Please open your Bible tonight to Genesis chapter 16. Genesis chapter 16, we're continuing our series in the book of Genesis. And in the chapter that we considered last time, in the previous chapter, chapter 15, that chapter contained the very important Abrahamic covenant. As you recall, God entered into a covenant with Abram. as his name was called before God changed his name to Abraham. And a key part of that covenant that God made with Abram was that Abram would have seed. He would have physical descendants that would be as numerous as the stars. But as yet, Abram had no seed and so he suggested to God that Eliezer, his servant, would and could be his heir but God responded to him in effect, no Eleazar will not be the seed that I'm talking about. The seed that I'm talking about will proceed from your own body. And yet here we come now to chapter 16 and there is still no seed. Abram and Sarai have lived in Canaan for 10 years now. Long years and still no seed. So follow along now as I read Genesis chapter 16 beginning in verse 1. Now Sarai, Abram's wife, bare him no children. And she had a handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now the Lord hath restrained me from bearing. I pray thee, go in unto my maid, that it may be that I may obtain children by her." And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai. Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar, her maid, the Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife. And he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes. And Sarai said unto Abram, My wrong be upon thee. I have given my maid into thy bosom. And when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes. The Lord judge between me and thee. But Abram said unto Sarai, Behold thy maid is in thy hand, do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dwelt hardly with her, she fled from her face." Let's pray together. Our Father, I do pray that You will help us to look into this passage of Scripture that we have here in our Bibles. to understand its meaning for us today, to understand that You have preserved this in Your Word, that we might gain insight and we might apply it. So, I pray, Lord, that You will help us as we do this study tonight. In Jesus' name, amen. I think it's fair to say that this chapter is saturated with emotion. And there is a dramatic tension here that is palpable. You can feel it. I mean, what is going to come of this poor pregnant Egyptian slave woman? What's going to happen to her? What is going to happen? What is God going to do? What are the theological implications of this situation? God's entered into a covenant with Abram. Has this messed things up? What will God do? How will He work this out? How will He bring His covenant forward in His broader plan of redemption that He has in mind through this patriarch that He's chosen, Abram? What's going to happen? Well, the key to understanding all of these questions is to look at this story actually through the eyes of Hagar. We're going to look at this story through the eyes of Hagar. And I would encourage all of us to use a little sanctified imagination this evening. Imagine that you are Hagar. You are Hagar. You are born in the house of Pharaoh. And you are born to servants in Pharaoh's house as the daughter of Egyptian servants. A life of service is all you've ever known. And somewhere along the way, as you're just going about your business, serving in the house of Pharaoh, some strangers arrive on the scene. Some strangers from some land far away on the east side of the Nile River. And the woman is exceedingly beautiful. And she catches the eyes of Pharaoh himself. And it's been told that the woman and the man are brother and sister. And so to appease the quote unquote brother, Pharaoh gives tremendous gifts to him. Camels, flocks and herds, sheep, oxen, donkeys, manservants and maidservants. And you, Hagar, are among those maidservants given to this foreigner." Well, it isn't too long that something weird starts to happen. The god of these foreigners begins to afflict the house of Pharaoh with plagues. And it is discovered that the reason he is doing this is because this woman that Pharaoh has cast his eyes upon is not this man's sister really, she is his wife. And so as soon as Pharaoh discovers this, he sends the foreigners away. And you are sent away with them. And you are now a servant of these foreigners. And you are taken away from your family, from your homeland. You are taken away from your familiar people, your familiar language. You are taken away from really everything that you know. And you become the handmaiden to this woman. And you serve her. You serve her. faithfully for many years. And you look upon your mistress and you realize that she's not getting any younger. She is now approaching 75 years old and she has not had any children. She has remained barren. And you know that that troubles your mistress. And then one day she comes to you And she has a strange look in her eyes. Something is up. She has come to you not to ask you, but to tell you that you are to serve as the surrogate mother of her children. She is going to give you as a wife to your master. But she is expecting that your children will become her children. She will claim your children as her own. Now any woman, I'll just stop here, any woman who has given birth to a child knows the intimate bond that takes place between mother and child. Our daughter, Kimberly, gave birth to her first child just a couple months ago. And we were able to show up there on the evening of the day of the birth. This newborn baby was there. And it was just such a sweet moment for us as parents to see our daughter bonding with that new life. It was precious. And so it is really just unspeakable that Sarai would make such a demand on Hagar to lay claim to Hagar's children. Well, as far as the narrative goes, Hagar doesn't say a word. She becomes Abram's wife. And unlike Sarai, she becomes pregnant right away. And this made Hagar feel empowered. She was now no longer just a handmaiden. She was now a rival. as far as her mistress was concerned. She was pregnant and Sarai was not. And so she viewed her mistress with contempt. And Sarai saw this attitude in Hagar. And it made her regret what she had done. But what she had done and what had been done could not be undone. And so she went to Abram And she dropped the problem right into his lap. And she said, my wrong be upon thee. In other words, she said to him, I now see that this was just a big mistake. Why did you go along with this? This is your problem now. Do something. Well, Abram did not do something. He really just gave it right back to Hagar and said, she's your handmaiden, you deal with her. And so she did. Sarai dealt harshly with Hagar. The Hebrew indicates that Sarai humiliated her, that's how severely she treated her. And we don't know exactly what that involved. We can well imagine that it involved at least verbal abuse. It may likely have involved physical abuse as well. And Sarai abused Hagar so severely that Hagar ran away. She ran away. And again, put yourself in this position. You are a poor, uneducated Egyptian slave girl. despised and rejected, used and abused, and you're pregnant. And now you're running away from all that you've known as far as life is concerned. And you follow your instincts and you head southward toward your homeland. But then you stop and you look around and as far as the eye can see in all directions, all you see is barren wasteland. You're all alone and you feel abandoned and you're hurting and you're scared and you're thirsty. And you realize that you need to find water soon. So you look on the horizon and you see a little cluster of trees and you know that where there are trees there must be water. So you head in that direction and you find a little oasis there. And there's a spring of water there, and it's refreshing. It's a very pleasant place for you to stop and refresh yourself. And while you're there, something truly amazing happens, truly amazing. The angel of the Lord, that is the Lord, the God of Abram and Sarai, makes himself known to you, right there in that place. Let's read about it. Look at verse 7 now. And the angel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur. And he said, Hagar, Sarai's maid, whence camest thou, and whither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai. And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands. And the angel of the Lord said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude. And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Behold, Thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael, because the Lord hath heard thy affliction. And he will be a wild man. His hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren. And she called the name of the Lord that spake unto her, Thou, God, seest me. For she said, Have I also here looked after him that seeth me? Wherefore the well was called Bir Lahai Roi. Behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered. And Hagar bare Abram a son, And Abram called his name, which Hagar bare Ishmael. And Abram was fourscore and six years old when Hagar bare Ishmael to Abram." Now is this not amazing what happens here? We serve an amazing God. God sent His angel to appear to this woman. The Lord God of Abram, the God of heaven and earth, sent His angel to a poor, uneducated, pregnant, Egyptian slave girl who was despised and rejected, used and abused, now on the run and all alone out in the wilderness. This woman was being addressed by the Lord God of heaven. It's truly amazing. And the angel tells her that God has heard her affliction. God has heard. He had taken notice of her. He genuinely cared about her. And from Hagar's perspective, God had seen her. And then she did what no one else has recorded in scripture as having done. She made up her own name for God. Thou God seest me. The Hebrew there reads Atah El Roy. You are the God who sees. The God who sees. Her name for him was the God who sees. And she named the place Beer Lahai Roy. literally translated, the well-belonging to the living one who sees. And you would capitalize living one there, a reference to God, the eternal God. That's the emphasis. The well-belonging to the eternal God who sees. And what did she do? She obeyed God. She returned to Abram and Sarai and she bore a son and Abram named him Ishmael. Ishmael's name literally means God who hears. He's the God who hears too. And so the name Ishmael would forever be a reminder to Hagar and to anyone else who would hear the story that she had had an encounter with the God who hears. If you were to read along in the Hebrew in the original text of the Old Testament and you would come to verse 13, you would see that the end of verse 13 is a very difficult portion to translate into the English. That explains why there are variations in translations among the English translations. If I were to make my best attempt at rendering this literally from the Hebrew, it would read this way. This is what Hagar is saying. Is it indeed true? Have I here seen him who looks after me?" She is just awestruck that this God whom she had never encountered before would take notice of her and in fact is looking after her and that she had had an encounter with this God. Thou, God, seest me. thou God seest me." This is the theme I'd like us to consider tonight. The God who sees cares about you. The God who sees cares about you. When does He care about you? Well, the God who sees cares about you even when you have run away from your problems. That's what Hagar did. She had run away from her problems. The angel of the Lord asked her, Hagar, Sarai's maid. Now, isn't it interesting that he addressed her that way? This is your identity, Hagar. You're Sarai's maid. What are you doing here? Where have you come from and where are you going? He asked those two questions. It's also very interesting that Hagar only answers the first question, I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai. She was running away from an abusive mistress whom she had disdained. So Hagar had run away from her problems and God directed her to go back and face her problems. The immediate response from the angel was, go back. You must go back, Hagar. You must go back to Sarai and Abram, back to where you belong, back to my chosen patriarch and to his wife, your mistress. You must go back. And although this would have been very difficult for Hagar to do, she did what the Lord had told her to do. I want to tell a true story about a girl named Alicia. Alicia was a teenage runaway. She ran away from home in search of approval and excitement. She ended up having a son out of wedlock. She married another man who turned out to be abusive and ended up in an abusive relationship. And this man whom she had married coerced her to sign away her parental rights over her son. and the son was given to the birth father. For eight long years, she had no contact whatsoever with anyone in her extended family. In fact, her husband would not permit her to have any contact. Finally, at the end of her rope, in a miserable situation, she prayed. And through the providential working of God, she was able to find a way to go back, to return to her family and to go back to her faith, the faith that she had abandoned. In her testimony, she writes this, quote, because this time I ran to love, acceptance, family, and purpose, which had been there all along. It just took my prayer and the prayers of my parents and many others to help me see this. My faith and love in my Heavenly Father has been restored as I allowed Him to finally bless me the way He had always wanted to do. I allow his will to dictate my life and no longer feel the need to make my own way. His plan and purpose is so much better." Now, we must be careful in our application here. We must admit that some situations are so abusive that it is not safe to go back, at least not immediately. And in those situations, you need some evidence that God is intervening, especially in the life of the abuser. Well, in this instance, Hagar had clear evidence that God was intervening. God was working and God gave her clear direction to go back. And so it is in most cases the right thing to do for someone who is running away, especially when they've run away from their problems, is to go back and to face those problems in the strength and by the grace of God. The God who sees cares about you. He cares about you even when you have run away from your problems. Secondly, we see here that God, the God who sees, cares about you even when you have responded poorly to your circumstances. Hagar had responded poorly to her circumstances. It's true. She was pregnant. Sarai was not. And this fact changed the dynamic of their relationship. And Hagar responded poorly. She despised her mistress. This was wrong. And so, through the angel, God instructs her how to respond properly. Look at verse 9. The angel says, return to thy mistress and submit thyself under her hands. God told her to go back and to submit to the authority of her mistress. Now, to willingly submit required a complete change in attitude on Hagar's part. She had to change from despising her mistress to respecting and submitting to her mistress. She had to change her attitude from one of pride and self-interest to one of humility. This is a pretty dramatic transformation. And yet this is what God told her to do. And so it is that God would enable her and give her the grace that she needed to do this very thing. We have another example in our Bibles of a runaway. slave by the name of Onesimus. We find that in the New Testament in the book of Philemon. Onesimus had been a worthless slave. Remember that? He ran away from his master and he ended up in Rome and somehow, through some circumstances, certainly orchestrated by the hand of God, he ended up running across the path of Paul. And Paul proclaimed the gospel to him and Onesimus was gloriously saved. You remember what Paul told him to do? Paul sent him back. Paul had him go back to his master Philemon. Sent a letter with him and instructed Philemon to receive Onesimus back, not only as someone who would serve him, but as a brother, as a brother in Christ. So it is that he went back to Philemon. We ought to respond properly to our circumstances. We ought to respond biblically to our circumstances. For example, we're told in 1 Peter 2, verse 18, servants be subject to your masters with all fear, not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward. Is this not hard to do? If you have a boss that is just plain ornery, I mean, you know what I'm saying? They just get up on the wrong side of the bed every day. Right? What do you do? Well, you're a Christian. You have a testimony there in that workplace, and you serve that boss as best you can and bear a testimony for Christ in that situation. We ought to respond biblically to our circumstances. We ought to always do what the Lord would have us to do. And is it not a comfort that even when we fail to do what we ought to do, that we have a God who still cares for us. He still cares for us. He still cared for Hagar and showed great compassion toward her by sending his angel to her, even after she had responded poorly to her circumstances. In Micah chapter 7, verse 18, we're told this, Who is a God like unto thee? that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage. He retaineth not his anger forever, because he delighteth in mercy. He will turn again, he will have compassion upon us, he will subdue our iniquities, and that will cast all their sins into the depth of the sea." We serve a God who is very forgiving, And even when we have failed, He still cares for us. The God who sees cares about you even when you run away from your problems, even when you have responded poorly to your circumstances. And thirdly, the God who sees cares about you even when you have acted outside of His will. Now it's true that Sarai was the initiator of this whole thing. She had concocted her own scheme to sort of help God out. God had told Abram that he would have seed from his own body, but it would seem to Sarai that that did not include her body that was now 75 years old. Nothing was happening there. She was not conceiving. So she manipulated her husband and her handmaiden so that she, Sarai, could have children by means of a surrogate. This was clearly wrong for Sarai to do this. And we aren't told in this account how willing Hagar was to go along with the whole scheme. There's no indication that she protested, but nor is there any indication that she had any choice in the matter whatsoever. But the fact remains that she did participate in this. She was party to it. She was party to a purely human scheme that was clearly outside of what God had intended. Now on a human level, we might expect God to curse Hagar and to curse her son. We might expect God to be so angry about the whole thing that He would just leave her and her unborn child out there in the wilderness to die. But this isn't what God does, because this isn't what God is. God is a merciful God. Psalm 145, verse 8, the Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger and of great mercy. The Lord is good to all, to all. and his tender mercies are over all his works." God was indeed compassionate toward Hagar. He was gracious. He was patient. He was merciful toward her and to her unborn son. He blessed them. God gave Hagar hope. hope that not only would she live, but she would live to give birth to a child, a son. And that this child would not only live, but he would grow up and become a man able to defend himself. All of that is contained in the promises that were given to Hagar from God through the angel. The angel said that this guy would grow up to become literally a wild donkey of a man. Picture that. Kind of a tough guy, maybe a little on the wild side, certainly strong, a powerful fighter. And furthermore, God made an astounding promise. Look at verse 10. The angel of the Lord said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for a multitude." This is the only time in our entire Bible where God makes such a promise to a woman. And He made that promise to Hagar. And the promise here is that she would have a lot of descendants through Ishmael. Ishmael would be a father of a great nation, if you will. And it does turn out that Ishmael became the father of the Ishmaelites. This was a nomadic people who lived in Northern Arabia. And to this day, some of the people in the Arab countries of the world descend from Ishmael. There was a time in my previous career where I actually had a co-worker who was a woman from Syria. And she told me on one occasion that her people descended from Ishmael. And so the Ishmaelites are still among us even today. And so God blessed Hagar and her son yet to be born. And this whole thing is a lesson in God's grace. Our God is a gracious God. We don't deserve His grace. Grace is by its very definition unmerited favor. If we got what we deserved as sinners, we would spend eternity in hell. But God Ephesians 2 verse 4, But God, who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together, has made us alive together with Christ, by grace are ye saved, and hath raised us up together and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace and his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. we worship a God of grace. Paul writes in Romans 5 verse 20, But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Now you turn the chapter to the next verse there and Paul anticipates a question that might come up in our depraved minds. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? What's the answer? God forbid. No way. How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein? You see, God's grace and God's forgiveness is not a license for us to continue in our sin. It's not a license to sin. It liberates us from sin. By His grace, we find forgiveness and cleansing and restoration, and we find the power to resist the temptation to sin again. The God who sees cares about you. He cares about you even when you have run away from your problems and responded poorly to your circumstances and acted outside of His will. He still cares about you. Now, we must confess that God sees everything. He sees all our afflictions. He's fully aware of all of our problems. He also knows all of our sins, however secret they may be. He sees us when we run away. In fact, He knows our every hiding place. Just ask Jonah. God sees all of our circumstances. And He sees all of our reactions to our circumstances. He hears every word that we speak. He knows every thought that we think. Thou, God, seest me. I think we ought to say this to ourselves often. We need to remind ourselves that God is watching. to keep us from sin. But we also need to remind ourselves that God is watching and that he cares when we are in trouble. Thou, God, seest me. If God saw and cared for Hagar, a pregnant, despised and rejected, used and abused, Egyptian runaway slave in the wilderness. If God cared for her, he certainly will see and care for you. Thou God, seest me. What about when I'm hurt? Thou God, seest me. What about when I'm scared? Thou, God, seest me. What about when I feel all alone? Thou, God, seest me. What about when my whole world is in tatters and I'm feeling overwhelmed? Thou, God, seest me. What about when I'm hurt so badly by someone that I can't even talk to anyone about it? Thou, God, seest me. What about when I've lost my job or my health is failing or my heart is broken? Thou, God, seest me. No matter your circumstances, no matter your hurts, no matter your situation, you may be out there all alone in the wilderness and about to die. Thou God, seest me. Call out unto him, turn to him, draw nigh to him and he will draw nigh to you. He cares about you, he cares for you. So let him get close to you, and let him show you just how much he really cares. Our Father, we thank you so much for this passage of Scripture. It just shows us how much you really care. It shows us that you care for everyone, no matter who they are, no matter what they've We have this truth encapsulated in a familiar verse, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. The greatest expression of your love and your care for all of humanity is demonstrated in the giving of your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Indeed, you do care. You are the God who sees, and you do care. And Lord, I pray that these thoughts would be a great encouragement to us. I don't know that somebody might be here tonight who is really carrying a heavy burden and who just desperately needed this encouragement tonight. that you're the God who sees, that you know the burden they're carrying. You know their unspoken prayer requests. You know the heaviness in their heart. You know the pain that's there. You are the God who sees, and you care. Thank you, Lord, for this reminder tonight. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.