Taking Matters into Your Own Hands?

Genesis 16:1-16

Have you begun to recognize a pattern in the story of Genesis, and especially in the life of Abram? We have seen a pattern where the Lord gives His promises, His people are tested and they struggle to trust and obey God’s word, and yet the Lord remains faithful to His word.

This pattern—the pattern of God’s promise; the test of faith and man’s struggle; and God’s faithfulness to preserve His people and His work—repeats in the story of Abraham.

In Genesis 12 God called Abram and made remarkable promises to him. Abram responded in faithful obedience, but he also struggled to walk consistently. After Abram arrived in Canaan, a famine overtook the land. Abram went down into Egypt. There, out of fear, he took matters into his own hands, and lied concerning his relationship to his wife Sarai. Disaster struck when Pharoah took Sarai into his harem. Though Abram appeared to be faithless in Egypt, God remained faithful, rescuing Abram and Sarai. Abram returned to the land of Canaan as a faithful worshiper and pilgrim.

In Genesis 13-14 Abram seemed to pass the tests of faith with flying colors, but Abram’s nephew, Lot did not. When things got difficult, he appeared to lose sight of the promises and purpose of God, going the way of the world, moving to the wicked city of Sodom. The results were disastrous, and yet God was faithful to preserve him.

In Genesis 15 God reiterated His promises to Abram of numerous decedents and possession of the land. Though Abram struggled with how God would fulfill these promises, Abram “believed in the Lord and He [God] accounted it to him for righteousness” (Gen. 15:6). Abram was justified by faith in the Lord and His promised Son. Then the LORD ratified His promises with a covenant. God appeared as fire and smoke and even foretold the future to Abram.

You might think that these events would render Abram immune to faithlessness. Now he would walk in perpetual faithful obedience. But what do we find next in the story? In Genesis 16 Abram and Sarai take matters into their own hands to try to produce the promised son. Abram’s once faithful obedience is reduced to faithless pragmatism. Again, the results are disastrous. “Here we have the multiplication of rejection, anger, hurt, jealousy, and vicious cruelty” (Kent Hughes, Genesis, Crossway p. 237). Despite this, again the Lord is merciful and kind. God is faithful to preserve His people and to fulfill His promises despite their faithlessness.

Get used to seeing this pattern. You see it again and again throughout the scriptures. God promises; a test comes and His people are tempted to disbelieve and to go their own way; but God is faithful—He keeps His promises even when people fail. Paul writes to Timothy, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself.” (2 Tim. 2:13).

Watch for how this truth is presented as I read our text, Genesis 16:

¹ Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. And she had an Egyptian maidservant whose name was Hagar. ²So Sarai said to Abram, “See now, the Lord has restrained me from bearing children. Please, go in to my maid; perhaps I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram heeded the voice of Sarai. ³Then Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar her maid, the Egyptian, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan. ⁴So he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress became despised in her eyes.

⁵Then Sarai said to Abram, “My wrong be upon you! I gave my maid into your embrace; and when she saw that she had conceived, I became despised in her eyes. The Lord judge between you and me.”

⁶So Abram said to Sarai, “Indeed your maid is in your hand; do to her as you please.” And when Sarai dealt harshly with her, she fled from her presence.

⁷Now the Angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. ⁸And He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from, and where are you going?”

She said, “I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.”

⁹The Angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hand.” ¹⁰Then the Angel of the Lord said to her, “I will multiply your descendants exceedingly, so that they shall not be counted for multitude.” ¹¹And the Angel of the Lord said to her:

“Behold, you are with child,
And you shall bear a son.
You shall call his name Ishmael,
Because the Lord has heard your affliction.
¹²He shall be a wild man;
His hand shall be against every man,
And every man’s hand against him.
And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”

¹³Then she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, “Have I also here seen Him who sees me?” ¹⁴Therefore the well was called Beer Lahai Roi; observe, it is between Kadesh and Bered.

¹⁵So Hagar bore Abram a son; and Abram named his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael. ¹⁶Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram.

I want to point out three things in this chapter: 1) though Abram and Sarai had faith, they sometimes struggled in their faith; 2) the disastrous results of taking matters into their own hands; 3) the tenderness faithfulness of God.

1. Believers sometimes struggle in their faith

First of all, notice that though Abram and Sarai had true faith, they sometimes struggled with their circumstances. The New Testament book of Hebrews shows Abraham and Sarah to be paradigms of faith; models to be imitated. But they were far from perfect. Though their faith was true, it was not without flaw. Abram and Sarai struggled in their circumstances.

Genesis 16:1 relates the situation that tested their faith. There we read, “Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children” (Gen. 16:1a). This was a big problem for them. After all the lofty experiences of his visions and promises from God, this was the heartbreaking fact Abram and Sarai lived with. God’s promises concerning numerous descendants and a great nation who would possess the land of Canaan all hinged upon Abram having a son. The LORD made it clear that Abram’s heir would be a son from his own body (Gen. 15:4). Still, they had no son.

In Abram and Sarai’s day, there was strong cultural pressure to have children, especially sons. Sons guaranteed that your family name would be carried on. Sons showed that you were prosperous and blessed. To be childless was a mark of reproach. In Abram’s case, the pressure to have a son was increased by two factors. The first was his name, which meant, “exalted father.” Can you imagine how Abram felt when people asked his name? He would reply “Abram.” They might have asked, “Oh, how many children do you have?” When he had to answer, “none,” do you think people snickered and shook their heads? The second reason Abram felt pressure to have a son was God’s repeated promise to give him a son. God had promised. Still, they had no son.

Can you sympathize with Sarai here? Surely, she believed in the promises of God and longed to see them fulfilled. The Lord said that Abram would have a son, but with the passing of time she began to doubt whether the Lord was able to bring life from her dead womb. Here we see Sarai’s faith struggle. Abram is at least 85 now and Sarai 75. Even with their longer lifespans, they were getting close to that age when it becomes physically impossible to reproduce. If God was going to come through, it seemed that it had to be soon.

The passing of time between God’s promise and fulfillment can tempt us to struggle with faith also. God has not promised any of us that we will be married, have children, be prosperous, healthy or wealthy—God gave Abram promises like this, but those were for him, not for us. But God has promised us forgiveness of sins and everlasting life. He promised never to leave us nor forsake us. He has promised to finish the work that He began in us. He has promised to hear our prayers and answer. He promised to indwell and empower us by His Holy Spirit. He promised that Christ would return and reign forever. He has promised us an inheritance with Jesus Christ in heaven.

We believe God regarding His promises. We long to see them all fulfilled. Nevertheless, when God delays in His response, when circumstances seem to prevent it, we also can have a faith struggle. The evil one can sometimes use these unanswered prayers and delayed fulfillments to sow seeds of doubt. And if we are not careful to tend to the garden of our life, we can be overrun by the weeds of discontentment and anxiety.

When circumstances are against us and God’s promises seem delayed, when we struggle in our faith, what do we do? Here is where Abram and Sarai give us a method to avoid. Don’t do what they did. They took matters into their own hands. So we see that …

2. Believers sometimes act in the flesh

Abram and Sarai here acted according to the flesh. I conclude this because Paul comments on this in Galatians where he urges the believers to walk in faith according to the Spirit (Gal. 3:2-3) and not according to the flesh (Gal. 5:16). There Paul contrasts Hagar and Sarai and their sons:

For it is written that Abraham had two sons: the one by a bondwoman, the other by a freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born according to the flesh, and he of the freewoman through promise, (Gal. 4:22-23)

Hagar’s son was born according to the flesh. The will of sinful man produced Ishmael. Look at how it happened.

Sarai, being frustrated and discouraged by the delay of the fulfillment of the promises of God, concocted a plan. The opportunity came with her Egyptian maidservant, Hagar. Genesis 16:1 says, “And she had an Egyptian maidservant whose name was Hagar.” You will remember that when Abram acted in the flesh in Genesis 12, going down to Egypt during the famine, Pharoah had showered Abram with gifts including female servants (Gen. 12:16). That may be when they acquired Hagar. So Abram’s past compromise of going down to Egypt and trying to pawn off Sarai as his sister comes back to haunt him in a different form.

Sarai makes her proposal to Abram in Genesis 16:2, “So Sarai said to Abram, ‘See now, the Lord has restrained me from bearing children. Please, go in to my maid; perhaps I shall obtain children by her.’”

As strange as this may sound to modern ears, it apparently was not unusual at all in those days. Ancient documents reveal that when a woman could not provide her husband with a child, she could give her female slave as a wife and claim the child of this union as her own. Rachel will later give her maid to Jacob for the same purpose. The plan was not an unreasonable one. It was culturally acceptable. But there was one problem. In the beginning God established marriage as a union of one man and one woman for life. In Genesis 2:24 we read, “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh” (Gen. 2:24). Certainly, Abram and Sarai were aware of God’s design, and Sarai’s plan was a clear violation of it.

Listen, just because something is culturally or even legally acceptable doesn’t make it right for the believer. For example: abortion, adultery, same-sex marriage, and pornography are all legal but they are not moral or biblical. Sarai was wrong to do what she did, not because she was proactive, but because she violated God design for marriage when concocted her plan. Sarai was indeed free to act, but only within the bounds of God’s revealed will. This was the error that Sarai made. She assumed that the Lord needed her help, all the while ignoring His design for the marriage bond.

If Sarai was guilty of presumption, Abram was guilty of passivity. Abram was complicit in Sarai’s sin. Sarai concocted the plan, but Abram participated. Genesis 16:2 ends, “And Abram heeded the voice of Sarai.” Now that they have a plan, they carry it out (Gen. 16:3-4): “Then Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar her maid, the Egyptian, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan. ⁴So he went in to Hagar, and she conceived.” It worked! Abram is going to have a son. Everyone should be happy right? No. It only created more problems.

Did you notice that the language used in this passage echoes that of Genesis 3 which describes the original sin of Adam and Eve? Just as Eve, thinking that she knew better than God, brought the fruit to Adam and he ate (Gen. 3:6), so too Sarai, thinking that she knew better than God, brought Hagar to Abram and urged him to lay with her (Gen. 16:2). Abram heeded the voice of Sarai (Ge. 16:2). This is also what led to Adam’s sin. In Genesis 3:17 The LORD said to Adam “… you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it.’” And of course, both times it led to disastrous consequences.

Please don’t think that I’m implying that it’s always wrong to listen to your wife. Often listening to your wife is the smartest thing a husband can do! God often gives our wives wisdom and insight which we lack. The problem isn’t listening to your wife; the problem is abdicating spiritual leadership if your wife suggests something that isn’t from the Lord.

Abram and Sarai are no longer living by faith, but according to the flesh. In his commentary on this passage, Warren Wiersbe shares four signs you are walking by faith 1) You are willing to wait on God; 2) You are concerned for the glory of God; 3) You are obeying God’s word; and 4) You have peace and joy within. Abram and Sarai failed on all four counts. They weren’t willing to wait, they weren’t concerned for God’s glory, they weren’t obeying God’s Word, and they had no peace and joy within.

That becomes evident as we read the rest of the story. Genesis 16:4 says about Hagar, “And when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress became despised in her eyes.” This means that she looked upon Sarai with a haughty, prideful look. Perhaps Hagar assumed that she would be Abram’s favorite now. Listen, if you give in to expedience, you never really get what you were after. Sarai thought she would gain a son by Hagar, who would fulfill God’s promise. Instead, she gained contempt for Hagar and conflict with Abram. Suddenly Sarai was the outsider in her own home.

So, being enraged at the arrogance of her servant, and being driven by a jealous spirit Sarai spoke to Abram, saying, “My wrong be upon you! I gave my maid into your embrace; and when she saw that she had conceived, I became despised in her eyes. The LORD judge between you and me.” (Gen. 16:5). What does Abram say to that? Genesis 16:6, “So Abram said to Sarai, ‘Indeed your maid is in your hand; do to her as you please.’”

These verses are so true to life. First a wife pressures her passive husband into a scheme to alleviate her embarrassment in the eyes of society. He goes along with things and she gets what she wanted. But it doesn’t satisfy her, so she blames him for the problems. Rather than taking responsibility at this point, Abram responds, “Do whatever you want, dear.” He was acting like a patsy, not a patriarch!

This part of the story ends with the pregnant Hagar running away: “And when Sarai dealt harshly with her, she fled from her presence” (Gen. 16:6).

What a sad story. What a mess we make of things when we choose to go our own way and to sin against the Lord. Oh that we would learn from Adam and Abram, Eve and Sarai, and choose the much better way, which is to live a life of simple faith in the LORD and obedience to God’s word.

But the rest of the story shows that even though believers are sometimes faithless and act according to the flesh …

3. God is always faithful

The third and last point of this sermon today has to do with faithfulness and mercy of our God. The LORD is patient with His people, and faithful to preserve them. Indeed, “He gathers together the outcasts of Israel. He heals the brokenhearted And binds up their wounds.” (Psalm 147:2-3).

This is so clearly demonstrated in Genesis 16:7-16. Having fled from Sarai’s harsh treatment, Hagar traveled in the wilderness toward her homeland of Egypt.

This is a very interesting and revealing text. The phrase, “Now the Angel of the Lord found her …” gives the impression that the LORD was seeking Hagar, He was pursuing her. God is a seeking God! We may think that we found Him, but the reality is, He found us. We were lost and confused, wandering away from Him. He came looking and found us! Jesus said He came “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:10). Hagar could flee from the presence of Sarai, but she couldn’t flee from the presence of the Lord.

Even when God’s people failed to live up to the covenant, God was faithful. And even though Abram had been unfaithful in his dealings with Hagar, God was faithful to her.

Genesis 16:7 is the first occurrence of the term angel in the Bible. This “Angel of the Lord” appears to be not simply a heavenly messenger, but the Lord Himself come to deal with Hagar in her time of distress. She recognized that it was God Himself who had seen her and whom she had seen, “Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, ‘Have I also here seen Him who sees me?’” (Gen. 16:13). This is a theophany, a manifestation of the LORD Himself. God showed this Egyptian slave that He cared for her by coming and meeting her Himself as she fled.

The Lord called Hagar by name and said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from, and where are you going?” (Gen. 16:8). The LORD wanted Hagar to think about two things: Where have you come from? and, Where are you going? Those are good questions to ask yourself when you’re in a difficult situation: Where have you come from? Did God allow that trial for some reason? Where are you going? Did you seek His permission to run? Our real need in a bad situation is not to escape, but to seek and to submit to the Lord.

The Lord is dealing with Hagar’s prideful heart. He calls her to repentance. The LORD’s message to Hagar included both command and a promise. First the Lord commanded her, “Return to your mistress, and submit yourself under her hand” (Gen. 16:9). Truly, the Lord is merciful and kind. He sees the affliction of this people. He pursues us even in our sin, and He calls us to repent, to return, even when it is hard.

Then He encourages her with His promises:

¹⁰ Then the Angel of the LORD said to her, “I will multiply your descendants exceedingly, so that they shall not be counted for multitude.” ¹¹ And the Angel of the LORD said to her: “Behold, you are with child, And you shall bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, Because the LORD has heard your affliction. ¹² He shall be a wild man; His hand shall be against every man, And every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.” (Gen. 16:10-12).

Hagar responds to the LORD’s message to her by faith. Genesis 16:13 says, “Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, ‘Have I also here seen Him who sees me?’” She has met the living Lord and now she obeys Him. She returns to Abram and Sarai. Genesis 16:15 says, “So Hagar bore Abram a son; and Abram named his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael.” Ishmael means “God has heard.” These names are her statement of faith.

One lesson we should surely learn from Genesis 16 is that when circumstances seem to be against us, when we feel like God has forgotten us and that He isn’t hearing our prayers, God wants us to submit in faith to Him, not resort to our own human schemes. We need to go back and put ourselves under the authority God has ordained for our benefit. If you’re a teenager, you need to submit to your parents. If you’re married, you need to commit yourself to your partner, in spite of the difficulties. If you’re hopping from church to church, disgruntled with each one because of the impossible people who have wronged you, you need to commit yourself to a church where Christ is honored and His Word is preached. Stick it out and work through the problems in a spirit of submission to the leadership God has placed in that church, even though they aren’t perfect.

At the end of Genesis 16 after all these attempts on the part of Abram and Sarai and Hagar to work out their situation, that with regard to the fulfillment of the promises of the covenant, Abram is right back where he started from. He has not taken one step forward towards the fulfillment of God’s promises towards him since the beginning of the chapter. Many troubles, many sorrows, but not one step forward in the progress of redemption because God will fulfill His word in His own way. He will not fulfill His word in our way.

There is both warning and hope combined in this story. Detours do not mean dead ends. God sees and God hears. Those who wait on Him will never be disappointed. The Lord was kind to Sarai and Abram and Hagar despite their sin. He would fulfill the promises that He made to them. But it would happen according to God’s plan, not human scheming. “He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it” (1 Thess. 5:24).