WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:09.439 So this evening we want to turn back to Genesis chapter 16. 00:00:09.439 --> 00:00:17.719 There's a very famous song, an Irving Berlin song that was made famous by Fred Astaire 00:00:17.719 --> 00:00:24.320 and Ginger Rogers, and I think also by Nat King Cole and Frank Sinatra. 00:00:24.320 --> 00:00:31.120 And laterally, for those of you who are younger, by Allied Dunbar in an advert that I think 00:00:31.120 --> 00:00:34.079 was in the 90s or so. 00:00:34.079 --> 00:00:38.960 And you know the chorus of this song, there may be trouble, I'm not going to sing it, 00:00:38.960 --> 00:00:43.640 you'll be glad to know, there may be trouble ahead, but while there's moonlight and music 00:00:43.640 --> 00:00:49.079 and love and romance, let's face the music and dance. 00:00:49.079 --> 00:01:00.280 Now it's lovely sentiments and very romantic, I'm sure, but really is that all we have. 00:01:00.280 --> 00:01:04.439 Because I don't think for many of us life is like that. 00:01:04.439 --> 00:01:11.840 It does seem certainly that there's not only trouble ahead, but there's trouble in the 00:01:11.840 --> 00:01:14.799 present for many of us. 00:01:14.799 --> 00:01:21.039 It always is to a greater or lesser degree, and of course within troubling and difficult 00:01:21.039 --> 00:01:26.560 and insecure and for many people very frightening days. 00:01:26.560 --> 00:01:33.000 Remember Bob Dylan in 1981 brought out a great album called Shot of Love, and they had a 00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:36.359 song on that called Trouble. 00:01:36.359 --> 00:01:43.799 And the chorus was trouble, trouble, trouble, nothing but trouble. 00:01:43.799 --> 00:01:49.959 And in many ways I think he was echoing the words that Job spoke in Job chapter 14 in 00:01:49.959 --> 00:01:58.120 verse 1 where he said, Man, whose born of woman is a few days and full of trouble. 00:01:58.120 --> 00:02:04.640 And I think the great reality of the Bible is, or the great truth of the Bible is it 00:02:04.640 --> 00:02:07.479 doesn't ignore reality. 00:02:07.480 --> 00:02:14.879 It faces the troubles and difficulties and the sufferings head on. 00:02:14.879 --> 00:02:22.759 And sometimes I think people think that makes the Bible depressing reading, and sometimes 00:02:22.759 --> 00:02:23.759 it is. 00:02:23.759 --> 00:02:27.680 But the great thing is that it doesn't leave trouble there. 00:02:27.680 --> 00:02:31.360 It leads us to the gospel dance and to the celebration of grace. 00:02:31.360 --> 00:02:35.520 And we must always remember that, and must always remember that where we are just now 00:02:35.520 --> 00:02:39.439 is not the end of the story or the picture. 00:02:39.439 --> 00:02:47.560 And I think that comes across very much in this account of Hagar and Sarah and Abram. 00:02:47.560 --> 00:02:52.879 And I just want to try and keep things sharp this evening and make two simple comparisons 00:02:52.879 --> 00:02:58.600 here and apply it along the way to our own lives as believers. 00:02:58.600 --> 00:03:02.080 And the first is very simple, well, they're both very simple. 00:03:02.080 --> 00:03:05.560 The first is that we mess up as believers. 00:03:05.560 --> 00:03:07.360 We mess up as believers. 00:03:07.360 --> 00:03:16.800 Now, as I unpack that through this story, I'm going to take a little aside here by just 00:03:16.800 --> 00:03:26.000 mentioning that we can mess up as believers by ignoring the hard bits of the Bible. 00:03:26.000 --> 00:03:32.060 So maybe you've read this story tonight and you think, this is just a weird story. 00:03:32.060 --> 00:03:35.759 And it's so different from 21st century living. 00:03:35.759 --> 00:03:36.759 I don't get it. 00:03:36.759 --> 00:03:37.759 I don't understand it. 00:03:37.759 --> 00:03:40.680 It's just so odd. 00:03:40.680 --> 00:03:44.920 And so you think, it's got nothing to say to me in my life today. 00:03:44.920 --> 00:03:49.960 And I think when we do that as Christians by ignoring the hard bits in the Bible, we're 00:03:49.960 --> 00:03:56.840 messing up and we're doing a great disservice to God because it's important that we do recognize 00:03:56.840 --> 00:04:04.159 that we require to work sometimes with Scripture and to dig with Scripture and to understand 00:04:04.159 --> 00:04:10.120 that God was speaking into history and into societies and into cultures and into times 00:04:10.120 --> 00:04:13.400 and generations, very different from ours. 00:04:13.400 --> 00:04:21.199 And it's our task and our privilege as well to understand these times so that we can understand 00:04:21.199 --> 00:04:24.519 what God is saying into them and therefore to us. 00:04:24.519 --> 00:04:29.000 We don't want to be like the Brits abroad, you know, where everything must be in our 00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:35.839 language and we must be able to get a full English breakfast whenever we go out to eat 00:04:35.839 --> 00:04:37.439 or whatever it is. 00:04:37.439 --> 00:04:43.479 And we don't expect to understand and recognize the culture into which we have gone. 00:04:43.479 --> 00:04:48.039 Now this is an ancient culture, ancient Near East. 00:04:48.040 --> 00:04:55.080 It was an honor and a shame culture, and God is working with people in and through that 00:04:55.080 --> 00:04:57.879 culture. 00:04:57.879 --> 00:05:09.320 And in the time of that this was happening and written, childlessness was a huge issue 00:05:09.320 --> 00:05:11.320 for families. 00:05:11.319 --> 00:05:19.159 I don't know, it still is a huge issue, but I think sometimes for different reasons, and 00:05:19.159 --> 00:05:27.319 in an honor and shame culture it was hugely significant that there were heirs and that 00:05:27.319 --> 00:05:31.399 there were children to carry the family name forward. 00:05:31.399 --> 00:05:37.519 Now the law of that time, not God's law, but the law of that time and the culture of 00:05:37.519 --> 00:05:42.000 that time allowed for slave surrogacy. 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:43.000 And that's what we have here. 00:05:43.000 --> 00:05:49.479 We have, you know, the strange story of Abram and Sarah having this promise from God that 00:05:49.479 --> 00:05:54.479 one of their own children would be their descendant and would be their heir and many children 00:05:54.479 --> 00:05:56.159 would come from that. 00:05:56.159 --> 00:05:59.599 And as they were growing older, they didn't see that happening. 00:05:59.600 --> 00:06:12.360 And so Sarah gives Abram her slave Hagar to be the surrogate mother of his child. 00:06:12.360 --> 00:06:20.760 And that was something that was allowed in that culture and that the society was very 00:06:20.760 --> 00:06:23.240 different from our society. 00:06:23.240 --> 00:06:30.840 And we must recall that that is not God's original pattern for families and for marriage, 00:06:30.840 --> 00:06:37.079 but nonetheless the Bible records what people were doing, not necessarily saying it was 00:06:37.079 --> 00:06:39.800 what God wanted them to do. 00:06:39.800 --> 00:06:44.079 So the times and the culture that this is written into is very different, this shame 00:06:44.079 --> 00:06:49.079 and honor culture where surrogacy like that was allowed. 00:06:49.079 --> 00:06:55.800 And we do need to think just a little bit about whether if Abram or Sarah or Hagar traveled 00:06:55.800 --> 00:06:59.759 to 21st century Scotland, what would they think? 00:06:59.759 --> 00:07:06.439 What would they think of our sophisticated and advanced society? 00:07:06.439 --> 00:07:14.199 I wonder if they would think we were completely crazy and brutal if they found out that, for 00:07:14.199 --> 00:07:21.759 example, 13,500 unborn children were aborted in Scotland in 2018. 00:07:21.759 --> 00:07:28.980 Which country they would ask is civilized and respects life and respects love and respects 00:07:28.980 --> 00:07:30.639 men and women. 00:07:30.639 --> 00:07:34.519 So we recognize cultures are very different. 00:07:34.519 --> 00:07:39.480 And if we ignore the hard bits, I think we're messing up as Christians and we're doing a 00:07:39.480 --> 00:07:41.599 disservice to God. 00:07:41.600 --> 00:07:47.600 So I think as we go into this story, we see that we can mess up as believers by taking 00:07:47.600 --> 00:07:49.920 things into our own hands as well. 00:07:49.920 --> 00:07:53.800 That's what we see in the early part of the story, isn't it? 00:07:53.800 --> 00:07:56.640 That God has made this great promise. 00:07:56.640 --> 00:08:05.520 And Abram and Sarah can't work out how this promise is going to be fulfilled because Sarah 00:08:05.519 --> 00:08:13.240 can't get pregnant and she isn't having a child and she's getting old. 00:08:13.240 --> 00:08:17.680 And so they take, as we've seen, they've taken matters into their own hand. 00:08:17.680 --> 00:08:23.639 But at no time in these early verses of chapter 16 do we see them consulting with God over 00:08:23.639 --> 00:08:24.639 it. 00:08:24.639 --> 00:08:31.439 Rather, they presume that they know what God has already decided and what is his mind because 00:08:31.439 --> 00:08:33.799 of the circumstances they find themselves in. 00:08:33.799 --> 00:08:38.959 And Sarah says, you know, behold, now the Lord has prevented me from bearing children 00:08:38.959 --> 00:08:43.240 go to my servant. 00:08:43.240 --> 00:08:46.319 There is a degree of impatience. 00:08:46.319 --> 00:08:52.559 There's a degree of presumption that they know what God has already decided. 00:08:52.559 --> 00:08:53.679 There's a lack of trust. 00:08:53.679 --> 00:08:55.719 They're not acting in faith. 00:08:55.719 --> 00:09:01.439 And interestingly, in the whole account between Abram and Sarah, it's very similar language 00:09:01.440 --> 00:09:10.320 to the language that's used with the account of Adam and Eve in that Sarah gives the servant 00:09:10.320 --> 00:09:16.080 girl to Abram and Abram agrees to that in the same way as what happened in the story 00:09:16.080 --> 00:09:21.160 with Adam and Eve, giving of the fruit and Adam receiving it. 00:09:21.160 --> 00:09:27.680 And in all of this, what they were doing may have been done with the very best of intentions. 00:09:27.679 --> 00:09:34.120 They may have wanted to see God's promises fulfilled, but they couldn't wait on God and 00:09:34.120 --> 00:09:41.159 they couldn't wait for God to reveal how it would happen without them taking circumstances 00:09:41.159 --> 00:09:47.719 and taking the whole situation into their own hands. 00:09:47.719 --> 00:09:53.439 Now we look at our own lives and we look at our circumstances and sometimes we think, 00:09:53.440 --> 00:10:00.280 we assume or we presume what God must be doing and what God is thinking. 00:10:00.280 --> 00:10:06.520 And maybe we sometimes imbibe the philosophy that God helps those who help themselves. 00:10:06.520 --> 00:10:08.600 It's not a biblical one. 00:10:08.600 --> 00:10:09.800 And we can be impatient. 00:10:09.800 --> 00:10:15.760 So we take matters into our own hands and we don't pray about seeking God's will and 00:10:15.760 --> 00:10:21.480 waiting on the Lord and waiting to see Him reveal His purposes for us. 00:10:21.480 --> 00:10:30.879 We can take His promises and not wait for Him to fulfill them. 00:10:30.879 --> 00:10:35.519 And especially if we consider doing something that may be culturally or legally fine for 00:10:35.519 --> 00:10:39.920 us to do, we just go ahead and do it. 00:10:39.920 --> 00:10:44.519 You know, an obvious application, maybe it would be in longing for an intimate relationship 00:10:44.519 --> 00:10:52.679 with someone in marriage that we don't wait on God for making the right choice. 00:10:52.679 --> 00:10:58.000 We make a rash choice of partner, someone that's unsuitable or someone that is not a Christian 00:10:58.000 --> 00:11:05.600 or not sympathetic to our faith and or maybe it's someone with whom we become sexually 00:11:05.600 --> 00:11:10.240 active before making any lifelong commitment to them in marriage. 00:11:10.240 --> 00:11:14.840 So it may be something like that or it may be a host of many different issues where we 00:11:14.840 --> 00:11:17.799 take matters into our own hands. 00:11:17.799 --> 00:11:18.799 We don't wait. 00:11:18.799 --> 00:11:20.240 We don't act in faith. 00:11:20.240 --> 00:11:23.240 We don't listen for His voice. 00:11:23.240 --> 00:11:30.600 And sometimes with the very best intentions, but disobedient to what God reveals in His 00:11:30.600 --> 00:11:36.519 word as His model and His will and His desire for us. 00:11:36.519 --> 00:11:40.840 And so we learn of the great danger of taking matters into our hands. 00:11:40.840 --> 00:11:41.840 We mess up. 00:11:41.840 --> 00:11:48.559 And I think sometimes when that happens, our decisions have serious and can have serious 00:11:48.559 --> 00:11:50.439 consequences. 00:11:50.439 --> 00:11:54.799 We see that here in the account with Abram and Sarah. 00:11:54.799 --> 00:12:04.240 Abram is willing to go along with this invitation from his wife and he takes Hagar to be his 00:12:04.240 --> 00:12:10.159 second wife and she conceives and gives birth to Ishmael. 00:12:10.159 --> 00:12:17.960 And his willingness to do that and Sarah's desperation to be respected and honored with 00:12:17.960 --> 00:12:21.919 an heir leads to great trouble. 00:12:21.919 --> 00:12:28.279 A break in the uniqueness and the intimacy and the sanctity of their marriage. 00:12:28.279 --> 00:12:35.480 And we see very quickly aspects of their marriage unraveling. 00:12:35.480 --> 00:12:43.559 Very soon there's jealousy between Sarah and Hagar. 00:12:43.559 --> 00:12:50.120 There's Hagar's own quickly disrespectful attitude towards Sarah. 00:12:50.120 --> 00:12:54.559 There's Abram shrinking from his responsibility when there's tension between the two women 00:12:54.559 --> 00:12:58.599 and he just says, well, you know, you do what you think is right. 00:12:58.599 --> 00:13:06.239 There's ongoing tension as Ishmael grows up, as we see in later chapters. 00:13:06.239 --> 00:13:13.039 And that affects Abram and Sarah because Abram has a great love for Ishmael, his son 00:13:13.039 --> 00:13:14.399 from Hagar. 00:13:14.399 --> 00:13:17.919 And Sarah finds that difficult to cope with. 00:13:17.919 --> 00:13:21.879 And it leads to, in many ways, to generations of troubles. 00:13:21.879 --> 00:13:22.879 We see that there. 00:13:22.879 --> 00:13:27.720 We associate with David and Bathsheba and we see lots of ways in which decisions have 00:13:27.720 --> 00:13:29.720 serious consequences. 00:13:29.720 --> 00:13:35.840 Yes, there's forgiveness and there's always forgiveness, but it doesn't preclude the 00:13:35.840 --> 00:13:39.039 consequences of our actions. 00:13:39.039 --> 00:13:46.759 And there's a great warning in this story for us as believers that there are consequences 00:13:46.759 --> 00:13:49.320 in this life for our choices. 00:13:49.320 --> 00:13:54.160 For the decisions we make, if we make them without reference to God, if we take matters 00:13:54.160 --> 00:14:03.000 into our own hands without seeking His will and without waiting on Him. 00:14:03.000 --> 00:14:09.160 And maybe more so than anything in relational decisions we make, decisions we make about 00:14:09.160 --> 00:14:14.720 who we spend time with and who we end up marrying in our lives. 00:14:14.720 --> 00:14:24.840 And that is because such decisions involve somebody else and involve somebody else intimately. 00:14:24.840 --> 00:14:30.600 But any rash decision we take without reference to God, we know can be forgiven and we know 00:14:30.600 --> 00:14:37.840 will be forgiven, but with that restoration goes a cost. 00:14:37.840 --> 00:14:40.279 So our decisions may have serious consequences. 00:14:40.279 --> 00:14:44.440 And I think at this point it's important if you're listening this evening that you're 00:14:44.440 --> 00:14:50.680 not a Christian, you're just maybe dipping your toe in the water. 00:14:50.680 --> 00:14:56.840 If you wouldn't call yourself yet a believer, it's important, I think, that you know that 00:14:56.840 --> 00:15:00.920 believers mess up, that the Bible is absolutely clear about that. 00:15:00.920 --> 00:15:06.400 You know, I hate when media and the films present Christians, either as kind of super 00:15:06.400 --> 00:15:14.080 clean cut, awfully nice and good prudes who are highly puritanical, or the other extreme 00:15:14.080 --> 00:15:21.920 raging hypocrites for whom their relationship with God seems to be just a public show, and 00:15:21.920 --> 00:15:28.840 the rest of the time they're just living a life that is not in accordance with God's 00:15:28.840 --> 00:15:30.920 will at all. 00:15:30.920 --> 00:15:37.360 But the truth is for nearly every believer, somewhat in the middle, that genuine Christians 00:15:37.360 --> 00:15:46.879 will mess up because they are sinners saved by grace, and God is doing a transforming 00:15:46.879 --> 00:15:50.000 work in their lives. 00:15:50.000 --> 00:15:53.759 A genuine Christians will be honest about their hearts and about their needs and about 00:15:53.759 --> 00:15:54.759 their weaknesses. 00:15:54.759 --> 00:16:02.360 There shouldn't be any self-righteousness in our lives, but nonetheless, we mess up. 00:16:02.360 --> 00:16:05.480 Now, that doesn't excuse people not believing. 00:16:05.480 --> 00:16:10.000 They're not saying, well, if you're a Christian, you shouldn't be messing up in your life, 00:16:10.000 --> 00:16:18.240 and I don't want anything to do with that, because there's a genuine recognition of the 00:16:18.240 --> 00:16:23.920 need for God on a daily basis, and they've recognized their need for Christ. 00:16:23.920 --> 00:16:31.680 And if you haven't done that, then maybe it's your head that's in the sand. 00:16:31.679 --> 00:16:40.000 What can I say to believers at this point that we must see that truth of believers messing 00:16:40.000 --> 00:16:45.439 up in this story here as a warning, not as an excuse. 00:16:45.439 --> 00:16:52.799 We can't take another well-known verse in society and in the world around us, which 00:16:52.799 --> 00:17:01.240 says, too air is human, which is, of course, correct, and to love is divine is also correct. 00:17:01.240 --> 00:17:09.960 But to air is human is not to be used as an excuse or as a reason not to change in our 00:17:09.960 --> 00:17:14.160 lives because in Christ we are empowered to be different. 00:17:14.160 --> 00:17:19.039 We will fail, but we are to be dependent. 00:17:19.039 --> 00:17:20.759 We don't want to fail. 00:17:20.759 --> 00:17:26.920 Our motive is to be obedient and to be loving and learning and having a changed heart that 00:17:26.920 --> 00:17:28.960 desires to do God's will. 00:17:28.960 --> 00:17:35.319 We want to seek patience to wait on Him and to follow Him and to obey Him. 00:17:35.319 --> 00:17:44.039 And we will always have that motive and seek to have that motive of not just sinning and 00:17:44.039 --> 00:17:46.200 doing wrong things so that grace may abound. 00:17:46.200 --> 00:17:50.519 We know that Paul speaks about that, speaks against that in the New Testament. 00:17:50.519 --> 00:17:59.079 Can you imagine a marriage where one partner is constantly unfaithful and continues to be 00:17:59.079 --> 00:18:05.319 unfaithful in that marriage because every time he comes back he's forgiven and accepted 00:18:05.319 --> 00:18:08.200 or she's forgiven and accepted? 00:18:08.200 --> 00:18:13.240 But that doesn't make for a healthy marriage. 00:18:13.240 --> 00:18:19.160 It makes for one that's enslaved and one where there's enabling wrong behavior that 00:18:19.160 --> 00:18:31.320 lacks respect and lacks love and lacks a good motive of passion and concern for your partner. 00:18:31.320 --> 00:18:39.160 So we need to recognize that the folly that is exposed in Scripture among those who believe 00:18:39.160 --> 00:18:45.560 is never an excuse for us to be careless about our own Christian life. 00:18:45.559 --> 00:18:51.639 So we see in this story that believers do mess up, but the second thing I want to say 00:18:51.639 --> 00:18:55.079 is that God doesn't mess up. 00:18:55.079 --> 00:19:00.079 And if that's the only thing you remember from this sermon this evening, I hope that 00:19:00.079 --> 00:19:01.519 you'll take it away with you. 00:19:01.519 --> 00:19:03.599 God doesn't mess up. 00:19:03.599 --> 00:19:10.720 He's intimately involved in this story and he works through the carnage in many ways 00:19:10.720 --> 00:19:13.319 of what is happening here. 00:19:13.319 --> 00:19:18.159 We see that he is the one who doesn't let go. 00:19:18.159 --> 00:19:25.079 He's made a covenant, this amazing covenant with Abram in the previous chapter that Thomas 00:19:25.079 --> 00:19:32.079 explained so well, so beautifully last week, that God was so committed to redeeming his 00:19:32.079 --> 00:19:38.279 people and Abram and his family and his descendants taking his right up to the work of Jesus and 00:19:38.279 --> 00:19:47.039 the cross and all of the spiritual descendants of Abram, including ourselves, who are Christians. 00:19:47.039 --> 00:19:53.200 He ultimately, he doesn't let go because he takes the consequences of making that commitment 00:19:53.200 --> 00:20:00.200 that he made in covenant, fulfilling it as we saw on the cross, where he takes our sin 00:20:00.200 --> 00:20:08.920 and he pays the price for that and is committed to returning again to bring us into the new 00:20:08.920 --> 00:20:10.799 heavens and new earth. 00:20:10.799 --> 00:20:16.840 And through that, his love will not give up on us. 00:20:16.840 --> 00:20:25.640 And his love did not give up on Abram at this point, though Abram and Sarah were untrusting 00:20:25.640 --> 00:20:27.799 and just went ahead on their own steam. 00:20:27.799 --> 00:20:32.159 We see that through this and the other events in Abram's life that God is working with 00:20:32.159 --> 00:20:39.359 him, forgiving him, training, teaching, drawing him to a place of deeper and deeper trust, 00:20:39.359 --> 00:20:46.200 right up to the penultimate act in many ways of this recorded of Abram's life, of great 00:20:46.200 --> 00:20:54.200 trust when he is willing to take that child who eventually is born to him and Sarah, the 00:20:54.200 --> 00:21:00.360 child Isaac, and he is asked to sacrifice him. 00:21:00.360 --> 00:21:10.279 And he entrusts that command to God, believing that God would provide a lamb or would raise 00:21:10.279 --> 00:21:13.400 his son back to life. 00:21:13.400 --> 00:21:17.680 So there's a maturing and a deepening and a commitment to Abram and he's not letting 00:21:17.680 --> 00:21:18.680 go. 00:21:18.680 --> 00:21:23.920 And I wonder if you or if I need to be reminded of that this evening. 00:21:23.920 --> 00:21:28.440 You know, there's a great verse in Philippians which says, Philippians 1, 6, I am sure of 00:21:28.440 --> 00:21:33.200 this that he who has begun a good work in you will bring it to completion on the day 00:21:33.200 --> 00:21:34.960 of Jesus Christ. 00:21:34.960 --> 00:21:39.840 Maybe this evening you need to be reminded of that. 00:21:39.840 --> 00:21:44.279 Maybe you're watching this evening as someone who made a profession of faith in Jesus Christ, 00:21:44.279 --> 00:21:46.279 but you've drifted away from him. 00:21:46.279 --> 00:21:49.160 You've maybe lost your first love. 00:21:49.160 --> 00:21:55.720 You assumed that God isn't interested, doesn't care, isn't true to His word, has moved on. 00:21:55.720 --> 00:21:59.840 Can I ask you to consider renewing your trust in him? 00:21:59.840 --> 00:22:07.519 Don't run away from him, because if he wasn't committed to you, if he wasn't committed never 00:22:07.519 --> 00:22:13.920 to letting go of you, he would never have gone beyond Gethsemane. 00:22:13.920 --> 00:22:16.080 He would never have made it to the cross. 00:22:16.079 --> 00:22:22.879 There's no deeper evidence of his commitment to not let go of all of those who have come 00:22:22.879 --> 00:22:25.960 to him by faith than his work in the cross. 00:22:25.960 --> 00:22:31.359 So please heed his loving warning and trust in him. 00:22:31.359 --> 00:22:38.839 Trust, especially when every atom of your being up till this point is maybe saying otherwise. 00:22:38.839 --> 00:22:43.240 And if you're in trouble or if you feel there are troubled days ahead, know that he will 00:22:43.240 --> 00:22:48.599 not let go even when we don't see and don't understand, and even when we're in the dark, 00:22:48.599 --> 00:22:54.559 he holds us and the dark for him is his light. 00:22:54.559 --> 00:22:58.440 So God doesn't mess up, he doesn't let go. 00:22:58.440 --> 00:23:01.519 He also is the God who hears our cries. 00:23:01.519 --> 00:23:06.000 And we see that very much in this, the great story with Hagar here. 00:23:06.000 --> 00:23:12.480 She is an Egyptian slave to Abraham and Sarah. 00:23:12.480 --> 00:23:18.240 She would have been generally devalued and insignificant in that society. 00:23:18.240 --> 00:23:22.599 And she then takes on the surrogate roller. 00:23:22.599 --> 00:23:26.039 I don't suppose she had much choice in it to be perfectly honest. 00:23:26.039 --> 00:23:32.960 And as she finds out she's pregnant, she becomes disdainful of her mistress, Sarah. 00:23:32.960 --> 00:23:37.920 And that leads to great tension so much so that Sarah wants her thrown out. 00:23:37.920 --> 00:23:42.880 And Abraham acquiesces to that particular request. 00:23:42.880 --> 00:23:47.519 Now when she's thrown out of her employment and her work in that home, she was kind of 00:23:47.519 --> 00:23:49.039 like a servant there. 00:23:49.039 --> 00:23:53.120 There was no furlough, there was no jobseekers allowance. 00:23:53.120 --> 00:23:56.600 She was thrown out pregnant and desitued. 00:23:56.599 --> 00:24:04.879 A slave who had no prospects whatsoever except death. 00:24:04.879 --> 00:24:09.359 And the angel of the Lord appears to her. 00:24:09.359 --> 00:24:13.359 God appears personally to her. 00:24:13.359 --> 00:24:22.119 The angel of the Lord here being synonymous with a revelation of God in the Old Testament. 00:24:22.119 --> 00:24:34.199 God appears to Hagar who has cried out in desperation to the God of Abraham and Sarah. 00:24:34.199 --> 00:24:40.759 It's a seminal moment in world history. 00:24:40.759 --> 00:24:49.399 And he makes promises to her and he tells her to call the son that she's going to have, 00:24:49.400 --> 00:24:54.640 a wish meal which means that God hears, God hears her cries. 00:24:54.640 --> 00:25:01.640 She goes on to praise God that she has seen God and she renames him. 00:25:01.640 --> 00:25:05.320 In verse 13, the God, you are a God of seeing. 00:25:05.320 --> 00:25:10.759 She calls the name of the Lord who spoke to her, you are the God of seeing. 00:25:10.759 --> 00:25:13.800 For she said, truly I have seen him who looks after me. 00:25:13.800 --> 00:25:17.600 And she knows. 00:25:17.599 --> 00:25:24.480 She's a nobody but she knows in the most remarkable way that God has personally come into her 00:25:24.480 --> 00:25:32.079 experience and she has had an audience with God, one of the few in the history of mankind. 00:25:32.079 --> 00:25:40.759 And God promises her the child and promises that she will have descendants but also asks 00:25:40.759 --> 00:25:47.199 her to go back and fulfill her responsibilities to Abraham and Sarah. 00:25:47.200 --> 00:25:49.920 She can't run from this situation. 00:25:49.920 --> 00:25:54.720 Now we don't know about the dynamics of what happened and her going back and probably was 00:25:54.720 --> 00:25:59.440 quite awkward and difficult but nonetheless she obeys and does so. 00:25:59.440 --> 00:26:01.279 He hears her cries. 00:26:01.279 --> 00:26:05.160 That is the God who doesn't mess up and that is our God. 00:26:05.160 --> 00:26:11.799 And there may be, as you listen this evening, a sense of feeling worthless that nobody really 00:26:11.799 --> 00:26:16.120 takes any interest in you or that God even doesn't. 00:26:16.119 --> 00:26:22.799 And yet this is a great picture of the living God who sees and who knows and who hears her 00:26:22.799 --> 00:26:24.519 cries. 00:26:24.519 --> 00:26:32.159 In the bleakest and darkest and most depressing situations we can find ourselves in, anyone 00:26:32.159 --> 00:26:41.959 who cries out to him, he sees and he will save as we come to him and seek for his salvation. 00:26:41.959 --> 00:26:44.439 It's intensely personal. 00:26:44.440 --> 00:26:49.240 God isn't a God who saves mankind. 00:26:49.240 --> 00:26:51.320 He saves individuals. 00:26:51.320 --> 00:26:57.640 And it's not good enough really for us just to have a general Savior who's not really 00:26:57.640 --> 00:27:01.360 very interested or very personal. 00:27:01.360 --> 00:27:08.960 The whole reality of the gospel message is that we have this intensely impersonal relationship 00:27:08.960 --> 00:27:17.559 with God who we feel is in our presence, who sees us, who we see by faith and who hears 00:27:17.559 --> 00:27:20.519 our cries. 00:27:20.519 --> 00:27:25.039 And again this evening maybe you might be in a position where you feel very far from 00:27:25.039 --> 00:27:34.720 God, cry out to him and maybe even hear him say, don't run away. 00:27:34.720 --> 00:27:38.480 Go back to the responsibilities you need to face up to. 00:27:38.480 --> 00:27:43.759 Say sorry in a situation if you need to do that, be reconciled with others but know that 00:27:43.759 --> 00:27:47.759 I am with you and know the way of healing and hope. 00:27:47.759 --> 00:27:52.759 So he hears our cries and the last thing I want to mention here is that he also reveals 00:27:52.759 --> 00:27:55.200 a bigger truth in this story. 00:27:55.200 --> 00:28:04.799 It's not only intensely personal but there's a broadening out of God's involvement to reveal 00:28:04.799 --> 00:28:11.680 that he has a wider purpose and a plan and a bigger truth being unfolded because we have 00:28:11.680 --> 00:28:17.960 the disturbing prophecy that he gives to Hagar about her son Ishmael and his descendants. 00:28:17.960 --> 00:28:24.279 Yeah, he has many descendants but he says, you know there in verse 11, hold your pregnant 00:28:24.279 --> 00:28:27.639 and you shall bear a son, you shall name Ishmael because the Lord is listening to your reflection. 00:28:27.639 --> 00:28:31.839 He should be a wild donkey of a man, his hand against everyone and everyone's hand against 00:28:31.839 --> 00:28:38.759 him and he shall dwell over against all as kinsmen and there's this reality that there's 00:28:38.759 --> 00:28:44.799 as a result of all that has happened and that has taken place and will take place, there 00:28:44.799 --> 00:28:51.839 will be an ongoing tension and ongoing hostility and division within the family and within therefore 00:28:51.839 --> 00:28:54.159 as it grows the nations. 00:28:54.159 --> 00:28:59.599 And we see that from early on in chapter 21 when Isaac is weaned and there's a great 00:28:59.599 --> 00:29:06.839 celebration when Isaac is born to Sarah and Abram and he's weaned, it's a great celebration 00:29:06.839 --> 00:29:10.439 but Ishmael makes a fool of him and mocks him. 00:29:10.439 --> 00:29:18.799 Ishmael by this stage was probably 16 or 15 or 16 years old and again Hagar and Ishmael 00:29:18.799 --> 00:29:25.599 are thrown out and as history develops we see two very different lines developing through 00:29:25.599 --> 00:29:40.000 Abram seed and Hagar seed basically Jews and Arabs and we see even to this day huge tensions 00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:47.879 between these two races nations in all its complexity. 00:29:47.879 --> 00:29:52.199 But what we see in this is also it reflects a spiritual reality. 00:29:52.200 --> 00:29:56.319 Galatians 4 speaks about that very much. 00:29:56.319 --> 00:30:01.920 It reminds us of humanity as a whole in a sense is that we have one Father, there is 00:30:01.920 --> 00:30:11.720 one God, one Father in heaven but ultimately the descendants of God who made us take two 00:30:11.720 --> 00:30:14.799 very different paths. 00:30:14.799 --> 00:30:20.840 There are those who are children, spiritual children of God who come to faith in him through 00:30:20.839 --> 00:30:26.799 Jesus Christ, the inheritance, Abraham's covenant inheritance and there's those who 00:30:26.799 --> 00:30:27.799 are not. 00:30:27.799 --> 00:30:34.079 That's the only two realities in the world and God says choose, you know, choose this 00:30:34.079 --> 00:30:45.519 day whom you will serve and we recognize that this physical picture bears a deeper spiritual 00:30:45.519 --> 00:30:59.319 reality and we see that spiritual reality transcending the two physical journeys that 00:30:59.319 --> 00:31:06.079 are taken by the sons of Abram because we know that Abram's physical seed, the Jewish 00:31:06.079 --> 00:31:14.920 people, they rejected the Savior and many Gentiles and many Arabs have become part of 00:31:14.920 --> 00:31:17.600 the spiritual family of God. 00:31:17.600 --> 00:31:23.240 In fact, Abram's, the promise given to Abram and to Isaac and to his descendants was that 00:31:23.240 --> 00:31:28.920 all nations of the world will be blessed through the seed that would come. 00:31:28.920 --> 00:31:31.120 That is the Lord Jesus Christ. 00:31:31.120 --> 00:31:33.720 And so the invitation goes out to all. 00:31:33.720 --> 00:31:42.240 It transcends national barriers and backgrounds and races and nationalities but it's still 00:31:42.240 --> 00:31:46.359 either those who follow Christ or those who don't. 00:31:46.359 --> 00:31:58.079 Every single human being belongs to one of these two sections of humanity and the invitation 00:31:58.079 --> 00:31:59.839 goes out to all. 00:31:59.839 --> 00:32:03.920 So we remember that and we remember that our Muslim friends are distant cousins who need 00:32:03.920 --> 00:32:07.759 Jesus Christ just as much as we do. 00:32:07.759 --> 00:32:12.920 So I finish just with that truth that comes through this passage and it comes through 00:32:12.920 --> 00:32:20.480 the covenant unveiled and comes through all of God's word, is that He is the God who doesn't 00:32:20.480 --> 00:32:23.839 mess up and He's the God of the impossible. 00:32:23.839 --> 00:32:30.200 You know, just like Abram and Sarah, we're prone to look at our life and even our life 00:32:30.200 --> 00:32:37.200 of faith in purely and simply rationalistic terms in our circumstances and if things aren't 00:32:37.200 --> 00:32:41.960 going according to plan then we just go ahead and make our own decisions. 00:32:41.960 --> 00:32:46.759 We help ourselves in life with a peppering of faith along the way. 00:32:46.759 --> 00:32:52.559 But all through the Bible we're asked to trust in the God, the God who is the God of the 00:32:52.559 --> 00:32:54.920 impossible. 00:32:54.920 --> 00:33:03.080 And even the fact that He allows Sarah to have child way beyond childbearing age is a 00:33:03.080 --> 00:33:05.039 testament to that. 00:33:05.039 --> 00:33:19.119 And the promise is that He impossibly takes judgment for our sin on Himself, divine judgment 00:33:19.119 --> 00:33:25.839 for our sin, divine wrath He takes on His own self, the impossible reality of salvation. 00:33:25.839 --> 00:33:33.039 And His promise is to always help us, to always be there to answer our prayers and to enable 00:33:33.039 --> 00:33:40.319 us to live the Christian life, which is impossible by faith because He is raised from the dead 00:33:40.319 --> 00:33:46.720 and He's empowered us to live in that new resurrection power, in that new life and with 00:33:46.720 --> 00:33:48.440 that great hope. 00:33:48.440 --> 00:33:56.279 So the encouragement is to trust and obey this God of the impossible and recognize that that 00:33:56.279 --> 00:34:03.599 is His stock and trade and give Him the glory for so doing. 00:34:03.599 --> 00:34:11.239 Luke 18 verse 27, Jesus says, What is impossible with men is possible with God. 00:34:11.239 --> 00:34:16.519 I mean, you take that away as you think of maybe the impossibilities you're facing this 00:34:16.519 --> 00:34:20.679 coming week, fears, doubts, struggles, battles. 00:34:20.679 --> 00:34:23.440 How can I possibly carry on as a Christian? 00:34:23.440 --> 00:34:31.920 May you cry out as hay guarded to the living God for salvation and may none of us do what 00:34:31.920 --> 00:34:36.440 Abram and Sarah did, which was to take things into their own hands. 00:34:36.440 --> 00:34:37.440 Amen. 00:34:37.440 --> 00:34:38.440 Let's pray. 00:34:38.440 --> 00:34:46.079 Father God, help us, we pray, to not take matters into our own hands without reference 00:34:46.079 --> 00:34:48.760 to you, without knowing your will. 00:34:48.760 --> 00:34:57.720 And if we don't know your will, not disobeying what we do know or not acting precipitously 00:34:57.720 --> 00:35:04.400 or presumptuously quickly without waiting to be guided by you. 00:35:04.400 --> 00:35:09.960 Help us to live out the impossible life of faith as we cry out to you for your strength 00:35:09.960 --> 00:35:18.560 and know that you take us day by day and you love us, you're committed to us so much so 00:35:18.559 --> 00:35:23.880 that you went from that garden in Gethsemane and you allowed these nails to be thrust through 00:35:23.880 --> 00:35:30.920 your hands and your feet because of your great love and commitment to us and your resurrection 00:35:30.920 --> 00:35:38.279 proves that great life and that great promise for each of us this evening. 00:35:38.280 --> 00:35:48.840 Amen.