Chapter 12: The Birth of Isaac and Exile of Hagar
Q1 - Whose voice did God hear in the wilderness? To whom did He reply? See Genesis 21:17. Can you think of another example in the Bible when God heard someone’s cry or prayer?
A1- God heard the voice of Ishmael, even though the scriptures do not say he was crying. His angel then responded to Hagar, Ishmael’s mother. It’s likely God heard Hagar’s crying as well.
Here are several examples of God hearing someone’s cry or prayer. You may think of others:
The Israelite People:
God heard the cry of His people who were in Egypt being oppressed by their taskmasters in Exodus 3:7 (NIV): “The LORD said, ‘I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering.’” He then sent Moses to deliver them.
Daniel:
God heard Daniel’s prayer and responded even before he finished praying in Daniel 9:20–23a (NIV): “While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel and making my request to the Lord my God for his holy hill—while I was still in prayer, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the earlier vision, came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice. He instructed me and said to me, ‘Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and understanding. As soon as you began to pray, a word went out, which I have come to tell you, for you are highly esteemed.’”
In Daniel 10:12 (NIV), God’s representative told Daniel this: “‘Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to them.’” Notice how quickly God responded to Daniel. He knew the inclination of his heart.
Cornelius:
In the New Testament in Acts 10, God heard the prayer of Cornelius, an officer in the Roman army from the Italian regiment (and obviously not a Jew). At the beginning of chapter 10, Cornelius, a devout and God-fearing man, had a vision. An angel instructed him to send for Peter and told him where he was staying.
Then, beginning in Acts 10:9, Peter had a vision that was repeated three times. In his vision, Peter refused to eat of anything offered to him because it was unclean according to the Jewish dietary laws given in Leviticus 11. The underlying meaning of this vision was that Jesus’s death had ushered in a New Covenant that would be for all people, and that Jewish customs would no longer apply.
As Peter was contemplating the meaning of the vision he had just seen, the men sent by Cornelius arrived. The Holy Spirit told Peter to go with them, as He had sent them. Peter invited them in to where he was staying, and the next day he left with the men to go back to Cornelius.
The remainder of the chapter tells of the conversion of Cornelius and his household to Christianity. Even though Cornelius was a Gentile, God heard his prayer (Acts 10:31) and provided a way for him to hear the Word, receive the Holy Spirit, and be baptized.
Q2 - What does Ishmael’s name mean? (See behindthename.com and Easton’s Bible Dictionary https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/Ishmael.) How was his name fitting to his and Hagar’s situation in life?
A2 - Ishmael’s name means “God will hear” or “God hears.” God heard Hagar’s cries of affliction when she fled from Sarah’s harsh treatment before Ishmael was born (see Genesis 16:11). He heard Abraham’s plea concerning Ishmael and promised to bless him and multiply him greatly (see Genesis 17:20). God later heard the cries of Ishmael himself when he and his mother were expelled from Abraham’s household (see Genesis 21:17).
Q3 - In Galatians 4:21–31, the Apostle Paul compares Ishmael and Isaac. What do their lives symbolize? What point is Paul trying to make with this comparison? Christians are symbolically the children of which one of Abraham’s sons?
A3 - In this passage in Galatians, Paul compares the Law given to Moses on Mount Sinai to the New Covenant. He used Hagar, Sarah’s servant, to represent the Old Law. Since Hagar was a slave, the son she bore, Ishmael, was born into slavery. The Old Law represented slavery because it could never set people free from their sins—it could not offer true forgiveness. The physical city of Jerusalem, the seat of the Jewish religion, then, represented slavery and the Old Law.
Isaac, the child of promise born to Abraham and Sarah, was born into freedom. He represents the New Covenant which Jesus brought about with His death, burial, and resurrection. The seat of the New Covenant is the new Jerusalem, a spiritual kingdom, and with the coming of the New Covenant came true freedom—complete freedom from our sins made possible by the perfect sacrifice Jesus made when He offered Himself on the cross. Christians are symbolically the children of Isaac, the child of promise who was born free.
Paul explains how Christians attain that freedom from sin in Romans 6:3–14. When we are baptized, we are baptized into Jesus’s death. In essence, we participate in His death, and just as He was raised from the dead, so we too arise from the watery grave of baptism to a new life. We are no longer slaves to sin but have been set free. We do not live under the Old Law, but rather under the grace of God made possible by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.