A Poor Choice

 DEVOTION

GENESIS

  A POOR CHOICE

Gen 16:1-4

16:1 Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; 2 so she said to Abram, "The LORD has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her." Abram agreed to what Sarai said. 3 So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived.

NIV

We are coming to the birth of Ishmael but first, we need to deal with this agreement by Abram and his wife Sarai. We do not understand why Abram would agree with this arrangement unless he thought that was how God had determined his descendants would outnumber the stars. God did say that a son coming from his own body it be his heir, but did not include Sarai in that promise. Although it is strange that Abram would agree to have two wives, unless that was acceptable in those days, since he must have been aware of the beginning history of mankind, and that God created one man and one woman establishing the union between them, as a single entity. However, Abram is still a man, and his need for a son drives him to agree to the plan of his wife Sarai. Interestingly, and this is not any condemnation, just interesting that it was Eve who was deceived first and gave Adam the fruit, and he agreed to taste it, and the devastating result that occurred, and now Sarai is the one who made this plan and Abram agreed and from history, we know that plan had devastating results. Perhaps Abram should have thought this plan out more thoroughly and he should have asked God about it before going into the tent of Hagar. Once again, we see that any of our plans should be the plan of God rather than our half-baked ideas. It is far better to move slowly, checking with the Lord, before jumping into bed with the wrong idea. Then we must consider we all suffer from being human with human needs, desires, aspirations, and ideas or plans in an attempt to make them happen. This may have been in the mind of Abram, as his wife Sarai was still barren, no matter how much or many times they tried to conceive a son. We know both of them were in their eighties as we know Abram was eighty-eight when Ishmael was born, and sometime later Sarai conceived the son Isaac, the rightful heir. Life was still longer in those days, but man was also still making poor choices which seems to be our custom. Why do we still make poor decisions, and poor choices, and not first go to God and seek his will in the matter? Is our humanity that stupid, or are we driven by those same needs, desires, and ambitions as Abram might have been? Why do we think we have a better plan than God’s plan? We need to move slowly, in fact, not move at all, unless we first check with God, and hear from him. Unless we hear from the Lord, we should just stay the course that He has put us on, keep it simple, no changes, no half-baked moves, so that we might avoid a devastating result. Let's make an effort not to make poor choices.