Hagar

The story of Hagar has been a story that has touched me deeply, so I was moved deeply by being able to enter into Hagar’s story again at a women’s retreat I attended.  If you have never read her story I urge you to turn to Genesis 16 right now.

As we unpacked this story I gleaned so many gems about this story that I never knew.  First of all did you know that when Sarai devises her plan and tells Abram to take Hagar to be his wife in the original text she says, “maybe I will built up.”  The goal was one of selfishness and self edification.  Sarai longed to be built up.  In her cultural she was nothing without a child.

Now when Abram consented to this plan and he took Hagar as a wife, that word took is the same word that is used in the garden of Eden when they they took the forbidden fruit and ate it.  They both took something that was not how God designed.

So this little plan was conceived with selfish motives and against the Lord’s plan from day one.

Yet Hagar’s name has significance.  It means, behold a person lifted up. 

Now from here we see two H’s in the Hebrew.  In the word Yahweh, a name God assigned to himself, a personal name God gave himself, the I AM, the ONE who IS.  Back to Hagar there are two H’s found in Yahweh. Know the word Yahweh was such a holy name that it could not be pronounced.  In Hagar’s name we find not one but two H’s as Yahweh also contains.  Sarai and Abram’s names were later changed to Sarah and Abraham later.  Yet Hagar, who was not originally in the Lord’s plan was given two from the start.  I love to see how he cares for Hagar with such sweet connections to her such as her name and a name he gave to himself.

Lastly when Hagar fled, she was desperate, tired of the abuse she was receiving from Sarai.  The Lord meets her and asks her two questions…

Where have you come from?

Where are you going?

The second question the Lord asks, Where are you going, first if we literally translate it means where do you seek to walk?  The question is referring to the journey.  She had no idea where she was going, but the Lord met her and gave her direction..........Go back. 

He offered no promise of change in the difficulty of the situation, but that this encounter was enough to sustain her.  Her El Roi- the God who sees met her in her time of need, her time of desperation.

I was encouraged to seek out my El Roi rather than running from the problem.  He is the only one who brings comfort and is faithful to give it.