Sermon – Genesis 16 – Hagar

Slide 2 … Question – How many of us like waiting for things?
Slide 3 … What do we not like waiting for?
Slide 4 … Some people do not like to wait on God. And that’s when some people take matters into their own hands and try to hurry God along, but that only makes things worse.
Slide 5 … At least that what happened to Abram and Sarai.
- God promised an heir would come from Abram’s own body and that he would have many descendants. Abram and Sarai waited for 10 years, but nothing happened.
- They waited for this child of promise, but year after year passed by and Sarah did not conceive; and we can only assume that they tried and tried and tried.
- Since nothing happened on its own between Abram and Sarai, they decided to help God out and found another way of bringing a child in to the world.
Slide 6 … Genesis 16:1-3 … Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had not been able to bear children for him. But she had an Egyptian servant named Hagar. So Sarai said to Abram, “The LORD has prevented me from having children. Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her.” And Abram agreed with Sarai’s proposal. So Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife. (This happened ten years after Abram had settled in the land of Canaan.)
Slide 7 … We read that Sarai had not been able to have children. Fairly or not, you can sense the pressure that Sarai felt; like it was her fault that the promised child wasn’t there.
Slide 8 … Since God’s specific promise was that an heir would come from Abraham’s own body, and nothing had been said about Sarah’s body, Sarah came up with a proposal.
Slide 9 … Hagar was among the servants in their household that they had acquired while in Egypt. So, Sarai suggests that Abram take Hagar as a wife and to have an heir through her.
Slide 10 … Sarai’s proposal seems shocking and strange to our 21^st century sensibilities, and to our Christian sense of morality.
- Yet, in the Middle Eastern culture of 4,000 years ago, this solution to the problem of Sarah’s barrenness was acceptable, strange as it may seem. Legal custom of that culture permitted the husband of a childless woman to take her servant as a second wife and any child born of that second union was regarded as the first wife’s child.
Slide 11 … In that cultural context, Sarai’s actions could seem praiseworthy.
- Sarai must have gone through an intense internal struggle to reach this conclusion.
- Sarai decided to surrender her own rights to Abram’s sole and undivided affection.
- Sarai surrendered her right to give Abram his first-born from her own body.
Slide 12 … Today, we have the benefit of knowing how things unfolded, and from our comfortable vantage point, it’s easy to see what Abram and Sarai should have done.
- The biggest problem I see throughout this situation is that it appears that no one sought the Lord’s input.
- Over and over again in Scripture when the persons involved inquired of the Lord and waited for God’s reply, things went much better for them.
Slide 13 … How much better things would have been if Abram had gone out under the stars and said, “Lord, Sarai and I are getting older with each passing year, and it is getting harder to wait for the promised child. We have come up with a possible solution, we are wondering what you think about this plan.” Unfortunately, Abram didn’t inquire of the Lord, and he and Sarah proceeded with their own plan.
Slide 14 … Genesis 16:4-6 … (4) So Abram had sexual relations with Hagar, and she became pregnant. But when Hagar knew she was pregnant, she began to treat her mistress, Sarai, with contempt. (5) Then Sarai said to Abram, “This is all your fault! I put my servant into your arms, but now that she’s pregnant she treats me with contempt. The LORD will show who’s wrong – you or me!” (6) Abram replied, “Look, she is your servant, so deal with her as you see fit.” Then Sarai treated Hagar so harshly that she finally ran away.
Slide 15 … The fallout from Abram and Sarai’s decision didn’t take long to kick in.
- The plan for Hagar to be a surrogate backfired, and rather than bringing joy to the household at last, it cause everyone to start turning against each other.
- This once harmonious home became a combat zone.
Slide 16 … When the consequences of sin begin to fall, relationships always suffer. It can get ugly fast; and blame can be put on people it doesn’t belong. Hagar despised Sarai; Sarai blamed Abram; and Abram blamed her right back.
Slide 17 … When Hagar realized she was pregnant, it wasn’t just her belly that got puffed up, her head did as well; and she began to despise her mistress. The Hebrew word means “small, insignificant, trifling, or dishonorable.” We are not told about Hagar’s specific actions or words, but she must have been doing more than just having internal contempt for Sarah. She likely began to taunt her about her barrenness and how Abram’s joy and attention was now Hagar’s because she was giving him a child.
Slide 18 … As soon as Sarai experienced this mistreatment, she took it out on Abram.
- She said this was his fault and appealed to the Lord for judgment.
Slide 19 … How would you like to have been Abram at this point? (rock and a hard place)
- Abram decided to throw the situation back in Sarai’s lap. He said, “look, she is your servant (yet now his 2^nd wife), so deal with her as you seem best. This was his subtle way of saying, “You came up with this idea in the first place, so you are going to have to fix what you started.”
Slide 20 … The Bible says that Sarah mistreated Hagar so much that Hagar ran away. It seems that nobody noticed that Hagar went missing or they didn’t care.
Slide 21 … How said that it appears they were not concerned for this young, pregnant woman and the dangers that she faced being alone in the wilderness with its predators and harsh conditions.
Slide 22 … In many ways, Hagar was the innocent victim of Abram and Sarai’s lack of faith. Hagar hadn’t asked for any of this – she’s simple been doing her servant work around the house one minute and the next she knew she was wearing a wedding veil and marching off to the wedding tent with the 85-year old groom.
Slide 23 … While Abraham and Sarah didn’t seem to care about Hagar, that was not the case with God. In the last section of this chapter, we see how the Lord expresses His grace toward Hagar and the son she is carrying.
Slide 24 … Genesis 16:7-10 … (7) The angel of the LORD found Hagar beside a spring of water in the wilderness, along the road to Shur. (8) The angel said to her, “Hagar, Sarai’s servant, where have you come from, and where are you going?” I’m running away from my mistress, Sarai,” she replied. (9) The angel of the LORD said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit to her authority.” (10) Then he added, “I will give you more descendants than you can count.”
Slide 25 … Genesis 16:11-12 … (11) And the angel also said, “You are now pregnant and will give birth to a son. You are to name him Ishmael (which means ‘God hears’), for the LORD has heard your cry of distress. (12) This son of yours will be a wild man, as untamed as a wild donkey! He will raise his fist against everyone, and everyone will be against him. Yes, he will live in open hostility against all his relatives.”
Slide 26 … Genesis 16:13-16 … (13) Thereafter, Hagar used another name to refer to the LORD, who had spoken to her. She said, “You are the God who sees me.” She also said, “Have I truly seen the One who sees me?” (14) So that well was named Beer-lahai-roi (which means “well of the Living One who sees me”). It can still be found between Kadesh and Bered. (15) So Hagar gave Abram a son, and Abram named him Ishmael. (16) Abram was eighty-six years old when Ishmael was born.
Slide 27 … What should stand out to us in this section is “The Angel of the Lord.”
- Who is this angel of the Lord? … This is the 1^st time in Scripture we find this phrase.
- The Hebrew word for “angel” literally means “messenger.”
Slide 28 … As we compare this appearance with other appearances in Scripture of the angel of the Lord, it becomes clear that this is most likely an appearance of the pre-incarnate Christ, God the Son.
Slide 29 … This angel of the Lord was no created angel like Gabriel or Michael, because this angel said things about himself that only God would say, like promising Hagar: “I will so increase your descendants.”
Slide 30 … God’s messenger instructs Hagar to return to her mistress and submit to her and then shares a picture of the future for Hagar and her son, whom she is to name Ishmael (which means “God hears”), because the Lord has heard her cry of distress.
Slide 31 … Hagar then gave God the name “The God who sees me.”
- Hagar could have told many people about her experience, because the desert spring where she had this encounter with God became widely known as Beer Lahai Roi.
Slide 32 … So, Hagar returned to the tents of Abram and Sarai and there Ishmael was born.
Slide 33 … Sadly, Hagar’s son, Ishmael will be unruly and troublesome, someone who is almost impossible to get along with.
- We don’t know exactly what God thought of Sarah’s idea, but He did not interfere with the plan, even though things in the Middle East would never be the same.
- Ishmael is the father of the Arab people and you know how much conflict there has been throughout history between the descendants of Isaac and the descendants of Ishmael.
Slide 34 … Abraham was 86 years old when Ishmael was born and we will read nothing more about Abraham’s story for the next 13 years.
- When the next chapter opens, Abraham is 99 years old.
- Abraham and Sarah have many more years to wait for God to fulfill His promise.
Slide 35 … So, what lessons can we learn about relationship with God from this story of Abram, Sarai, and Hagar?
- Lesson #1 … God doesn’t expect us to everything on our own – we need to wait on Him and trust Him and ask Him what we are to do and how to do it. We don’t need to run ahead of God and get ourselves in trouble.
Slide 36 .. One of the fundamental problems with Abram and Sarai’s plan was that it grew from a mindset that said: “God has told me what He wants and the rest depends on me. God has shown me the goal and it’s up to me to figure out how to reach that goal. God isn’t getting the job done, so He needs me to do it.”
Slide 37 … God had a plan for fulfilling His promise, and His plan was for a child to be born from Abraham through Sarah, not Hagar.
Slide 38 … Sadly, many Christians operate by the same mindset … “It might be God’s plan, but it all depends on me.” … Do you see how wrong that is?
Slide 39 … Lesson #2 – Do not become arrogant.
Slide 40 … Let’s focus on Hagar for a minute – her arrogance was shameful. She acted the way we often act when we forget that everything comes from the Lord.
Slide 41 … Hagar had no more control over becoming pregnant than did Sarai, so why take pride in being pregnant as if she had done it and then look down on someone who had not gotten pregnant?
Slide 42 … The same is true of all the gifts and abilities that we have – if God had not given them to us, then we would not have the ability or opportunity to use them or develop them – that’s true with your voice, organizational skills, language skills, ability to type, being able to fix things, or the ease in making friends – they all come from the Lord … and then we could get into spiritual gifts, which we all have at least one to use to build God’s Kingdom and help our fellow believers.
Slide 43 … Because we didn’t do anything to earn these gifts or abilities, then we don’t have the right to look down on or make fun of others who don’t have the skills, gifts, or abilities that we do.
- Let’s be sure to be humble about all we are and all we have and give glory and thanks to God for what He has given us.
Slide 44 … Lesson #3 – We should always ask God for guidance.
- We need to not proceed in any decision or direction until we have adequately laid it before God and have received His input.
Slide 45 … The old adage, “It is easier to ask for forgiveness than permission” is not a good approach to following God. It has been said that, “God’s work, done in God’s way, will never lack God’s supply.”
Slide 46 … We will be most effective when we do what God wants, in the way God wants, and with the resources that God supplies.
- See how we can get off track if we are not in line with God’s will in each of those aspects?
Slide 47 … Lesson #4 … God sees and is always with us.
Slide 48 … God saw Abram and Sarai, and God saw Hagar and Ishmael within her. God sees you and me, too! He sees us at our best and He sees us at our worst. God sees what we are facing and what we need. God sees how hard we are trying to be faithful and to please Him. God sees how overwhelmed you are caring for your children, your spouse, your parents. God sees the challenges you are facing at work or school or in your marriage. God sees how hard it is to live on your income. God sees when loneliness eats away at you. God sees, cares, and is with us and will help us.
Slide 49 … When God sees us in the hard place, His Will is usually not for us to run and hide from the difficulty. His Will is usually for us to stay and allow Him to mold us through the hard times.

Slide 50 … He told Hagar to go back and submit to her mistress. God enabled Hagar to do the hard thing, and He will do the same for us. God sees and is with us always.

Slide 50 … Lesson #5 (last one) – It is best to wait upon the Lord.

Slide 51 … Scripture encourages us to wait upon the Lord.
- Psalm 33:20
- Psalm 27:14
- Isaiah 40:31
Slide 52 … But waiting is hard to do.
- We like things to be fast.
- We like fast food and to be in the fast lane.
- We want instant downloads or overnight delivery.
Slide 53 … Why fast things? Because life is short and we don’t like to “waste” time waiting.
- But it is usually in waiting that God does His best work in us.
Slide 54 … Second only to suffering, waiting may be the greatest teacher and trainer in godliness, maturity, and genuine spirituality most of us will even encounter. Waiting can confront our fears, weaknesses, and force our faith to grow.
Slide 55 … When we are forced to wait, the Lord helps us acquire an appreciation for the blessing to come. Meanwhile, while we wait, God builds our maturity so that when the fulfillment comes, we are prepared to enjoy His blessing to the fullest.
Slide 56 … Review of all the lessons.
Slide 57 … We must never try to get ahead of God – we must wait in absolute trust. We must wait on the God who hears and sees us. This is the only way to experience all that God has planned for us.
Slide 58 … While the details of each believer’s life are different – careers, incomes, skills, abilities, talents, hobbies, backgrounds, etc. … the “big” things are all the same.
Slide 59
- Salvation through Jesus Christ
- Fulfilling the Great Commission
- Building His Church
- Equipping, Empowering, and Encouraging Believers