Genesis 16.13-16-Hagar's Response to the Lord's Promises
Sunday January 15, 2006
Genesis: Genesis 16:13-16-Hagar’s Response to the Lord’s Promises
Lesson # 82
Please turn in your Bibles to Genesis 16:1.
On Tuesday we studied Genesis 16:1-6, which records that against the will of the Lord, Abram agreed to his wife, Sarai’s scheme to have him sleep with her Egyptian maid, Hagar in order to have a child since Sarai was barren and now in menopause.
In this passage, we see Hagar fleeing from the presence of Sarai.
On Wednesday evening we studied Genesis 16:7-8, which records Hagar’s encounter with the preincarnate Christ.
Then, on Thursday evening we studied Genesis 16:9-12, which records the Lord’s gracious promises to Hagar.
This morning we will study Genesis 16:13-16, which records Hagar’s response to the Lord’s gracious, promises.
Genesis 16:1, “Now Sarai, Abram's wife had borne him no children, and she had an Egyptian maid whose name was Hagar.”
Genesis 16:2, “So Sarai said to Abram, ‘Now behold, the LORD has prevented me from bearing children. Please go in to my maid; perhaps I will obtain children through her.’ And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai.”
Genesis 16:3, “After Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Abram's wife Sarai took Hagar the Egyptian, her maid, and gave her to her husband Abram as his wife.”
Genesis 16:4, “He went in to Hagar, and she conceived; and when she (Hagar) saw that she had conceived, her mistress (Sarai) was despised in her (Hagar’s) sight.”
Genesis 16:5, “And Sarai said to Abram, ‘May the wrong done me be upon you. I gave my maid into your arms, but when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her sight. May the LORD judge between you and me.’”
Genesis 16:6, “But Abram said to Sarai, ‘Behold, your maid is in your power; do to her what is good in your sight.’ So Sarai treated her (Hagar) harshly, and she fled from her presence.”
Genesis 16:7, “Now the angel of the LORD found her (Hagar) by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur.”
Genesis 16:8, “He said, ‘Hagar, Sarai's maid, where have you come from and where are you going?’ And she said, ‘I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.’”
Genesis 16:9, “Then the angel of the LORD said to her, ‘Return to your mistress, and submit yourself to her authority.’”
Genesis 16:10, “Moreover, the angel of the LORD said to her, ‘I will greatly multiply your descendants so that they will be too many to count.’”
Genesis 16:11, “The angel of the LORD said to her further, ‘Behold, you are with child, and you will bear a son; And you shall call his name Ishmael, because the LORD has given heed to your affliction.’”
Genesis 16:12, “He will be a wild donkey of a man, his hand will be against everyone, and everyone's hand will be against him; And he will live to the east of all his brothers.”
Genesis 16:13, “Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, ‘You are a God who sees’; for she said, ‘Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?’”
The fact that the “angel of the Lord” is not an angel but rather an appearance of the preincarnate Christ is confirmed in that Hagar states that she has seen God who is omniscient.
As we noted on Tuesday, this appearance of the preincarnate Christ in Genesis 16 is a “theophany” or “Christophany.”
The statement “You are a God who sees” refers to the omniscience of the Lord meaning that the Lord knows perfectly, eternally and simultaneously all that is knowable, both the actual and the possible and thus has all knowledge of every event in human and angel history.
Proverbs 5:21, “For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the LORD, and He watches all his paths.”
Proverbs 15:3, “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, watching the evil and the good.”
Hagar recognizes the Lord as the One who sees her indicating that she is now a believer like Abram and Sarai.
In human relations to be known personally by a high placed person can be a great advantage.
How much more important is it to be known by God.
Psalm 139:1, “O LORD, You have searched me and known me.”
Psalm 139:2, “You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You understand my thought from afar.”
Psalm 139:3, “You scrutinize my path and my lying down, and are intimately acquainted with all my ways.”
Psalm 139:4, “Even before there is a word on my tongue, behold, O LORD, You know it all.”
Psalm 139:5, “You have enclosed me behind and before, and laid Your hand upon me.”
Psalm 139:6, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is too high, I cannot attain to it.”
There is a great difference between acknowledging that God is omniscient and the recognition that there is a personal relationship between God and you.
Hagar’s recognition that she has a personal relationship with the Lord indicates that she has accepted Christ as Her Savior and is a believer.
The apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 8:3, “But the man who loves God is known by God.”
Hagar’s recognition is more than the acquisition of a certain knowledge about God because the Lord has touched her heart and this changed her.
Hagar has accepted by faith the Lord’s revelation of Himself.
1 John 4:16, “We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.”
The Lord revealed Himself to Hagar in order that she might love the Lord.
The teaching of the Word of God is designed to reveal who and what God is and what He has done for us and is a means to an end and not an end in itself.
Bible instruction is a means to an end and that end is to love God and to love others with God’s love.
Paul taught this principle to Timothy.
1 Timothy 1:5, “But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.”
So we see that love for the Lord has started to grow in her heart and even towards Sarai who she now shares a relationship with the Lord.
She loves the Lord and now even Sarai because the Lord first loved her.
1 John 4:19, “We love, because He first loved us.”
This means that in spite of Sarah’s unreasonable and probably cruel attitude towards her, she can now submit, because she knows her and Sarai have something in common, namely, a relationship with the Lord.
Nowhere do we see in the rest of the Bible that Hagar is bitter towards Sarai.
Genesis 16:13, “Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, ‘You are a God who sees’; for she said, ‘Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?’”
Now in Genesis 16:11 we have the Lord naming Hagar’s son “God hears” and in Genesis 16:13 we have Hagar giving a name to the Lord, “God sees.”
These two names form not only the climax to this section in Genesis but also the entire point, namely that God hears and God sees.
Hagar has received a direct revelation from the Lord about His character and nature.
She has received revelation from the Lord that He is compassionate as illustrated by the Lord naming Hagar’s son, “Ishmael,” which means, “God hears.”
God’s love is “compassionate” meaning that God intensely desires and will act to alleviate the pain and suffering of another or remove its cause (1 John 3:16-17).
1 John 3:16, “We know love by this that He laid down His life for us; and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”
1 John 3:17, “But whoever has the world's goods, and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him, how does the love of God abide in him?”
1 John 3:18, “Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth.”
Hagar has also received revelation that the Lord is omniscient as illustrated by Hagar naming the Lord, “the One who sees.”
The Lord spoke in direct revelation and Hagar responded by placing her faith in the Lord.
Then, we see Hagar giving an explanation for naming God as the One who sees, namely, she has looked at and accepted the revelation of the One who sees.
In Genesis 16:13 in the New American Standard updated version, we see a rhetorical question attributed to Hagar, namely, “Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?’” but this translation is incorrect for the following reasons.
“Have…even” is “not” an interrogative particle introducing a question but rather it is the adverb gam (sG^), which is an “emphatic” particle emphasizing Hagar’s statement, which follows and should be translated, “indeed.”
“Here” is the adverb halom, which indicates the location in which Hagar looked at the preincarnate Christ indicated in Genesis 16:7 as by “a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring of on the way to Shur.”
“I remained alive” is the verb ra’ah (har), which in the 1st person common (neither masculine or feminine) singular qal perfect form means, “I have looked and accepted the revelation of” and not “I remained alive” since never in the Old Testament does the verb mean, “to live.”
In the context of Genesis 16:13, the verb ra’ah not only means, “to look at” (the preincarnate Christ) but also “to accept (by faith) the revelation of Himself and His message to her.”
“After” is the substantive `achar (rj^a^) (akh-ar), which is used as a preposition to denote the direction in which Hagar was looking or seeing, namely, in the direction of the Lord.
Therefore, together, the qal perfect form of the verb ra’ah and the preposition `achar means, “I have looked at.”
“Seeing Him” is incorrectly translated since in the original Hebrew text we have the masculine singular qal active participle form of the verb ra’ah, which in the participle form functions as a substantive meaning, “the One who sees.”
It also serves as the direct object of the qal perfect form of the verb ra’ah that appears early in the passage meaning that participle form of the verb ra’ah receives the action of the qal perfect form of the same verb.
Therefore, Genesis 16:13 should be translated as follows:
Genesis 16:13, “Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, ‘You are a God who sees’; for she said, ‘Indeed, here in this place, I have looked at and accepted the revelation and message of the One who sees.’”
The New International Version comes closest in accurately translating this passage.
Genesis 16:13, “for she said, ‘I have now seen the One who sees me.’” NIV
Genesis 16:14, “Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered.”
“Beer” refers to a well dug close to the spring (Hebrew `ayin, “spring”) for convenience and “Lahai-roi” means, “belonging to the living one, my seeing one.”
“Kadesh” means, “holy”, and was an oasis about seventy miles southwest of the Dead Sea and is also called “Kadesh-Barnea” and was located west of Israel’s western boundary, the River of Egypt or the Wadi el-Arish, in the southwest Negev.
“Bered” was a town in the south of Palestine, near the well Lahai-roi (Beer-lahai-roi), twelve miles from Beersheba.
Genesis 16:15, “So Hagar bore Abram a son; and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael.”
Genesis 16:16, “Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to him.”
After Hagar’s encounter with the preincarnate Christ, she returned to Hebron, to Abram and Sarai and undoubtedly told them both about her experience with the Lord.
No doubt, all three resolved to live together as amicably as possible and with the help of the Lord.
When the child was born, Abram in obedience to the revelation received by Hagar from the Lord, named their son, Ishmael.