Today's text from the ESV Study Bible: Genesis 16-18
Heaven was busy in these three chapters.
We find an angel of the Lord visiting Hagar, and proclaiming that she will have a son, he should be named Ishmael, and that "he shall be a wild donkey of a man,
his hand against everyone and everyone's hand against him".
Interestingly, if I understood this right, it is Ismael's family tree that will breed the religion of the Muslim. In fact, the Muslim believes that it was Ismael who Abraham was told my God to sacrifice in coming pages, and further they hold Abraham to be their patriarchal father as well.
What most caught my attention, however, was God again appearing to Abram. Here, God tells Abram that he will establish an everlasting covenant with him and his offspring, and makes the circumcision a sign of this covenant.
Further God announces that He is God Almighty, instructs Abram to walk before Him, be blameless, and gives Abram the new name of Abraham.
I found this announcement to be a distinct key to the heart of God. God desires that we understand that he alone is God Almighty, he desires a relationship with us, that we not merely know "of" him, and he further desires that we be blameless, by obeying his statutes.
Further, we learn in the Book of Revelation that when God's elect are brought to heaven, we all given a new name.
What a beautiful glimpse into the heart of Abba. Little does Abraham know that from his very loins, from this future promised nation, will come Messiah to create God's fully disclosed plan of redemption.
It will soon all start to be fulfilled in the birth of Isaac from the womb of the barren Sarai, now named Sarah.
As we shall soon see, this journey of redemption throughout the history of mankind gets very, very messy. But as we learned from the Book of Job, God is orchestrating every turn of the page, and will ultimately, with the Second Coming of Christ, complete what was started this day from the laughing hearts of Abraham and Sarah.
