God Hears

The desert seemed endless. They had wandered for days, and Hagar had no idea how far they were from where they started. They could have walked in a circle for all she knew, and her master’s tents could have been over the next ridge. Not that it mattered. He had sent them away- at his wife’s orders, Hagar knew- and now it seemed that his son- her son- would die in this desert of thirst and heat.

She looked down at the boy- not far down, now, he had grown fast these last months and his tunic was too short. His father had not paid him as much attention since the baby had been born. How was this his fault? He had been the apple of his father’s eye ever since he was born, of course he was going to find it hard to adjust to suddenly being a big brother. Even if he didn’t yet understand that little Isaac had usurped his place as heir to his father, he could tell that the adults around him no longer had time for him. And he had been caught mocking the baby- as if children didn’t mock each other all the time- and even Hagar would have agreed that some appropriate discipline was called for.

But instead she and her son were sent away into the desert with nothing but a water-skin and some food. Abraham had at least looked somewhat distressed when he sent them away, but Hagar had been too angry, too worried and too busy trying to reassure her son to pay attention to Abraham's mumbled words.

And now the water in the skin was gone. She remembered how, before Ishmael was born, she had run away from his father and Sarah, and had thought she was going to die of thirst in the desert. That time there had been a spring, and a stranger had told her that her child would grow strong and have many descendants. She had believed it was a blessing from her master's God, the God who had seen and heard her. Over the years the memory of the stranger she had met in the desert had faded. It must have been a hallucination, she had thought. Deserts were strange places, and she had been dehydrated, distressed. No wonder she had imagined seeing and hearing someone who told her what, on some level, she had wanted to hear. Comforting promises that if she went back everything would be all right, that her son would have a great future. That she was not just some insignificant slave but was seen, known, heard. That someone cared.

That rang hollow now. She had gone back to her master, strengthened by the encounter with the stranger, had submitted to Sarah's jealousy for so many years for her child’s sake. And Ishmael, ‘God hears’, had been happy and healthy and his father Abraham’s acknowledged heir until Isaac had arrived. Isaac, ‘laughter’. And his mother Sarah had laughed, first in disbelief, then with joy at her son’s birth after so many years of childlessness. And then she had laughed with jealous triumph over Hagar, her rival. The son of the slave was displaced by the son of the wife. Isaac was the inheritor of the prophecy that Abraham would have more descendents than grains of sand in the desert. Well might the tiny boy and his mother laugh, while Hagar wept bitter tears. There was no way back this time.

The boy stumbling through the desert heat beside her was near the end of his endurance. He had stopped asking her for water. She felt his forehead, burning hot. She looked around, desperate for water, for shelter, for help. But there was only a carrion bird, soaring far above, shadowing their movements. Waiting.

There was a bush a short way ahead that would at least give some small shade. She led Ishmael towards it. As they reached it he stumbled, and she caught him, and gently lowered him to the ground under the scrubby branches.

“Thirsty,” he muttered, his eyes closed. Her heart bled.

“Stay here,” she told him, trying to keep her voice calm. He barely seemed to hear her, but went on muttering and sobbing quietly.

She walked quickly away, her eyes blurred with tears. She could not bear to watch him die. She sat down in the shade of another bush and sobbed, worn out, hopeless. It would have been better if she had never gone back to Abraham and Sarah, if she had died out in the desert before Ishmael had ever been born. No stranger was going to appear this time.

“The God who sees me”. Her sobs turned to bitter laughter. It had been a cruel joke. If he could see her now, did he not care that her son was dying?

And then the silence of the desert was broken.

“Do not be afraid.”

A voice, a voice that was familiar and yet which she had not heard since that last time in the desert. It seemed to come from everywhere and yet from nowhere, it was all around and yet had no source.

“God has heard the boy crying. Lift him up and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.”

Hagar looked up. Not far ahead, where she was sure had only been sand and rocks the last time she looked, she now saw a well of water. She hurried over, filled the skin, and ran back to Ishmael. Her hands shaking, she raised his head and helped him drink. His muttering stopped, and his eyes opened. “Mother?”

“It’s all right,” she said, tears streaming down her face. And somehow she knew it would be all right. “God has heard us.”



Based on Genesis 21 https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%2021&version=NIV