TEXT: Genesis 21:8-21; Matthew 10:24-33

Genesis 21:8-218 The child grew, and was weaned; and Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned.9 But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac.10 So she said to Abraham, "Cast out this slave woman with her son; for the son of this slave woman shall not inherit along with my son Isaac."11 The matter was very distressing to Abraham on account of his son.12 But God said to Abraham, "Do not be distressed because of the boy and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for it is through Isaac that offspring shall be named for you.13 As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring."14 So Abraham rose early in the morning, and took bread and a skin of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered about in the wilderness of Beer-sheba.15 When the water in the skin was gone, she cast the child under one of the bushes.16 Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot; for she said, "Do not let me look on the death of the child." And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept.17 And God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, and said to her, "What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.18 Come, lift up the boy and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make a great nation of him."19 Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. She went, and filled the skin with water, and gave the boy a drink.20 God was with the boy, and he grew up; he lived in the wilderness, and became an expert with the bow.21 He lived in the wilderness of Paran; and his mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt." Matthew 10:24-3324 "A disciple is not above the teacher, nor a slave above the master;25 it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher, and the slave like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household!26 "So have no fear of them; for nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known.27 What I say to you in the dark, tell in the light; and what you hear whispered, proclaim from the housetops.28 Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.29 Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.30 And even the hairs of your head are all counted.31 So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.32 "Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven;33 but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven.

"WHAT THE WINNERS DON'T WANT YOU TO KNOW"

TEXT: Genesis 21:8-21; Matthew 10:24-33

Well our parent denomination has been in the news again, but then we have come to expect that as a regular June occurrence. I used to look forward with pride to see Southern Baptists make the New York Times. Now I cringe, and then laugh at the absurdity. It seems that the messengers to that annual convention love to celebrate the power that comes from being the largest evangelical denomination in the world by flexing their muscles while shaking their fingers in the faces of some minority group or position. Over the past few years they voted to boycott Disney and to urge member congregations to do likewise because, among other things, Disney has decided to treat gays and lesbians as people deserving equal treatment by their amusement parks and under their employment policies. Three years ago, Richard Land, the director of the S. B. Christian Life Commission, in an interview on CNBC, declared that this was our opening shot on the SBC's war against homosexuals! I cringed. The convention then passed a resolution calling for a focused emphasis on the conversion of the Jews and the appointment of a missionary with the assignment to evangelize the Jewish community in America by the Home Mission Board.
Then, we were told that women were never to be called as local church pastors because it was unbiblical and now the chaplaincy credentialing of the denomination has been instructed not to credential women who have been ordained as chaplains nor renew the credentials of those women who are currently recognized if they are already ordained. Why? Women are never to be in any spiritual leadership role which could be construed as being a leader of men. Women in the home are to be submissive to their husbands. And in the church silent when it comes to spiritual leadership. Then, to top it off, these religious leaders of evangelical Christendom, declared that Jesus should no longer be used as the sole lens through which to do biblical interpretation. Now we have an inerrent Bible in the hands of supposedly inerrent mega-church pastors.

Where am I going with all of this? Well, one of those inerrant pastors at this year's convention has declared that Mohammed was a "demon-possessed pedophile" and that the god of the Muslims is not the God of the Bible. To make matters worse he received a standing ovation and not a single Southern Baptist leader has stepped forward to counter Dr. Vines declarations. They have all defended his position.

All the while, newspaper reports from around the world speak of growing famine in numerous countries. War and the threat of war looms on the horizon in more than one global hotspot. Terrorists strike at the soul of nations with bombs taking the lives of the innocent, and terrorists strike at the livelihoods of other populations by taking land and income through claims of divine right.

Yet, while I have been blasting those fellow Baptists, I have found that the root of what I see as their sin is common to the human condition. No, make that more confessional and admit, to my condition. It is the pride of the winner. It is the pride of the one who comes from behind and takes the race. It is the pride that somehow decides that one's triumphal position as winner makes that one innately better than the remainder of the field.

Denominations debating the merits of Disney and of one another with resolutions while the world is burning with hatred and nationalistic pride. As one "no longer acceptable" target of hatred (blacks) is replaced by another more "defensible" one within evangelical circles, while the HIV/AIDS virus claims the life of yet another person. Religious leaders attacking faith communities while mothers and the babies at their breast keep dying from starvation or preventable illnesses. People pushed to the fringes, and even into the deserts, while we assert the merits of our own righteousness, our own chosen-ness. After all, we are the biggest, the winners, the most visibly blest, and thus, right.

Where is God at such times?

So, here is the story: Abraham is very old and he therefore has a very big problem. With no heir, no one to carry on the family name, no heir to fulfill God's promise to make a great nation of Abraham, what is he to do? His wife, Sara, is very old as well. So she has suggested, and he has willingly agreed, that he take Hagar, her maid, as his concubine (a fancy word for accepted mistress). Hagar bore him a son, who for several years became the apple of his dad's eyes, until one day Sara became pregnant as promised and she too bears a son, Isaac.

"The child grew, and was weaned; and Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac. So she said to Abraham, "Cast out this slave woman with her son; for the son of this slave woman shall not inherit along with my son Isaac." The matter was very distressing to Abraham on account of his son. But God said to Abraham, "Do not be distressed because of the boy and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for it is through Isaac that offspring shall be named for you. As for the son of the slave woman, I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring." So Abraham rose early in the morning, and took bread and a skin of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered about in the wilderness of Beer-sheba.

When the water in the skin was gone, she cast the child under one of the bushes. Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bow shot; for she said, "Do not let me look on the death of the child." And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept. And God heard the voice of the boy; and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, and said to her, "What troubles you, Hagar? Do not be afraid; for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is. Come, lift up the boy and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make a great nation of him." Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. She went, and filled the skin with water, and gave the boy a drink.

God was with the boy, and he grew up; he lived in the wilderness, and became an expert with the bow. He lived in the wilderness of Paran; and his mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt."

This story is not familiar to us in the way that the story of Abraham taking Isaac to the mountain for sacrifice is. The rabbis didn't much like this story, they didn't care for Ishmael. But to our Islamic neighbors it is pivotal. For Jews and Christians, we tend to favor those wonderful tales of younger brothers who do well rather than older brothers who get blessed. We delight when cunning Jacob puts one over on macho, mountain man Esau. We thrill to see little Joseph step ahead of all his older brothers who tried to do him wrong. We imagine ourselves as little David who is anointed to be king after his older brothers are passed by. We celebrate with the young prodigal brother while we scorn the elder brother who shuns the homecoming party.

Israel loved such stories. Little Israel, among the smallest of nations, not too big, not too powerful. A nation without a land. The Old Testament story is to a large extent the story of how little brother Israel usurped the older brothers like the Philistines and the Canaanites and took their place in a land promised to little brother Israel.

The Christian community loves to tell such stories as well. We love to hear of the prodigal son, who though he was younger, though he really did not deserve the inheritance, is delightfully given all by the end of the story. We love it, I guess, because, as Gentiles, we had no part in the promises of God to Israel. They weren't given by God to us. Yet, in an amazing act of topsy-turvy grace, God in Christ gave these promises to us as well. And we, Johnny-come-lately Gentiles celebrate our election, our inclusion, and what we regard as our exclusive right to the older brother's inheritance.

Is that why this story in Genesis-this story of an older brother who lost his rightful inheritance, lost his family, thrown out with his mother into the desert to die-is not our favorite story?

Hagar and Ishmael's story continues. In places like Rwanda, Liberia and Somalia as thousands, by some estimates maybe a million, have died and die from starvation, disease and violence. Millions becoming orphans, left alone to die.

We the "younger brothers" here in North America, watching the deaths in mother Africa, the cradle of civilization, originating place of all the human race.

Most of us here are supplanters, the Johnny-come-latelies of the world. We sit and listen to the story in the New World, which really wasn't a new world, but a very old world that we came to and drove out millions of older sisters and brothers for a few beads or if that didn't work by our lightening sticks. We supplanted them. They were before us. Those who had rightful claim to the inheritance of this land but we supplanted, superseded, and replaced with ourselves.

Too bad Sarah couldn't celebrate the birth of her son Isaac and enjoy that good gift and leave it at that. Too bad that she callously drives out Hagar and Ishmael. They could have lifted their voices together as women blessed by God. But no, Sarah saw her sister Hagar as competitor and drove her away.

Why do our blessing which we haven't earned and don't deserve become the wedge between us and others less fortunate? I wish I knew, but I don't. Neither does the story. We are just left to ponder the murderous actions of our great-great ancestors and of others cowardly compliance. Just as we are left to ponder some of our nation's, our families, and yes, even the Christian church's unsavory dealings with some of those whom we have supplanted.

Most of the world can identify more with the story of Hagar and Ishmael than that of Sarah, Abraham and Isaac. The world's suffering being what it is, so often at the hands of the very ones who are supposed to be not only blessed but a blessing.

Maybe we have to be part of one of those suffering multitude or one who has been supplanted to understand the wonder and glory of this story of Hagar and Ishmael-the story of how God works wonders to bless people like Abraham and Isaac, yes. But also the wonder that there is room in God's great heart to bless Hagar and Ishmael as well. As the birth celebration is in full swing up at Sarah's tent, God slips away, out into the desert, to hear the cries of Hagar, to preserve her and her child from death, and to bless her child as one who will be the father of a great nation.
Africa, Central America, Inner Cities, HIV/AIDS units-who hears the cries of the mothers, the fathers, the children?

Blessings come to some parents and their children as the blessings came to Isaac and Sarah. I don't know why, they just do. Somehow, they are just blessed by God. But least we become arrogant and scornful of those not so blessed, there is a lesson to be learned from today's story. While the blessed are so busy celebrating their dubious achievement, thinking about how God is on their side, God has slipped off into the wilderness to be with the dispossessed. Exposed, endangered, at risk, God has a special place and blessing for them as well.

The mother cries out in Rwanda, Somalia, or Central America. Who will hear her? The international community does care, but only a little. Those places and people are of no strategic importance to us. Briefly we mourn and then move on to another story on the evening news. Who will hear?

The homosexual young man or woman, cut off from church and spiritual support, as well as equal rights under the law. Who will hear their cry?

The Jew, the elder brother, the victim of centuries of persecution at the hands of Christians who have militantly sought to convert them. Who will hear the cry of the elder brother?

And while the younger brother, the prodigal, is busy celebrating his unexpected and undeserved bounty, the father slips out of the house to be with the elder brother, to remind him that he too is still blessed and will be blessed.

Maybe its time for us to slip out to be present with those whom we have supplanted rather than staying in our encampments celebrating our skewed triumphalism.