Or, Conflicts of Interest When Things Were Going Well
Scripture: Genesis 21:1-34
Date: July 24, 2016
Speaker: Sean Higgins
According to Solomon, there is a time to laugh. Before that he said there is a time to weep, but we could also throw in a third alternative and say that there is a time to laugh and a time to not to. A teenage boy gets it wrong in Genesis 21 and gets kicked out of the house.
We’ve been waiting ten chapters for resolution to a very personal problem that God said He would fix. And we could almost miss it. There’s more reason to take note because of the conflict that comes about rather than the joyful celebration itself. In fact, in the midst of obvious prosperity and fulfillment of promises, two kinds of conflict occur for Abraham. There is a conflict over offspring and inheritance (verses 1-21) and a conflict over land (verses 22-34). The LORD works through the conflicts to make His will known and to deliver blessings to His chosen.
Kids are a blessing from the LORD. Abraham and Sarah attempted to grab that blessing back in chapter 16 through alternative family planning. Now a son is born to them in miraculous fashion, but it leads to conflict over who will get what.
The birth of a child is usually something celebrated. The birth of this child is especially to be commemorated. This boy is the fulfillment of divine promises.
The LORD visited Sarah , and visited means that Yahweh involved Himself and enabled her to conceive a child. When God visits, He brings and/or announces and/or accomplishes good things. He told Abraham that this would happen when He visited Abraham back in Genesis 18:14. Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son . It’s a fast nine months, covered in a phrase. There is no mention of the couple’s response to her pregnancy or the growing anticipation of a growing baby in her belly twenty-five years after receiving the promise, and who knows how many years of a childless marriage.
Rather than the subjective reactions, Moses stresses the objective reality that all of it happened according to God’s Word: as he had said , as he had promised , at the time of which God had spoken to him . We can try to imagine how Abraham and Sarah were feeling. What we need to know is that God fulfills His promise.
Abraham obeyed in two ways: naming and circumcising. Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac . The LORD told Abraham to name him this when Abraham laughed in Genesis 17:19. “Isaac” (yiṣḥāq) means “he laughs,” and it is time to laugh now. Abraham also circumcized his son Isaac when he was eight days old as God commanded him . The father carried out his covenant responsibilities.
To emphasize the unlikeliness, all this happened in his old age , when he was a hundred years old , in his old age . Isaac wasn’t born when it was doubtful, he was born when it was inconceivable.
Sarah was old, too, far past the age for women to give birth. She’s the only one whose words are recorded regarding Isaac’s birth: Sarah said, “God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh over me.” Laugh (ṣāḥaq) is the key word; Isaac’s name is from this root. It won’t be that they laugh at her, an old woman with a baby, as if it’s out of place. They will laugh with her, in recognition of God’s out-of-the-ordinary blessing. ”Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children?” No one in their right mind. But this is exactly what God promised. It is a time to laugh in joy and thanks to God.
Not long afterward someone else was laughing, but it wasn’t appropriate and it led to the break up of the family.
Two or three years passed since verse 7. Isaac grew and was weaned . In other words, Sarah finished nursing him. And Abraham made a great feast , he threw a party to celebrate the health of his young boy. Children didn’t always survive through infancy, so this milestone is meaningful.
To Ishmael it was a reason for mockery. Sarah saw the son of Hagar…laughing . The banquet goes bad. The word “laughing” is a form of the name Isaac (meṣaḥēq), and a variation of Sarah’s laughter. There have been a few proposed interpretations: was Ishmael mocking, playing (rough), abusing? He was probably 15 or 16 years old depending on how long Sarah weaned Isaac. Whatever he did, it made Sarah livid.
So she said to Abraham, “Cast out this slave woman with her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not be heir with my son Isaac.” Sarah wouldn’t even use Hagar’s name, or Ishmael’s name. Ishmael’s name isn’t used anywhere in the chapter, he is always just a “son” or a “boy.” Most important to Sarah, he should not be an heir. Whatever she saw Ishmael do wasn’t as big what she did not want to see, that is, a split in the inheritance.
Abraham wasn’t happy about his wife’s counsel: the thing was very displeasing . He loved Ishmael, he didn’t want to lose his son.
Unlike Sarah’s counsel to take Hagar as a wife, Abraham probably would not have listened to her counsel to divorce Hagar now except that God told him to. God said to Abraham, “Be not displeased because of the boy and because or your slave woman. Whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for through Isaac shall your offspring be named . Abraham couldn’t have both boys. That wasn’t God’s plan. God used Sarah’s bitterness to bring about His will.
It may have been the next day, meaning that there may have been no warning for Hagar or Ishmael, that Abraham banished them from the household. On one hand, bread and a skin of water are kind. A skin of water could have been made of goatskin and hold about three gallons (Denham). On the other hand, as John Calvin wondered, what about giving them a donkey to carry more supplies? What about sending one of his servants with them to help? Did Abraham give them so little so that they would have to stay close? They wandered in the wilderness without purpose, without protection, and with very little provision.
They didn’t last long. When the water in the skin was gone, she put the child under one of the bushes. Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot, for she said, “Let me not look on the death of the child.” We don’t know why Ishmael was doing so much worse than Hagar, but he could go no further. Hagar helped him lie down under some sort of minimal shade to die.
Though she cried out loud, Ishmael must have prayed. God heard the voice of the boy and intervened. The angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and told her to get up. Then the angel reaffirmed God’s promise to keep Ishmael alive and to make him a great nation. What they needed first was water. Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water . The earth wasn’t opened, her eyes were opened to see what had been there all along.
The next couple sentences summarize at least a few years and complete God’s word to Hagar from chapter 16. Mother and son make it back to Egypt, or close to it, where Hagar was from. She found a wife for Ishmael and he matured into a fighting, bow-using, wilderness man. God not only achieved His purposes in Isaac’s birth but also in Ishmael’s life.
Like a few of the previous chapters, this second scene is more closely tied to the first scene than it may initially seem. It begins with At that time , probably referring to the time from Ishmael’s banishment to Ishmael’s bowman-ship. It’s a “meanwhile, back at the ranch” sort of reference.
But the chapter also fits together because it reveals a second conflict that comes while Abraham is doing well. It is also a conflict that results in a further progress of God’s establishment of Abraham’s chosen man.
At that time refers to Isaac’s early childhood and Ishmael’s early manhood. Abraham’s household was growing, though minus Hagar and her son. Things were going well for Abraham, so well that King Abimelech noticed and wanted to make certain that there would be no problems between them.
Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army said to Abraham, “God is with you in all that you do.” In other words, “God is blessing you, we see it. Please don’t run over us.” Now therefore swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me or with my descendants or with my posterity . “You could be here for a while, and I want a guarantee that you won’t attack me.” That’s part of the reason for bringing his General with him. Abraham agreed and the two of them made a “nonaggression” treaty.
Some time after that, even if it was a just a few days later, a conflict came up about a well that Abraham dug and that Abimelech’s men seized . Abraham didn’t want to fight about it. He just agreed not to fight with Abimelech, so he appealed to the king under the terms of their agreement.
It’s possible that Abimelech lied to Abraham, that he did know about the well, and perhaps came to sign the treaty before Abraham became aware of the problem. “Sorry, it’s too late for you to do anything about it now.” However, between the two of them, Abimelech has not been the one to deceive or make excuses. He claimed he hadn’t heard about the issue until Abraham brings it up.
Abraham gave a gift to Abimelech that Abimelech didn’t understand, so Abraham explained that it was ”a witness for me that I dug this well.” The terms were agreeable, which mean that not only did Abraham have permission to dwell in the territory, now he had a piece of it to call his own, at least sort of. The conflict led to legal clarification about land rights.
Therefore that place was called Beersheba, because there both of them swore an oath . The name “Beersheba” is a pun that could refer to “seven” or “swear.” Both Abraham and Abimelech are mentioned seven times, and there were seven sheep, so it could mean “well of seven” (or “well of oath”).
Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba and called there on the name of the LORD, the everlasting God . It may have been more than a single tree; the Greek translators understood it to be more like an orchard, and the Jerome in his Latin translation understood it to be a grove (Hamilton). Either way, it symbolizes stability in sojourning. He could put down roots here, and in recognition of that he worshipped.
El Olam means “God of eternity” or “the God of ages.” God isn’t limited by time. He is God who sees the beginning and the end, and it is a fitting title as Abraham is seeing the end of the beginning parts of the covenant offspring and covenant land come to fruition. God is God from this time forth for forevermore.
God will do laughable things according to those without faith. It seems impossible, and the things are impossible from the human perspective. There is a kind of laughter that belongs with faith, with worship, with humility when we see His word come true. We like to say laughter is war. Laugher done well is also worship.
Are you trusting God for something in His Word, for anything, that you will laugh about in amazed thankfulness in the future?
And do you realize that God clarifies His purposes and also fulfills His promises through conflicts? Blessings do not always feel like blessings in the moment. The loss of Ishmael did not feel like a blessing to Abraham, but through it God confirmed His choice. The strife between Abraham and Abimelech over the well did not feel like God’s favor to Abraham in the moment, but later he could see God’s peace in his sojourn.
There is a time to laugh, a time to not to, a time to weep, a time to wait, and a time to celebrate.