Welcome to Week 8 of MATRIARCHS!
Study God’s Word with us online or use them in your small group or Sunday School class!
Each lesson includes:
- Teaching video every Monday (15-20 minutes)
- Short lesson provided as the content of the post
- In-depth downloadable PDF to deepen your study
- Worksheets that take you even deeper
ALL LESSONS ARE FREE AND YOU CAN MAKE AS MANY COPIES AS YOU’D LIKE!
Week 1: Eve – A Mother Like No Other
Week 2: Sarah – Mother of Nations
Week 3: Rebekah – Mothering Through Barrenness
Week 4: Mary – Stubbornly Inflexible or Sacredly Flexible
Week 5: Naomi – Not Forsaken
Week 6: Jochebed – Desperate Times, Desperate Measures
Week 7: Hannah – What to Do When God Is Silent
Below is the video lesson guide. Please click on the PLEASE DOWNLOAD YOUR FREE IN-DEPTH BIBLE STUDY OF HAGAR link which takes you to the next level and helps you gain a more extensive and life-changing understanding of God’s Word. You can also CLICK HERE for your FREE WORKSHEET DOWNLOAD to take your group even deeper. There is also a link to the YouTube video link to study and hear details of Jochebed’s story. It is a story that many women can relate to.)
HAGAR: The GOD WHO SEES and HEARS
She was a young, beautiful Egyptian servant girl who landed quite a prestigious position in the house of Abram. It was a position that was typically acquired through tried and true obedience and trustworthiness. Yet, with the prestige of this position, she was stripped of all personal rights, required to be in complete subjection to her Master’s house. Including the inconceivable demand of being beckoned to Abram’s bed where the barren Sarai would offer her as a surrogate to bear her children.
In those ancient days, it was culturally acceptable for a barren woman to employ her handmaiden, or servant to bear her children. And, though it was culturally acceptable, remember that Abram and Sarai had been called out of their culture. God had set them apart from the cultural norm of their day.
While her story is captured in just two chapters in Genesis (16 & 21), there is so much we can relate to and learn from Hagar’s story.
- We have been called out of the cultural norms of today to a culture of Kingdom living
There are a lot of cultural norms that we live in today. But, as daughters of the King, we are called out of that culture! Today’s culture continues to move at warp speed away from Truth and righteousness, so much so, that we have become desensitized to worldly, degrading images and ideologies. We must renew our commitment to vigorously guard our homes, our hearts and our minds from the cultural norms that have hijacked truth and righteousness.
- He knows YOUR name! No matter how alone, or invisible you may feel right now, He knows your name! [Read Isaiah 43:1-2]
Up until this moment she was referred to as “my maidservant” or “your maid.” To Abram and Sarai, she was merely an Egyptian slave girl, and was treated as such. However, in Hagar’s very first encounter with God He calls her by her name! Gently, lovingly, by her name. [Genesis 16:8]
After he calls her by name He asks her two very important questions:
- “Where have you come from, and where are you going?”
God often uses questions to get to the root of what is in our heart. He doesn’t ask questions because He doesn’t know the answer. He asks questions to give us the opportunity to ponder, and be honest with ourselves, so that we can discover the answer.
Where have you come from? Like Hagar, most of us have wounds in our past that need tending to. We’ve pushed them down, and put on our Sunday morning happy face, learning to cope while minimizing our pain, determined to not look back, but to do the “good Christian thing” of pressing on and through. While that sounds all noble and good, please know that God never intended for His daughters to just press on and through, and cope with life. He intended for His daughters to walk in freedom, and abundant life! [Read Isaiah 61:1-3] – [Click here to go deeper and for steps on the healing process].
Where are you going?” Are you running away, going back to Egypt, the place God delivered you from, or are you running toward Him, pressing daily into His Truths, and soaking in His presence? Be honest. If you need to turn around, there’s no better time than now to make a U-Turn! [Click here to go deeper and for help on making that U-Turn]
We read on in verses 11-13, “And the Angel of the Lord said to her: “Behold, you are with child, and you shall bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, because the Lord has heard your affliction. He shall be a wild man; His hand shall be against every man, and every man’s hand against him. And he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren. Then she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, “Have I also here seen Him who sees me?”
- Hagar wasn’t seeking God. God sought her out! He truly is THE GOD WHO SEES!
Living in Abram’s house, surely Hagar had heard about God, but she likely thought that He was only the God of Abram and Sarai. Surely not for a slave girl like herself. He came to her, and He saw the inside aching of her heart.
As true as that was for Hagar, it is for us today!
He sees through your spoken words and hears the thoughts of your heart.
He sees through your smile.
He sees you in your darkness.
He sees the heartache of the woman betrayed by a trusted friend.
He sees the wounds that have pierced your heart.
He sees the toll that rejection has had on your tender heart.
He sees every injustice perpetrated against you.
He sees you in your loneliness.
He sees the unmet longings of your heart.
He is El-Roi, the God Who Sees You!
PRAY ABOUT IT:
Father, thank you that You are El Roi, the God who sees me. When I feel alone, and hurting, help me to remember that not only do you see me, but you also hear me. I know that mothering is much easier than parenting! Please strengthen me with courage as I lovingly, but firmly take hold of my children’s hand, and guide them against the cultural norms of today. I confess that I can’t do this on my own, Lord! Strengthen and fill me please, with the power of your Spirit, in Jesus Name, AMEN.
If this lesson has spoken to your heart… if God has used it, please be sure to leave a comment and please share on your social media outlets using the hashtag #MATRIARCHS
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