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20 So God was with the lad; and he grew and dwelt in the wilderness, and became an archer. 21 He dwelt in the Wilderness of Paran; and his mother took a wife for him from the land of Egypt. ~ Genesis 21:20-21
Today, we return to our study of Genesis 21 where we last saw that getting what we want does not always solve our problems. You will remember that Abraham and Sarah illustrated this point when they came up with the idea of siring a son with Sarah's maidservant. Over and over we see not only in the Scriptures but in our very lives that we can get all the things we crave and still have an empty heart.
In the middle of all of this Hagar and Ishmael were driven out into the wilderness and from there both Hagar and Ishmael cried out to God for help. In response to this "God opened Hagar's eyes and she saw a well of water." God is always ready to lead us in the way we should go only if we cry out to Him.
In v.20 of today's passage we read, "So God was with the lad; and he grew and dwelt in the wilderness, and became an archer."
Through the horror of being thrown out of Abraham's family with his mother, Ishmael cried out to the Lord and the Lord responded. God always responds to the cries of our hearts as long as our cries bow to the will of the One who made us. Down through the years I have run in to different folks who have had a problem with what Abraham and Sarah did here and I understand that. They did create this problem and as God made it clear His covenant promises were to go through Isaac. That did not mean that God did not have good plans for Ishmael and Hagar as long as they bent their will to Him. And, we are no different than them. As indicated by this verse, Ishmael lived in the favor of the Lord. In fact, God was with Ishmael there in the wilderness and he became an archer.
While in the wilderness, Ishmael was not alone for God was with him. In Isaiah 7:14 we read, "Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel." Because of the virgin birth and the death of the Lord Jesus and His resurrection, we can know for ourselves the gift of "God with us" which is the meaning of Immanuel. Not just with us, as a friend who walks beside us, though He indeed does that. But God with us, as in He comes to live inside us, giving us strength in place of weakness, courage in place of fear, and vibrant life in all those dark places that once felt dead.
The Lord Jesus is His name and Immanuel was His calling. And, if we have come to the place where we trust our existence with Him, we never have to be alone. We never have to wonder if He is with us. We can simply rest knowing He is in us and that He will never leave us. Even though Ishmael was banished from the household of Abraham, he was not ignored by God. In fact, God preserved Ishmael and watched over him in his wilderness abode. And, he became an archer, and married an Egyptian woman whom his mother found for him. From this man and woman would come a great host of people, part of God’s fulfillment of His covenant promise to Abraham.
The uncertainties of the wilderness create a need in our souls for God and to develop a dependence upon Him. Often God leads us to the place where we just do without, so we would come to know Him as your Protector and Provider. God allows us be lonely, so that we would come to know Him as our Savior and Friend. He allows us to be frightened, so that we would come to know Him and His peace. It is in our weakness that we discover His strength. In the wilderness, God reveals to us Himself. In the darkness of the wilderness, He is our light. In the confusing maze of the wilderness, we learn to let Him be our guide. It is in the wilderness that He separates us from the influences of the world, as well as the things and people that we have learned to depend upon, so that we will learn to depend upon Him.
In v.21 of today's passage we read, "He dwelt in the Wilderness of Paran; and his mother took a wife for him from the land of Egypt."
When God takes us to the wilderness, He withholds that which we have come to depend upon other than Himself. He knows when we have come to depend on your job as our provision, so, He must sometimes take our job from us. God has been known to remove our jobs from us for a time, so that we will learn to depend on Him. God also knows that there are times when we have come to depend on our strength or stamina, so He has been known to allow sickness into our lives, so that we will learn that our strength is in Him. It is often through our deprivation that we are afforded the privilege of seeing that God is our provision.
Without a father to set him up with a wife, Hagar stepped in and made the selection for Ishmael. As she was from Egypt, so was her daughter in law, Ishmael’s wife. Both the mother and the wife of Ishmael came from the same people. The place where they settled is called the Wilderness of Paran. This place is so absolutely barren and wild that being an archer makes all the sense in the world. One can’t be a very successful farmer in a place like the Wilderness of Paran. It’s around the area of Mount Sinai and is just as unforgiving as any place you’d ever want to visit.
In the end, this story of Ishmael is one that ultimately points us to the amazing work of the Lord Jesus Christ in fulfilling the law that we cannot fulfill. Moses portrayed Ishmael as the "son of laughter." And we’ve already seen that God had promised to bless Ishmael and make him into a great nation. All of God’s people are saved by grace, not by works or by ethnicity. Only those who humbly receive the free gift of mercy and grace are truly a part of God's family.
Incidentally, Paran means beauty. As a result of being driven to the wilderness was Ishmael afforded the opportunity to see the beauty of God's ways. God expressed the beauty of His ways best through the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. In John 3:16 we read, "For God so loved the World that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life." There is always purpose in our pain. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord always looks at the heart. Sometimes our hearts must be broken to receive what the Lord has for us. Sometimes it takes the collapse of all things in our lives for us to discover there is no better love than His.
