Genesis Part 030
No doubt Sarai longed for the fulfillment of God’s promise, just as Abram did. But with no fulfillment in sight, Sarai began to consider other options . . .
Didn’t God promise Abram a son without limiting Himself to providing the son through Sarai? Perhaps the promised son would come through Hagar. Besides, if it was not God’s will, wouldn’t He simply close up Hagar’s womb? This is how our human brains reason. Impatience produced the “solution” to the problem: Abram should go into Hagar and father children by her. Abram offered no resistance to the idea, seeming to suggest that he, too, found the reasoning compelling.
This might strike us today as a very strange way to attempt to solve the problem. There is, however, more than meets the eye here—a cultural factor that would have provided a rationalization for Abram and Sarai. Dr. Eugene Merrill explains in his book Kingdom of Priests: A History of Old Testament Israel: “Certain peculiar actions of Abram and his wife in Genesis 15 and 16 require some attention to ancient Near Eastern custom and law, especially a few Hurrian practices attested in the Nuzi tablets [documents from northern Mesopotamia of the patriarchal age] . . . [An] example is Sarai’s barrenness and the steps she took to ensure offspring despite it (Genesis 16:1-6). She simply offered her slave girl Hagar to Abram as a surrogate mother, and the child of that union, Ishmael, came to be regarded as the son of Abram and Sarai. This . . . is paralleled by Nuzi texts which describe the same remedy for a similar situation” (1987, pp. 38-39).”
In Genesis 16:6 it’s clear Hagar didn’t ask for this situation. She is simply a servant being forced into a bad situation. The name Hagar means “flight” and here we see that Hagar flees after being treated harshly from Sarai. In verse 10 God gives Hagar a divine prophecy of her son and his descendants. He then tells Hagar to name her son “Ishmael” meaning “God will hear.”
Who would the descendants of Ishmael become? From the UCG study aid “The Middle East in Bible Prophecy,” it states: “This description of Hagar's descendants is significant because many of today's Arabs are Ishmaelites—descendants of this same Ishmael, whose father was Abraham. Muhammad, the founder and prophet of Islam, was descended from Kedar, one of the 12 sons of Ishmael (Ismail in Arabic). Today 22 nations in the Middle East and North Africa are Arabic nations, most of whose people are adherents of Islam. An additional 35 countries are members of the Islamic Conference, most of them with Islamic governments, but whose people are of different descent.”
“Ishmael would ultimately become the father of many of the Arab peoples so that, even today, we still live with the tragic results of Sarai’s solution—i.e., major facets of the perpetual Middle East conflict.”
The lesson ought to be obvious. What would have happened if Sarai and Abram had simply waited for God to provide the solution? Perhaps generations of strife could have been avoided. The geopolitical scene today might be very different, with the ever-present threat of war much diminished. We must learn to live with what God gives us, trusting that if He has made a promise, He will fulfill it at just the right time and in just the right way. Man cannot bring about the fulfillment of God’s promises on his own. To attempt to do so is presumptuous and inevitably leads to misery. But to patiently wait for God to act, knowing that He cannot lie, builds faith and character, and avoids what could be generations of strife.
UYA Team | uya@ucg.org
United Young Adults (UYA) primarily serves the 18–32-year age group for the United Church of God. There are three main areas of contribution to the lives of the young adults: Promoting Spiritual Growth, Developing Meaningful Relationships and Making the Most of Your Talents. The Know Your Sword series is a daily expository message introducing God’s Word from a trusted perspective.
