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.” (Genesis 16:13)
Why I love the episodes in scripture is that they are real.
When I say real. I appreciate that people don’t often make a big deal of having divine encounters that leads them to up and leave everything they know to go on some wild goose chase because some invisible entity said so. Let’s face it, that’s all that Abram was doing as far as regular people would see it. Yet we read it today as believers, because we are beneficiaries of the ‘wild goose chase’ that Abram obediently pursued.
What I mean by real then, is that one minute Abram is credited for believing God. The next minute he agrees with his wife’s assessment of the situation as far as the seed thing is concerned and consents to the alternative arrangement put to him by his wife. As a husband myself, I can certainly relate to one minute doing what your wife suggested only for later on to be blamed for the very thing you did by the very wife who told you to do it! (Love you, Authrine.)
The presence and grace of God, however, even when we make alternative arrangements is something to carefully note. Hagar doing a runner is understandable. Yet God’s grace still extends to her right in the middle of a desert. God heard her and saw her plight. God responded with a call to submission and a promise of blessing even in the alternative arrangements.
I am not at all suggesting that God blesses our mess. Neither am I reading God condoning our efforts to do things our way rather than His. What I am reading is that His grace and mercy is evident in this episode. It remains sad that what Hagar was told would lead to one of the most contentious conflicts in the world today.
There remains hope, however, that the same God who expressed grace and mercy will extend still to those who in the midst of the conflict turn their eyes to Him. As we look, we too must submit to His ways, rather than the alternative arrangements.
For His Name’s Sake
Shalom
C. L. J. Dryden
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