Bible Text: Genesis 16 | Pastor: Eric Danielson | Series: Abraham

There are times when we want something really bad, but we know that in order to get it we would have to make a compromise in our faith. It’s easy to reason with ourselves and justify compromises for many reasons, but in today’s example from Abram’s life we will see why it is so important to take a stand and say “no” to compromise.

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No More Compromises
Genesis 16

One of the things I’ve wanted to do for several years is go back to school to get a Master’s of Divinity degree. It’s one of the things that many pastors do and it usually takes about 5 years and up to $50,000 to complete. For a long time it wasn’t even a possibility for me because I didn’t have the time or money to make it happen, but two years ago Crown College launched a new online MDiv program where I wouldn’t ever have to go to campus. And they also gave major discounts to alumni and students who enrolled in the first year of the program. Then I found another program that would pay half of my bills once I graduated. So I was looking at an opportunity to do something I really wanted to do and it was the best price I was ever going to see and probably the least time consuming.

But I also knew that if moved forward with the program, in spite of the reduced time and expense, it would still put our family in a very stressful situation for several years because of the time commitment and financial cost. And these were two areas the Lord had been working on me to get under control for the sake of my family. The bottom line was, if I went for it, it was going to be a major strain on my family and even though Amy was in support and everything else seemed like a green light, I just didn’t feel a peace about it and I knew that if I pushed forward I would be making a major compromise. I would be going against what I believed God wanted me to do to try to get something I really wanted.

I think we face these situations a lot in our lives – situations where we want something really bad, but the only way we can get it is to make a compromise in our faith. It would require us to do something that God didn’t want us to do. It might be a decision about who you choose to be friends with or who to date and marry. It might be a decision about where to go to college or what kind of degree to pursue. It might be a decision about accepting promotion at work or a new job altogether. A lot of times we’re tempted to make compromises when it comes to something we want to buy, but can’t really afford. It might be the temptation to cheat on your taxes, or you’re tempted to move in with your fiancé before you get married to try to save some money. There’s something in our spirit that tells us we shouldn’t move forward, but we really want to. And it’s easy to justify compromises for one reason or another.

This morning we are going to look at a time when Abram faced a situation like this and made the wrong decision. We’ve been learning from his example for the past 5 weeks, but this time we learn from a major mistake he made. He made a compromise in order to get something that he really wanted and it ended up being very costly. And my hope is that as we look at his example, God will speak to our hearts about the compromises we’re tempted to make.

Abram and Sarai had been in Canaan for 10 years and they were still facing the same central problem – they had no children. God had promised them several times that their offspring would inherit the land and that they would be as numerous as the dust of the earth or the stars in the sky, but year after year went by and they still had no son. Abram was now 85 years old and Sarai was 75 and even though people lived longer in that time, they were definitely getting to the point where they would be unable to have children.

The story today begins with Sarai in the spotlight, and it’s important that we think about things from her perspective. Sarai knows there’s one thing her husband wants more than anything else, and that was a son. But for whatever reason, she had not been able to conceive. I talked with Amy about how a woman would feel in her situation. She wanted to have children and please her husband by bearing a son, but she couldn’t. If you’re a wife, you can imagine how she would have felt. She would have felt very vulnerable, especially in that culture – like a disappointment; a failure; she would have struggled with insecurity. And I believe that it was because of these things that she came up with a plan – something I think she didn’t want to do, but felt like she had to.

Read Genesis 16:1-3.
Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. 2 And Sarai said to Abram, “Behold now, the LORD has prevented me from bearing children. Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. 3 So, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife.

For a wife in a monogamous relationship, this would have been a very difficult thing to do. But again, I think it was out of her vulnerability and the desire to please her husband that she did it. According to the Code of Hammurabi, it was a common practice in that era for an infertile wife to offer her servant to her husband to obtain children through her – like a surrogate mother. Leah and Rachel actually did the same thing several years later with their servants and Jacob. Under this arrangement, the children born to the servant-wife would be considered children of the chief-wife. So in this way Sarai could still provide an heir for her husband. She could give him what he wanted most – Abram would be pleased and an heir would be born. But even with the differences in culture, I think this would have been a very difficult thing for Sarai to do. Abram was not a polygamist – he had been devoted to her for several decades, so for her to offer another woman to him was likely a very difficult thing. I think she looked on her plan as a noble sacrifice – something she had to do to please her husband and provide an heir.

So she proposed the idea to Abram and he agreed. So that’s the setting for this story. Let’s see what happened next.

Read Genesis 16:4-6.
4 And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. 5 And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the LORD judge between you and me!” 6 But Abram said to Sarai, “Behold, your servant is in your power; do to her as you please.” Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her.

So all kinds of bad stuff happened when they moved forward with this plan. We aren’t given a lot of information about their situation, so you have to piece together the details to try to understand what’s going on. Again, I talked with Amy about this to try to understand Sarai’s reaction. We are told that when Abram slept with Hagar, she conceived. So this is exactly what was supposed to happen. You’d think everybody would be happy. But the opposite happened. It says that when Hagar conceived, she looked with contempt on Sarai. I looked up the definition of original Hebrew word and it means to despise, dishonor, and look down on. In the past, I just looked at this as a prideful thing – that Hagar gets pregnant and all of a sudden feels superior to her mistress who couldn’t conceive. But as I thought through their situation I realized there’s a lot more that could be going on.

I remember when Amy got pregnant – all of a sudden her mommy heart came to life. She fell in love with Sophia long before she was even born – something that if you’re a mom, you can probably relate to. That mommy heart is very protective and possessive – the nurturing instinct takes over and is so powerful that mom’s make incredible sacrifices for the sake of their kids. Now think about if you’re in Hagar’s situation. One day, your mistress comes to you and tells you that she wants you to sleep with her husband so you can become pregnant and bear a child for him, since she had not been able to. “Oh, and by the way, I’m going to take your baby as my own as soon as he or she is born.”

The text doesn’t tell us about Hagar’s initial reaction to this other than at first she was apparently willing to go through with the plan. But it does tell us that when she became pregnant something changed and she turned against Sarai. I think it was because she didn’t want to give up her baby anymore. So Sarai became her enemy, and she treated her with contempt. This of course didn’t go over well with Sarai who was already in a vulnerable situation. Not only was she unable to conceive; not only had she given her servant to sleep with her husband; but now her servant turned against her and became her enemy. Things were falling apart, so she goes to Abram. And her reaction to him is very strong, which is understandable because of the emotions of the situation, but what she says is kind of surprising. She very strongly accused Abram of wrongdoing. “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the LORD judge between you and me!”

So she puts all the blame and responsibility on Abram, even implying that if the Lord would judge between them, Abram would be found to be in the wrong. Now, if I’m Abram, this is one of those times as a husband where I’d be scratching my head in confusion. And that’s what I think he does: “What did I do?… Wasn’t this your idea in the first place? I just went along with your plan. If Hagar is treating you poorly, she is under your authority, so do what you need to do.”

Why did Sarai respond like she did to her husband? I asked Amy that, and this is what we thought: When Sarai first went to Abram to propose the plan with Hagar, she was in an extremely vulnerable position and the idea she came up with was a last resort – the only thing she thought she could do to please her husband and provide an heir. But deep down we think she really didn’t want to do it. And I think what she needed and wanted her husband to do, was to step out in faith in that moment and say, “Honey I love you no matter what. Thank you for your desire to please me, but we can’t do this. The Lord brought us here and promised to give us offspring, so we are going to wait on him together for the answer.” In her vulnerability, she needed him to lead by faith, but he didn’t. He gave in to his desire to have a son by conforming to the practices of the people around them. I think he knew that sleeping with Hagar would be a compromise on many levels, but he did it anyway. Rather than waiting on the Lord he went ahead with the worldly solution and it lead to all kinds of trouble.

We’re told that Sarai went back to Hagar and treated her harshly so that Hagar ran away. And the story ends like this…

Read Genesis 16:7-16.
7 The angel of the LORD found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. 8 And he said, “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from my mistress Sarai.” 9 The angel of the LORD said to her, “Return to your mistress and submit to her.” 10 The angel of the LORD also said to her, “I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude.” 11 And the angel of the LORD said to her, “Behold, you are pregnant and shall bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, because the LORD has listened to your affliction. 12 He shall be a wild donkey of a man, his hand against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he shall dwell over against all his kinsmen.”
13 So she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.” 14 Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; it lies between Kadesh and Bered.
15 And Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael. 16 Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram.

… “And they all lived happily ever after.” Not exactly. This is all going to resurface again in Genesis 21 and create more problems. In fact the consequences of Abram’s compromise would be felt by Abram’s descendants for hundreds of years. Abram made a major compromise and it was very costly.

The same thing will be true in our lives when we choose to take the things we really want by making compromises in our faith. God is merciful and forgiving, but there are still consequences. And I think we can see these consequences all around us in the world as people choose to do whatever they want rather than waiting on the Lord.

So many marriages and families are in turmoil because of compromises people make. So many lives are in ruin; so many financial catastrophe’s; so many messed up kids. The consequences of making compromises are at an epidemic level in our culture and yet people continue to make them. People continue to push forward to try to get what they want and they leave a wake of pain and destruction behind them.

I want to call you to something different. To live a life of faith in God and wait on him. Sometimes God doesn’t give us what we want because he knows it will destroy our lives. Sometimes he wants us to wait so that we’re in a better situation. When are God’s people going to stand up and say, “Enough is enough? Though everyone else might go the other direction, I’m going to stand firm in the Lord and trust him.”