Genesis 16B (2011)

• Remember in Chapter 15 we witnessed the Lord take upon Himself a covenant

with Abram

○ In that covenant ceremony, the Lord appeared in the form of fire and
smoke while Abram was in a deep sleep

■ When the moment for the agreement to the covenant came,

only God acted

■ He proceeded through the bloody animals, thus binding Himself

to His vows to Abram

• And the vows God made included not only the words
spoken in that moment

• They also included the words God spoke to Abram in all

three of the appearances God makes to Abram

• God promised to make Abram a great nation, to grant

him descendants, an inheritance, and to bless those who
bless him while cursing his enemies

○ These promises were affirmed in Chapter 15, and they were a one-way,
suzerainty grant without condition

■ Abram need do no more to keep these promises than he did to

obtain them in the first place

■ They depended on God’s faithfulness, not Abram’s

■ Because they reflected glory upon God and not Abram

• Now in Chapter 16, we’ve witnessed a great sin in Abram’s life, a sin of
faithlessness

○ Sarai was unwilling to wait on God for a son, while Abram was unwilling
to act to correct his wife

■ The results of their sin are profound, both in the immediate

moment and over the course of centuries and millennia

■ The second half of the chapter examines those consequences

○ But above it all, it highlights God’s faithfulness

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Genesis 16B 2
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• When we ended last week, Sarai’s handmaiden Hagar had become pregnant
with Abram’s first son

○ The confirmation of Hagar’s pregnancy had created a new and

dangerous dynamic in the family

■ The slave now had the upper hand on her owner

■ Scripture said that Hagar showed contempt for Sarai

■ And Sarai, knowing that Hagar couldn’t be sold now that she was
Abram’s wife, is at a loss for what to do next

■ So she protested to Abram and demanded he come to her

protection

○ Abram for his part as husband is lying down on the job, so to speak

■ He fails in correcting his wife and now he fails in supporting his

wife

■ His only response for Sarai was to state the obvious: Hagar was
Sarai’s slave, do what you want with her

• How can we imagine the pain Sarai felt in her situation?

• She thought she was doing the right thing by her

husband in sacrificing her position as wife when she gave
Hagar

• She wanted to give her husband a child, and she made a

mistake in how she tried to solve the problem

■ Now Sarai could appreciate her mistake, and she comes to

Abram looking for support and concern and she gets it thrown
back in her face

• Left with no other options, Sarai treats Hagar harshly hoping to drive her away -
and it works

○ In v.16 we’re told that Hagar flees from Sarai

■ This entire episode has been a disaster for everyone

• Abram lost a servant in his home

• Sarai lost her handmaiden

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Genesis 16B 3
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• And Hagar has lost a home and is now on the run in the
middle of a pregnancy

■ Hagar’s flight amounts to theft and kidnapping

• Running away as a slave was stealing from Abram

• And taking the unborn child was kidnapping, since the

child belonged to Abram and Sarai

○ Then the Lord stepped in…

Gen. 16:7 Now the angel of the LORD found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by
the spring on the way to Shur.
Gen. 16:8 He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from and where are you
going?” And she said, “I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.”
Gen. 16:9 Then the angel of the LORD said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit
yourself to her authority.”

• For the first time in Scripture, we’re introduced to the angel of the Lord

○ The term angel of the Lord is an important character in the Old

Testament

■ It occurs 58 times in Scripture

■ Despite the use of the word angel, this is no ordinary angel

• The word angel itself in Hebrew actually means
messenger or ambassador

• And when this word is combined with the name for God,
Yahweh, it always refers to the Second Person of the
Godhead

• The Person Who is eventually revealed as the incarnate

Jesus

■ But prior to His incarnation, the Second Person of God appears

as a messenger or ambassador of the Father

○ We can know that this term is a reference to God Himself by looking at

the context in which it appears

■ In every context where He appears, there is also a reference to

God in the same text

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Genesis 16B 4
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■ For example, later in this text we will find Hagar addressing the
“angel” as God in v.13

• Certainly, Hagar came to recognize this Messenger as

Someone more than an angel

• When the Lord appears before Hagar, He finds her by a spring of water in the
desert, on a road leading to Shur

○ Shur is a wilderness bordering the Negev, which means Hagar is likely

headed to Egypt

■ This makes perfect sense

■ Hagar is going home

■ Where else would she go at this point?

○ Since she is moving through a desert, water is a crucial resource, so she

has stopped by a spring

■ As the Lord appears to her, He asks two questions:

• Where have you come from and where are you going?

• Here we find another example of God asking questions

when we know He already has all the answers

■ Why does the Lord ask a question of any kind?

• When He wants to trigger new thinking and
understanding

• He wants Hagar to think twice about what she’s doing

○ Hagar may have been heading south toward

Egypt, but she probably didn’t know her final
destination

○ It was simply fleeing, as her name means

○ If you notice, the Lord began by identifying Hagar as Sarai’s maid

■ The Hebrew word for maid literally means slave girl

■ The Lord plainly calls Hagar Sarai’s slave girl

■ He seems to be reminding Hagar right from the start where she

belongs
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Genesis 16B 5
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○ Hagar answers plainly

■ She says she is fleeing from the presence of her master Sarai

■ Hagar makes no attempt to deny the truth: she was wrong

○ Hagar is the true victim in this entire episode

■ Hagar was pressed into slavery to support Abram’s family

■ She was pressed again into marrying Abram and giving him a
child

■ Then she was hated by her own mistress who made these
decisions

• More importantly, Hagar had no knowledge of the Living

God

• She had no promises from God, unlike Sarai and Abram

○ She was just a Gentile suffering under the sin of her Hebrew masters

■ But as she was committing this sin, the Lord stepped in and
turned her around

■ In v.9 the Lord says, return to your owner and submit to her
authority

• Does the Lord’s command surprise you?

• Let me ask you what else can a holy and perfect God say?

• Hagar’s flight was breaking the law and depriving Abram

of his child

○ How could God approve of that behavior?

○ It mattered not the reason for her sin…sin is sin

○ And two wrongs don’t make a right

• The Lord needs Hagar to stay with Abram because it suits His purposes for
Abram and Sarai

○ As you may know, God will direct Abram and Sarai to send Hagar away
in a future day

■ But for now, God wants Hagar to remain in the household

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Genesis 16B 6
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○ There are two reasons for this delayed departure

■ First, God wants Hagar’s departure to teach a lesson for the

future Israel

■ Hagar and her son will form an important picture for God in
telling the story of Israel

• There will be a seed to rule the world and save men from
their sins

• But that seed will find its source in God’s promises, not in
the works of men

• In order to tell that story fully, God needed not only a son
by His promise, but He also needed a son by human effort

• Then God could contrast the outcomes of each, thereby

teaching how only God’s promises lead to glory

○ We’ll study more about this contrast in the next

chapter

■ Secondly, Abram’s sin must bear consequences for himself and

his nation

• Remember I mentioned that Abram’s unique position in

God’s plan for the world means that both his faithfulness
and his sin carry great consequences

○ When Abram is strong, the world benefits

○ And when Abram is weak, the world suffers

○ All this is according to God’s plan

• The child that will come from Abram’s sin must dwell near
the sons of promise, because God will use one to chastise
the other

○ The offspring of Hagar will eventually become

enemies of Israel

○ And God will use these enemies to discipline His

children in Israel

○ For God works all things to good for those who

love Him and are called according to His purpose

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Genesis 16B 7
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○ So the Lord tells Hagar to return, submit to authority, do the right thing

■ And then God proceeds to show her how her obedience will lead
to blessing

Gen. 16:10 Moreover, the angel of the LORD said to her, “I will greatly multiply your
descendants so that they will be too many to count.”
Gen. 16:11 The angel of the LORD said to her further,
“Behold, you are with child,
And you will bear a son;
And you shall call his name Ishmael,
Because the LORD has given heed to your affliction.
Gen. 16:12 “He will be a wild donkey of a man,
His hand will be against everyone,
And everyone’s hand will be against him;
And he will live to the east of all his brothers.”

• The Lord assures Hagar that her child will yield an uncountable number of
descendants

○ Notice the text says “I” will…

■ The angel is speaking as God Himself, as He truly is

○ This promise is exactly the same one that God made to Abram

■ Why would God give the same promise to Hagar’s child?

■ Because this child is also Abram’s child

■ And the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable

■ Because God promised that Abram’s seed would fill the world, so
it must be with his child of Hagar

• This child will eventually become the father of all Arab

nations

○ What an amazing testimony to God’s faithfulness

■ God is so faithful, His promises so sure, that not even God

Himself can ignore them or change them

• God promised Abram that his seed would be

uncountable, and so it must be

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Genesis 16B 8
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■ And though God’s promise was directed toward a certain son yet
to come, nevertheless it was spoken to Abram

• Therefore God’s word will reign true regardless of how

many sons Abram conceives

○ Now we are starting to understand the power of that earlier covenant

moment in Chapter 15

■ It means something when God makes a promise

• It will stand and nothing can change it

■ God made promises to you when He called you into faith

■ And those promises were spoken through His Word

• He said He would never leave us nor forsake us

• He will prepare a place for us

• He will confess us before His Father

• We will reign with Him in His kingdom

• We will receive an inheritance in that kingdom

■ Those promises can’t be changed, not by the world, not by you,

not by God Himself

• We will sin, though God desires we live holy and pleasing

lives

• But our sin will not change these promises

• We will fail, but God will not

■ This is why Paul can say:

Rom. 8:38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,
nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,
Rom. 8:39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

• This son, however, is not the one of God’s design when He gave His promises to
Abram

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Genesis 16B 9
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○ So, even though Hagar will have the benefit of many descendants, she is
not the direct recipient of all the other promises

■ Remember, the promises were spoken to Abram not to Hagar

■ So she is benefiting from her association with Abram

■ She is not herself receiving those same promises

○ Therefore her family has a different fate than does Abram’s

■ And God shares those details with her

• Hagar learns what is in store for her pregnancy

○ First, she will have a son

■ God gives the first sonogram

○ And God gives her the name, Ishmael

■ The name Ishmael means “God hears”

• Because God heard her affliction and visited her

• There is great irony here, because God rescues an

Egyptian after he hears her affliction at the hands of
Hebrews

• Later, God will rescue the Hebrews when he hears their

affliction at the hands of the Egyptians

■ Both times, God hears because He is bound by his own word to

hear

○ By announcing the name of the child, God is making a prophetic

statement

■ As a slave mother, Hagar will have nothing to do with naming

the child

■ Abram will name the child

• So the only way the child’s name will be Ishmael is if
Abram selects this name on his own

• And what do you think Hagar will think when she hears
Abram announce the name of the child?

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Genesis 16B 10
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• Do you think she will be encouraged to witness God’s

word coming to reality before her eyes?

• God is good to show Himself faithful in these ways

○ Next, God tells Hagar her son will be a wild donkey (or ass) of a man

■ His hand will be against everyone and everyone against him

• These are proverbial statements that carry much
meaning

• Being a donkey reflects both his personality and his

lifestyle

○ The people from Ishmael will be roamers in the

same way that wild herds of donkeys roam the
desert in Abram’s day

○ Wild donkeys are particularly unruly, independent

and nomadic

• Such are the Arab peoples

○ Historically nomadic, hot blooded, and rarely

given to submit to the authority of non-Arabs

■ Secondly, God says they will be a warring people

• More importantly, they will be aggressors by nature,
provoking conflict with their neighbors

• This prophecy has proven true over the centuries

○ And his aggression will result in others retaliating

○ Why does the Lord determine this kind of future for the descendants of
Ishmael?

■ The answer comes in the last line of v.12

■ Ishmael will settle east of all his brothers

• We all know the significance of east by now

• He will represent the sin and rebellion of the world

■ And geographically, Ishmael will settle directly next to his

brothers, the nation of Israel
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Genesis 16B !11

• This explains why God has chosen to make Ishmael the

man he becomes

• He will be a thorn in Israel’s side, by design

• He will be a cause for Israel’s chastisement in the days

when God determines to send Israel a message

■ Here we see the full implications of Abram’s sin

• By choosing to act outside God’s will Abram has set in
motion a world of enmity between the seed of flesh and
the seed of promise

• But this is always the pattern

○ When Adam sinned, he set in motion a battle

between the sons of the enemy and the sons of
God

○ The struggle between spirit and flesh will

continue until God puts an end to all flesh

○ And here we see it again, Abram’s child of flesh set

to war with the child of promise

○ We might ask ourselves at this point why God intervened to stop

Hagar’s sin of running away, yet God didn’t stop Abram and Sarai from
sinning in the first place

■ The answer is that Abram and Sarai knew better

• They had God’s promises and knew Him through faith

• They were already in a position to obey properly

• And yet they didn’t

○ When God’s people sin despite having the word of

truth, then we face consequences

■ But Hagar knew none of these things

• So only now God appears and reveals Himself

• And by that revelation, God brings understanding

leading to obedience

• Look at Hagar’s response and what follows

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Genesis 16B 12
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Gen. 16:13 Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, “You are a God who
sees”; for she said, “Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?”
Gen. 16:14 Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; behold, it is between Kadesh and
Bered.

• Hagar’s first response is to declare that this angel is God Himself

○ This is a statement of faith similar to the one Paul makes on the road to
Damascus

■ In both cases a traveler is arrested on a desert road by the Lord,

who appears to correct the person’s sinful direction

■ And in both cases the appearance results in a changed life, one

that follows the Lord’s leading and receives the Lord’s blessing

○ Here we have evidence that Hagar has received salvation as a result of

this experience

■ She may remain a slave and she may have a son destined to
torment Israel

■ But she has been called to become a child of God

• And what led God to bring Hagar into the family of God?

• Nothing more than her association with Abram, a man

who has received God’s promises

• A promise to bless all the nations of the Earth

■ And in response to that call she will return to Abram and submit
to Sarai’s authority, as her Lord has asked her to do

• She may be a slave to Sarai, but her true Master is now

the Lord – and Hagar is obeying Him now

• This is a beautiful picture of how we too share in the blessing to Abram

○ Like Hagar, we are Gentiles who have been arrested in our normal
course of sinful life

■ We encountered the Lord, Jesus

■ And by that encounter, our life of obedience began

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Genesis 16B 13
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• And we are receiving the blessings of promises made to

Abram and Israel

• We are grafted into the promises, and so we share in the

blessings

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