27 JUNE GENESIS 16

When Flesh Tries to Fulfil Faith – God Sees the Afflicted

Genesis 16 reveals the tension between faith in God's promise and the temptation to bring it about by human means. Ten years had passed since the Lord promised Abram a son, and Sarai remained barren. Instead of waiting for God’s timing, Sarai proposed a culturally acceptable but spiritually flawed solution.

Genesis 16:1–2 (NIV) "Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; so she said to Abram, ‘The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.’ Abram agreed to what Sarai said." This decision was rooted in despair, not divine direction. Sarai acknowledged the Lord’s sovereignty but tried to take the outcome into her own hands. Abram, rather than consulting God, acquiesced. The result was inevitable: relational fracture and spiritual complication.

Genesis 16:4–6 (NIV) "He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. Then Sarai said to Abram, ‘You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my slave in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me.’ Abram replied, ‘Your slave is in your hands. Do with her whatever you think best.’ Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her." Hagar, now pregnant and mistreated, fled into the wilderness, alone, vulnerable, and likely feeling forgotten. But then the narrative shifts dramatically. God appears not to the patriarch or matriarch, but to a runaway slave.

Genesis 16:7–8 (NIV) "The angel of the Lord found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur. And He said, ‘Hagar, slave of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?’ ‘I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,’ she answered." This is the first appearance of "the angel of the Lord" in Scripture, widely understood as a theophany (a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ). God calls Hagar by name, honours her humanity, and engages her in conversation.

Genesis 16:9–10 (NIV) "Then the angel of the Lord told her, ‘Go back to your mistress and submit to her.’ The angel added, ‘I will increase your descendants so much that they will be too numerous to count.’" The Lord did not condone Sarai’s actions, but He called Hagar back into divine purpose. He gave her a promise, an echo of the very language given to Abram.

Genesis 16:11–12 (NIV) "The angel of the Lord also said to her: ‘You are now pregnant and you will give birth to a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard of your misery. He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.’" The name Ishmael means “God hears.” This was not just about the child, but about Hagar’s suffering. God had seen her affliction and responded with compassion and legacy. Overwhelmed by the encounter, Hagar gave God a new name:

Genesis 16:13 (NIV)"She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: ‘You are the God who sees me,’ for she said, ‘I have now seen the One who sees me.’" This is the only place in Scripture where a human gives God a name: El Roi – The God Who Sees Me. In her lowest moment, God met her with the assurance that she was not invisible. Hagar obeyed and returned, bearing Abram’s first son. Genesis 16:15–16 (NIV) "So Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram gave the name Ishmael to the son she had borne. Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore him Ishmael."

Genesis 16 ends not with resolution, but with realism. Ishmael is born, but the promise of Isaac remains. Human attempts to fulfil divine promises bring complexity, but God’s faithfulness is never derailed.