Rembrandt: Abraham Casting out Hagar and Ishmael (1637),
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Genesis 21:8–21 and Matthew 10:24–39
Expressions of Faith
The fat was in the fire
When Isaac and Ishmael played;
The pot just boiled over
With Sarah, for Isaac afraid;
The mother lost it then—
The father saw no way to win;
He couldn't stand the heat,
So Abraham had to give in;
I wonder if he knew
He'd cast his burden on the LORD
When casting Hagar out
To sink or swim of her accord?
The death sentence he gave,
He pushed to the back of his mind;
This tale thus goes to show
The love of this Yahweh is blind;
For all concerned were saved,
And saw the LORD does not slumber;
Or put another way—
The hairs of your head are all numbered.
Scott L. Barton
(The first line, from Frederick Buechner's writing about
Hagar in Peculiar Treasures [Harper & Row, 1979] and the subsequent Beyond
Words, inspired the poem.)
The child grew, and was weaned; and Abraham made a great
feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the
Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac. So she
said to Abraham, “Cast out this slave woman with her son; for the son of this
slave woman shall not inherit along with my son Isaac.” The matter was very
distressing to Abraham on account of his son. But God said to Abraham, “Do not
be distressed because of the boy and because of your slave woman; whatever
Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for it is through Isaac that offspring
shall be named for you. As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation
of him also, because he is your offspring.” So Abraham rose early in the
morning, and took bread and a skin of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it
on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and
wandered about in the wilderness of Beer-sheba.
When the water in the skin was gone, she cast the child
under one of the bushes. Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way
off, about the distance of a bowshot; for she said, “Do not let me look on the
death of the child.” And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and
wept. And God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar
from heaven, and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for
God has heard the voice of the boy where he is. Come, lift up the boy and hold
him fast with your hand, for I will make a great nation of him.” Then God
opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. She went, and filled the skin with
water, and gave the boy a drink.
God was with the boy, and he grew up; he lived in the
wilderness, and became an expert with the bow. He lived in the wilderness of
Paran; and his mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt.
+ + +
“A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the
master; it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave
like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how
much more will they malign those of his household!
“So have no fear of them; for nothing is covered up that
will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known. What I
say to you in the dark, tell in the light; and what you hear whispered,
proclaim from the housetops. Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot
kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. Are
not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground
apart from your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do
not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.
“Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I
also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven; but whoever denies me before
others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven.
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth;
I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.
For I have come to set a man against his father,
and a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of
me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and
whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who
find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will
find it."
+ + +
DC Comics
Romans 6:1b–11
Wonder
I have to hope that no one wonders
If too much sin of theirs can sunder
Them from the possibilities of grace
When feeling like a real basket case!
For grace is nothing theoretical,
Nor would it ever tilt heretical
To say that all who want to know it
Can have the life Christ spent to show it.
His resurrection's no reward
For upright living you might hoard;
Dear wonder man and woman, it cuts through
For you. Right now. Out of the blue.
Scott L. Barton
What then are we to say? Should we continue in sin in order
that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on
living in it?Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ
Jesus were baptized into his death?Therefore we have been buried with him by
baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the
glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.For if we have
been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him
in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with
him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be
enslaved to sin. For whoever has died is freed from sin. But if we
have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know
that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer
has dominion over him. The death he died, he died to sin, once for all;
but the life he lives, he lives to God. So you also must consider
yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
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