Hagar, Elect?

[Backwoods Presbyterian]

I am preparing a sermon on Gen 21:8-20 and having a hard time with what to say about Hagar. I know Ishmael is reprobate.

What say y'all about Hagar?

 

[Zenas]

 

[Backwoods Presbyterian]

Would expect nothing less Joshua

 

[A5pointer]

She saw YHVH and lived who knows.

 

[Hamalas]

From what I read in Galatians 4:21-31, I would be inclined to say no. Verse 30 stands out in particular:

But what does the Scripture say? "Cast out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit with the son of the free woman.""

 

[TimV]

She was an uneducated, low class heathen. As happens so often, she forgot her station, and mocked the one who lifted her up. She was punished, and humiliated, with the full approval of the man who had taken pleasure from her and to whom had given a son.

Yes, she was a real B. Uncouth, unloved, ignorant and stupid.

And she cried, and the Great God heard her, and sent His messenger to look after her, and comfort her, and bring her back into the covenant house hold. He didn't promise her the moon. This was tough love. She had a problem that needed to be dealt with, and had to learn to submit. She had to learn her place, like the Syrophoenician woman who needed to understand that leftovers were her portion.

But the Great God blessed her, and ordered her back into His covenant family. She had some rough edges to be knocked off, and she submitted to His will.

She was poor, ignorant, crude and stupid, and the God who looks after people like us blessed her.

Gen 16:13 So she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, "You are a God of seeing," for she said, "Truly here I have seen him who looks after me."
Gen 16:14 Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; it lies between Kadesh and Bered.

Amen.

 

[staythecourse]

She was always non-elect in my view. She was Sinai and not the free woman. All the temporal promises God were just that and no more. Cain saw God, too, was blessed and went to Hell so "seeing God" or talking to him tete-a-tete is not an indication of salvation.

 

[satz]

I don't think that the fact that Paul uses her allegorically (is that the right word?) to make a theological point in Galatians can really be used as a determinant of her relationship with God.

 

[Hamalas]

I don't think that the fact that Paul uses her allegorically (is that the right word?) to make a theological point in Galatians can really be used as a determinant of her relationship with God.

I don't know, when we only have a handful of passages that talk about her I think we have to take them all, including the Galatians passage, into consideration.

 

[kalawine]

I don't think that the fact that Paul uses her allegorically (is that the right word?) to make a theological point in Galatians can really be used as a determinant of her relationship with God.

I don't know, when we only have a handful of passages that talk about her I think we have to take them all, including the Galatians passage, into consideration.

I've been confused about this subject for some time now. It is a good question, though perhaps unanswerable.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

I am inclined to think she was a convert.

I don't think the Galatians passage speaks to her personal spiritual state.

 

[kalawine]

I am inclined to think she was a convert.

I don't think the Galatians passage speaks to her personal spiritual state.

I guess I may seem to be plagued with a case of schizophrenia after saying before that this question was "unanswerable" and now I'm agreeing with someone's answer. But it does seem to me (after further reflection) that any "hero of the faith" who wasn't point-blank condemned is probably a Christian.

 

[Timothy William]

I don't think that the fact that Paul uses her allegorically (is that the right word?) to make a theological point in Galatians can really be used as a determinant of her relationship with God.

Indeed, Paul seems to make a point of spelling out that this is an allegorical interpretation, not a comment on Hagar's spiritual state.

If Paul's argument in Galatians is that, as a slave, Hagar could not be part of the promise, and therefore Hagar could not be elect, then by inference no slave could be of the Elect. So why would Abraham circumcise his whole household, slaves included?

 

[ColdSilverMoon]

To me the verse that tends to indicate she was elect is Genesis 21:19:

Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water, and gave the lad a drink.

I'm not a language scholar, but this terminology seems to be used throughout the Bible to indicate God opening hearts and minds to His truth, such as Luke 23:31 when Christ appears to the men on the road to Emmaus. Add in her earlier obedience when He told her to return to Sarah, and I think you have all the earmarks of a true believer: one called by God who responds with a life of obedience.