Genesis 16:1-16 | For onto Us a Donkey was Born

Introduction: A Christmas Sunday in Genesis

If you have a Bible, go ahead and grab it and turn to the book of Genesis, chapter 16. We'll be looking at the entire chapter. Sometimes during the holidays, preachers will switch to a different book. I actually think Genesis 16 is a perfect passage for a Christmas Sunday. I hope by the end of the sermon you'll be able to see why. I'll read the whole chapter for us, and then we'll pray. If you don't have a Bible, use a pew Bible in front of you. If you don't own a Bible and you're visiting us here this morning, we're very happy that you're here. Feel free to just take that Bible home with you. We'd love for you to be able to have a copy of God's Word that you can read for yourself.

Abram’s wife, Sarai, had not borne any children for him, but she owned an Egyptian slave named Hagar. Sarai said to Abram, “Since the Lord has prevented me from bearing children, go to my slave; perhaps through her I can build a family.” And Abram agreed to what Sarai said. So Abram’s wife, Sarai, took Hagar, her Egyptian slave, and gave her to her husband, Abram, as a wife for him. This happened after Abram had lived in the land of Canaan ten years. He slept with Hagar, and she became pregnant. When she saw that she was pregnant, her mistress became contemptible to her. Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for my suffering! I put my slave in your arms, and when she saw that she was pregnant, I became contemptible to her. May the Lord judge between me and you.” Abram replied to Sarai, “Here, your slave is in your power; do whatever you want with her.” Then Sarai mistreated her so much that she ran away from her. The angel of the Lord found her by a spring in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. He said, “Hagar, slave of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?”She replied, “I’m running away from my mistress Sarai.” The angel of the Lord said to her, “Go back to your mistress and submit to her authority.” The angel of the Lord said to her, “I will greatly multiply your offspring, and they will be too many to count.” The angel of the Lord said to her, “You have conceived and will have a son. You will name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard your cry of affliction. This man will be like a wild donkey. His hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand will be against him; he will settle near all his relatives.” So she named the Lord who spoke to her: “You are El-roi,” for she said, “In this place, have I actually seen the one who sees me?” That is why the well is called Beer-lahai-roi. It is between Kadesh and Bered. So Hagar gave birth to Abram’s son, and Abram named his son (whom Hagar bore) Ishmael. Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to him. — Genesis 16:1-16 (CSB)

Let's pray. We pray this morning, even as we hear from your Word, that if you don't help us, we know, Lord, that our hearts are prone to despair, darkness, even distraction. So we ask, Lord, that your light from your Word would shine into the darkness of our hearts this morning. We pray that you would do that by your grace. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

This is a weird sermon text for Christmas Sunday. But I think what we find in this passage is something different than what you may be used to hearing during the holiday season. Christmas is often focused on hope, on light, on positive feelings, and cuddling around the fireplace with your families. But what happens after Christmas? Often we find that life is dark, hopeless, that reality tends to build dread and exhaustion as opposed to positivity. And Christmas can feel like the holiday equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears, singing carols to yourself while distracting yourself from the dismal realities outside.

What we find in the Bible, when it comes to the Christmas message of hope, is something totally different. Not one that distracts ourselves from the darkness of this world, but something real. Something that's able to look at the dark realities of this life in its face. Real darkness. And just like in the actual Christmas that we celebrate, real light. So, this is the main idea for us this morning: that our plans are hopeless, and we can only hope in the promised Son. That our plans are hopeless, and that we can only hope in the promised Son. See, Moses draws out here really two things for us to focus on this morning, for us to reflect on as we head into the holidays: First, our hopeless plans. And secondly, God's hopeful promise. We'll start with point number one.

Our Hopeless Plans

Read with me from verse one:

Abram’s wife, Sarai, had not borne any children for him, but she owned an Egyptian slave named Hagar. Sarai said to Abram, “Since the Lord has prevented me from bearing children, go to my slave; perhaps through her I can build a family.” And Abram agreed to what Sarai said. — Genesis 16:1-3 (CSB)

We saw last week that Abram's been given an amazing covenant promise. God brings him outside, tells him to look up at the stars in the sky, that they would have as many children as there are stars in the sky—a countless number, an amazing promise. In chapter 16, the camera cuts to his wife, Sarai. What about her? She hasn't borne any children, and she's tired and desperate for good reason. I mean, she's lived a pretty exhausting life. I think being married to Abram is kind of like riding a rodeo bull, right, as a spouse.

For one, the last time Sarai is mentioned in Genesis is when she's told to lie to the Egyptians about being Abram's sister and then was given over to Pharaoh to be one of his wives. I'm not sure of any wife that would be in a good mood after that. Second, she's had to move her entire life to a foreign land at 65. I'm sure wives here can all recall times where your husbands have come home with crazy ideas. But none of us have had our husbands or fathers come home and tell us that God literally told them to give up everything that they had and move into the middle of nowhere, and that God was going to give them a place, a people, and power. Okay, man. We'll go.

Third, let's grant that you're Sarai and you believe in that promise that God spoke to Abram of a place, a people, and power. That promise takes work to believe in order to give up everything that you know, that you're familiar with for 65 years, and get up and go. Not only that, she's already lived 65 years of life. Sarai is already well acquainted with the pain of having to wait: 65 years, no kids; seeing peers get pregnant; seeing hopes turn into dreams that then turn reality into a nightmare. Think about how much work it would take for her heart to be willing to hope again—to hear that God is actually promising her a child, to get up and go anyway, to stoke the ashes of hope again. She does it, only to have to wait 10 years.

See, for Sarai, her biggest battle isn't something outside of her. It's what's inside of her. It's not the armies of Canaan that Abram has to get up and fight. It's the dread that creeps into her heart; the quiet that's violent and rages within her. And after 10 long years, that flame of hope is extinguished, and all that's left for her is bitterness. You see who she blames here in verse one? She blames the Lord. She says that the Lord has prevented her from bearing children. After all, when you've done all of that, when you've decided to make those difficult decisions for God, who's left to blame? God has left her in the desert of her desires for decades. And God is the one who got her hopes up, only to snuff them out with His silence. I mean, what kind of sadistic God would do that? Have you ever felt like that? Bitter? Hope tends to sour pretty quickly in the face of hardship. And Sarai had had enough of God's bitter providence.

So, she decides that she's going to do things her own way. If she can't bear her own son, the closest solution is to have someone bear a child in her place. So, she wants to have a child through her slave, Hagar. And just to be clear, that is not okay. It is not an okay thing to do. It might even feel insane to force someone to bear a child. And what I don't want to do during the sermon is excuse that. It's a bad thing. That being said, it was a practice that was pretty common in this day. It goes all the way back to Hammurabi, which is probably a name that you haven't heard since like eighth grade. Having a servant bear your child was considered an ancient form of surrogacy. You can kind of almost extend your line because at least one person is still involved in the process of bearing children. And all of that, by the way, makes it still not okay—not just because you're taking advantage of Hagar, but because you're not trusting in God's plans. Sarai tries to will her own way into a child. And Abram agrees. He says, “Okay.”

While trusting in God's plans may feel bitter, while choosing to hope and seeing those hopes drift away might grip at your heart, making your own plans doesn't make it any better. See, for Sarai, it actually makes things even worse. You see that in verse three:

So Abram’s wife, Sarai, took Hagar, her Egyptian slave, and gave her to her husband, Abram, as a wife for him. This happened after Abram had lived in the land of Canaan ten years. He slept with Hagar, and she became pregnant. When she saw that she was pregnant, her mistress became contemptible to her. — Genesis 16:3-4 (CSB)

Abram takes Hagar, gave her to her husband, and Hagar gets pregnant. And with that pregnancy doesn't come any hope at all. Actually, it comes with more trouble. Sarai becomes contemptible to Hagar. Hagar hates her. She can't stand her. And we don't know exactly why. I mean, it could be because she was just involuntarily married to her master, now has to bear his child. That alone is a tragedy. It could be because of pride, now being elevated to a status of being the mother to Abram's children, unlike Sarai. In any case, the bigger sin is still Sarai's. She's gone from viewing Hagar as a means to her own selfish ends to now as a means to her suffering. And Sarai chooses to point her finger at anyone. And now she chooses to point her finger at her own husband. That happens in verse five:

Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for my suffering! I put my slave in your arms, and when she saw that she was pregnant, I became contemptible to her. May the Lord judge between me and you.” — Genesis 16:5 (CSB)

All the venom that she has towards God now redirects towards her own husband. She says, “It’s your fault that I’m suffering. It was your job. It was your action. You slept with her.” It may have been Sarai's plans, but the verse makes clear that Sarai's plans come with Abram's approval. This very much is Abram's fault. I just want to make that absolutely clear, because not only is Abram culpable for the sin that they committed, he's also responsible for Sarai as a leader of the home. He had a responsibility to remind her of the promises of God and insist on faithfulness to Him. And Abram does nothing. He just agrees to it. He goes with her plan. And that passivity is sin.

Not only is it sin, it's not new either. This passage should remind you of Genesis 3:16, during the Fall, when God tells Eve, “Your desire will be for your husband, yet he will rule over you.” She wants to dominate him, yet he will rule over her. And what you see in this chapter is Sarai doing exactly that. Her desire is overrunning Abram here. And God, in condemning Adam in the very next verse in Genesis chapter 3, points to the fact not just that he ate the fruit, but that he “listened to his wife and ate from the tree about which God commanded him, ‘Do not eat from it’” (Genesis 3:17).

Now, God is not telling you husbands to not listen to your spouse. That's not what he's talking about. What he means is that there is a double violation happening. Just because your kid thinks that it would be fun to go swing swords in the neighborhood doesn't make it okay for you to do that. And in fact, if you go do that with your kid, I'm not faulting the seven-year-old; I'm looking at you. And this exact same thing is happening to Abram, right? Not only is he responsible and culpable for the sin that he has, he's also responsible. Sin doesn't just happen. Abram's passivity and his permission, and then his participation, places him completely at fault. He is absolutely at fault for this sin. But he's not the only one, is he?

Sarai desiring or dominating her husband is a reversal of that creation order, but it's also repeating the pattern of sin. In fact, she is rhyming with the same sin of Eve, where Eve looks at the fruit, takes it, gives it to her husband. And Sarai does the exact same thing. It's actually the same language here. Sarai takes Hagar and gives her to Abram, and they fall into sin again. And yet, despite all of the sin that's spewing around everywhere, staining all the parties involved in this story, Sarai is blind to all of it. She doesn't see her own fault. She's so tunnel-visioned on her own suffering that she can't see her own participation in it. She's so blind that she's willing to say that if she were to stand in court before God, God would condemn Abram and not her. She would be found innocent of all charges. She blamed God, and now she blames her husband. Just like Eve pointing fingers at the serpent, Sarai is willing to point her fingers at anyone other than herself.

If you and I are being completely honest, we do that all of the time, don't we? Pointing the fingers at other people. All of us have a part of us that assumes that the bad things that you and I have done aren't really that bad, and what's really wrong is what the other people said around us or what other people did around us. “Yes, I shouldn't have said that, but if you didn't say that other thing towards me, I would have gotten upset.” You don't understand exactly why we did what we did. And if we're being totally honest, if God were to come and judge all of those situations, if He actually stepped into the room and looked at us, what would He say? Surely, you and I would all have an ice bucket of reality splashed straight into our face. It's embarrassing to have to own up to our own sin. It's hard for Sarai to look at the situation and be able to say, “I caused this.” It's easier to pick up our shovel and just keep digging, to double down. And that's exactly what Sarai does. And Abram responds by throwing up his hands again. He goes, “Listen, do whatever you want.” And that's exactly what Sarai does. She treats Hagar terribly to the point where she is more willing to run into the middle of nowhere than to live with her mistress, because what Sarai ultimately wants isn't justice. She wants evil. Her bitterness in her heart is spilling out in bitterness towards everyone around her. She ultimately doesn't want what's right. She just wants to express her frustration to everyone around her. And Hagar is so mistreated, so abused, that she flees.

If you take a hard look at Sarai's quest for vengeance, it's hard not to see ourselves. Bitterness towards God spills out in bitterness towards others. Blindness to sin makes us blind towards our faults. Not only are we blind to our own faults, we're also blind to others' humanity. That's Sarai. That's all of us. And what I want us to do this morning is to empathize, to understand Sarai's pain. And while you understand and empathize with Sarai's pain, you shouldn't excuse it either. Our impatient, sinful quest to try to actualize our own plans only digs us deeper into darkness. Is that you this morning? Does hearing God's promises in light of your earthly pain fill your heart with discouragement, with bitterness? I don't want to diminish the pain and difficulty of having to bear that kind of burden for years. The true rest doesn't begin with digging our own way out of the ditch that we find ourselves in. It starts with dropping the shovel, because our plans won't land us anywhere but deeper in our sins. Our only hope that we can possibly have isn't our plans or our inner resolve, but the hope of a greater future. We need something outside of us. This brings us to point number two.

God's Hopeful Promise

Read with me from verse 7:

The angel of the Lord found her by a spring in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. He said, “Hagar, slave of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?”She replied, “I’m running away from my mistress Sarai.” — Genesis 16:7-8 (CSB)

The camera cuts to the second woman in the story, Hagar. If there's anyone in this story who has a reason to be bitter, it is her. Living your life as a slave to a family, to be given over to your owner without any agency, and now pregnant, mistreated by your mistress who forced you onto her husband. And now you're on the run for your life. Hagar finds herself in a wilderness by a spring on the way to Shur, which is towards Egypt, which is where she's from, her Egyptian heritage. And the Angel of the Lord appears. And He asks her two questions: “Where have you come from?” and “Where are you going?” Hagar only has the strength to answer the first: “I am running away from my mistress.” Because when you're as exhausted as Hagar is, she doesn't have the energy to think about question number two. She has been running her whole life, and all she knows is that she can't stay where she's been. She is so desperate for any sense of peace that she would rather waste away in the wilderness than return to the hopeless hellscape that's behind her. The reason why God asked her wasn't to hear new information. God already knows exactly who she is. That's why He calls her by name. He knows who she belongs to. He asks her so that Hagar can articulate, so she can verbalize her pain. She's saying, “I can't go back.” And the only true solution to her pain is God's promises. See that in verse 9:

The angel of the Lord said to her, “Go back to your mistress and submit to her authority.” The angel of the Lord said to her, “I will greatly multiply your offspring, and they will be too many to count.” The angel of the Lord said to her, “You have conceived and will have a son. You will name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard your cry of affliction. — Genesis 16:9-11 (CSB)

What changes, what hinges in this story for Hagar, isn't anything that she chooses to do. It's what God tells her. You see it happen three times because it's extra important: “The angel of the Lord said to her,” “The angel of the Lord said to her,” “The angel of the Lord said to her, ‘Go back to your mistress.’” In terms of circumstances, it almost sounds like God is telling her to just go back to her miserable existence. But what changes isn't Hagar's present circumstances, but her future. Not only does God promise that she would have a son, God promises that she will have so many kids. Her offspring will be too many to count. And having kids, especially in this time, is more than just a nice-to-have. For Hagar, having kids means having a future, an innumerable blessing. See, a few minutes prior, she was willing to risk death, having her entire lineage wiped off the face of this earth for the sake of getting away from where she was. And God is promising her the exact opposite of that: an amazing future with innumerable children. You see how God chooses to respond to Hagar and you and I in the midst of our suffering.

Sometimes coming to church means that you're supposed to act as though everything's good. You see Christmas lights, amazing wreaths that people put up for us. They look amazing, right? And we want to dwell on positive thoughts, good vibes where the Lord blesses us and we get to rejoice in all that the Lord has done. And that is an absolutely appropriate experience for you and I to have. But what about when things go wrong? What happens when bitterness bites, where we feel that instinct to run with no idea where to go? We cry out in our pain into the void. We see here in Genesis 16 that when you and I cry out into the darkness, God hears. He listens. In fact, that's why Ishmael is named Ishmael – because the Lord hears. A name that Hagar didn't choose for herself, but one that God chose for her, because his name is a reminder to her of all that the Lord will do for her: that the Lord has heard her cries, will grant her an incredible future. I mean, that promise that God gives her sounds familiar, doesn't it? A great multitude of offspring. It sounds almost like the exact promise that Abram gets in the midst of his darkness in the previous chapter: “Look up at the stars in the sky. Your offspring will be that numerous.” Now Hagar in her darkness receives a similar promise. She will have a multitude of offspring. And yet Ishmael is no Isaac, and he's no Abram either. The roads diverge in verse 12.

This man will be like a wild donkey. His hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand will be against him; he will settle near all his relatives. — Genesis 16:12 (CSB)

This is where the roads of Ishmael and Abram diverge. You see, Abram is promised a place, people, and power. And that power will be used to bless the nations. That's what Abram heard: “All the nations of the earth will be blessed through you.” Ishmael, however, isn't going to be a blessing. He is going to be a wild beast. The word is a literal wild donkey. He is going to be against everyone. Everyone's going to be against him. That doesn't really sound like a Christmas promise. It doesn't seem like someone who's going to carry on Abram's legacy, but his spiritual father Cain, one man against all. His power wouldn't be used to serve; it'd be used to curse those around him. And why would God tell Hagar that this is going to happen? I mean, that's just like a really weird thing to tell a mom: “Your kid's going to be a wild donkey.” Well, I think the reason why God tells Hagar that this is going to happen is because this is exactly what's going to happen. That's why God does it. Ishmael was born from sin and wasn't part of the promise that God had given Abram. Ishmael certainly provides hope for Hagar, but he can't bring hope to the rest of humanity. In other words, Hagar gets Ishmael. You and I don't get any good news from this child being born. So, what hope do we have?

The True Hope: Emmanuel

I hope that you and I get this Christmas as we read a passage like this. When you read the story of Hagar and you read the story about Ishmael being born for her, it should remind you not to hope in Ishmael, but hope in our Emmanuel. See, there's only one other name in the Bible where you see an angel of the Lord appear to a person in a desperate condition and name their child for a specific person. We see this phrasing, right? “You will name him this for the Lord will do this,” right? And that happens in Matthew chapter 1. Turn in your Bible with me to Matthew chapter 1. We'll be looking at verses 20 to 23. Keep your finger in Genesis; we'll go back there. Joseph is betrothed to Mary. He finds out that Mary's pregnant. He assumes the worst. He says that he wants to divorce her privately, not wanting to disgrace her. Everything changes in verse 20:

But after he had considered these things, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because what has been conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” — Matthew 1:20-21 (CSB)

“You are to name him Jesus.” The name means that the Lord saves because He will save His people from their sins. That is the hope of Christmas that you and I get to celebrate. Not an end of all of our problems immediately, but a God who hears our cries and recognizes our root problem, our deepest need, and provides the only solution. In fact, this promise goes all the way back. That's the way Matthew understands this promise. Look at verse 22:

Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: See, the virgin will become pregnant and give birth to a son, and they will name him Immanuel,which is translated “God is with us.” — Matthew 1:22-23 (CSB)

That bitter pain that you and I have, if we were to trace it all the way down to its roots, it's the same problem for all of us. You and I all have to deal with the bitter bite of sin. Our rebellion against a holy God has corrupted this broken world, and we are all suffering under sin's bitter reign. We are all participants in its kingdom, rebelling against the Lord of lords and the King of Kings. And all of us have cried the pain of having to live in this broken world. And all of us have participated in its evil. But the good news of the gospel is that the Lord hears (Ishmael's meaning), and the Lord saves (Jesus's meaning). And the way that He saves isn't just by hearing our pain or being a good listener, but by coming to us.

I mean, do you see the way that the angel speaks to Joseph? It says, “You will name him Jesus,” which means that the Lord saves, “because he will save his people from their sins.” The Lord saves. Name Him. The Lord saves because Jesus will save. Because Jesus is the Lord. That's the confounding truth of Christmas: that the Lord takes on flesh and dwells among us; that the Lord who hears, that the Lord who sees, is also the Lord who comes. I mean, it's no wonder that He's called Emmanuel, “God with us.” Because the good news of the gospel is that the Lord doesn't just hear you, the Lord comes to you. Jesus is the only God who steps into our darkness, who meets us in our wilderness, in our bitterness. He comforts the discouraged. He bears the punishment of sin on His shoulders on the cross, dying the death that you and I deserve for sins. He rises from the dead victorious over sin and death three days later.

The only hope that you and I could possibly have is if the true Son of Abraham brings true hope, a true light, a God who sees and saves. What we get to celebrate every single Sunday morning is that God absolutely did. Would you trust in that good news today? That God hears you in your pain, that He sees you where you are. Will you hear His Word this morning? Will you trust in this Emmanuel? Because if you do, next week will still probably look the same. Hagar's told to go back to her master. But your future will be altered forever. This promise changes everything, and it gives Hagar real hope. That's exactly what we see happen at the end of our passage. Let's go back to Genesis chapter 16. Let's finish by reading verse 13.

The God Who Sees

So she named the Lord who spoke to her: “You are El-roi,” for she said, “In this place, have I actually seen the one who sees me?” That is why the well is called Beer-lahai-roi. It is between Kadesh and Bered. So Hagar gave birth to Abram’s son, and Abram named his son (whom Hagar bore) Ishmael. Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to him. — Genesis 16:13-16 (CSB)

Hagar's entire life changed after one encounter with the divine. And what sticks with her isn't just the promise of a future. She's not dwelling on the thoughts of having lots of kids or on Ishmael being a really strong guy. She's not focused on these gifts. She's focused on the One who saw her. So she names the Lord God “the God who sees,” El-roi. Not a deaf God, not an evil God, but a seeing God. And what greater truth can you and I celebrate today than the good news that God sees us? Not with disdain, not with expectations that you need to put a smile on that face, but a God who's able to see you where you are this morning. All the pain, all the difficulty, all of the reasons for you to be hopeless, He comes to you anyway. The good news of Christmas starts at night and helps us see the brilliant light that came to us. A reason for true joy. “Let earth receive her King.”

Let's pray. Lord, we thank You for this good news of Christmas. We pray, Lord, that You would help us to hope in Christ, to hope in the Gospel, this good news that we have. We pray, Lord, that this promise of future fulfillment changes everything about the way that we live our lives today. We pray, Lord, that if anyone here doesn't know You this morning, that they would turn from their sin and trust in this hope, not in their own plans, that they will be able to rest in Christ and all that You've done for us. We thank You for dying and rising for us. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.