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Sunday, March 11, 2018

"Chosen But Messy"

A Sermon Based Upon Genesis 21: 8-21 NRSV

By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin

Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership
March 11, 2018

For the past few weeks, we have been preaching from the life of Abraham, the ancestor of all biblical faith.   Scripture sometimes speaks of Abraham as a ‘friend of God’ (Isa. 41:8; James 2:23).  Jesus called his own disciples, who were descendants of Abraham, his ‘friends’ (Jn. 15:15).    In a way, all people of faith can be named ‘friends of God’.  But what we are going to learn today is that just because we are God’s friends, this does not in any way mean that we are a privileged or superior people to everyone else.   God’s people do not have a monopoly on the goodness and grace of God. 

Besides this, what we will see in today’s text is that God’s people can be perfectly ‘imperfect’ friends of God; people who have faith, but who still have a long ways to go.   One writer explained today’s story of faith this way, saying, “the religious consciousness which was to have noble growth in Israel, had its subsoil in the same life and same ideas (and I might add same failures) as other peoples of ancient times (Bowie, IB).   In other words, Abraham was not perfect, he was a flawed human being.  But even as a flawed human being, Abraham did open his heart to God by faith, warts and all, so that his faith could be perfected by God’s grace.  

One of the most wonderful truths about biblical truth is that it tells us exactly this kind of truth; truth that comes with warts and all.   The Bible does not hide who Abraham was, just as it does not hide how faith was, before it was perfected in God’s love through Jesus Christ.   What we see, particularly in today’s text, is that Abraham was not always a great example of what a person of faith can be, but still, God ‘credited’ Abraham’s with “righteousness” because of his faith (Rom 4:3).   Abraham believed (or trusted) in God (Rom 4:6), as Paul put it, but, as Paul adds: “If, in fact, Abraham was justified by works, he had something to boast about---but not before God” (Rom. 4:2).   As we will see in today’s text, Abraham really had nothing to boast about.  Neither do we.

Paul reminds us, that also in this way, we are children of Abraham.   Yes, we are people of faith; having a faith that will also be ‘credited…as righteousness’, but , as Paul adds, faith is credited to us because ‘our transgressions are forgiven,…(and our) sins are covered’ (Rom. 4:7).  In this same way,  just like Abraham, as like Israel too, we Christians are also a ‘chosen’ (Eph. 1:11, 1 Pet. 2:9) people, who are chosen to be objects of God’s love and recipients of God’s grace.  But this in no way, means that we are any better than anyone else, nor does it mean that we are the only people God loves or saves.

CAST OUT THIS SLAVE WOMAN…. (10)
Our text today begins on the ‘happy note’ of the fulfillment of God’s promise.   God had promised Abraham that he would be blessed with a child, and would become a great nation so his faith could bless the whole world (Gen. 12: 1-3).  “All the peoples on earth will be blessed through you”(Gen. 12:3.  It was made very clear from the beginning, that the ‘blessing’ Abraham received was never just about Abraham alone, but this was a blessing that was always intended for ‘all peoples on earth’.   Abraham’s blessing was for everyone.

It is exactly this ‘promise’ or ‘calling’ to ‘bless others’ that makes the second part of today’s story especially hard to think about.  This is one of those places in the Bible where faith gets messy, complicated, and can even appear to be down-right cruel.   It is one of those hard parts of the Bible that some believers quickly pass over, excuse, or explain away.   As one pastor put it, this is ‘one of those things that ought not to happen’ (James Killen).   The truth in this story is told twice in Genesis (see Gen. 16), perhaps just so that we don’t miss just how ‘messy’ and ‘imperfect’ Abraham’s faith was.   This reminds us that, even as ‘friends of God’, we are all on a journey to learn how to love like God loves.

The ‘messiness’ of this story focuses on what to do with Ishamel, Sarah’s other son.  Now that Isaac is born, what does the family and the future look like?   It was not ‘faith’, but Abraham and Sarah’s lack of faith that asked for this.   If you recall, when it didn’t look like she and Abraham could have children on their own,  Sarah decided to allow her Egyptian slave-girl named Hagar, to become Abraham’s surrogate wife  (Gen. 16:1ff).  This was a standard practice in world where family was business, as well as, family.  

Hagar quickly conceived, but this complicated the family arrangements.  Sarah became jealous of Hagar, and even before the child was born, earlier in Genesis 16, we read that with Abraham’s blessing Hagar was sent away, only to be sent back by the angel of the LORD.   Now that the promised child Isaac has been born,, the same jealousy and the same question arises again: “What happens to Hagar and Ishmael?”  Sadly, the problem arises in a most innocent moment when the two children were ‘playing’ together.  Sarah takes the scene as insult; perhaps it might have been a reminder of her own lack of faith.  In the next moment, Sarah demands that Abraham ‘cast out this slave woman with her son.’   Sarah’s reasoning: ‘This slave woman shall not inherit along with my son Isaac’ (10).

It is always ‘sad’ when families, who have grown up together, experienced and shared life together, come to a point where they don’t want to travel through life together any longer.   Often, it happens because of some disagreement about ‘inheritance’, just like Sarah voices it here.  You and I know this happens, sometimes even to the best of families.  People get their feelings hurt, one makes unreasonable demands, the parents failed to make their last wishes clear, and now, after the parents are gone, the family relationship falls apart.  The world and the love they once shared, is gone forever.  Sometimes it can be reduced down to piece of furniture, a tract of land, or an amount of money.

But Sarah’s jealousy over Ishmael is not about monetary inheritance; it is about God’s promise, and it is about her own weakness of faith.   Sarah realizes that she has failed, and now she wants to protect her son.   Perhaps it even has a motherly motivation; maybe she didn’t really wish her servant-girl and child any harm.  However, what she does is wrong, and it proves that she, like Abraham, were not ‘justified by works’.  We also read, that this whole ordeal seemed so unfair and ugly that ‘the matter was very distressing to Abraham’.  Ishmael was Abraham’s  ‘son’ too (11). 

Perhaps this whole story occurs in the Bible’s story about faith, to remind us, that even people of great faith, sometimes ‘get it wrong’.  Sometimes we too have taken matters into our own hands, and have either made matters worse.  Sometimes we too have hurt some really good, innocent people, even by trying to bring God’s blessing into the world.  This whole story, being about the mistreatment of a ‘slave-girl’ should make us all take note of our own failures, flaws, and mistreatments of those around us.   Sometimes we have intentionally or unintentionally hurt others,  either actively by our own power, or because of our own passive participation in a culture, a people, or a nation, that has been less than perfect.

About a year and a half ago, it was announced that the prestigious, Georgetown University, was going to take steps to ‘atone’ for its past of profiting from having slaves and by participating in the slave trade that was once a part their own history, as it has been part of the history of our nation.   More than a dozen prestigious Universities, including Brown, Harvard, and the University of Virginia have publically recognized their own ties to slavery and the slave trade.   What Georgetown University decided to do, was to go beyond admitting their past or apologizing, but they are now planning on making restitution and reparations, by allow descendants of slaves to have preferential treatment and special scholarships, if they desire to study at their school.  https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/02/us/slaves-georgetown-university.html

When the “Black Lives Matter” movement started, sometimes misguided and othertimes misunderstood,  causing no small amount of controversy, I found it interesting that during the public discussion, that the conservative, evangelical magazine, Christianity Today---a magazine that was endorsed and started by Billy Graham---ran a ‘cover article’ about one how a Lynching Memorial is planned to be erected in Montgomery, Alabama, remembering how 4,000 African American were lynched between 1877 and the early 1950’s.   In the Bible and in American history too, memorials are a way, not just to remember the past, but they can also be a way to remember heal from the ‘sins of our past’, so we can all move to a better future.

GOD HEARD THE VOICE…. (17)
What is most important this sordid story, is not just to revisit what was done wrong, but how, even in the midst of human sin and failure,  and just when this child was about to unjustly ‘die’ in the wilderness, God shows up.   God ‘hears the voice (or cry) of the boy’  (17).  God reminds ‘Hagar’ not ‘to be afraid.’  God shows up in the midst the ‘troubles’ of the forsaken and forgotten to make a promise of ‘greatness’ just for them (18).  God ‘provides’ for them in their own wilderness.  God quenches the thirst of this humble child, so that he not only survives, but he thrives in the wilderness he must make his home.

When I read this story, of God’s provision for Ishmael, I wonder how often people of color, who are descendants of slaves, or Indians, or poor forgotten, working-class peoples around the world, might read such a story.   Do they see God, also as their redeemer; even though have been part of a subjugated, persecuted, or enslaved people?   Interestingly, Christian faith is often more alive and vibrant among people who have been abused, mistreated, or maligned, than it is among those who are blessed, advantaged or privileged.   I have a book in my study, strangely entitled, “Reading the Bible with the Dammed”.   This book reminds me, that strangely enough, it is people who have been persecuted, who have suffered, and who started out as forgotten and forsaken by the powers of this world, who often best understand their own spiritual hunger and need of God.   

Through the years, some of the greatest ministry moments, were spent not in churches, but in prisons.  In Greensboro, a deacon there by the name of Sid Wrenn, ran a prison ministry.  When he took me with him one Thursday evening, he prepared me saying, “Pastor, I need to warn you that some of these guys are mixed up.  Some of them are going to say something you might not want to hear, but I also want to tell you, these are some of the most spiritually hungry and open people I’ve ever known.  I mean no offense to you or my church, but if I had to give up one, I give up my regular church over being here with these guys every Thursday night.  Their need and desire for God is the highlight of my week.”

What people like Hagar and Ishmael mean for the story of faith, is that sometimes any of our lives might feel more like them, than like Abraham and Sarah.   Most of us don’t live lives with Hollywood endings, where the hero comes returns, and sweeps us off our feet and rides off into the sunset.  Most people have to learn to live ‘beyond happily ever after’, because somewhere in life, we realize that most heroes, like John Wayne, or Captain America, are just myth. A person of faith learns to live life ‘beyond happily ever after’ because in reality, few lives really turn out like that.    For most of us, our spiritual journey can seem much more like Hagar and Ishmael, than Abraham and Sarah.  Life can seem like the promise has completely skipped over us.  When this happens, we know that if is wasn’t for our faith in God, we know, that in this life, that we wouldn’t have a prayer.

To be true winners in this life, we must learn to ourselves in the shoes of the losers, not just the winners.  This is not easy to do.  Most of our hero stories, in fiction or in history,  try to focus on the successes, not the feelings of failure forsakenness.  Most of us don’t dare try to imagine ourselves as descendants of Hagar and Ishmael.  Even the Bible, which pictures God’s promise coming through Isaac, could lead us to think that nothing good could come from Ishmael, just like Nathaniel once wondered: ‘what good could come from Nazareth’ (Jn. 1:46), especially from a forsaken Jew who was crucified on a cross.    



GOD WAS WITH THE BOY (20)
In our own time, with heightened tensions between Muslims and Jews, and now, also between Christians and the Radical State of Islam, need to consider something else very important from this story about Ishmael.  

Modern day Muslims, are Arabs who consider themselves descendants of Abraham, just as much, or even more so, than many secular Jews do.  If you go to Jerusalem, you will see that the large Dom of the Rock sanctuary, marking the skyline of Jerusalem is a Muslim sanctuary, not a Jewish or Christian one.   And the continued ‘hot’ question of our world is how can both Jews and Muslims co-exist in the Holy Land, and the great city of Jerusalem, which is today anything but its own namesake; a city of peace?

What could be a way forward could begin with an honest interpretation of what is happening at the end of this story.  When God comes to save Ishmael, and his mother Hagar, we are simply told that ‘God was with the boy’ (20).   Think about these words, they almost sound the same as the name found in both the Old and New Testament, child of promise who is ‘Immanuel, God with us’ (Isa. 7:14; Matt. 1:23).  The only difference is that long before God was revealed in the child known in Isaiah’s day, or the even more completely in the child Jesus, of Matthew’s day, God was already there ‘with the boy’ we know as Ishmael.  

What we need to understand that although Ishmael isn’t the child of promise, Ishmael isn’t the child without a promise either.   God had a unique purpose in blessing Abraham’s seed through Isaac, not because they are better than Ishmael’s, but because they were blessed to reveal God’s love to ‘all people’s’ including Ishmael’s people, and the rest of us too.   God loves Arab peoples, just like he loves Jews, and just like God loves Christians, and just like he loves other religious people, and even secular people too.   

There is an interesting little story in Gerald McDermott little book entitled, “Israel Still Matters”.  In that book Dr. McDermott argues that Israel has a right to the promised-land, and that Christians and Arabs should respect that.  I don’t have time to go through all his arguments, nor do I want to, but there is one story he tells that especially caught my attention.   McDermott says that when he lived in Israel, he talked to a lot of people who actually lived there and didn’t care too much about the politics.  He said that there were even many Arabs there, who would rather live under the rule of Israel, than under any government of Palestinian Arabs.   Their reasoning was simple.  They would much rather be ‘Arabs’ under Jews who govern the land with democracy and freedom, than live under Palestinian rule that would rule with the restrictions or forced or extreme Islamic religion.   They wanted to believe in God through the lens of their Muslim culture, but they didn’t want all the negatives that came with it.  They wanted the freedom and democracy only Israel could give.


If we want to be the people who bring God’s peace (Shalom) in the world, we must work to undo sin of Sarah and Abraham, who kicked Hagar out, so that all can rediscover the grace which God revealed that could save Abraham, and us too.   It is not in Jerusalem, but at Golgatha, just outside the walls of the great city, where Jesus died on the cross, that God’s love was fully revealed.  This is not because Jesus was Jewish, nor because Jesus established the Christian Church.  No, the reason God’s love and grace was revealed fully in Jesus, was because “God was in Christ reconciling the whole world unto himself’.   It is in the pain, in the suffering, and in the death this Son of God, Jesus the Christ, that God reveals the only kind of love that will ‘provide’ the ‘saving grace’ God has always intended for the whole world.  Amen.

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