Genesis 16

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Genesis 16:1-16

“Now Sarai Abram’s wife bare him no children: and she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. 2 And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai. 3 And Sarai Abram’s wife took Hagar her maid the Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife. 4 And he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived: and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes. 5 And Sarai said unto Abram, My wrong be upon thee: I have given my maid into thy bosom: and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes: the LORD judge between me and thee. 6 But Abram said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thy hand; do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face. 7 And the angel of the LORD found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur. 8 And he said, Hagar, Sarai’s maid, whence comest thou? and wither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai. 9 And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands. 10 And the angel of the LORD said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude. 11 And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ismael; because the LORD hath heard thy affliction. 12 And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren. 13 And she called the name of the LORD that spake unto her, Thou God seest me: for she said, Have I also here looked after him that seeth me? 14 Wherefore the well was called Beerlahairoi; behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered. 15 And Hagar bare Abram a son: and Abram called his son’s name, which Hagar bare, Ishmael. 16 And Abram was fourscore and six years old, when Hagar bare Ismael to Abram.”

Introduction

[Audio version: https://resources.ccphilly.org/detail.asp?TopicID=&Teaching=WED527]

“Genesis chapter 16, we come to a new chapter, God has made promises to Abraham, and said that because Abraham believed his promises he counted it to him as righteousness. And yet as we come to chapter 16 we find Abraham wavering, faltering. Having the promises of God, but staggering as he longs to embrace them. You may be in a position like that this evening, where you feel that God has made you a promise, he’s given you a verse, he said something specific to you for your life, and sometimes other Christians in well-meaning may say ‘You know, it’s hard to take that verse and say that’s what it means.’ But you know, everyone in this room knows what it’s like when God really gives you something, and you know it in your heart he’s given you something, and yet sometimes you wait and you don’t see the fulfillment of it, and there’s a struggle. And we need to remember that it tells us in Hebrews that it’s through faith and patience that we inherit the promises of God, faith and patience that we inherit the promises of God. You see, as God makes promises to us, faith believes the promises of God, hope anticipates the promises of God, but it’s patience that waits for the fulfillment of the promises of God. But all of his promises are ‘Yea and amen,’ they will never change, they will never turn, he will never rescind them or take them back. And he had made a promise unto Abraham about a son that he would have, and about the fact that his seed would be like the stars of heaven, like the dust of the earth. And Abraham was getting old, as he’s waiting for these promises he’s 85 years old at the beginning of chapter 16. Sarai, God’s little helper is 75 years old [so this is 1900BC, give or take a year or two]. They’ve been in the land for 10 years, he convinced his family to leave Ur of the Chaldees and make this move, and waiting and waiting, and he’s coming back and saying ‘God showed me the stars tonight, God made me the promise our seed is going to be taken down to Egypt for 400 years, and our offspring, they’re going to be like a multitude,’ and years and years are gone by and nothing’s happening--except--Sarah’s getting older, and it seems like at this point at 75, she feels like she’s past the time when she can conceive, can conceive and bear children. Abraham’s 85, and she’s going to undertake a plan to produce a kid in some other way than waiting, because that looks like a no-end, you know, a dead-end street to her. She just doesn’t feel that it’s going to happen that way. Now Abraham at 85, remember, he lives to be 175, he’s middle-aged, so he remarries at 145.

God’s Little Helpers

But it says to us here “Now Sarai Abram’s wife bare him no children: and she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said unto Abram,” notice what she says, “Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing:” she is so right, she has no idea how right she is, “I pray thee, go in unto my maid;” and notice she doesn’t say “and thus saith the LORD “it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai.” (verses 1-2) So we come to this situation. Sarah, Abram’s wife, no children. Now that in the culture is a reproach in any circumstance, but particularly in light of the fact that they feel like these promises have been made, they’ve left their homeland, they’ve travelled, they’re here in this strange place, and nothing has happened, and Abraham’s having these visions, God speaking to him and so forth, and evidently Sarah isn’t getting her share of those spiritual experiences, and she’s maybe not sure that Abe at 85 has got everything straight. I’m 56 and I don’t have everything straight anymore. But she has a handmaid, an Egyptian whose name is Hagar. Now, it’s interesting because this Egyptian, this is the second major mistake we’re going to see Abraham make, but it’s connected to the first mistake that he made, when he went down into Egypt during the famine. And it’s just you know, sometimes the mistakes we make, they bear their own problems, they compound, you know. And it says that he brought back servants and handmaids from Egypt, and evidently Pharaoh, when he had planned on marrying Sarah, thinking that Sarah was Abraham’s sister, at some point had appointed a handmaid to take care of her, and to tend to her. And then when he has this dream and finds out what the truth is, he just says ‘Get out,’ and he had them take all of their gold, the silver, the flocks, the handmaids and the servants and so forth. So Hagar comes back out of Egypt, out of the first mistake that Abraham made there, and comes back now and is with them. Sarah says to Abraham, ‘Look, we’re getting older, we’re working against the clock. Can you hear it ticking? My biological clock wound down and stopped a number of years ago, it’ll be a miracle if yours is still going. But I have this idea, if you’ll take Hagar, because the LORD hath restrained me,’ now that’s very important, because the LORD it tells us in Hebrews, is going to wait until their physical frames were as good as dead. Because the picture that we have here, you know, there’s a two-fold lesson here. One is, that of application, when we’re waiting for the Lord, when the Lord has told us to do something, and wait, and we get tired of waiting, you know, we’re Americans, we wait two days and the program’s over, let alone years. And then we decide we’re going help, and we apply our own wisdom, our own resources, we apply the flesh, we create something that then we have to live with, we give birth to something that we hadn’t anticipated in the long run. That’s part of the picture, that there is waiting, because when God does something he doesn’t need any help. Lots of times he likes to wait until everybody’s 100 percent sure when it does happen, that it’s something that’s happened from his hand. And our tendency is to get involved and be God’s little helper. And I encourage you, if God has made a promise to you, and you know it, or one of the verses of Scripture has risen off the page and become your own, and you’ve taken hold of it, and it’s very important to you, I encourage you not to let go of that, but to wait, and to see what the Lord might do. She says to Abraham, “now, the LORD hath restrained me” and yet, I’m not sure what kind of a sense she really has of that, or that she’s mad at God, we can get mad at God when he doesn’t produce what we think he should. She says ‘So I have this idea, why don’t you take my handmaid Hagar, and go on in and sleep with her, and perhaps we can gain, I can gain a child through her.’ Now, we don’t want to establish any New Testament doctrine here, so we’re going to make this completely clear. In this culture, before the Law was given, that was a legal option, a surrogate mother, it was proper, we find it in the Code of Hammurabi, we find it in the cuneiform tablets, it was accepted that if a woman was barren, that she could give her handmaid to her husband and be a kind of a surrogate mother, almost a second-hand wife to bear children. And it was legally acceptable. [That is kind of what happened with Jacob, with Rachel’s & Leah’s two handmaids.] But just because something is legal doesn’t mean it’s right. And we sure need to remember in this world, that just because something’s legal, especially in Massachusetts, just because something’s legal, doesn’t mean that it’s right. We vary state by state what is right and wrong anymore. Now, several things, first of all, Abraham, you know, I’m not sure what’s going on here, I mean, first of all when your wife says to you, ‘Honey, why don’t you take my handmaid and sleep with her,’ you have to sit back and think ‘OK Lord, is this in code? Because I want to break the code here, is that code ‘For I wish I could do this for you, but, here is this option, but I know because you love me, you’d never exercise that option?’ Was Abraham supposed to say ‘Honey,’ I know he was supposed to say this, ‘Honey, we’re supposed to trust the LORD, we’re not gonna do that.’ In Genesis chapter 3, I think verse 17, God said to Adam ‘Because you have hearkened to the voice of your wife, these are all the troubles you’re going to have.’ And God says to Adam there, ‘You should not have listened to Eve when she said to partake.’ But in Genesis 21:12 he’s going to say to Abraham, ‘I want you to hearken to your wife Sarah and all that she has said.’ So here is the problem, and it’s tricky, guys. Sometimes it’s a good thing to listen to our wives, and sometimes it’s not a good thing to listen to our wives. Sometimes our wives are saying something to us, and she wants us to listen, and sometimes there’s a test, and you have to make sure you break the code [most men aren’t smart enough to break the code, so we’re always getting into trouble]. I don’t know if Abraham was just supposed to say ‘OK,’ and go right into the tent [laughter], but she says ‘Why don’t we do this, Honey,’ “Abram hearkened,” it just says that, “And Abram hearkened unto the voice of Sarai. And Sarai Abram’s wife took Hagar her maid the Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram” notice this “to be his wife.” (verse 2b-3) Notice that, that’s Sarah’s intention. But God is not going to honour that. But Sarah gives Hagar to Abram, and it says very clearly, “to be his wife.” She’s being God’s little helper here, and so is he. “And he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived: and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress” Sarai “was despised in her eyes.” (verse 4) Now, evidently, it doesn’t give us all the dynamics of that, but Hagar conceives, so she must kind of look at Sarah and say ‘Hey, obviously your marriage, the problem is on your end, and not on Abraham’s end, because Abraham and I didn’t have any problems, it seems like you must be the one whose barren, not him.’ And she said all of that with a look. [laughter] You know, A.W. Wildersmith said, I listened to a study he did, he said “We’re just learning that the human eye is not just a receptor, it’s a reflector.” You can tell when somebody’s smiling with their eyes, you can tell when somebody’s flirting with their eyes. My wife says to me all the time, “You didn’t look like you want to,” you know ‘Honey, do you want to go to the Mall?’ ‘Yea,’ ‘You don’t look like you want to go to the Mall.’ I mean, so Sarai knows as she walks by Hagar, Hagar’s looking down at her, there’s some disrespect, she’s despising her mistress, she is now with child, Sarai is infertile, and she sees that she’s despised in her eyes. “And Sarai said unto Abram,” I love this, “My wrong be upon thee: I have given my maid into thy bosom: and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes: the LORD judge between me and thee.” (verse 5) Marriage has not changed, these are very human people, look, it’s very interesting what we’re going to see here. What do you do when you get into a tense situation, particularly in a family, what do you do when you make a mistake, and then you know you’ve made a mistake? Watch these personalities. Sarah blame-shifts, she says to Abraham ‘This is YOUR fault,’ ‘but you told me to do it,” you didn’t understand it was in code? She blame-shifts, and then it’s going to tell us that she mistreats, she abuses, and it doesn’t tell us in what way, Hagar. So Sarah, what she does with her mistake, instead of getting on her knees and repenting, and I know you would never do this [chuckles], but she blame-shifts, and then she’s abusive, at least with her mouth, waaay back then. Abraham says “But Abram said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thy hand; do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face.” (verse 6) ‘What does this have to do with me? Do whatever you want to do with her,’ he refuses to take his lead, spiritually, in this situation. He’s a no-hassle kind of guy, ‘Go sleep with my maid,’ ‘ok,’ ‘This is your fault,’ ‘ok, do whatever you want to do with her.’ He refuses to take the lead. And Hagar, when she’s under pressure, she runs away, she flees, heads out of town. Nobody handles the pressure here the right way. God does not go ‘Pew! New cast, I’m starting over. Whoever cast these characters, this is all wrong.’ “And Sarai said unto Abram, My wrong be upon thee: I have given my maid into thy bosom: and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes: the LORD judge between me and thee.” (verse 5) This is a husband and wife argument here, “But Abram said unto Sarai, Behold, thy maid is in thy hand; do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face.” (verse 6) ‘Do to her as it pleases thee, whatever you want to do with her go on, why are you fighting with me for, she’s yours.’ because a handmaid was considered property. Now before that Sarah’s saying ‘Take her to be your wife,’ now she’s not the wife anymore. Now he’s saying ‘She’s yours.’

Hagar Flees And Meets “The Angel Of The LORD”

So “Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face.” (verse 6b) you may have a gloss there, it says that “she afflicted her” in some way. And she fled from her face, she flees now, she runs. Now watch this, “And the angel of the LORD found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur.” (verse 7) this is on the way to Egypt, “And he said, Hagar, Sarai’s maid, whence comest thou? and wither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai.” (verse 8) Now if you look in verse 9 it says “the angel of the LORD,” and you look in verse 10 it says “the angel of the LORD,” you look in verse 11, it says “the angel of the LORD.” Many, many times in the Old Testament we encounter this personage, “the angel of the LORD.” It can be an angel, she’s going to call him God here, and LORD. Many times “the angel of the LORD” is specifically identified as the LORD, right in the text. And yet the very name, “the angel of the LORD,” tells us that he’s not just the LORD, but somehow a representation, because “angel” means messenger, so you have both the text telling us this is “the LORD,” and “the messenger of the LORD.” Now how is that? Theologians call this a theophany, and most often it’s an Old Testament appearance of Jesus Christ [who was Yahweh in the Old Testament, as clearly shown in John 1:1-18] before his incarnation. The first time we have “the angel of the LORD” in the Bible is here, four times. The first time we have an Old Testament appearance specifically of Jesus Christ, and there’s one other place you could debate, this is undebatable, is not to Abraham, not to Sarah, not to Noah, but to Hagar, to an Egyptian, to a victim, to an abused woman, to a broken life, to no one special, not to a patriarch. Because you might be sitting here tonight and say ‘What would the Lord want to do with me? What would he ever care about the brokenness in my life?’ ‘He might talk to Pastor Joe or one of the elders, he might talk to Billy Graham, might talk to Benny Hinn [laughter],’ you might think that way. Here’s the person at the bottom of the rung in this scene as it were, Hagar, an Egyptian, a Gentile. And the first Old Testament appearance of Jesus Christ is to her. He leaves the 99 to save, and he goes after the 1 that’s lost, that’s in the wilderness, that’s fled, that’s been abused. [Comment, based on John 1:1-18, which proves Jesus was Yahweh of the Old Testament, I believe it was the pre-Incarnate Jesus Christ appearing to all those people Pastor Joe just mentioned, wherever the word LORD is mentioned in the Old Testament of the King James Bible.] And it says “he found her,” verse 9 says, “And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands.” Verse 10 says “I’m going to multiply, I’ll bless,” “And the angel of the LORD said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude.” (verse 10) It’s a remarkable picture. It says he found her. Remember those old bumper stickers, “I found it,” was a big campaign. I appreciated the campaign, but theologically that was terrible. First of all, with any due respect it would be “I found Him,” but it should have been “He found me.” Or it could have been “He found it.” The LORD found her as it were, we’re not even sure she was lost, but the idea is, he comes to her, he finds her by a fountain, verse 7, she calls it a well down in verse 14. First time we have the word “fountain” in the Bible is in regards to Hagar, and the first time we have the word “well” in the Bible is in regards to Hagar, and throughout the Bible fountains and wells speak of refreshing and living water, of God’s care, his provision in the desert, difficult times. This is a remarkable chapter. He takes this Egyptian woman, a nobody, the one that you would think he wouldn’t care about, she’s pregnant outside of marriage, she’s abused. This is the first person in the Bible that Jesus specifically comes and appears to, that we’re told specifically about, this is the first time we hear of a fountain, we hear of a well, we hear of a place of refreshing. And he comes to her. And he talks to her. And he knows her name, Hagar, Sarah’s maid. He knows her name, he knows what she does for a living, he knows where she belongs, Hagar, Sarah’s maid. [And he’s going to cut her loose from Abraham and Sarah so he can use her and Ishmael to raise up twelve nations of Arabic peoples in the Middle East and North Africa.] He asks her two questions, look, “whence camest thou? and wither wilt thou go?” “Whence comest thou?” when did this happen? Where are you coming from? “Whence comest thou?” from where and when? Maybe he’ll ask you that question tonight, where are you coming from? Where and when? How’d you end up here?’ If you don’t know Jesus Christ tonight, ‘how in the world did you end up here? 😊’ Some friend tricked you into free dinner or something, but you know, he’s got you here because he loves you. But you know, he’s got you here because he loves you. And the second question is not ‘Where are you going?’ “Whither wilt thou go?” it’s more than that, it’s ‘Where do you want, wilt, to go?’ he puts her will in there, ‘Where is it that you want to end up?’ ‘What’s the destiny you are making for yourself? What’s the direction of your life? Where are you coming from? And where are you going now? Where do you think you’re going to end up? What is it that you want? Where do you want to be? Where do you want to end up?’ You think a million dollars would make you happy? Be fun to try it for a day, wouldn’t it? Plenty of millionaires in Betty Ford Clinic, so we know that doesn’t help. Think if we had a big contract, big house, look at the problems we see in the world. What is it that you want? “Where wilt thou go?” what is it that you want? Isn’t it amazing, here’s the LORD appearing to this Egyptian woman, whose fleeing, whose where she shouldn’t be, in a situation, victimized in some way that she shouldn’t be in, in the desert, headed back to Egypt where she shouldn’t go. And he comes to her, and he finds her by the fountain, specific place. Hagar, Sarah’s maid, he reminds her of her place, ‘Where are you coming from?’ “Whence comest thou? and wither wilt thou go?” where is it you want to end up? Please listen tonight if he’s asking you that question. God in fact is tender enough to come to a person here who most feels like an outsider, shouldn’t even be in church, don’t want to do anything with religion, you know, ‘If God’s real, he don’t even want me around him.’ You could not be more wrong. The person that is the most downcast, outsider, broken, suicidal, lost, frustrated, looked down on by the world in this room tonight, the most broken person is the one he is the most interested in. And he knows your name, and he knows your place, and he wants you to take some inventory--where are you coming from, and where is it you’d like to end up? Where’s your life going? Where’s your destiny? Where are you going to arrive on the path that you’re on? She says to him, ‘I’m fleeing, I’m fleeing, I’m running from the face of my mistress Sarah.’ And she’s kidnapping Abraham’s son, too, she’s just not aware of that. “And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands. And the angel of the LORD said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude. And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ismael; because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.” (verses 9-11) “Ishmael” which is “God hears,” Ishmael, “God hears,” “because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.” Please listen, the Lord has heard your affliction, I didn’t say it, the Bible says it, “the Lord has heard your affliction.”

The LORD Prophecies What Kind Of Man Ishmael & His Descendants Would Be Like

“And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.” (verse 12) Now it’s literally “he shall be a wild ass of a man,” it’s speaking of the wild ass that lived in the desert, who was considered brilliant in one sense, because he could survive where no one else could survive, but he was considered foolish on the other side because he couldn’t get along, he was territorial, he didn’t get along with another wild donkey that lived out in the desert. He says their nature is going to be strong, independent, survivalist but ornery, not getting along. You know, the problem we’re seeing on the news today, a lot of it is Isaac and Ishmael, both with Abraham’s blood in their veins. It’s interesting, the first baby in the Bible named before his birth is Ishmael, the second baby in the Bible named before his birth is Isaac. God knew all along, look at the problem in the news tonight when we go home, we think ‘Lord, he knew, he predicted, none of it’s a surprise to him.’ His hand is on the nations of the world right now, and he is steering, and it may look like things are out of control, but things are not out of control, things are not out of control, things are arriving at the station. The train is pulling in, and ending up exactly where he said it would be. All of the nations of the world are aligning themselves exactly where he said they would be. [Now Pastor Joe couldn’t have realized it would take 17 years for that to be occurring right now, after Vladimir Putin’s Russian Federation declared war on and invaded the nation of Ukraine on the 24 of February 2022, and that war has been going on for over a year now, and nationally, this world has gone from being a unipolar world right after the Soviet Union fell, to a multipolar world, where military power-blocks of nations are aligning with each other against the United States and its allies, Russia and China and Iran aligning with each other, against a soon to form United States of Europe, India and currently the United States. The Russo-Ukrainian war is causing European nations, particularly Germany, Poland and France to go through a military re-armament not seen since World War II. That war is acting as a proving ground for modern military weapons and tactics, just as the Spanish Civil War was just before WWII struck. Where is it all headed? see https://unityinchrist.com/prophecies/2ndcoming_4.htm]

Hagar’s Amazing Conversation With The LORD—The LORD Stoops Down To The Hagar’s Of The World

“And she called the name of the LORD that spake unto her, Thou God seest me: for she said, Have I also here looked after him that seeth me?” (verse 13) Now that’s a very strange construct in the Hebrew. What she says is ‘He’s the God that sees me,’ she’s staggered. It isn’t just “he sees me,” like he’s got 20/20 vision, it’s “He attends to me, he sees me to care after me.” She realizes something here, please listen, she’s fled, she’s been abused, she’s driven from everything, taken from her home, driven from the place where she was. She was probably blessed for awhile when she conceived, now she’s in the desert alone, maybe she’s worrying about dying. And God comes, he reveals himself to her, and she’s realizing ‘Wait, I was always within his view, he never lost sight of me, and he was not only there to see me, to be cognizant of me, he was there to see me and assist me and to care for me.’ And she asks an interesting question, she says “Have I also here looked after him that seeth me?” (verse 13b) Now scholars are trying to figure out, is she saying ‘Have I looked after him, no I wasn’t even looking for him, he was looking for me,’ or is she saying ‘Have I looked after this One here, that also sees me, in the sense that I have seen God and lived?’ Because even in their culture they believed you couldn’t see God and live. She seems to be saying, ‘I looked in the face of the One that seeth me, I’ve also looked on him.’ First time in the Bible, we have “the well” here, “Wherefore the well was called Beerlahairoi; behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered.” (verse 14) It is “Beerlahairoi” “the well of him who liveth and seeth me.” It is the well that we all want to drink from when we’re afraid, when we’re dejected, when we’re cast down, when we’re afraid, when we’re desolate, he’s the same, the Bible says, he never changes. In the middle of that there is the well, the spring. And it is the well of him that liveth and seeth me. Look, he sees abused women and unborn children, he is a tender God, he’s loving. And when you’re thinking, ‘You don’t understand, I am so broken, I am so broken, I feel like God has cast me off.’ And listen, please, the Bible says ‘A broken and a contrite spirit I will not despise,’ the LORD says. A broken and contrite spirit is the acceptable sacrifice to bring before him. In this world, when something is broken, we try to repair it or we throw it away. In this world if something is broken it has less value. In the Kingdom of God, when a man or a woman is broken, is when they take on value. Because when a life is broken, that is when God begins to move, to heal, to change, to form, to realign, to care, to hear, to encourage. She says this is the well of the One who lives and seeth me. She’s no longer, by the way, a polytheist at this point in time, she has been converted. And I am sure that we will see Hagar in heaven [that’s his own personal belief, we’ll see] in the not too distant future. Paul tells us there’s a picture here of two covenants, one is about what takes place in the flesh, better if I read it than try to remember what it says, Paul says this, theologically, he says “Tell me those of you who desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law, for it is written Abraham had two sons, one by the bondmaid and the other by the freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh, he that was of the freewoman was by promise, which things are an allegory, for these are two covenants, the one from Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Hagar. For this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.” Paul says, yes there is a practical lesson in that we should wait for God, because when we don’t wait, we confuse things, and God gives us promises. And if we really believe, belief is what takes hold of the promise, hope is what endures, and patience is there waiting, hope is anticipating, and the promises of God are ours, but we enter into them through faith and patience, those two things. But Paul says, theologically, outside of the practical application, there’s a truth here, and that is, that anything that nature produces is of the Law, anything that says ‘except ye do this, except you wear a tie, except you be baptized, except ye be circumcised,’ anything, Paul says, that lends itself to the Law and to legalism, genders to bondage. And he says the one son is born of the bondmaid, and is a picture of the Law, picture of whatever, this is all the flesh can produce is strife and difficulty. The other son, he says, is a picture of that which is born of promise, there’s no human strings attached to it, we don’t deserve it, we’re not worthy of it, it’s a picture of--you know, God waits until Abraham and Sarah, their bodies are dead, so that the birth is miraculous, because it’s a picture of the covenant and his forgiveness and his love in Jesus Christ. And the only way we can receive that this evening, the love of Christ, is miraculously. You don’t deserve it, you’ll never earn it. And sometimes as we become Christians we think ‘OK, I gotta do this, and gotta do this,’ let me tell you something, as Christians, the Holy Spirit, the new birth, the new creation, God’s at work in us, conforming us into the image of his Son. It says he works in us to will and do of his own good pleasure, and there are good works foreordained that we should walk in them, and our God is holy, and he who names the name of Christ should depart from iniquity, but we don’t do that be straining and striving and trying to be religious and trying to do Christian stuff. Jesus said ‘If you abide in me you will bear much fruit,’ in John 15. You don’t see a grape hanging on the vine going ‘Grrrrblll I’m going to get ripe, that grape is really struggling, that grape over there,’ you just abide in Christ, he’s the vine, we’re the branches, the life comes from him, it’s from Promise, not earned, it’s not deserved. If you believe Jesus Christ loves you with all of his heart, the Bible says, we love him because he first loved us. No one in this room this evening deserves the love of God, and he has showered it on us to a degree that will take us eternity to grow in. There is so much grace represented in this room tonight, it is mindboggling and it is beyond what we can conceive, and we receive it by faith when we believe. Look around this room, who’d have gathered us [loud applause]? Not me. I wouldn’t have picked me either. So ya, there’s a practical lesson, that is waiting on God, to believe his promises, not to try to do it, to get in the flesh and make something happen, it needs to happen the way the Lord said it would happen. Because then we produce offspring we don’t want, that produces problems, that produces strife, and then what do you do when there’s strife? Some people blame-shift, they get abusive with their mouth, some people refuse to do anything. Some people just run [that’s the smartest thing you can do, if you’ve made the mistake 😊]. None of those are right in this picture here. Above and beyond all that is the theological picture of the Law and Grace That we probably wouldn’t have thought much about, except Paul tells us about it in Galatians chapter 4 [to read about what Paul was saying about these two covenants in Galatians 4, see https://unityinchrist.com/galatians/Galatians4-1-31.htm], that there’s a picture here, there’s an allegory. Verse 15 says “And Hagar bare Abram a son: and Abram called his son’s name, which Hagar bare, Ishmael.” Now evidently, Hagar comes back to the camp. Hagar, we don’t see this recorded, has an interview somewhere with Sarah and asks forgiveness, apologizes, tells Abraham and Sarah that God appeared to her and told her she’s going to have a son and his name should be Ishmael. And Abraham, they believe it enough, so that when the child is born they in fact name the child Ishmael, at Hagar’s bidding. “And Abram was fourscore and six years old, when Hagar bare Ismael to Abram.” (verse 16) he was 85 at the beginning of our chapter, this was a tough year, chapter 16 in Abraham’s life. He was 85 when the chapter started, he’s 86 now, but he’s five years older I guarantee ya. [Now Abram was 75 in 1910BC, eleven years later, in 1899BC Ishmael was born, and 13 years later, in 1886BC Isaac was born, or thereabouts.] He was fourscore and six years old when Hagar bare Ishmael to Abraham.

In Closing

Now, we can’t cover chapter 17 in five minutes, but we’ll look at this, “And when Abram was ninety years old and nine, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect.” (Genesis 17:1) that’s 99. Look, this is 13 years after the end of chapter 16, and it’s 24 years after he came into the land. He came into the land with God leading him, making him a promise. He struggled with those things, God reaffirmed them. He goes through chapter 16, chapter 17 is 13 years after that, and the thing to take note of here is, in the life of Isaiah, Abraham, many, there are gaps of time often between when the LORD speaks. It says here Abraham was 99 years old, “the LORD appeared to him,” now 99, that’s enough to give you a cardiac. 99 years old, and he said to him, he didn’t say ‘Fear not,’ he said to him “I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect.” Now you’d think at 99 he’s going to say ‘It’s time for you to go out to pasture, take a break.’ 99 years old, hasn’t heard anything we know of for at least 13 years. We think ‘This is Abraham, that he’s got his antenna up and every day with him and God, he’s got an uplink, they’re talking and going back and forth.’ And we think if the Lord hasn’t made an impression in our heart for a week or for a couple weeks, he’s mad at us, he’s not talking to us. Try 13 years. Now I’ll tell you the truth, the primary way God speaks to me is through this [must be holding up his Bible], I sit alone with it, I read it, I end up with tears running down my face. He talks to me, it’s just my neurosis. He may talk to you a different way. I hear people say ‘When the Lord talks to me it’s like, Headlines, head-something,’ and I understand what you’re saying. Some people say it’s like an impression. Well sometimes he’ll do that. But this is what I find, the more time I spend in the Scripture, first of all, that’s the safest place to be, because God will never contradict it. And I find that as I read through the Scripture I may read for a day or two, but sometimes, somewhere, a verse just rises off the page, and it so touches me. Then all of a sudden I’ll stop and say ‘Woah, Lord, you’re here aren’t you, you just ignited that one.’ And I kind of get the sense of what that’s like. And then when I’m driving in the car, I’m somewhere, and the same thing happens, I’m sensitive to it, because I’m trained in here to sense it when it happens. Now he treats us all as individuals, I understand that. I get around some Christians and they say ‘Well the Lord told me, and the Lord told me, and the Lord spoke to me, and the Lord told me, and the Lord spoke to me,’ and I’m thinking ‘You know I’ve been saved a long time, I’m envious of this guy, I’d have a running conversation all day, you know.’ And when somebody does that, that’s a trump card, what are you going to say? ‘Well I really don’t think you should,’ ‘Well the Lord told me to do it.’ ‘There isn’t anything I have to say, you just played the trump card.’ But people get tired of hearing that sometimes. You know I heard Billy Graham once on Larry King, and Larry said “Did the Lord ever speak to you?” and he said, “You know, one time, I was up early in South Carolina, I was walking in the mountains and something was really troubling me,” and he said “I was walking with the dogs, and all of a sudden I got this tremendous peace, I think the Lord spoke to me that time.” I thought, ‘Wow, what a relief.’ Now when he appears to you and talks to you, there’s no confusion. 99 years old, the LORD Jehovah [Yahweh] appears to Abraham, what a sight that must have been, and says to him “I am El Shaddai, I am the LORD Almighty,” first time in the Scripture, it’ll be used 48 times in the Old Testament, El Shaddai, The Almighty. Again, if you get Griddlestone’s, you probably won’t, but there’s a guy name Griddlestone who has a study on Old Testament Hebrew words and synonyms. And he does a really interesting study on the names of God, and El Shaddai is very strange, because one side of it is interpreted as “The Strong Arm of God, the strength, the manliness of God,” not macho, macho is a Spanish word, it means “mule,” by the way, forget about that. Just the strength of God. And yet the other side of “Shaddai” has the idea of mountain or breast, so it gives us this interesting picture of God as the Almighty, but the Almighty Provider, the one who can tenderly care for, and yet be strength unimaginable. And somehow he reveals himself to Abraham. We’re not sure if Abraham ever realizes Jehovah [I prefer the name Yahweh], it seems like the covenant name of God is really revealed to Moses, and as he writes the Book of Genesis he uses the term Jehovah [Yahweh], Moses. But it seems Abraham knew best El Shaddai, the God revealed to him as El Shaddai, the All Powerful One, but the All Powerful Tender Provider who stoops down to nurse us, to provide every need. He said “I am the LORD Almighty God, walk before me, and be thou perfect.” Now he’s not saying ‘Walk before me and be sinless,’ or we can all give up, because Abraham already wasn’t sinless. He’s saying ‘Do this sincerely, do this with a committed heart, do this the right way.’ And now he’s going to move in, in verse 2 as we look there, he’s going to say “I will” look at verse 2, “And I will make my covenant between me and thee,” now he’s going to say “I will” 24 times in chapter 17, so read through it. Chapter 17, God will, 24 times, “I will,” and he’s going to say over and over, 9 times “my covenant.” This is unparalleled in ancient history. Anthropologists, archeologists, you go back to these days, it is unparalleled for a deity to make a covenant with a human. There were arrangements between deities, false gods and people, and people would sacrifice their children or sacrifice something to try to appease a deity, to try to appease his anger. There were perversions of what God the Father and a human being should have in covenant. But unparalleled in ancient history is the fact that Jehovah [Yahweh] comes to Abraham and establishes his covenant with Abraham, he passed through the parts alone, you have Deity coming to a man, making the covenant. And now 9 times he’s going to talk about his covenant, 24 times he’s going to say “I will.” You just go down and read through them, “I will, I will” 24 times, and besides the “me’s” and the “my’s” as you go through here, and it’s remarkable to see what he’s going to say, we’re going to have to go there next week, but he’s going to change his name now to Abraham, and Sarah. In fact it’s interesting, because he includes the 5^th letter from the Hebrew alphabet now, he inserts it into both of their names. And throughout Scripture 5 is the number of grace. I don’t know if that’s relative at all, but he just did something very beautiful here, he changes his name to Abraham ‘the father of many nations.’ So Abraham’s gotta go back into camp, now, at 99 and say to Sarah again ‘Guess what, guys, don’t call me Abram anymore, I got a new name.’ ‘Oh talkin’ to God again, huh.’ ‘Yup,’ ‘What’s your name now?’ ‘Abraham, the father of many nations,’ ‘I kind of figured it’d be something like that.’ ‘And Sarai, he told me your name’s changed too, you’re no longer Sarai, you’re Sarah now, Princess.’ ‘At 89 I’m finally a princess?’ But this is what God was waiting for. They couldn’t wait, they got involved in the flesh with Hagar, they tried to do it on their own. God is waiting to fulfill his promise until no other one could ever fulfill the promise.’ Abraham’s body is dead, and Sarah’s body is dead, then he’s going to bring, miraculously the “son of Promise” into the world. Because that’s how he would bring Christ into our lives, miraculously, without human help, without human aid, without human effort, without righteousness of our own…through Christ, his covenant, Deity making covenant with us, remarkable. I’m going to have the musicians come, we’ll sing a last song together. Would you do this, read through, I was hoping to get through 16 and 17, but you slowed me down so much tonight, so next week, I don’t know if we can do 17, 18 and 19, but read 17, 18 and 19, maybe we’ll move at Warp Speed if the Lord tarries. But read those chapters, 17 speaks of his Covenant, then we come to 18, 19 you have the record of Sodom and Gomorrah there. So just read through those things. We’re going to sing a last song, and as we do, if you’re here this evening and you don’t him and you can’t believe the measure of love that we’re talking about, and forgiveness that comes freely to you, it either has to be all of him, or not at all. You can’t get your fingerprints on it, you can’t provide a Hagar, there is nothing you can do but receive the promise of God in regards to forgiveness. If you don’t step out of the boat onto the water it’ll never happen, it’ll never happen [see Belief Is Not Enough: Three Essential Steps To Salvation at: https://unityinchrist.com/Does/Does%20God%20Exist.html]. But this evening as we sing this last song, if you’re thinking ‘You know what, if the chasm between me and God, the distance between me and God is simply that I need to do this by faith, I’m not worthy, so I have to do it by faith, I don’t deserve it so I have to do it by faith, my life is filled with sin so I have to do it by faith, if that’s what it takes, I’m ready. Because as I listen, where am I coming from, where am I going, where do I want to end up? What’s my destiny? When you’re dead and you’re dead and there ain’t nothing else?’ That ain’t true at all, you’re eternal, and you’ll spend eternity separated from God, or in his Kingdom in his presence. And the door is open tonight, you can come. While we sing this last song, if he’s drawing you, you come out of your seat, you walk down here, stand in front, we want to pray with you, give you a Bible. If a friend brought you, he’s going to say ‘Come on, come on, I’ll go down with you, you come.’ Let’s stand, let’s pray. And if you’re a Christian, been struggling, look, with condemnation, I never want to make the Scripture give you a license to live in the flesh and to live in sin and live in compromise, because it doesn’t do that. But it certainly gives us liberty, that if we confess our sins, he’s faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, if we in genuineness say ‘Lord, I’m blowing it, I’m supposed to be a Christian, I’m supposed to be your son or daughter, tonight would you please make that right in my life, I’m tired, I’m worn out it, I’m a phony, I’m a hypocrite, I’m tired of playing the game, and as I lift my voice and sing this song, Lord, just cleanse me, renew me, fill me afresh with your Spirit, give me a new start.’ He will do that for you also. But if you’ve never come tonight…[transcript of a connective expository sermon on Genesis 16:1-16, given by Pastor Joe Focht, Calvary Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116]