Hagar, Ishmael, And God's Promise To Abraham
Genesis 15 - Genesis 17
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Hagar meets the Angel of the Lord in the wilderness.
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 BRAM WAS NOW growing old. Although he had great riches and many servants, yet he had no children. One night while he lay asleep in his tent-home, God appeared to him in a vision. "Do not be afraid," God told him, "for I will protect you, and will give you a great reward because you are faithful."
"What will you give me for a reward ?" Abram asked. And God answered that some day Abram should have a son. Then, at God's bidding, Abram rose up and went outside his tent door and looked up at the starlit heavens. "The children of your family," God told Abram, "shall some day be as many as the stars-so many that no one can count them." Abram understood by this that God was speaking of the people who should some day possess Canaan's land, for they should be Abram's descendants. And he believed in the Lord, although he could not see even the beginning of that great family of promise.
God also caused Abram to understand that there would be a time when the children of his family should become slaves in a strange land, and should dwell there for four hundred years. After that they should again return to Canaan, and possess the land for their own. We shall see in later stories how this came to pass.
We remember that at one time Abram and his household journeyed into Egypt, during a famine in the land of Canaan. When they returned to Canaan they brought with them an Egyptian servant-girl named Hagar. They taught Hagar to know about the true God and to listen if he should speak to her. And they expected her to work faith-fully for them, a.s good servants should.
One day Hagar did not please her mistress, Sarai. This was wrong, and Sarai punished her severely. Hagar became very unhappy, until finally she decided to run away.
Now, running away is never an easy thing to do, and as Hagar hastened along the sandy, desert road she grew very tired. So she stopped to rest by a fountain of water along the roadside. In this lonely place, in the deep wilderness, some one found her. It was an angel of the Lord.
"Hagar, Sarai's maid, where did you come from? and where are you going?" the angel inquired.
"I am fleeing from my mistress," Hagar replied, "because I am unhappy."
"Return again," the angel said, "and try to please Sarai. After a while God will give you a little son. He shall grow up to be a strong man, and he shall be called Ishmael."
Hagar knew it was a messenger from God who spoke to her. And she knew now that she could never run away from God, because he had seen her all the while. So she obeyed the angel's word and returned again to her mistress. Afterward that fountain of water in the wilderness where the angel found her was called Beerlahairoi, a word w means, "A well of the Living One who sees me."
So after Hagar returned to Sarai's tent-home, God gave her the child he had promised. Abram named him Ishmael, which means, "God hears." And Hagar remembered that this was the name by which the angel had said the child should be called. Abram loved Ishmael; but Ishmael was not the child that God had promised to give to him. We shall learn more about Hagar and Ishmael by and by.
The years passed on until Abram was nearly one hundred years old. Then God spoke to him again. Abram fell on his face and listened. God said, "I will make a covenant with you." Now, a covenant is a promise between two persons, each one agreeing to do something for the other. In this covenant God promised to give Abram a son and Abram promised to serve God faithfully. Then God said, "Your name shall no more be called Abram, but Abraham, which means, 'The father of many,' and your wife, Sarai, shall be called 'Sarah,' which means, 'Princess.'"
Next Story:
Abraham Gets Strange Visitors
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Lot's Choice, And How It Brought Trouble
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