Genesis 16:1-3 comments: Hagar given to Abram by Sarai

1 ¶  Now Sarai Abram’s wife bare him no children: and she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. 2  And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now, the LORD hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai. 3  And 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.

Sarai acknowledges that her not having children is God’s will at that point. God has restrained her from having a child. How many modern Christian women acknowledge God’s hand in something like this? Since the time of Isaac Newton, Christians have reduced God to the First Cause of things only and do not typically acknowledge His hand in the fundamental processes of life. The modernist’s watchmaker God who winds things up and stands back, available perhaps to wind it if it runs down or correct the time if in error, is not the God of the Bible. Any honest reading of the Bible, in particular, the Book of Job, will show us that God is directly involved in the daily processes of our lives and life’s complexity goes beyond its existence to its moment-by-moment function. If God can be likened to a watchmaker then He is a watchmaker that not only built the clock but moves the hands.

At this point in the narrative we could understand if the promise that God made to Abram, that a great people would come from him, did not include Sarai. But, she is part of the promise as we will find out. Still, as we will see later in Jacob’s life, a woman of substance in those days might regard children coming from her personal servant as her own.(43) This never worked very well emotionally as jealousy and a sense of being held in contempt would rise up in these situations where the patriarch afforded himself intimacy with a servant woman.

Sarai may not have known about the promises made to Abram although I doubt he kept her in the dark. But, if she knew what God had promised to Abram, here is a classic example of going ahead of God. We need to wait on God and not try to improve on His plans and His will. God will do a thing in His own time and our impatience and ego can cause a world of trouble for us when we try to push ahead without God. Sarai is going to “help” God. This is an unfortunate mistake.

Sarai has given her servant, Hagar, to Abram for the purpose of producing a child. We would rightfully regard this as wicked and sin today but remember the culture that Abram and Sarai were brought out of and understand that our veneer of Christianity, even civilization, is very thin. God is merciful, though, and His grace abounds all through the Bible as we will see.

Here, also, we see how the concept of wife is bound to sexual intimacy and we understand the meaning of go in unto my maid.

(43) This shows one of the great differences between slavery and servanthood in the world of the Bible and that of Antebellum (Pre-Civil War) America. The thousands of sexually abused slave girls in America forced to bear their masters’ offspring was never viewed by the unfortunate wife of the slaveowner as representing her. In fact, there are diaries of the wives of slaveowners which revealed that those women were heartbroken over the culturally accepted adulteries they had to suffer.

Genesis 15:17-21 comments: the Promised Land

17 ¶  And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. 18  In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: 19  The Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, 20  And the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, 21  And the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.

The geography of the grant of land given by God to the Hebrews is very interesting and has an impact today on international events. God, in the symbols of a smoking furnace and a burning lamp (see Deuteronomy 4:24; 9:3; and Hebrews 12:29 among many other passages] passed between the pieces of animals establishing the covenant with Himself to grant this land to Abram’s descendants so it was not dependent upon any action of Abram other than believing and receiving. This is not unlike salvation from an eternity of agony in a place described as a lake of fire. God provides this to anyone who receives His visible image, Christ, as Himself, believing the gospel.

From the river of Egypt, the Nile river, to the Euphrates river, the land boundary of the territory promised to Israel, to be realized in the millennial reign of Christ, is pretty extensive if you look at a map. It is the seat of Christ’s rule from Jerusalem in the millennium, during which He will reign for a thousand years because, for one reason, Paul said;

Galatians 3:16  Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.

We know Christ will physically rule on earth for a thousand years as John said.

Revelation 20:4  And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. …6  Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.

During His reign the Jewish people will occupy the earth and the promise of this land grant will be fully realized.

Zechariah 8:20  Thus saith the LORD of hosts; It shall yet come to pass, that there shall come people, and the inhabitants of many cities: 21  And the inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, Let us go speedily to pray before the LORD, and to seek the LORD of hosts: I will go also. 22  Yea, many people and strong nations shall come to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem, and to pray before the LORD. 23  Thus saith the LORD of hosts; In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you.

In a prophecy of a time after Christ God said He will bring the remnant of Israel home. See this great prophecy in Isaiah, chapter 11.

Isaiah 11:1 ¶  And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: 2  And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD; 3  And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: 4  But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. 5  And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. 6  The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. 7  And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. 8  And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den. 9  They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.10 ¶  And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious. [see Romans 15:12; Revelation 22:16] 11  And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people, which shall be left, from Assyria, and from Egypt, and from Pathros, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar, and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea. 12  And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.

The nation of Israel, created by human political action and struggle, will always face adversity, even near extinction under the persecution of the Beast of Revelation, until Christ returns. But, when He returns to rule the promise will be realized.

Revelation 11:15  And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.

Genesis 15:12-16 comments: four hundred years of suffering

12 ¶  And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him. 13  And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; 14  And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance. 15  And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. 16  But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.

   

God is going to make this covenant with Himself and it is important that Abram have nothing to do with this part. He puts Abram to sleep and it is a deeper sleep than Abram had ever known. It is called an horror of great darkness. God put Adam to sleep when He created Eve.

Genesis 2:21 ¶  And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;

But, think of the deep sleep you are in within a nightmare where you see things so clearly but cannot move or respond and feel so utterly helpless. Job’s friend, Eliphaz, speaks of frightening visions in sleep, in Job, chapter 4, and Daniel in chapter 10 of that book, as well. Fear and dread, horror, overwhelm a helpless Abram who is in a deep sleep and unable to perform any part of this covenant now.

We are saved by God’s covenant and, by the cross, He has accomplished both parts of it. Our will has no part in our being saved.

John 1:13  Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

God tells Abram that his seed will be servants in a foreign land, which we know to be Egypt. They will be afflicted for four hundred years and will serve the people of that land. This is an about, not an exact 400 years, ten months, 23 days, and two hours type of statement.

Exodus 12:40  Now the sojourning of the children of Israel, who dwelt in Egypt, was four hundred and thirty years.

And then, Luke recounting what Stephen said, alluding to what Moses had written from God’s words;

Acts 7:6  And God spake on this wise, That his seed should sojourn in a strange land; and that they should bring them into bondage, and entreat them evil four hundred years.

If I wrote you a lesson that said, “in the thousand years since the Norman invasion of England,” and then, in the lesson later wrote, “in the nine hundred and fifty years since 1066, when William the Conqueror defeated King Harold at Hastings,” would that be a contradiction or would you understand what I said as meaning the same thing?

Here is Paul referring to this bondage bracketed between the covenant and the giving of the Law.

Galatians 3:17  And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.

Rabbis have written that the affliction begins when Ishmael, the offspring of Abram and Hagar, an Egyptian, begins to persecute Isaac, the son of the promise. They regarded the four hundred years to start from that point.

God also tells Abram that four generations will come into being in Egypt before returning to the land that is promised, The Promised Land of Canaan. For instance, Levi, Jacob’s son, and his son, Kohath, and his son, Amram, and his son, Moses. These were four generations that sojourned in Egypt. It is then important to see that God is talking about two different things; four hundred years of affliction and four generations in a foreign land. As the Bible clearly states in Exodus the Hebrews come out of Egypt with a great deal of wealth given to them freely by the Egyptians.

In a parallel to the Christian’s life we see that Abram’s offspring must suffer before they can reign. This is a doctrine clearly enunciated in Paul’s letters to Christians, as it was reflected in Jesus’ ministry on earth; the cross before the crown. If you read the account in Matthew and Luke of Satan’s temptation of Christ you will see that Satan tried to reverse the order. (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13).

There is a clear doctrine set forth here that shows that God will put up with just so much foolishness from a people before he ‘drops the hammer’ in a manner of speaking. The Hebrews are being built as a people nursed in Egypt while the inhabitants of Canaan grow more and more wicked and when the right time comes God will cause His judgment on Canaan to come about. Later, He will give Israel hundreds of years to ‘get right’ before He removes them from the land.

Genesis 15:7-11 comments: the covenant, a deposit on the promise

7 ¶  And he said unto him, I am the LORD that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. 8  And he said, Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it? 9  And he said unto him, Take me an heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon. 10  And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided he not. 11  And when the fowls came down upon the carcases, Abram drove them away.

God brings up another promise that He made to Abram, the inheritance of the land of Canaan. God took Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees. Remember, most of the time the ch sound is like a k. The Chaldeans or Chaldees were a root ethnic tribe of Babylonia and were dominant for a period of time. Some priests of Babylon were identified as being Chaldean. (see Ezra 5:12; Daniel 2:10) But, again Abram is challenging God and demands to know what assurance he can be given that will guarantee this promised inheritance.

God promised to save the Christian from an eternity of agony and suffering, God’s response to, His judgment on, a rebellious humanity.

Acts 16:31  And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.

Romans 10:9  That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. 10  For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. 11  For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. 12 ¶  For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. 13  For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

God coming to indwell a person by the vehicle of the Holy Spirit is the deposit, the earnest money, the guarantee of that promise of salvation.

Ephesians 1:13  In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise,

14  Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.

Any Christianity or Christian philosophy without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is a pathetic joke, a dangerous delusion, and stumbling block to sanity. Without the indwelling of the Holy Spirit the Christian faith is reduced to humanistic drivel, man aspiring to please a God he does not or cannot know personally. It then becomes a political slogan, a cultural expression, a way to keep the masses down, or a justification to dominate others.

 The Holy Spirit’s indwelling, the fruit it produces in the Christian as listed in Galatians 5:22-24, and the religion it demands as an expression of your faith as explained in James 1:27 and 1John 2:15-17, are part of the foundations of proof that this indwelling is real. Being born again of the Spirit is the proof we have that God’s promises in Christ are real to us as this upcoming ritual is the deposit, the earnest, so to speak, of God’s promise to Abram.

Abram obeys God and performs the first part of the ceremony around making a covenant.

Jeremiah 34:18  And I will give the men that have transgressed my covenant, which have not performed the words of the covenant which they had made before me, when they cut the calf in twain, and passed between the parts thereof, 19  The princes of Judah, and the princes of Jerusalem, the eunuchs, and the priests, and all the people of the land, which passed between the parts of the calf;

Writers, both Jewish and Christian, have different opinions about the significance of the particular animals used. The she goat might represent the Law given to Moses later.

Numbers 15:27  And if any soul sin through ignorance, then he shall bring a she goat of the first year for a sin offering.

The ram might represent salvation through faith in Christ as Abram, then named Abraham, tells his son, Issac, in a prophecy that points forward to Christ;

Genesis 22:8  And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering: so they went both of them together.

And a ram was made available in place of Issac;

Genesis 22:13  And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.

The turtledove and the pigeon, used for purification, are also part of this blood covenant.

Leviticus 12:6  And when the days of her purifying are fulfilled, for a son, or for a daughter, she shall bring a lamb of the first year for a burnt offering, and a young pigeon, or a turtledove, for a sin offering, unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, unto the priest:

Leviticus 17:11  For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul.

But, regardless of the purpose of those creatures other than the heifer, which purpose scholars are not sure of, this covenant was understood by the people of the ancient world as the passage in Jeremiah indicates.

Fowls of the air are symbols also of the Devil (see the Parable of the Sower in Mark 4 as just one example) so there is significance in Abram’s part of this covenant, in his obedience first, and also in his keeping corruption from his part. We could make sermons about this and many have been made about keeping things of evil from your worship of God; influences, worldly values, and carnality fluttering around your solemn willingness to wait on, obey, and follow the Lord Jesus Christ.

Genesis 15:2-6 comments: Abram's complaint

2 ¶  And Abram said, Lord GOD, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? 3  And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir. 4  And, behold, the word of the LORD came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. 5  And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. 6  And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness.

Abram poses the impertinent question of what can God give him of value since he has been denied a child. God’s plan is greater than Abram, in his complaint, can imagine. He will not only give Abram what Abram desires; an heir, but God intends to give him a great heritage, more than he can imagine.

God challenges Abram to count (tell as in a bank teller) the stars if he can, as the number of his descendants shall be like the number of stars.

Up until the invention of the telescope mankind was able to count only a few thousand stars. However, God likens their number to the number of particles of sand on the sea shore. This is not an exact numerical comparison but an equivalence, meaning the numbers are similar, an amount too great for a man to number.

Hebrews 11:12  Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.

However, it is not so with God. He can count them and has names for every one. This is one of those amazing facts about how great the God who created the universe and who orders all matter, energy, space, and time is.

Psalm 147:4  He telleth the number of the stars; he calleth them all by their names.

Genesis 15:1 comments; Abram's reward

1 ¶  After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.

God appeared to people in different ways. There is a vision, as in this verse and elsewhere where the person is in a trance but fully awake and God has taken over the person’s consciousness. He spoke to Samuel, Isaiah, Nathan the prophet, Ezekiel, Ananias of Damascus, Peter, Paul, and others in this way.

Numbers 12:6  And he said, Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream.

Numbers 24:4  He hath said, which heard the words of God, which saw the vision of the Almighty, falling into a trance, but having his eyes open:

He also appeared as an angel of the Lord, with an angel being a presence, something tangible you could interact with, the preincarnate Word, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Isaiah 63:9  In all their affliction he was afflicted, and the angel of his presence saved them: in his love and in his pity he redeemed them; and he bare them, and carried them all the days of old.

Judges 2:1  And an angel of the LORD came up from Gilgal to Bochim, and said, I made you to go up out of Egypt, and have brought you unto the land which I sware unto your fathers; and I said, I will never break my covenant with you.

Judges 13;21  But the angel of the LORD did no more appear to Manoah and to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was an angel of the LORD. 22  And Manoah said unto his wife, We shall surely die, because we have seen God.

God also appeared in a dream, as to Solomon.

1Kings 3:5  In Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night: and God said, Ask what I shall give thee…15a  And Solomon awoke; and, behold, it was a dream…

God is Abram’s reward. This is in contrast to the puny reward the king of Sodom would give him. We are called to look for our reward from heaven rather than from the world of men. This is a very difficult exercise of faith because we are taught from our earliest age of understanding to look for some kindness or boon at the hand of man, rather than God. This is so obvious when we are excited at our paycheck or even a trophy but oblivious to God’s deliverance, mercy, and blessings throughout the week as they happen.

The Lord is Abram’s protection, his defender, and his reward. He needs no other. It is God who delivered him and God who made him wealthy and has given him great success.

Genesis 14:21-24 comments: accepting no reward of evil

21¶ And the king of Sodom said unto Abram, Give me the persons, and take the goods to thyself. 22 And Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have lift up mine hand unto the LORD, the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth, 23 That I will not take from a thread even to a shoelatchet, and that I will not take any thing that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abram rich: 24 Save only that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men which went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their portion.

Abram is not going to let the king of Sodom make himself Abram’s benefactor. He will owe nothing to this king. This is a good lesson, not to enrich oneself by the kindness of someone or something evil. One might make a sermon about ‘generosity’ of the Devil and what the consequences of accepting a reward at his hands might be. Even if the king of Sodom, most likely a high priest of his own god, had good intentions, Abram was not going to put himself in the position of having to be grateful to him.

A reward carried with it some important considerations. To accept a reward from a king implied an understanding of loyalty to that king.

Job 7:2  As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow, and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work:

As much as this king of Sodom would have liked to have someone as wealthy and powerful as Abram beholden to him, perhaps even out of fear, Abram, the friend of God, would not permit such a thing.

 The mercy and grace of God will be Abram’s reward in the very next chapter. He needed no bounty from a human king, especially one who worshipped devils in all likelihood. In the American business culture of Christianity it does not matter who rewards me as long as I get one. The reward is the object and the character and condition of the granter of the reward is irrelevant. This is characteristic of even the most conservative churches whose preachers announce from the pulpit how wicked and Godless the government is, all the while accepting tax breaks and any benefit they or their congregation can get from that same wicked government, accepting rewards from the king of Sodom. Abram would be appalled.

Three confederates only are mentioned but in this method of writing referring to the leadership can also imply men following. Clearly you don’t believe that only the kings mentioned earlier who attacked Sodom and Gomorrah were present but that they had an army with them. Common sense tells us that the reference to Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre does not mean that they, too, would not have had their own servants armed and battle ready.