Sixth Sunday after Pentecost

June 22, 2008

Sermon by Pastor John Marboe.

READER SHIRLEY EVANS: The First Lesson is from Genesis 21, starting at verse 8. (Genesis 21:8-21)

The child grew, and was weaned; and Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac. So she said to Abraham, “Cast out this slave woman with her son; for the son of this slave woman shall not inherit along with my son Isaac.” The matter was very distressing to Abraham on account of his son. But God said to Abraham, “Do not be distressed because of the boy and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for it is through Isaac that offspring shall be named for you. As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring.” So Abraham rose early in the morning, and took bread and a skin of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered about in the wilderness of Beersheba.

When the water in the skin was gone, she cast 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, “Do not let me look on the death of the child.” And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept. And God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is. Come, lift up the boy and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make a great nation of him.” Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. She went and filled the skin with water, and gave the boy a drink.

God was with the boy, and he grew up; he lived in the wilderness, and became an expert with the bow. He lived in the wilderness of Paran; and his mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt.

The Word of the Lord.

PASTOR JOHN MARBOE: Our focus this morning will be the story from Genesis that Shirley read so well, the story of Abraham, of Sarah, of Hagar, of Ishmael, and Isaac. It is a story that is familiar to most of us, I’m sure. It is one of the greatest stories ever told, and its influence on the life of the world continues powerfully to this day. It is by this story in Genesis that three of the world’s great religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—understand their historic beginning. My guess is that it has been a long time since you have heard or read the story, so this morning I will begin with a brief retelling.

The story begins in Genesis 12, with Abram and Sarai. Later God will rename them “Abraham” and “Sarah.” But Abram and Sari are already married. They lived in Mesopotamia, in a city called Ur, just a few miles south of modern-day Baghdad, in Iraq.

One day, Abram hears God speak to him, saying, “Leave your home and everything familiar, and I will make a great nation of you in the place where I show you.” So Abram, without saying a word, together with Sarai, his wife, and Lot, his nephew, gather what belongings they can pack up and they head out in a caravan, to a land called in that day Canaan, present-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria. But when they arrive, the situation looks bleak. There is a famine in Canaan. The ground is hard and cracked, the streams are dry, and there is nothing to eat.

Now, one of the great things about this story is the way it plays on themes of barrenness and fertility. The land is barren, but so also are Abram and Sarai. They have no children, and they are already 75 and 65 years old, respectively. It looks bleak. But God has promised this barren couple tons of descendants. It may look to us like Abram has faith when he goes to Canaan, but I guarantee any sane person who would have looked at him at the time would have thought him cuckoo.

They can’t stay in Canaan, right? So they head down to Egypt, that big ancient civilization just to the south. The first pyramids have already been around for about a thousand years by this time.

Sarai, you have to understand, is a gorgeous woman, a real head turner at 65 years old. The king of Egypt notices her, wants her, and pays Abram a great sum to take her as his wife into his harem. Abram accepts the deal. What? This isn’t the part you heard in Sunday school. How could Abram let this happen? Well, you see, he was afraid that, because of Sarai’s great beauty, he might be killed by powerful Egyptian men so that they could get to Sarai. So he hatched the story and had Sarai agree that they would tell people they are brother and sister.

One of the great things about the Bible and the way it tells stories is that it does not make its heroes moral heroes. From time to time, biblical heroes are morally heroic, but all of them, every one, are flawed, and the Bible freely shares these flaws with us. Abram and Sarai are flawed people.

Sarai is in Pharaoh’s harem. Now, I’m no expert on marriage, but I’m guessing this is the beginning of marital difficulties for Abram and Sarai. But God rescues her out of that situation. And how does God do it? Well, God does it the way God normally rescues people from Pharaohs in Egypt—with plagues. So God sends plagues on Egypt. Now, Pharaoh is a smart guy. He figures out somehow that it’s because Sari is really Abram’s wife and not his sister that all these plagues are coming. So he orders Sari and Abram sent away, with all of the riches that he’s given them. So back to Canaan they go. Apparently the famine is over. Abram becomes mighty in the region, after the fashion of the day, by winning battles and cutting treaties with local tribal chiefs.

But time is marching on, and Abram and Sarai are still without children. Sarai has an idea. While she was in Egypt, she had picked up a servant girl by the name of Hagar. Had they met in the harem? We don’t know. But now they have Hagar as Sarai’s servant. “Hagar” is a word that means “stranger.” Sarai gives her servant Hagar to Abram as a second wife in order to get children by her. Polygamy was normal in those days of course, but this isn’t so much polygamy as it is forced surrogate motherhood.

Hagar becomes pregnant, and, understandably, she begins to show distain for Sarai. This is not a happy household. Sarai becomes infuriated. So what does she do? Well, she does, of course, what she should do—she takes it out on Abram. She yells at Abram: “I gave you this woman to embrace, and now she has turned on me.” Abram is not going to get in the way of this speeding locomotive. He goes passive. (I didn’t know Abram was Norwegian.) He goes passive. He says, “Well, she’s your servant. Do what you want to her. She may be my wife, but she’s still your servant.” Sarai drives the pregnant girl out into the desert, where certain death awaits her and her child. But an angel appears and finds her sitting by a spring of water and tells her to return to Sarai and Abram, but also adds this, saying, “I will multiply your offspring so that they cannot be counted. You shall bear a son and call him Ishmael,” which means “God sees.” Hagar responds by saying to God, “I call you El-roi,” or “God is my vision.”

The great Bible teacher Amy-Jill Levine underlines how remarkable this scene is. God appears in the form of an angel, not to Abram or Sarai but to a slave, an Egyptian, a woman, and a pregnant woman at that. Hagar receives a promise concerning her descendants that is very similar to the promise that’s been given to Abram.

Hagar returns and gives birth to Ishmael. Ishmael is Abram’s firstborn son. He is not illegitimate in the view of that day. He is fully Abram’s son, and he begins to grow up. But God appears to Abram again to tell him that he will be the father of many nations and God renames him “Abraham,” which means just that—”Father of Nations.” But God says, “I am going to give you more than Ishmael. I’m going to bless Sarai, who will henceforth be called Sarah” (meaning “princess”). Now, Abram finds this rather funny. He laughs. “I’m old,” he says. “I’m old, I’m a hundred years old, and Sarai is 90.” So God says, “Yes, you are going to have a son, and his name will be Isaac,” which means “laughter.”

Abraham pleads with God that Ishmael be the one to inherit—see, Abram has fallen in love with Ishmael—he pleads that Ishmael may be the one to inherit the promise. But God says, “No. Isaac will receive the land that has been given to you. But I will bless Ishmael, too and many tribes will come from him.” That brings us to our story today. It’s a long way around to it, but there is no shortcut to seeing the whole picture.

Isaac is born. Isaac is born, and Sarah sees the two boys playing together. Ishmael is fourteen years older than Isaac. Can you visualize this? You can imagine that Isaac, the little tyke, worships his older brother, old enough almost to be his dad, while the real dad is old enough to be his great, great, grandfather. Ishmael plays with Isaac and loves the little guy. Sarah sees it, and a chill wind comes over the household.

By the laws of that day, the eldest son always gained the inheritance. How could she let her son, her little boy, become subject, as he most certainly would, to Ishmael, the servant girl’s son? Sarah goes to Abraham and demands that he cast out the slave woman, who, by the way, is also Abraham’s wife, and her son, who is his firstborn son. Abraham, as you can imagine, is deeply troubled. He doesn’t want to do it. But he realizes that there can now be no peace in his house any other way. Even God is not prepared to resist Sarah’s feeling on this one. God counsels Abraham to go ahead and send Hagar and Ishmael away, which he reluctantly does.

Out in the desert, Hagar and Ishmael are soon spent, and they are near death. Their food and water are gone. Hagar drags young Ishmael under a bush so that he can die in the shade. Just then an angel calls to her again and tells her that God has heard the voice of her son. The angel reminds her Ishmael is blessed and will have nations for descendants. Miraculously, a well appears and they are saved with water. Ishmael grows up in God’s favor, the Bible tell us, marries a good Egyptian woman like his mom, and becomes the father of twelve tribes.

Bruce Feiler—whose best-selling book on Abraham is available in our very good library—Bruce Feiler is on to something when he writes that at the heart and foundation of three great religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—is this story. It’s no wonder, then, that the conflict between these religions mirrors in some way the conflict in the story. It’s a family feud, and family feuds are the most hostile and the most cruel often because they are battles over identity, over place or position, over parental affection, and over inheritance.

The story originally belongs to the Jews. It’s a Jewish story, though surely its roots precede even Judaism. This story belonged to the Jewish people long before Christianity or Islam existed. Jews quite naturally read it that way. To them, it is the story about how God made a covenant with their ancestors, and it was passed down from Abraham, through Sarah, to Isaac, to Jacob, and so forth. Long before Islam existed, Jews also understood Ishmael to be the father of all Arabs.

But in the Seventh Century, A.D., Mohammed picked up on the story and came to understand that he and his people were indeed part of God’s blessing in this story from Abraham as descended through Ishmael and Hagar. Muslims believe that Hagar and Ishmael, when they were sent away, ended up settling in Mecca, where Abraham, from time to time, would visit them and make sure that they were okay. To this day, it’s taught in Islam that the Kaaba at the center of Mecca, around which pilgrims circle and pray, is a house built by Abraham and Ishmael.

The story, of course, is no less important for Christians, especially for Lutherans, for the notion that God makes people righteous by faith, apart from obedience to any law, comes from Paul’s reflection on this same story. Paul noticed that Abraham had no law because Abraham lived hundreds of years before Moses. Furthermore, Abraham wasn’t a morally perfect person, as we have seen.

But, Paul emphasized, Abraham was righteous in God’s sight, not by law or by lineage but because he believed God’s promise. So Paul, a Jewish Christian, proclaims that being a child of Abraham, and therefore a child of God, is not about descending from Abraham, either through Sarah or through Hagar, but occurs, no matter what anyone’s nationality or creed or moral record, whenever someone trusts God and believes God.

Well, did Abraham exist in the historical sense? It doesn’t really matter. The story about him has become history. Abraham lives in his various descendants, whether biological or spiritual, who comprise over half the world’s current population. Jews, Christians, and Muslims trace their relationship to the living God through a common spiritual ancestor and through this common saga.

Who then are Jews and Muslims to us, and to each other? Well, whatever else, we are children of Abraham—all.

What would happen if Isaac and Ishmael were to play together again; if Sarah could recognize Hagar as part of the family and not as a threat; if Hagar learned compassion for her barren mistress; if Abraham insisted his children get along, that they recognize and treat one another with respect?

This story has no ending, yet. It remains open. The final chapter to the story, begun in Genesis 12, has yet to be written in history. May God grant Abraham’s wide family, for all its divisions and feuding, redemption and peace through recognition.

Amen.