide to have kids, it will just happen immediately. Often times, that is not the case, and it wasn’t the case for us. A year went by and still nothing. So we decided to take matters into our own hands and went to a fertility doctor. We both were tested, and everything seemed to be okay; we were told we could have kids. Tami went on medication, but every month that went by without Tami getting pregnant was a difficult time for us; especially Tami. It caused her to become very sad about the situation.
We took the situation into our own hands, instead of taking it to the Lord and trusting Him. It just so happens that after we moved to Colorado, and were busy with getting situated in a new house and church, that less than a month after we were there, Tami got pregnant!
The point is, Bible characters are just like us, and we are just like them, and God tells us about this because story He wants us to know that it’s not our goodness that saves us, but God who saves us. It’s not because we are good that we have a relationship with God; it’s because God is good, and you and I are responding to His goodness.
In this passage we see Abram, and Sarai, and Hagar’s lives exposed for us to see. Not only so we can see the mistakes they made, but that we can see that God can overcome any of our mistakes. Hagar finds herself pregnant, and thrown away by Sarai and Abram. Abram wouldn’t defend her, Sarai didn’t want her around and was abusing her, and now she has run away. She actually runs away all the way to the border of Canaan, at the edge of Egypt. She is exhausted. But she discovers that she isn’t alone in this desert like she thought she was.
III. An Encounter with God- (Genesis 16:7-8; John 4:10-11; Psalm 1:3)
a. God comes to us- We read in Genesis 16:7-8, “The angel of the
LORD found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur. 8And he said, ‘Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?’ ‘I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,’ she answered.” God is the one who comes and meets us in our difficult situations, and we see that here, as God comes to Hagar in her most desperate time. God comes to Hagar through one of His angels, as a messenger from God. As a messenger from God, the angel has come to bring Hagar an important message.
In this encounter we see a turn of events. Whereas it was Sarai’s idea to have Abram sleep with Hagar, now we see that it is God’s idea that the angel of the Lord come to Hagar, and the plan that will be given to Hagar is from God as well. The difference is that even though God’s plan might be hard to understand, or difficult to follow, or challenging to accomplish, God’s plans will succeed for the good of His people. Unlike Sarai’s plan which did not work out for the good of anyone.
The angel of the Lord lets Hagar know that he has found her; he searched for her and found her. This meeting isn’t by chance, but by arrangement of God. It is a reminder to Hagar that God knew that she was lost, and that she needed help, and that God has come to help her through the presence of His angel. Hagar might not have wanted to be found, because she didn’t want to have to go back to Abram and Sarai, maybe she didn’t even think that she was lost. If you don’t know where you are going, then you don’t know that you are lost. But the angel lets her know that she is indeed lost, not just physically, but lost in God’s purpose as well.
b. God’s life-sustaining presence- The angel finds Hagar sitting by a
spring. In the Bible, we see that many significant meetings have taken place by life-giving springs. In the New Testament, John uses the term “living water” to speak of the Holy Spirit. When Jesus encounters the Samaritan woman at the well, he says, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” (Jn. 4:10-11) John explains later that Jesus was referring to the Holy Spirit when he spoke of living water. Or in Psalm 1:3 where we read: “They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in the season…”
I don’t think it is coincidence that God meets Hagar at a spring. As she is thinking about how this water will keep her alive, so God is coming to bring her life as well; his life-sustaining presence. In this encounter with the angel, God will give Hagar a message of hope in the midst of her despair. And it starts out with the angel calling her by name, as the angel says, ‘Hagar…where have you come from and where are you going?’ Throughout this passage, nobody calls her by her name except God. Everybody else sees her as a servant, probably even Hagar, but God sees her as the wonderful person He created her to be. God knows who she is.
Then the angel asks her a question so that she will respond to him. Maybe this is because the angel thought she would be too surprised to talk, or not know what to say. So the question is simple, and straight forward. Instead of ordering her around, he has a discussion with her. But I think that it also gives Hagar a chance to come clean with what she has done, similar to when God met Adam and Eve in the garden and asked them, “Where are you?” after they sinned. Through this question, it allows the angel of the Lord to engage Hagar, and open her up to receive a spiritual truth. Through this question he hoped to open her heart to be receptive to his message.
She has run away, and she doesn’t know where she is going, but the angel of the Lord is here to give her a promise from God!
IV. Hard Paths to God’s Promises- (Genesis 16:9-13)
a. The angel gives a command- Verses 9-12 tell us: “Then the angel
of the LORD told her, ‘Go back to your mistress and submit to her.’ 10 The angel added, ‘I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count.’ 11 The angel of the LORD also said to her: ‘You are now with child and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the LORD has heard of your misery. 12 He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone's hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.’”
In the passage I just re-read we see the angel giving a command. It is probably not what Hagar wanted to hear. The last thing she would have wanted to do was to go back to Sarai, but even more, to go back and submit to her as her maidservant again. This word “submit” means to yield to another; to be under someone’s hand. But the angel wanted her to know that this was God’s plan for her, and that this plan had a great future.
The angel of the Lord knew that her child was important to her. Because of this, the message that the angel tells her has news of her son. God wanted Hagar to know that God had a plan for her son; even a name, Ishmael. The plan might not have sounded that great to her, but it was partly the outcome of her sin, for having gone along with becoming pregnant from Abram; attempting to get a better place for herself by sleeping with Abram.
We tend to forget about Hagar, because the main characters of the story are Abram and Sarai. But there is an important lesson to be learned here through Hagar’s story. In many ways, we are more like Hagar, than Abram or Sarai. We are not wealthy, or powerful people. We can be overlooked by others as Hagar often is. And we can find ourselves in hard places, either by our own doing, or by the circumstances that occur around us. And it is in these hard places that God seeks us out and works the most on our behalf.
b. Not in this alone- Example: “Installing Love.” Think with me for a
moment if you are like Hagar, and God has asked you to do something challenging, difficult, like go back to Sarai. How can you do this? You can only do this with God’s love in your heart. But how do you get God’s love there? Maybe you could do it like loading a computer program. Here’s how it might go….
Installing Love: (the phone rings)
Tech Support: Yes, how can I help you? Customer: Well, after much consideration, I've decided to install Love. Can you guide me through the process?
Tech Support: Yes. I can help you. Are you ready to proceed?
Customer: Well, I'm not very technical, but I think I'm ready. What do I do first?
Tech Support: The first step is to open your Heart. Have you located
your Heart? Customer: Yes, but there are several other programs running now. Is it okay to install Love while they are Running?
Tech Support: What programs are running? Customer: Let's see, I have Past Hurt, Low Self-Esteem, Grudge and Resentment running right now.
TechSupport: No problem, Love will gradually erase Past Hurt from your
current operating system. It may remain in your permanent memory but it will no longer disrupt other programs. Love will eventually override Low Self-Esteem with a module of its own called High Self-Esteem. However, you have to completely turn off Grudge and Resentment. Those programs prevent Love from being properly installed. Can you turn those off?
Customer: I don't Know how to turn them off. Can you tell me how?
Tech Support: With pleasure. Go to your start menu and invoke Forgiveness. Do this as many times as necessary until Grudge and Resentment have been completely erased.
Customer: Okay, done! Love has started installing itself. Is that normal?
Tech Support: Yes, but remember that you have only the base program you need to begin connecting to other Hearts in order to get the upgrades…One more thing before We hang up. Love is Freeware. Be sure to give it and its various modules to everyone you meet. They will in turn share it with others and return some cool modules back to you. Customer: Thank you, God.
I’m sure Hagar had hurt and low self-esteem to get past. I’m sure she was feeling resentment toward Abram and Sarai. She needed God’s love in her heart, just as we do, to be able to do what God was asking of her. Hagar was filled with God’s presence after this meeting, as we hear her say in verse 13, “Then she called the name of the Lord, who spoke to her, ‘You area a God who sees..Have I remained alive here after seeing Him?’..” The wonder of meeting God personally is that you can do things that you didn’t think you could do.
Conclusion: On this Mother’s Day we acknowledge the importance of children to mothers. Hagar was concerned for her son, so she ran away. But God wanted Hagar to know that He would be with her and with her son. It can be challenging to raise a child, especially if you do it all alone, without God’s help. I want to thank all the mothers here for the love you pour out to your children. I want to encourage you to know that God sees what you do, and God will come to you and be with you, especially in the hardest times. But you have to humble yourself, and let God be a part of your decisions, and let God fill you with His love. Happy Mother’s Day. Amen.
Genesis 16:1-15
Mother’s Day; May 10, 2009
Introduction: On this Mother’s Day, we think about moms, and children, and wanting good things for our kids. It is amazing how unique children are. Tyler and Tiffany are very different from each other, not just because they are boy and girl, but in who they are. Tyler is more reserved and school comes easy for him. Tiffany is more outgoing and has to work harder to do well in school.
As parents we try to notice all that our kids are doing without comparing one to the other. We try and let them be who God created them to be. And mothers are wonderful at caring for their kids and wanting the best for them. They are there for their kids, and notice what they do. They encourage them, and challenge them, and help them to be all that they can be.
Our scripture reading this morning is about 2 women, Sarai and Hagar, the struggle between them, and the God who sees all.
I. A Human Solution- (Genesis 11:30, 12:1-3, 15:4-5, 16:1-2)
a. The Problem- Most of you are probably familiar with this story,
but let me give you a little background to help us with our understanding. When Abram was 75-years-old, and his wife Sarai was 65-years-old, God called Abram to leave his family and his home to follow God to a new land; a land that God would give him. The blessing that God would give for this would be that all the families of the earth would be blessed through him, and that through him God would make a great nation.
But Sarai was barren, not having any children at this point, we are told in Genesis 11:30. In Genesis 15:4 God makes a promise to Abram that He was going to give Abram an heir, “one who would come forth from your own body…” And even more, in Genesis 15:5 God continues the promise: “Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them. So shall your descendants be.” So these promises are given to Abram, and Abram believes God.
Another ten years pass, Abram is now 85, and Sarai is 75, and still they have no son. They were feeling some pressure, since they were advanced in years and didn’t have an heir. They were getting nervous that God hadn’t answered His promise. So they decide that they need to do something about it on their own. They need to seek to come up with a solution to the problem at hand.
b. Solving the problem without God- So Sarai comes up with a plan
of her own. Let’s read Genesis 16:1-2 again… “Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; so she said to Abram, ‘The LORD has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her.’ Abram agreed so to what Sarai said.” Ten years is a long time to wait for a promise to be answered, especially if you are 75-years old, and the promise is that you will have a baby. You too might want to come up with your own plan to make this promise come a little faster.
If we look a little closer at the text, we can see some hints that this is not a good plan from God’s perspective. Hint #1- Sarai observes that she has a problem,
barrenness, and that she has a maidservant, Hagar. Sarai sees Hagar as a solution to her problem. She is old, Hagar is young. But in seeing Hagar in this way means that Sarai doesn’t see Hagar as a person, just as an answer to her problem. We can see this even more when we see that Sarai never calls Hagar by her name; she only refers to Hagar as “my maidservant.”
Hint #2- Sarai recognizes that the Lord is the one who is keeping her from having children, as she says to Abram, ‘The Lord has kept me from having children…’ Instead of talking to the Lord about this problem, about her confusion, about her frustration, she decides to act without the Lord’s help. Hint #3- The third hint is that Abram listened to Sarai. How I’m not saying here that husbands shouldn’t listen to their wives, but rather that Abram should have led himself and Sarai to seek the Lord before making a decision like this.
And we have the same problem that Abram and Sarai do; we don’t like to
wait on the Lord either. Even though we claim to be people of faith, children of God, we have a tendency to come up with “solutions” of our own, instead of seeking God for the solution, or continuing to be patient and waiting on the Lord. We desire to have the problem resolved, the pain to be done away with, the issue taken care of, so much so that we are vulnerable to the sin of ‘going it alone.’
But meeting our deepest needs with quick fixes often causes unpleasant circumstances in our lives, and in some cases we can make the problem even greater. And we see this happening in the story of our text here.
II. Feet of Clay- (Genesis 16:3-6; Romans 3:23)
a. Plodding along- Continuing on in the text, verses 3-6: “So after
Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. 5 Then Sarai said to Abram, ‘You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my servant in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the LORD judge between you and me.’ 6 ‘Your servant is in your hands,’ Abram said. ‘Do with her whatever you think best.’ Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her.”
The word “despised” used here for what Sarai was feeling towards Hagar means to “make light of.” Hagar is hoping that by going along with what Abram and Sarai are wanting her to do, have a child, will build her up and give her a greater status with them. What it ends up doing is bringing her down. No one comes out well in this story. It is a reminder of Romans 3:23, that tells us: “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Sarai’s plan causes her to feel anger towards Hagar. Even more, she begins to blame Abram, as she says, ‘You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering…’ Hagar goes from maid, to wife, and then back to maid again, and in the end she is mistreated by Sarai. Abram doesn’t take charge in any way, allowing Sarai to mistreat Hagar. So Hagar runs away.
None of the players come out looking good in this story. This reminds us that the people in the Bible are just that, people, and that they are not perfect. In essence they have feet of clay, meaning that they are no better than you are me; they plod along through life trying to fulfill their dreams. But without God they stumble.
b. Not saved by our goodness- Have you ever had an experience like
this, where you think that your plan will make things better? EXAMPLE: I remember how a few years after Tami and I were married, we decided to try to have kids. A few months went by and Tami wasn’t getting pregnant. It’s funny, because so many people think that once they decide to have kids, it will just happen immediately. Often times, that is not the case, and it wasn’t the case for us. A year went by and still nothing. So we decided to take matters into our own hands and went to a fertility doctor. We both were tested, and everything seemed to be okay; we were told we could have kids. Tami went on medication, but every month that went by without Tami getting pregnant was a difficult time for us; especially Tami. It caused her to become very sad about the situation.
We took the situation into our own hands, instead of taking it to the Lord and trusting Him. It just so happens that after we moved to Colorado, and were busy with getting situated in a new house and church, that less than a month after we were there, Tami got pregnant!
The point is, Bible characters are just like us, and we are just like them, and God tells us about this because story He wants us to know that it’s not our goodness that saves us, but God who saves us. It’s not because we are good that we have a relationship with God; it’s because God is good, and you and I are responding to His goodness.
In this passage we see Abram, and Sarai, and Hagar’s lives exposed for us to see. Not only so we can see the mistakes they made, but that we can see that God can overcome any of our mistakes. Hagar finds herself pregnant, and thrown away by Sarai and Abram. Abram wouldn’t defend her, Sarai didn’t want her around and was abusing her, and now she has run away. She actually runs away all the way to the border of Canaan, at the edge of Egypt. She is exhausted. But she discovers that she isn’t alone in this desert like she thought she was.
III. An Encounter with God- (Genesis 16:7-8; John 4:10-11; Psalm 1:3)
a. God comes to us- We read in Genesis 16:7-8, “The angel of the
LORD found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur. 8And he said, ‘Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?’ ‘I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,’ she answered.” God is the one who comes and meets us in our difficult situations, and we see that here, as God comes to Hagar in her most desperate time. God comes to Hagar through one of His angels, as a messenger from God. As a messenger from God, the angel has come to bring Hagar an important message.
In this encounter we see a turn of events. Whereas it was Sarai’s idea to have Abram sleep with Hagar, now we see that it is God’s idea that the angel of the Lord come to Hagar, and the plan that will be given to Hagar is from God as well. The difference is that even though God’s plan might be hard to understand, or difficult to follow, or challenging to accomplish, God’s plans will succeed for the good of His people. Unlike Sarai’s plan which did not work out for the good of anyone.
The angel of the Lord lets Hagar know that he has found her; he searched for her and found her. This meeting isn’t by chance, but by arrangement of God. It is a reminder to Hagar that God knew that she was lost, and that she needed help, and that God has come to help her through the presence of His angel. Hagar might not have wanted to be found, because she didn’t want to have to go back to Abram and Sarai, maybe she didn’t even think that she was lost. If you don’t know where you are going, then you don’t know that you are lost. But the angel lets her know that she is indeed lost, not just physically, but lost in God’s purpose as well.
b. God’s life-sustaining presence- The angel finds Hagar sitting by a
spring. In the Bible, we see that many significant meetings have taken place by life-giving springs. In the New Testament, John uses the term “living water” to speak of the Holy Spirit. When Jesus encounters the Samaritan woman at the well, he says, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” (Jn. 4:10-11) John explains later that Jesus was referring to the Holy Spirit when he spoke of living water. Or in Psalm 1:3 where we read: “They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in the season…”
I don’t think it is coincidence that God meets Hagar at a spring. As she is thinking about how this water will keep her alive, so God is coming to bring her life as well; his life-sustaining presence. In this encounter with the angel, God will give Hagar a message of hope in the midst of her despair. And it starts out with the angel calling her by name, as the angel says, ‘Hagar…where have you come from and where are you going?’ Throughout this passage, nobody calls her by her name except God. Everybody else sees her as a servant, probably even Hagar, but God sees her as the wonderful person He created her to be. God knows who she is.
Then the angel asks her a question so that she will respond to him. Maybe this is because the angel thought she would be too surprised to talk, or not know what to say. So the question is simple, and straight forward. Instead of ordering her around, he has a discussion with her. But I think that it also gives Hagar a chance to come clean with what she has done, similar to when God met Adam and Eve in the garden and asked them, “Where are you?” after they sinned. Through this question, it allows the angel of the Lord to engage Hagar, and open her up to receive a spiritual truth. Through this question he hoped to open her heart to be receptive to his message.
She has run away, and she doesn’t know where she is going, but the angel of the Lord is here to give her a promise from God!
IV. Hard Paths to God’s Promises- (Genesis 16:9-13)
a. The angel gives a command- Verses 9-12 tell us: “Then the angel
of the LORD told her, ‘Go back to your mistress and submit to her.’ 10 The angel added, ‘I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count.’ 11 The angel of the LORD also said to her: ‘You are now with child and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the LORD has heard of your misery. 12 He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone's hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.’”
In the passage I just re-read we see the angel giving a command. It is probably not what Hagar wanted to hear. The last thing she would have wanted to do was to go back to Sarai, but even more, to go back and submit to her as her maidservant again. This word “submit” means to yield to another; to be under someone’s hand. But the angel wanted her to know that this was God’s plan for her, and that this plan had a great future.
The angel of the Lord knew that her child was important to her. Because of this, the message that the angel tells her has news of her son. God wanted Hagar to know that God had a plan for her son; even a name, Ishmael. The plan might not have sounded that great to her, but it was partly the outcome of her sin, for having gone along with becoming pregnant from Abram; attempting to get a better place for herself by sleeping with Abram.
We tend to forget about Hagar, because the main characters of the story are Abram and Sarai. But there is an important lesson to be learned here through Hagar’s story. In many ways, we are more like Hagar, than Abram or Sarai. We are not wealthy, or powerful people. We can be overlooked by others as Hagar often is. And we can find ourselves in hard places, either by our own doing, or by the circumstances that occur around us. And it is in these hard places that God seeks us out and works the most on our behalf.
b. Not in this alone- Example: “Installing Love.” Think with me for a
moment if you are like Hagar, and God has asked you to do something challenging, difficult, like go back to Sarai. How can you do this? You can only do this with God’s love in your heart. But how do you get God’s love there? Maybe you could do it like loading a computer program. Here’s how it might go….
Installing Love: (the phone rings)
Tech Support: Yes, how can I help you? Customer: Well, after much consideration, I've decided to install Love. Can you guide me through the process?
Tech Support: Yes. I can help you. Are you ready to proceed?
Customer: Well, I'm not very technical, but I think I'm ready. What do I do first?
Tech Support: The first step is to open your Heart. Have you located
your Heart? Customer: Yes, but there are several other programs running now. Is it okay to install Love while they are Running?
Tech Support: What programs are running? Customer: Let's see, I have Past Hurt, Low Self-Esteem, Grudge and Resentment running right now.
TechSupport: No problem, Love will gradually erase Past Hurt from your
current operating system. It may remain in your permanent memory but it will no longer disrupt other programs. Love will eventually override Low Self-Esteem with a module of its own called High Self-Esteem. However, you have to completely turn off Grudge and Resentment. Those programs prevent Love from being properly installed. Can you turn those off?
Customer: I don't Know how to turn them off. Can you tell me how?
Tech Support: With pleasure. Go to your start menu and invoke Forgiveness. Do this as many times as necessary until Grudge and Resentment have been completely erased.
Customer: Okay, done! Love has started installing itself. Is that normal?
Tech Support: Yes, but remember that you have only the base program you need to begin connecting to other Hearts in order to get the upgrades…One more thing before We hang up. Love is Freeware. Be sure to give it and its various modules to everyone you meet. They will in turn share it with others and return some cool modules back to you. Customer: Thank you, God.
I’m sure Hagar had hurt and low self-esteem to get past. I’m sure she was feeling resentment toward Abram and Sarai. She needed God’s love in her heart, just as we do, to be able to do what God was asking of her. Hagar was filled with God’s presence after this meeting, as we hear her say in verse 13, “Then she called the name of the Lord, who spoke to her, ‘You area a God who sees..Have I remained alive here after seeing Him?’..” The wonder of meeting God personally is that you can do things that you didn’t think you could do.
Conclusion: On this Mother’s Day we acknowledge the importance of children to mothers. Hagar was concerned for her son, so she ran away. But God wanted Hagar to know that He would be with her and with her son. It can be challenging to raise a child, especially if you do it all alone, without God’s help. I want to thank all the mothers here for the love you pour out to your children. I want to encourage you to know that God sees what you do, and God will come to you and be with you, especially in the hardest times. But you have to humble yourself, and let God be a part of your decisions, and let God fill you with His love. Happy Mother’s Day. Amen.
posted by Logan's Blog at 3:16 PM
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