God Hears
Ishmael was the son of Sarah ’ s slave, Hagar. We meet Hagar in Genesis 16. After long years of not being able to have a baby, Sarah decides to try to have a child by proxy. Apparently this was the practice of the day. Hagar was Sarah ’ s choice for the proxy. We do not know where Sarah got Hagar, nor how long she had her. We do know that Abraham traveled to Egypt to avoid a drought a few years before this. When he was in Egypt, he and Sarah lied about their relationship saying that Sarah was his sister. As a result of the lie, Pharaoh took Sarah to be his wife. God intervened and stopped Pharaoh. Because of Sarah, Pharaoh gave Abraham many gifts including male and female servants. My guess would be that Hagar was one of these servants. We do know that Hagar was Egyptian. When Abraham was 85 years old Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham in order to produce a child. Genesis 16:4 tells us, “ When Hagar knew she was pregnant, she began to treat her mistress, Sarai, with contemp