Throughout my 61 years, I’ve learned that rushing often leads to undesirable outcomes. This lesson, however, is not unique to me. Even the patriarch of faith had to learn it. It’s fascinating how the Holy Spirit unveils the triumphs and tribulations of the men of God in the Bible, serving as a guide for us all.

In Genesis 15, God gives Abram a promise of an heir and descendants to follow that outnumber the stars.  That’s a great promise, and Abram believed God.  The promise spoke of Abram having an heir, but it did not give specifics on how that would happen except that this heir would come from Abram’s own body.

In Genesis 16, time has passed, and Sarai has not become pregnant. So, Sarai’s impatience sets in, and the suggestion of how to fulfill the promise without involving her comes into play.  A solution according to the flesh is offered by Sarai to Abram, and he accepts it.

The problem is that this solution after the flesh creates a false heir.  The child named Ishmael, born by Sarai’s maidservant Hagar, is not according to God’s plan of an heir for Abram.  The result is tension and conflict in the camp.  Hagar begins to hold Sarai in contempt, and then Sarai blames Abram for it. Abram gives Sarai permission to treat Hagar however she wishes, and Sarai treats her harshly, and Hagar flees.  That’s when God gives Hagar a promise of how the child she carries in her womb will be a wild man, and his hand will be against every man.  God sends her back to Sarai in submission.  Abram was eighty-six years of age when Ishmael was born.

Four years later, when Abram turns ninety, the Lord appears to him. God establishes a covenant of circumcision with Abram as it pertains to all the men and the male children. After this, God interacts with Abraham again and changes both Sarai’s name and Abram’s name to Sarah and Abraham. He tells Abraham he will give him a son born of Sarah. Abraham asks if a son should be born to a man one hundred years old with a wife who is ninety and asks that Ishmael be his heir.  God refuses to accept Ishmael as the heir and insists that Sarah will bear the promised child, who is to be called Isaac.  God reveals what type of covenant He will make with Isaac: an everlasting covenant.

A year later, Isaac was born. At the time of Isaac’s weaning, it was evident that Hagar and her son Ishmael disdained Isaac, the promised son, and Sarah was displeased and asked that they be sent away.  God promises Abraham that he will make a nation of Ishmael but that Abraham’s seed is tome through Sarah’s son Isaac.  So Abraham sends Hagar and Ishmael away.

Sarai and Abram’s impatience led to this moment of heartache and pain. Abraham had to send a son whom he deeply loved and wished could be his heir away, never to be seen again. Can you imagine how hard this must have been for Abraham?

The greater revelation in all this is how it speaks of the New Covenant in Christ and the Law Covenant of Moses.

Galatians 4:21 Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law? 22 For it is written that Abraham had two sons: the one by a bondwoman, the other by a freewoman. 23 But he who was of the bondwoman was born according to the flesh, and he of the freewoman through promise, 24 which things are symbolic. For these are the two covenants: the one from Mount Sinai which gives birth to bondage, which is Hagar— 25 for this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children— 26 but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all.

Galatians 4:28   Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise. 29 But, as he who was born according to the flesh then persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, even so it is now. 30 Nevertheless, what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the bondwoman and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.” 31 So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman but of the free.

God was able to take the impatient mistake made and preach the gospel through it generations before the gospel was to be fulfilled in Christ.  But let’s learn the lesson impatience reveals here and the heartache it can produce.  Beauty came out of all this, and a prophetic picture of how the law is to be sent away once one is born again into promise.  Trying to have both dwell together creates conflict and tension.  So, I want to learn to be patient about the promise God gives me, and I want to make sure I am allowing myself to tolerate the Law covenant as a way of attaining anything from God. To experience the promise we have in Christ now, we must put away the bondwoman and her son from us.  Everything good that God has is ours in the promised son!