Hurry Up & Wait

If you have your copy of God's word, go and make your way to

Genesis chapter 16, Genesis 16 as today we resume our series

Genesis 16 · chapter mention

answering God's call through the first book of the Bible,

Genesis, where we left off and took a couple three-week hiatus

as we for Palm Sunday and Easter.

We're in Isaiah 52 and 53 and then last Sunday in my absence,

man who was with us three years prior, Wayne Nagle with families

for families came and was a great blessing, challenging and

calling us to care for the vulnerable.

That ministry it really the heart of our church.

It was been going on for quite some time now to care for foster

children. Many foster families in the life

of our church and many that support and serve foster

families. And so I pray that you were

encouraged last week is as I was away on mission with three other

church members in Lesotho, Africa, which is a country just

South of South Africa. And we returned this past week

and church family. I just want to share just a

little bit about that. And really the, the, the main

thing I want to say is is thank you.

Thank you for being a church that is willing to be a Great

Commission, not just right here, but to the ends of the earth

church. Thank you for being a church

willing to serve and support your pastor and willingness for

him to go, to be a part of going to tell others about Christ,

whether it be across the street or around the world.

What we did was we'll show some pictures here in a second, but

we teamed up with one of our IMB partners, right?

So part of what we do at the church is part of your offerings

and tithes go to support the full time salary of people on

the field around the world to tell people about Christ.

They don't have to raise money because we're able to provide

them with that money. So we teamed up with one of

these families there and we were able to multiply their efforts

as they serve in a larger city where they live in Lesotho and

they minister to university students.

But then they disciple them in their homes after evangelizing

them. But then there's the rural,

mountainous areas of Lesotho that have villages as far as you

want to hike and walk. All right.

And So what we did was we helped divide into teams with the

missionaries efforts. They go and take the gospel and

do discipleship in these rural areas and what they call the

Highlands or the mountains of Lasutu.

This is actually a picture from the window of the room where I

slept in Lasutu. This is what I woke up to and

watched every morning. That's Mahalay Reservoir right

there. Now the the view is five star.

I'm not necessarily saying that the lodging was all right.

It was great. Food was great.

I mean, for international it was I wouldn't complain one bit, but

the views were absolutely spectacular.

So what we were doing is we were driving a four wheel drive

Toyota Helix with mud tires and everything.

It was awesome. All right, crossing rivers and

creeks and mud and climbing up Jeep trails because you don't

have roads that go to these villages, but you could drive as

far as you could and then you hiked from there.

All right, We're at 5 to 7000 feet and so we're walking into

villages. The next picture where you can

see what the homes look like. This is one of our translators

and our student pastor there. This is what a typical, you

don't need to see the whole village, but you see a couple of

the first houses there. And what we would do is, is we

would in the villages where they had the missionaries had already

been, we would follow up and do evangelism and do discipleship

through a translator. As we talk, you'll see a couple

pictures of me teaching. I think along the way we would

also evangelize the shepherds. These are very much a

shepherding culture. They have sheep and goats and

cows that are ranging throughout these mountains, and you would

go to them and hike to them to try to share.

So if you want to keep going on the pictures, we can just kind

of walk through those. We cross creeks, had to take off

our shoes, put them back on, and I could have borrowed a horse

there, but we didn't do that. Crossed in the vehicle there you

can see just the scenery is amazing and people are

throughout. You can't see people right here,

but villages are tucked into these mountains and the

shepherds are throughout them. Let's keep going.

This lady ran from a village over to memorize the verses on

that white card that we would give them.

So in the language, they would take the Romans Rd. in John 316.

In order to get a Bible, they have to memorize these verses.

And then we would give them a Bible in their own language

which they otherwise had no access to and a little Bible

cover. So this lady ran from 1 village

to the next. These were shepherds we shared

with that had never ever heard the gospel.

And let me just say this, I think what struck me most about

this trip is we had an opportunity to share with more

people who had never heard the gospel in their life than any

other opportunity I've ever had. These three shepherds never

heard the gospel. All young guys out there, all

alone in these mountains shepherding their sheep.

Obviously I could look at them and talk about the great

Shepherd. I could look at them and say all

we like sheep have gone astray. They knew exactly what I was

talking about and they realized right when I'm spiritually

speaking about sin and their need of a Savior.

And so we were able to lead several shepherds to Christ just

through these conversations. We would hike to them.

Let's go to the last shepherd that we had a chance to share

with. You can see some of his sheep

there. That's his little Hut to the

left that he sleeps in. We had hiked down this steep

embankment to this guy. His dogs were going crazy.

They keep these dogs to keep sheep thieves away, which those

dogs think we're the sheep thieves.

You can imagine how this goes. You pick up a rock and you start

praying. All right, say God, I don't want

to ruin this opportunity with the shepherd with his dogs

before I get a chance to share with him.

We walked down. He was very receptive to us

through a translator. We just end up, we just

immediately drop in, hey, we've come to share the good news of

God's love with you. And I don't know if you've ever

heard this, but God sent his one and only son so that whosoever

would believe in him should not perish.

Why? Because we've strayed like

sheep. The wages of sin is death, but

the free gift of God in Jesus Christ is eternal life, and all

who call on the name of the Lord will be saved.

And have you ever heard this? No, I've never heard this.

See, the look on his face just change as he realizes what we've

just hiked down this mountain to share with him.

He's not talked to anybody in two months all alone by the time

we've shared the gospel. You think about that passage

where I say, this is how beautiful are the feet of those

who bring the good news of peace.

And all over him is written this gratitude.

I can't really explain to you the that the look that came over

his demeanor as we shared with him.

He didn't know who we were walking down this mountain and

yet to hear the story. And he looked at us and then he

says, I'm so thankful for what you've shared with me.

I wish I had a sleep, a sheep slaughtered so I could feed you

before you left this guy. We told the missionary was going

to go back the following Friday after we arrived in the States

on Thursday and the missionary said, I'm going to be back and

I'm going to be up this road that's up the mountain.

On Friday, the missionary sent me a WhatsApp that said that

shepherd with four others, we're sitting by the road waiting for

him on Friday to hear more about what we shared.

I mean, praise God, praise God, church family, that, that that's

what it's all about, whether it's across the street or around

the world. You know, we when I, one of the

reasons I love to go is because it's like a spiritual boot camp.

It reminds me what really matters in life.

It reminds me really what I'm supposed to be doing, whether in

Cartersville or in Lesotho. It reminds me of the joy of the

privilege of sharing the greatest news on the planet,

right? And it reminds me that the power

of God when we speak the word of God has the power to change a

human heart. Whether someone who's never

heard it before, who grew up hearing it, but has never

received it in church family, this is our privilege and

responsibility. And I'm thankful, thankful we're

part of a church family who values getting the gospel around

the world. One of my goals for you, if it's

if it's something that you've not set, is that maybe at least

once a year you would think about intentionally going

somewhere that otherwise you would not have gone had you not

chosen to go because you were taking the gospel.

I think that should be a rhythm of every Christian.

It doesn't have to be Africa, but it could be just somewhere

further than you would normally go for the sake of telling

someone about Christ. Well, I could keep going on

that, but my duty here this morning is to preach the word of

God. All right, so let me do that.

Out of Genesis chapter 16, there are some texts that just throws

Genesis 16 · chapter mention

sermon titles at you. I mean, it's like pick one,

right? I thought about several for this

text. I didn't choose any of them, but

I could have said the title of this sermon is the autopsy of a

dumb decision. That one would have fit.

We could have called this sermon No good and the Bad and the

ugly. We could have called this sermon

how not to do life, marriage and family.

All of that would have been appropriate.

May not capture the whole story, but it's spoken to what we're

going to see. I can tell you what we're about

to read is the brokenness and sinfulness of man and the crazy,

constant, never ending grace of God in the middle of all our

mess. That's what we're going to read

and that's what we're going to see.

All right, So be watching for that as we go.

Listen to Genesis 16, verses 1 and 2.

Genesis 16:1

Now Sarah, Abraham's wife, had borne him no children.

She had a female Egyptian servant, whose name was Hagar.

And Sarah said to Abram, Behold, now the Lord has prevented me

from bearing children. Go into my servant.

It may be that I shall obtain children by her.

And Abram listened to the voice. Sarai, I warned you.

This one starts in the shade, and it gets, it just gets

shadier before it gets better. So just be patient, all right?

Sarah is 75, Abraham's 85. They left home 10 years ago,

headed toward the land God had promised them.

It has been over a decade since they heard God's promise that He

would give them an offspring, and that that offspring would be

as numerous as the stars of the sky.

But guess what? How many offspring do they have

after 10 years? Absolutely zero.

Notice closely what Sarah says to Abram.

The Lord has prevented me from bearing children.

Now just watch this Sarah rightly acknowledges that God is

God over her circumstances. She's rightly acknowledging that

God is sovereign. God is the one who's ultimately

in control. God is the one who's ultimately

the author of life. So she's expressing belief in

God. But this belief in God is not

coming out in a positive way, is it?

It's actually being expressed in a negative way, is actually

being expressed in the form of blame.

She is blaming God for what is happening, or rather really

what's not happening. To be more specific, I think we

could say and admit that her words are words that are soaked

in pain. She's speaking out of the depth

of pain of year after year after year of desiring a child and yet

not having one, hearing the promise of God for a child, but

not having a child. All right.

So word soaked in pain of hope not realized.

Word soaked in the pain of prayers not yet answered.

Word soaked in pain of public shame for decades and pain now

of blaming God for one's problems.

Maybe you could put yourself in Sarah's shoes and I could just

hear say it like this, Abram. Maybe you're supposed to be the

father of many nations, but obviously I'm not the mother.

This is how she feels ready to give up.

Sarah believed in the sovereignty of God over the

womb, but in her pain, she's actually about to act in direct

opposition to the sovereignty and power of God.

Now watch this. This is what we do when we often

often do when we are in pain or in fear.

It's not that we stop believing in God, but we often start

navigating by our own power rather than waiting and

operating in faith in God. Let me put it like this.

Sarah believes in God. She's just tired of waiting on

God. You ever been there?

I'm not lacking faith in God. I'm just, I'm just tired of

waiting on Him. I'm ready to make something

happen. I'm ready for this to be real.

I'm ready to be over this. I'm ready to experience.

I want this and I've wanted, I prayed for it.

And yet pain or fear can cause us to act illogically,

unfaithfully, ungodly even in believing in God, right?

So she's going to take things into her own hands because of

her pain. And that's going to be a big

mistake. No, notice, Sarah's plan is

this. It's an Egyptian, one of their

servants by the name of Hagar. Now, there was a social custom

in this day that if a wife was barren and failed to bear

children, then often times the man would marry another wife in

order to have children. In fact, in Lesotho where I just

was, it was customary, a little different than if the wife

failed to bear the husband a son.

Eventually they can marry another wife in order to try to

have a son. None of that's right.

I'm just saying it was reality. None of it was God's design.

But this is the way they operated in their day and in

their custom. All right, So what was Abraham's

response? Here's what he says.

And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai.

Abram listened to the voice of his wife.

Now, if you know your Bible, that ought to give you a Bible

flashback real quick. Do you know where?

And you know with who, where Adam and Eve in the garden in

the beginning. Here's how it went.

Adam, Genesis 317 and to Adam, God said, behold, Adam, you have

listened to the voice of your wife.

I'm going to be real careful right here.

You ready, guys? I can tell you that if God has

given you a good woman, all right, and I'm sure he has.

Amen ladies, that 99% of the time you ought to listen to her.

I need an Amen. I only got 1 from 1 man.

Come on ladies, where you at? Right. 99% of the time, if God's

given you a good woman, you ought to listen to her.

Why is that? Well, let's just be honest guys,

because God has given women an intuition and insight of

discernment, often times a wisdom that we as guys don't

have anywhere in our ballpark that she sees, she knows, and

she's getting. She's understanding that we

don't have often times and yet, and yet there's obviously a time

not to listen to the voice of your husband or your wife.

When is that? When the voice of your husband

or wife contradicts the voice of God.

I made sure you were listening right.

Whenever that happens, that is the moment not to listen to the

voice of one that's contradicting the voice of God.

Young people in the room or unmarried people in the room

that are interested in marriage. I want to read a verse of

Scripture that by the way, probably doesn't read

politically correct in our day. It could be applied either way

toward a husband looking for a wife or wife looking for a

husband. It's written in the book of

Proverbs as to a son. So it's under the direction of

thinking about a wife and here's what it says.

And so as you think about marriage, please keep this in

consideration. Proverbs 12 for an excellent

wife or you just thinking for girls in the room.

An excellent husband is the crown of her husband, but she

who brings shame is like rottenness in his bones.

The character of your spouse will either be like a crown on

your head, blessing your life, giving, giving goodness in your

life and God's will in your life, or it can be the opposite,

bringing a cancer and a rottenness at the core of your

life. You better marry for character

or you will regret it. Mark it down.

Marry for character. Looks won't last anyway.

All right, You don't have to say me into that.

Especially if you're wives. I'll let you say that about your

husband. But husbands don't say that

about your. All right, let's move.

Let's move on. Here we go.

The first thing I want you to see out of this text is this

truth. You ready?

God's will by our plans is a recipe for disaster.

God's will by our plans is a recipe for disaster.

Have you ever realized it's possible to do the right thing

the wrong way? Have you realized it's possible

to have the right destination in mind, but take the wrong route?

This is exactly what's going on. God had promised Abram and Sarah

a child, but Sarah decided to go about it her own way, right?

So what should Abram have said in response to Sarah?

No, would be the most simple answer.

I don't know. It was going to just, we're

probably going to require more than that, right?

But what, what, what should we do when the voice of our spouse

contradicts the voice of God? Knowing this has happened to us

all? There's been times my voice and

my marriage has contradicted the voice of God.

All right. And I'm a pastor.

Let's be honest. This is all of us.

What should we do? It's going to be easier said

than done, but let me give you a little example of the way

Abraham might have said it. Are you ready?

I'm not saying this is easy, but here's an example.

I'll just file this away next time you might need it.

You ready? Sarah?

Honey, bless your heart. We're just keeping it Southern.

All right? You're my wife, I love you and I

know that you are hurting, but we're in this together and as

hard as it is, let's keep believing God for a miracle.

I don't want to sin against God. I don't want to sin against you.

I don't want to sin against our marriage with another woman.

Let's pray about it and see where God leads.

Now. Whatever four or five sentences

that was would have been a game changer.

Whatever four or five sentences you might need is going to be a,

a game changer. By the way, it's not just what

you say, it's how you say it. We talk about in our

discipleship strategy, gather, grow, give and go.

Part of that grow part is this idea of offering biblical

counseling in our body. And I just kind of want to

demystify what that is for a moment because honestly, what

what was needed right here was just some biblical counsel

because you know what biblical counsel is?

It's contradicting unbiblical thinking with biblical truth.

And this is what we owe one another as brothers and sisters

in Christ, as friends. Hey, when you come across

unbiblical thinking in your friend, speak up with the voice

of God with what the Word says and confront and correct in

love. But with what the Bible says.

You can do this as a friend, as a spouse, as a parent, as AI

mean as a Co worker. We ought to be doing this.

You can sit down with somebody in our church to for biblical

counsel, but all you're all we're seeking to do is line up

our lives with the voice of God and correct unbiblical thinking

with biblical thinking so we can live God's work.

That's what that's what biblical counseling is.

It's what Abram and Sarah needed in this moment.

Now follow along beginning in verse 3.

So after Abram had lived 10 years in the land of Canaan,

Sarah Abrams wife took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave

her to Abram her husband as a wife.

And when he went into Hagar and she conceived, and when she saw

that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her

mistress. And Sarah 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.

But Abram said to Sarah, Behold, your servant is in your power,

Do to her her as you please. Then Sarah dealt harshly with

her and she fled from her. Abram marries Hagar as his

second wife, which was never God's design.

Multiple wives is in the Bible because God allows mankind to

have a choice and we choose to do things our way instead of

God's way. But the Bible's design is is

unmistakably clear. Genesis 224 And a man shall

leave his father and his mother and be joined with his wife, and

the two shall become one flesh. God's word isn't unclear.

We do things our way instead of God's, unfortunately.

But practically speaking, let's state the obvious.

The plan does what the plan works, right?

They have a child. How often do we justify a

decision, a direction, a choice, because it because it what it

works? But there can be a wrong way to

do a right thing. There can be a right destination

with the wrong route. So what they've done is not

honored. God.

Yeah, it's it's it's worked in one way.

It's actually going to produce a lot more of what they didn't

want to work. And so we don't operate our

lives, we don't do church, we don't live the Christian life

based on what works. We live the Christian life

according to what God's Word says.

By the way, that means we may not always do the easiest thing.

We may not always live in a way that makes the most common

sense. But if you're living according

to God's Word, it's not about what works.

It's about what God has said and our willingness to submit to

that or not. So one wrong doesn't make a

right, it just leads to more wrong.

In this case, more wrong than Sarah saw coming in the form of

this. Hagar is pregnant, but her it's

not just her tummy that's getting big, it's her head

that's gotten big first. And she starts prancing and

dancing and bragging in front of Sarah, her mistress, and saying

look at me, I'm better than than.

You can imagine how that went. Sarah blows A gasket but notice

who she blows it on. She blaming herself for blaming

who? Blaming Abram.

It was her idea she came up with and guess who she blames?

Now Don't say anything husbands because this is true of all of

us. This is default to our sin

nature. When we make a bad decision

guess what we look around for someone to what someone to

blame. This is this is what we do.

Remember Adam in the garden after God came to him.

Where are you Adam? Adam says what to God after he

knows God is known, he's disobeyed.

Adam says what a double whammy of isn't everybody but me.

In fact, God, it was the woman that you gave me, right?

I'm looking at the other gender. I'm looking at God, but Adam's

not looking at you know who, because we default into blame

shifting. This is what we do.

We don't want to take responsibility for our own sin.

And so Abram's not innocent here either though even though he's

being blamed. All he had to do was look at

Sarah and say honey, that's not a good idea.

OK, but that's not what he did. Furthermore, Abram and Sarah

sink even lower. You could say when Abram

passively responds to Sarah and says not my problem, do what you

want with her. And Sarah goes from temper

tantrum to straight up Cruella Deville on Hagar, so much so she

got to flee for her life in the life of her unborn son.

All right, so guys, this is this is where I want to just stop and

speak to us as husbands and his father's for a minute, because

here with Abram, we see y'all one of our most consistent

failures as men. I'm speaking to myself as much

as anyone else in the room. But we as men, you can look at

the pattern of men in the Bible. You can look at at our own

lives. I can look at my own life.

And I can tell you there are potholes in the call to be a

biblical man that we as men tend to fall into.

And Abraham's falling flat face into one right here.

You say, Kyle, what is that? All right, it is a failure to

lovingly and sacrificially lead to say we're going to go God's

way. All right, And let me explain.

A crisis comes to Abram and he responds cowardly, with

avoidance. He responds selfishly, not my

problem. Passively does nothing.

What's so ironic, though, if you know the story of Genesis has to

be what we've been walking through this.

When Abraham's nephew Lot is abducted by armies of thousands,

you know what Abram does? He goes into hero mode.

He wore kits out with his M4A1 silenced assault rifle helmet

and body armor and night vision and a Glock 19 and goes out and

kicks tail and takes names and comes on a what a hero.

But the first bullet at home, the first shots fired at home,

and Abram goes yellow belly. He runs for the hills, he

deserts, he does nothing. Man, let me modernize this is

this is this is a thing where the devil gets us so often, OK,

And I'm talking to me, too. But listen, Abram is a hero at

work, but he's a coward at home. Abram's a leader in his office,

but he's a bum at the house. Abraham is selfless on the job

site, but he's selfish at home. He gives it all at work.

People think wonderful of him at work, but he's got nothing left

to give those most important to him at home.

Men, may it never be. I'm convinced the devil is fine

if you win all your away games. Just don't win the ones at home.

Men, let me tell you 3 things. You will never do anything more

important than these three things.

Are you ready? And none of them involve a

dollar number one, Walk personally with God #1 #2 build

a godly marriage. As far as it depends on you #3

parent God's way. You show me a man who does those

three things. I don't care if he's got no cent

to his name. That man is a hero in the

Kingdom of God. Walk personally with God.

Build a godly marriage. Love your wife sacrificially

more than any other person on the planet.

If your job gets more than she does, you need adjustments to be

made. If your coworkers get more than

your kids, you need to make adjustments.

The most important things in your life do not involve a

dollar. They involve God's will for your

family, your home, and your life.

God's will by our plans is a recipe for disaster.

But #2 let me show you this out of this text in verse 3 through

6. God's will requires patience and

prayer. God's will requires patience and

prayer. If you think about it, God has

Abram and Sarah in a spiritual waiting room.

Who likes to sit in a waiting room?

Are the magazines that great? But we don't look at those

anymore. It's our phone.

Nobody likes to sit in a waiting room.

We don't like to wait for somebody to respond to the text

message, right? Nobody likes to wait.

And yet God puts us in spiritual waiting rooms.

Why? Let me give you 2 reasons in

your It's number one to grow your faith.

Forcing a human solution is not faith.

But that's what we do, isn't it? But that's not faith, that's

unbiblical behavior based on unbiblical thinking, right?

Every moment we have to wait on God, we are exercising and

growing our faith. I've said this before and I

repeat it again. Better words than I could come

up with from somebody else. The only thing that's harder

than waiting on God is wishing that you that you had this one's

even better. Watch this.

Whatever a man or woman attempts on their own without God will be

a miserable failure, or even more, a miserable success.

The second reason why God often asks us to wait and puts us in a

spiritual waiting room is to give God the glory.

If you think about it, God is eliminating every means but

miracle to fulfill His promise to Abram and Sarah.

God said, Hey, y'all, you're not going to be to do it your way.

I'm going to make sure y'all so old, ain't nobody going to know,

right? They're all going to know this

was God, not y'all it. You're going to be so past the

point of any biological possibility that I'm going to

get all the credit. So just keep waiting.

God loves to do things in ways that only he can get the credit.

So faith requires waiting on God.

Let me read the rest of the chapter.

The Angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water.

That's Hagar in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur.

And he said, Hagar, servant of Sarah, where have you come from

and where are you going? And she said, I'm fleeing from

my mistress, Sarah. And the Angel of the Lord said

to her, return to your mistress and submit to her.

The Angel of the Lord also said to her, I will surely multiply

your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for

multitude. And the Angel of the Lord said

to her, Behold, you are pregnant, and you shall bear a

son. He shall call his name Ishmael,

because the Lord has listened to your reflection.

He shall be a wild donkey of a man, his hand against everyone,

and everyone's hand against him. He shall dwell over against all

his kinsmen. 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.

Therefore the well was called Beer Lehi Roy.

It lies between Kadesh and Beret.

And Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram called the name of his son

whom Hagar bore Ishmael. Abram was 86 years old when

Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram the first time.

The phrase the Angel of the Lord appears in the Bible is right

here. You might be tempted to think,

well, maybe this is just a normal Angel like we think of

angels, and yet that's clearly not the case.

Clearly the one speaking here is the very Lord himself.

And this again, as we've seen through Genesis, is another,

what we could call Christophany, A literal physical appearance of

the second person of the Trinity long before he takes on human

flesh and was called Jesus, born to the Virgin Mary, as God

promised would happen here, Hagar has hit the road somewhere

between Abram and Egypt, probably fearful she couldn't

make it all the way. She's by the only spring there

was to be had. And there the Lord finds her and

calls her Hagar, servant of Seraph.

God calls your name and gives you a description.

It's time to listen up. When God starts asking you

questions, it's really time to pay attention because let me

remind you, God doesn't ask questions because he doesn't

know the answer. He asked questions because you

need to think about the answer and I need to think about the

answer. So here's the questions he asked

Hagar to answer. Are you ready?

Hagar, where have you come from? Let me translate.

Hagar, are you running away from the place you belong?

Hagar, are you running from the place that I put you?

Second question, Hagar, where are you going?

Let me translate. Hagar, are you going to a place

I haven't called you? Hagar, are you striking out on

your own power, on your own will, your own way?

Hagar, are you headed to a place I'm not leading you?

She responds by saying what God already knows.

I'm fleeing from my mistress Sarai, she says.

But God says go back and submit to her.

Go back to the place I have for you, my will for you, my purpose

for you. Submit yourself to my plan.

Abram and Sarah obviously didn't care for you.

God says, but I care for you. I'm going to bless you.

I'm going to be with you. Go back.

As I was reading and setting this, I just couldn't help but

believe with all my heart that this is a word from the Lord

that somebody needs to hear in the room today or maybe watching

online. You say, Kyle, what word is

that? That word is to go, to go back,

maybe to hear that question, where are you going?

Where are you leaving? Are you leaving the place I put

you? Are you abandoning the plan I

have for you? Are you leaving my my will where

I placed you? I said, Kyle, what might we need

to go back to the deal is maybe you're in the room and you're

fleeing a person, place or thing or situation where God LED you.

God put you. But if you're being honest, it

got hard and you wanted to run. You wanted out.

So you fled and you struck out on your own and God's calling

you to go back. You say, Kyle, go back to what?

Well, let me give you some ideas.

Maybe a family relationship that you ended, Someone that you've

chosen not to speak to for years.

God's calling you to go back. What about the spouse that you

might have abandoned? What about the parents or

grandparents you may have cut off and ceased a relationship

with over some disagreement? What about a job or a boss or a

Co worker that you dropped because you got offended?

What about a school or a degree or a trajectory for a career you

felt God calling you to that you quit?

What about the church you walked away from because you got hurt?

Is God calling you to go back anywhere you've run from?

Hagar thought her circumstances needed changing, but actually it

was Hagar that needed changing. And if you think about it, most

of the time it's not our circumstances that need

changing, it's us that need changing.

The flesh just wants to run away, but God wants to

demonstrate his power. He says to her, I will multiply

your offspring. I you will bear a son, Ishmael.

And Ishmael's name means God has heard.

The question is, will she say yes to God's call and allow God

to pick up the pieces of her life that are now shattered as

she's chosen to run away from God's place and God's plan and

God's purpose. Verse 13 says this.

So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her.

You are a God of seeing that in the Hebrew is you are El Roy.

That is the God who sees, which means God is a God who cares.

He is not a God up there, unaware of your situation, of

the details of your life. He sees, he knows, and he cares.

Parents, if you teach your kids the names of God, one you ought

to teach them is that God is Elroy.

He is the God who sees. He knows them.

He watches over them. He has a plan for them.

No matter where they go, whether it might make stray, even if

they run away, God sees. God knows.

God cares. She's seeing now.

She's feeling now. She's experiencing now the

personal love of God for her. Even when life is shattered.

She's run away. She's got nowhere to go, and yet

she notices. God has noticed her.

God, you're a God who sees me. You're God who cares for me.

She names the well beer Laha Roy, the well of the living one

who sees me. Remember this chapter is a

testimony to the fact as we as human beings as broken as we

are, but God is always so good. Number three, let me put it to

you like this as practically as I know how God will pick up the

pieces, but there's a big keyword.

It's 2 letters IF if you let him, God and only God can pick

up the pieces if you let him. Hagar said yes to the call of

God and she returned. I'm sure she told Abram and

Sarah all that she had experienced.

Abram claims the boy is his own son.

Why? Why should you?

The name of this series is Answering the Call of God.

Why should you say yes to God's call on your life?

What if you say Kyle, listen, I've run so far, I've, I've left

what I feel like is God's will. It's got to be too late for me.

God is a God who sees you right where you are.

You can't outrun his gaze. You can't outrun his care or his

sight. Why should you say yes to God no

matter where you are, like Hagar did?

Because God is a God who sees you, who cares for you.

If you've got breath in your lungs, His plan for you is not

over. And He can pick up whatever

pieces are broken if if you give all the pieces to him, but if

you hang on to them, they'll stay broken.

But God can pick up the pieces. Let me finish like this.

Ishmael told you means God has heard.

I want you to just imagine Abram and Sarah every time they heard

the name Ishmael in their household.

That means God has heard, no doubt.

I think it probably was a reminder #1 never to attempt

God's will their way again, right?

I bet it was a reminder to never forget that God's will requires

patience and prayer. And I bet it was a reminder that

despite their mistakes, God was faithful to pick up the pieces

and even give His blessing when they chose to do it their way

instead of God's way. Is it God good?

Is it God good despite all our mess?

Only He and only He can pick up the pieces.

Let me finish with the words of another.

One writer makes the following observation about this chapter,

and it's helpful. He says the thing that shouts

the loudest here in this chapter is not is that there's not an

honorable character in the whole cast of Genesis 16.

They're all imperfect. So are we.

Abram was the worst. He was pathetic, passive,

impotent, uncaring about either his wife or Hagar.

Neither woman had any compassion for the other.

Sarah was worse, but you get the impression that if Hagar had the

chance, she'd have just been just as bad.

Now let's to be real honest, every single one of us have had

chapters in our life that could be titled The Autopsy of a Dumb

Decision, the No Good, the Bad and the Ugly, How not to do XY

or Z. But God is the God who sees, the

God who knows and the God who cares.

So much so that He sent his one and only Son to die in your

place despite all our sin and the fact that no matter, no

matter where we've run, no matter what we've done, that if

we're willing to put the pieces at the feet of Jesus, he'll pick

him up. And so therefore, hurry up and

wait on God. Hurry up and wait on God.

Maybe today, as John and Praise team come out, you need to hurry

up and wait on God by placing your faith in Jesus Christ for

salvation. Maybe you've delayed.

Maybe you've thought about it. Maybe you've heard about it.

But today is the day. Maybe maybe you're thinking I'll

have other time or I need more time to process.

But listen, every time you feel that tug, that conviction of the

Holy Spirit that he's calling you and you say no, it's a

little more of a stepping back from the will of God rather than

a step toward it. Would you be willing to come out

and tell me, say, Kyle, I need to trust Christ?

Maybe maybe you're in a situation where you're tempted

to get a hedagon and to force a human solution in a situation

where you need to wait on God. Maybe you want to come pray

about that to get on your knees or come stand or come talk to

one of our encouragers or me to pray for you.

Maybe finally you've got pieces that you know only God could put

back together, and the question is, will you let him?

Will you give them to him? We say, God, if I need to go

back, I'll go. God.

If I need to repent, if I need to restore, if I need to say I'm

sorry, if I need to return God, I'll go if you'll go with me and

only God will put back the pieces if you'll let him.

Heavenly Father, I pray that whatever you want to do in our

lives right now and in the moments that followed that you

would have your way. We'd say yes to you.

In Jesus name I pray, Amen. Would you stand with me?

We're going to sing, we're going to wait on you.

We're going to worship and let's respond in faith to what you've

heard today. You come.