THROUGH THE BIBLE: Genesis 1..

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com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. So Genesis chapter 16, and I'll be reading from the ESV translation. Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children.

She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said to Abram, Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go into my servant. It may be that I shall obtain children. by her, and Abram listened to the voice of Sarai.

So after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar, the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram, her husband, as a wife. And he went into Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she took, or she looked with contempt on her mistress. And Sarai said to Abram, may the wrong done to me be on you. I gave my servant to you, your embrace.

And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me. But Abram said to Sarai, Behold, your servant is in your power, do to her as you please. Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her. The angel of the Lord found her by the spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur.

And he said, Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going? She said, I'm fleeing from my mistress. The angel of the Lord said to her, return to your mistress and submit to her. The angel of the Lord also said to her, I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude. And the angel of the Lord said to her, behold, you are pregnant and shall bear a son.

You shall call his name Ishmael because the Lord has listened to your affliction. He shall be a wild donkey of a man, his hand against everyone and everyone's hand against him. And he shall dwell over and against all his kinsmen. So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her. You are a God of seeing.

For she said, surely here I have seen him who looks after me. Therefore, the well was called Bel or Bir Lahayaroy. It lies between Kadesh and Bered. And Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram called the name of his son, who Hagar bore, Ishmael. Abram was 86 years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram.

This is the word of the Lord. Amen. Now, Moses, the author of Genesis, starts this chapter by reminding us once again that Abram and Sarai are still childless. Even back in chapter 11, when we're first introduced to Sarai, the first detail we know of her is that she was barren. She had no children.

And this is a big dilemma. Because God's promise to Abram that he'll be the father of a great nation and all the nations of the world will be blessed through him cannot be fulfilled if he remains fatherless. So it becomes obvious to us that divine intervention is needed. in order for this promise to be fulfilled. Abram's faith will be tested.

Now we know and all of us do know that Abram had a true saving faith because we're told one chapter earlier in chapter 15, Abram believed the Lord and he counted it to him as righteousness. But this doesn't mean that a person who has a genuine saving faith won't waver in his faith. True faith in God must always be strengthened by reminding ourselves who God is and reminding ourselves to hold to the promises or His promises. Because the enemy is always attempting to sow seeds of doubt in an attempt to cause our faith to fail. Sometimes this doubt is rooted in our uncertainties and in our own weaknesses.

Circumstances and lack of patience may cause us to overlook the promises of God and take matters into our own hands. For Abram and Sarai, this was exactly the case. Although God's promise to give them an offspring was so clear, time was passing by and they weren't getting any younger, and this plagued their minds. Sarai was desperate for a child and she wanted nothing more than to become a mother and she had all but given up the idea that she would bear a child in her old age. being aware of the ancient New Eastern custom and the laws pertaining to slave women bearing children, Sarai contrived a plan involving Hagar, the slave woman she'd brought back with her from Egypt.

You see, if Hagar was to bear a child, the child born to her would legally be the child of her mistress. In this case, that child would be Sarai's child. So the text tells us that Sarai proposed a plan. And she proposed that plan to Abram, her husband. And this was not unusual because in a few chapters time, we'll see that Rachel also does the same thing with her husband, Jacob.

But how about Abram? Was he okay with all of this? One would expect after reading chapter 15, that this man of faith would make a stance, right? He'd make a stance and he'd say lovingly, he'd exhort his wife and encourage her to remain resolute and patient, trusting in the Lord and His promises. Surely by now Abram had learnt to trust in the Lord who created the heavens and the earth and who had guided him faithfully throughout his journey from the land of Ur.

Surely he would trust God to provide the offspring. He knew that God was able to fulfil And he knew that even if it meant by way of miracle, God was able to give him an offspring through his wife. But the narrative tells us, Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. In a lapse of judgment, maybe, or what I think is simply a blatant lack of faith, Abram agreed to the terms set by Sarai. And as a result, Hagar bore to him a child.

Beloved compromise set in. And both Abram and Sarai were, they allowed their own infallible wisdom to become a substitute for the faithful promise of God. From experience, we all know that whenever we too rely on our own understanding, the results, well, the results are never good. Now to be clear, some have suggested that Sarai was acting in faith. They would say, that God promised Abram an offspring from his own loins, and no text up until this point suggests or asserts the offspring must come from Sarai.

Some would say Sarai conceded that her child-bearing days were now behind her so she acted in order to fulfil the promise of God. But either way, the context allows us to determine that her actions and that of Abram were not consistent with faith. Firstly, God never told Abram that he was to marry another. Not at all. God knew Sarai was his wife, and he promised an offspring, and that offspring would obviously come through his wife, Sarai.

Back in chapter 12, the plague that afflicted the Pharaoh of Egypt and his household was on the account of Sarai, we're told. It should have been clear that God was preserving her for the promised offspring. It should have been clear. but also by virtue of the blame game that occurs in the next few verses that we read in the text that we read this morning, makes clear that Sahara's intentions were far from pure. They were rather selfish.

And lastly, and more telling, I think, is the language used by Moses, the author of this book. I believe the words in verse 2, Abram listened to the voice of Sarai, are meant to take our attention back to Genesis chapter 3. You see, in verse 17 of Genesis chapter 3, the exact same Hebrew words are used. Speaking to Adam, God says, because you have listened to the voice of your wife, you can see the similarity there, and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, you shall not eat of it. Cursed is the ground because of you.

Negative consequences followed Adam, of course, and the same will be for Abram. Now that's not to say that men should never listen to their wives. Of course, much wisdom can come from that. But these were negative suggestions and they were not consistent with the true faith. Abram or Adam listened to his wife Eve and her sinful suggestion to eat of the fruit and what happened?

All of humanity was plunged into sin. Abram too listened to Sarai in our passage this morning and the result was the birth of a people who will always be in enmity with the people of promise. Ishmael would be an enemy of Isaac. History supports the fact Beloved, one thing is clear, Abram and Sarai weren't meant to take matters into their own hands. They simply needed to trust in the Lord and rely on Him to work out His promises in His good time, not theirs.

What they did was a lack of faith. Now, as with any sin, there are always consequences. The now proud Hagar began to treat Sarai with contempt. You see, her position had gone from being a slave to Sarai to being Abram's wife, bearing his own son. She had more value now.

And this was all too much for Sarai to handle. It seems jealousy overtook her and the blame game began. Now to be clear, Sarai encouraged Abram to take Hagar, so she ought to take full responsibility for this horrible plan, right? But she's right in a way. To blame Abram, she was correct.

Because Abram is the head of his household. Not only should he have trusted God, but he also should have had his wife's best intentions in mind. But he didn't. Even under pressure from Sarai, he could have said, no. No one forces anyone else to sin.

It's an active choice on our own behalf. So what does Abram do? How does he respond to the suffering of his wife? Well, he doesn't make matters better, that's for sure. He refuses to assume headship and take control by resolving the hostility between the women.

Instead, he decides to take a weak, neutral position, not wishing to get involved in the conflict. And he says to Sarai, do as you please. by implication, negating his obligations to protect the woman who bears his child. As a result, Hagar goes from being valued back to being treated once again as a slave woman, but this time under the harsh rule of Sarai. The mistreatment was so bad that she had no option but to run away.

So she begins her journey south, probably heading back down to her home in Egypt. But the angel of the Lord heard Hagar's affliction, and the angel of the Lord here is most likely, and is, the second member of the Trinity, the Son of God himself. He tells her three things. First, she is to return to Sarai and submit to her. You see, the only place on earth where the true God is worshipped is with Abram and Sarai.

Second, he says that she'll bear a child and she's to call him Ishmael and his descendants will be great, great in number. And the third thing that he says to Sarai is that her child will be a wild and rebellious man having many enemies. See, as difficult as it is for Sarai to think about returning back, sorry, for Hagar to think about returning to Sarai due to the harsh treatment that she was subjected to, she trusts God and she obeys. She sets back to Abram and Sarai as the Lord had commanded. In Abram's 86th year, she bears him a son and they call him Ishmael.

Now many years later in the New Testament, the Apostle Paul writes to the Galatian Christians. He makes a comparison between Hagar, the slave woman, and Sarai, the free woman. Now this picture won't become really clear to us until we get to chapter 21 of Genesis where Abram sets out or casts away Hagar and her son Ishmael into the wilderness. But it'll suffice to say this morning that now Paul's teaching in Galatians is teaching that Ishmael is born of a slave woman and he represents those according to the flesh. He represents the law.

Those who think they're able to achieve salvation and their own freedom by human efforts. Like Abram and Sarai, who tried by their own action and in their own efforts and wisdom to forcefully bring to fruition the promise of God. Yet Paul says that the law only makes slave children. Those remaining under the law will never be free. On the other hand, Isaac, the promised offspring to Abram and Sarai, born to Abram when his body was as good as dead, Hebrews 11 tells us, he represents grace.

Born by miraculous means to a free woman, not the result of human wisdom or human effort, but by the sovereign grace and power of God in God's perfect time, not theirs. Isaac represents the people of promise, the people of spirit, the true children of God. Those who know that they are dead in their transgressions and acknowledge that the work of their own hands can never please God. They understand that their own exertion plays no role in receiving the promises of God. but they humbly recognise that Jesus Christ alone has accomplished all things and all the work for our salvation, and he saves his people, hear this, by grace alone.

Everyone falls into one of these two categories, either slaves to sin under law, and they cannot be saved under law, or the people of grace who recognize salvation is simply of the Lord and by grace. These people receive the promises of God by coming to Christ in faith with hearts expressing the words, I think the words of the hymn writer top lady, nothing in my hand I bring simply to thy cross I cling because they recognize in him and in him alone is salvation and true freedom. Amen.