road2answers

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

1 The LORD visited Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did to Sarah as he had promised. [i] (Genesis 21:1, ESV) Have you ever been passed over or overlooked? Were you one of those enviable few who were picked first for teams on the playground? Or, were you left standing until the very last? These playground dramas continue even in our adult years as we are passed over for promotions or others are recognized over us. This week I read about a court case from 2004 were a Wisconsin employee won a gender discrimination case because she was passed over for promotion despite excellent performance. Key in the jury ’ s verdict was evidence of the manager ’ s history of gender based “ humorous ” comments such as “ Just like a woman to say that; ” “ You ’ re being a blonde again; ” and “ It ’ s a blonde thing. ” The manager also implied that the female employee did not need a promotion because she had a husband to “ take care of her ” and the manager did not think she would