Does God Still Hear? – Genesis 21:8-21 (Year A, Pentecost 4)

(This sermon is adapted from a 2008 message preached by Rev. Dr. Rhonda Blevins at the Community Church at Tellico Village)

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God Hears

Our Old Testament reading today does something rather audacious — it makes our dear old Father Abraham look like a henpecked, deadbeat dad. Now, that’s quite a fall from grace for the Father of Faith.

You remember the background, right? God promised Abraham and Sarah that they would have a son in their old age. They waited. And waited. And waited some more. Sarah, a woman of action if there ever was one, decided that waiting on God was taking entirely too long, and so she came up with Plan B: Abraham would conceive a child with her Egyptian slave woman, Hagar. Henpecked Abe — ever the accommodating husband — consented without what appears to be a great deal of resistance. And sure enough, Hagar became pregnant.

Predictably, Sarah became terribly jealous and banished the pregnant Hagar into the desert. Alone. In the desert. Pregnant. If you’re wondering whose side God is on in this little domestic drama, keep reading.

In the middle of that desert, God appeared. And isn’t that just like God — to show up in your most desperate hour? Even more remarkable: it was Hagar, this foreign slave woman, who became the first person in all of scripture to ever see God. Not Abraham. Not Sarah. The slave. Isn’t that just like God — to lift up the lowly and humble the proud?

God commanded Hagar to return to Abraham and Sarah, but not without making her a promise that will sound familiar: “I will greatly multiply your descendants so that they shall be too many to count.” Then God told her to name her son Ishmael — which means, simply, “God hears.”

So Hagar returned. And Abraham, at the ripe age of 86, became a first-time father. Welcome to the world, Ishmael: God hears.

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The Son He Didn’t Plan For — and the Son He Did

The birth of Ishmael did not, however, settle Sarah down. For fifteen more years she kept at it, and finally — when Abraham was 100 years old — Sarah gave birth to Isaac. One hundred years old. I have trouble getting up off the couch at my age. Abraham was fathering children at 100.

But Isaac’s arrival only reignited Sarah’s jealousy, and this time she gave Abraham an ultimatum: banish Hagar and the fifteen-year-old Ishmael. Cast them out. Into the desert. Again.

And Abraham did it.

In our day and time, Abraham would find himself in family court before the week was out. Child neglect, abandonment, failure to provide — the charges practically write themselves. This is our sweet, innocent, teddy-bear Abraham. Father of Faith. Role model of the ages.

So Hagar and Ishmael wandered in the desert. When they had used up their last drop of water, when there was nothing left to do, they sat down and wept. Out loud. Without apology. And — in two of the most quietly powerful words in all of scripture — God heard.

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Does God Still Hear?

Which brings us to the question at the heart of this passage: Does God still hear? Or has he, as it were, become hard of hearing in his old age?

That question is not merely academic. It walked into my office one afternoon in the form of a twenty-year-old college student I’ll call Susan. She came in, closed the door behind her, and with unusual seriousness asked if I had a moment to talk. I said I did. And she began.

She told me about a friend named Jessica who lived on her dorm hall. They’d grown close that year. Jessica had started coming to the Bible study Susan hosted in her room. Then they learned that Jessica was pregnant — and considering an abortion. So Susan and a few friends prayed. Hard. Earnestly. Every night. They were convinced they were praying in accordance with God’s will. Susan quoted scripture back to me: “Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”

But Jessica had the abortion.

“I don’t understand,” Susan said. “Explain that to me.”

I have to be honest — I don’t remember exactly what I said to her. I remember the empathy I felt. I remember my own crisis of faith as a young adult, the first time God refused to live up to my expectations. Most Christians experience this disillusionment at some point. We grow up singing God Answers Prayer, but as another student once put it to me with blunt honesty: “I’ve had more unanswered prayer than answered.”

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The Genie in the Bottle

Let’s be honest about something. Deep down, most of us would love for God to function like a genie in a bottle. You pick up your Bible, give it a little rub, and poof — wish granted. Health restored. Relationship healed. Parking spot provided.

It’s a charming idea. It’s also terrible theology.

Sarah didn’t understand this. When she couldn’t conceive, she didn’t look inward or sideways — she looked up and pointed her finger at God. Scripture records her own words: “The Lord has prevented me from bearing children.” God was her personal genie, and the genie wasn’t cooperating.

This theology is everywhere in our culture. It’s the theology that blames hurricanes and other natural disasters on God’s wrath. It’s the theology behind Susan’s anguished question about unanswered prayer. It has a long history — and the kindest thing I can say about it is that it is primitive and childlike. We come by it honestly. But we are invited to grow beyond it.

Because here’s the thing about genies: they give you what you want. God tends to give you what you need. And those two things are not always the same.

Does God still hear when the doctor calls it cancer? Does God still hear the silence in a broken relationship? Does God still hear the cries of children orphaned by war, disease, and disaster?

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What God Actually Gives

Back to the desert. Hagar and Ishmael are alone, without water, weeping. And God heard. And then God did something.

God gave Hagar two things — and only two things, but exactly the right two things.

First, God gave her hope. A promise that Ishmael would become the father of a great nation. A future worth living toward. In her darkest hour, God gave her a reason to get up. Hope. Because God knows what every human being in crisis most desperately needs: not a solution to every problem, not an explanation for every tragedy — but a ray of light to walk toward.

Second, God opened her eyes — and she saw a well of water right there beside her. It had been there all along. Sustenance. Not a feast. Not a palace. Water. Exactly what they needed, right when they needed it.

Hope for tomorrow. Sustenance for today.

That is what God gave Hagar and Ishmael. That is what God has given to people across the whole sweep of human history. And I believe — I have staked my life on this — that it is what God gives to you and to me.

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Listening Through the Noise

A few years ago I watched an interview with Peyton Manning — one of the great quarterbacks of his era. The interviewer pointed out that Manning had taken fewer sacks that season than almost any other quarterback in the league. The remarkable thing was that Manning was never known for his scrambling ability. So the interviewer asked: how?

Manning’s answer surprised him. He didn’t say “I have a great offensive line” or “I get rid of the ball quickly.” He said: “I listen to the crowd.”

He explained that there’s a steady roar in a stadium that runs beneath everything — the motion, the play-calling, the reads, the coverage. But in the split second before a 300-pound lineman reaches the quarterback, the crowd draws a collective gasp. And Manning had trained himself, amid all the noise and chaos of an NFL game, to hear that gasp — and act on it.

I listen to the crowd.

With everything else God has going on — and the scope of that is genuinely incomprehensible — God listens to his people. And responds. Not always as we demand. Not always as we script. But with hope for tomorrow and sustenance for today.

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One More Thing About Abraham

I should tell you how the story ends.

When Abraham finally died — at the age of 175, which tells you God has a sense of humor — both of his sons came to bury him. Isaac and Ishmael, side by side, laying their father to rest. Reconciliation. Forgiveness. Closure.

It is the common belief of Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike that Ishmael became the father of the Arab peoples, and through them, the faith of Islam. Isaac, of course, is the father of Israel. Two half-brothers. Two great faiths. One grave.

Maybe one day the descendants of Isaac and Ishmael will find their way back to that moment — standing side by side, not as enemies, but as brothers.

Let there be peace on earth, O Lord. And let it begin right here.

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Does God hear? Yes — resoundingly, persistently, lovingly. Not as a wish-granting genie, but as the one who meets us in our desert and says: I see you. I hear you. Here is water. Here is hope.

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“A Tale of Two Fathers”
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