Unpleasantville – Blended Families

Unpleasantville – Blended Families
Sycamore Creek Church
Genesis 21:8-21
Tom Arthur
January 24, 2010

Download this sermon here.

Note to reader: This is a manuscript and not a transcript.  While I prepare a manuscript, I don’t preach from it.  All the major points are here, but there are bound to be some small differences from the sermon as it was preached live.  Also, expect some “bonus” material that wasn’t in the live sermon.

Peace, Friends!

I grew up in a blended family.  My parents adopted my brother, seven, and my sister, three, who were half-brother/sister when I was five.  My youngest brother was born when I was in 1^st grade.  My parents divorced when I was in 3^rd grade.  When I was in Jr. High, both of my parents remarried.  My step-mom had an adopted son (whom my dad ended up adopting as well) and my step-dad had two daughters.  By the time all the dust had settled, I had three brothers, a sister, and two step-sisters.  Only one of those siblings was biologically related to me.  There’s some pretty serious blending going on here.

Coming off of Christmas, I was reminded as I prepared for this sermon that Jesus too grew up in a blended family.  He lived with his mother and a man who was not his earthly father, Joseph.  We’re not alone in our blended-ness.

Today we continue in our series Unpleasantville: The Genesis of Messy Relationships. We’re exploring relationships in the book of Genesis.  So far we’ve covered marriage and courting.  Today we’ll look at blended families.  What we’ve seen already and what we’ll continue to see is that there is plenty of dysfunction to go around.  There’s even more of God’s grace.

There’s a very powerful and provocative movie that was made in 2008 called The Duchess.  Keira Knightley plays the Duchess of Devonshire.  She is in a loveless marriage and is expected to produce a male heir for the Duke.  She has several daughters and several miscarriages before she has a boy.  In the meantime, the Duke has taken in a mistress, one of the Duchess’ best friends, Bess.  Bess has three boys by her husband.  The tension between this triangle is palpable.  There is a scene where Bess’ boys come to live with them.  The Duchess sees her husband, the Duke, being a “father” to these boys who are not his.  She is understandably distraught.

This movie helps set the emotional stage for our scripture story this morning: the sending away of Hagar and Ishmael.  Abraham marries Sarah, but Sarah cannot conceive a child.  Sarah offers Abraham her handmaiden, Hagar.  Abraham has sex with Hagar, and Hagar bears him a boy, Ishmael.  Eventually Sarah does conceive a boy, and Isaac is born.  This is where we pick up in the story.

Genesis 21:8-21 NLT

⁸ As time went by and Isaac grew and was weaned, Abraham gave a big party to celebrate the happy occasion.

⁹ But Sarah saw Ishmael — the son of Abraham and her Egyptian servant Hagar — making fun of Isaac. ¹⁰ So she turned to Abraham and demanded, “Get rid of that servant and her son. He is not going to share the family inheritance with my son, Isaac. I won’t have it!” ¹¹ This upset Abraham very much because Ishmael was his son. ¹² But God told Abraham, “Do not be upset over the boy and your servant wife. Do just as Sarah says, for Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted. ¹³ But I will make a nation of the descendants of Hagar’s son because he also is your son.”

¹⁴ So Abraham got up early the next morning, prepared food for the journey, and strapped a container of water to Hagar’s shoulders. He sent her away with their son, and she walked out into the wilderness of Beersheba, wandering aimlessly. ¹⁵ When the water was gone, she left the boy in the shade of a bush. ¹⁶ Then she went and sat down by herself about a hundred yards away. “I don’t want to watch the boy die,” she said, as she burst into tears.

¹⁷ Then God heard the boy’s cries, and the angel of God called to Hagar from the sky, “Hagar, what’s wrong? Do not be afraid! God has heard the boy’s cries from the place where you laid him. ¹⁸ Go to him and comfort him, for I will make a great nation from his descendants.” ¹⁹ Then God opened Hagar’s eyes, and she saw a well. She immediately filled her water container and gave the boy a drink. ²⁰ And God was with the boy as he grew up in the wilderness of Paran. He became an expert archer, ²¹ and his mother arranged a marriage for him with a young woman from Egypt.

This is God’s story for us today.  Thank you, God.

Blended families often find themselves stuck between a rock and a hard place, don’t they?  Here Abraham is stuck between Sarah and Hagar and Isaac and Ishmael.  Well, Abraham isn’t the only one stuck, but we’ll focus on him today.

Going back to The Duchess, we continue to explore the emotional landscape of being in a blended family.  There is a scene not long after Bess and her boys show up to live with the Duke and the Duchess where the three of them are sitting at the dinner table.  The Duchess offers to make the Duke a deal.  She will accept the illicit relationship that the Duke and Bess have if the Duke will allow her a relationship with the man she has come to love, Charles Gray.  This “deal” goes over like a ton of bricks.  The Duke is furious.  He has all the power.  Why should he make a deal?  He would then be the laughing stock of the country.  No deal will be made.  Once again, the tension is palpable.

The circumstances aren’t quite the same, but the emotion is palpable in this story we read in Genesis.  We read that “this upset Abraham very much because Ishmael was his son” (21:11, NLT).  Abraham finds himself severely stuck emotionally.  What is he to do?  The NLT masks the problem a bit.  Here’s how a more literal translation puts it: “The matter was very distressing to Abraham on account of his son” (21:11, NRSV).  “On account of his son.”  Which son?  Here’s the rub.  Blended families often find themselves in situations where they have to choose between two family members.  Abraham has to choose between Isaac or Ishmael, Sarah or Hagar.  Which one will he choose?

I find myself in this situation almost every holiday season.  Actually, I find myself in this situation almost every time I go back to Indianapolis for a visit.  Which family members do I visit when?  Do I spend Christmas morning with my Mom and step-dad or with my Dad and step-mom?  Which Thanksgiving meal do I go to first?  If I’m only there for one night, which house do I sleep at?  Thankfully, my blended family interacts with me in very civil and loving ways around these kinds of choices, but I still feel the tension of deciding.

Abraham’s heart is broken about having to decide.  When he eventually does figure out what to do, we read, “So Abraham got up early the next morning, prepared food for the journey, and strapped a container of water to Hagar’s shoulders. He sent her away with their son, and she walked out into the wilderness of Beersheba, wandering aimlessly” (21:14).  Did you notice that not one word is spoken by Abraham?  It’s almost as if he can’t bear to say what’s happening.  Will he break down crying?  If you read it, especially if you read it in Hebrew, you see that Abraham is actually delaying.  It’s like he’s putting off the final moment of saying goodbye.  He wakes up early (did he not sleep well?).  He prepares food.  He gets water.  He gives it to Hagar.  After all this preparation he finally sends the boy with her.

In the midst of this heartbreak are the children.  The NLT reads that this whole situation happened when “Sarah saw Ishmael — the son of Abraham and her Egyptian servant Hagar — making fun of Isaac [Isaac-ing]” (21:9).  What is translated here as “making fun of” is literally “Isaac-ing.”  It’s pretty ambiguous just exactly what Ishmael is doing with Isaac, but I think that “making fun of” isn’t quite right.  The whole thing is a play on words on Isaac’s name which means “to laugh.”  I think Ishmael is simply laughing and playing with Isaac.  That’s how the NRSV translates it: “Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac” (21:9).  Ishmael may in one sense be acting in the way that only Sarah thinks Isaac should be acting, but there need not be any malicious intent on Ishmael’s part.  I think what’s going on here is completely innocent on the children’s part.  They don’t know how their actions are stirring up emotions in the adults around them.

One of the best things my mom did for me growing up was to keep her personal junk about my dad away from me.  She didn’t poison me toward my dad.  She found other places to vent about her frustrations.  She realized that her children didn’t know what was going on, and that one day we should be allowed to make decisions on our own about our relationship with our father.  My dad did make some mistakes (my mom too), but in the end, they both love their children, and my mom’s actions kept the possibility open for me to be able to receive and give back that love.

As we continue reading this story we see that despite what we may think about the messiness of blended families, God works despite and even amidst that messiness.  We read, “But God told Abraham, “Do not be upset over the boy and your servant wife. Do just as Sarah says, for Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted. But I will make a nation of the descendants of Hagar’s son because he also is your son” (21:12-13).  God’s main focus may be on Isaac, but God does not neglect Ishmael.  Before Abraham had only one nation, now he will have two!  As one commentator puts it, “God cares for this outsider whom the tradition wants to abandon” (Brueggemann, 183).

It seems that this extra blessing even comes amidst the wilderness time, the deepest and darkest point of the story.  We read, “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’” (21:17).  God is interested in Hagar as well, whereas Abraham seemed primarily interested in his sons.  God has an eye out for the one who is powerless, the one who is on the fringe of the family and society.  This makes me ponder the question: who is powerless in your blended family?  Don’t forget that God cares for and has a special love for the one who has the least power.

Amidst this wilderness time, God helps Hagar see new things and dream new dreams.  We read, “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” (21:19).  I don’t think that the well just miraculously appeared, but rather Hagar was blinded by the pain of her situation so that she didn’t see the resources that were right in front of her.  When God speaks in the wilderness, God opens our eyes and we see new possibilities, new dreams, new doors that either did not exist before or we did not have the eyes to see.

Sometimes my family life growing up was like a soap-opera, but other times it was great.  I asked around the office of those who had or have blended families what the strengths are in those blended families.  Here are some strengths that came to mind either from my family or from the staff’s families.

We have super-huge extended families.  At one point I had four grandmas and four grandpas.  It’s at moments like this when kids really cash in on Christmas and birthdays!  There were also more kinds of family traditions to draw from, more possible mentors or role-models (both in parents and step-siblings), and our step-parents had different resources/gifts/talents than our biological parents.  I came out of college debt-free because I had two families paying for it!  We learned patience, understanding, and forgiveness as we learned to be flexible in learning new ways of doing things.  These are all from the kid’s perspective, but what about for the parents?

In blended families parents get alone-time.  When the kids are at the “ex’s” house, you get your house to yourself.  Parents have extra hands, people, and vehicles to get kids around.  During tough times when all four parents are on the same page, there is double the support.  I saw this clearly when one of my siblings recently was in a difficult place in life.  My four parents agreed on the course forward.  What an amazing set of strengths to draw from when all four are working toward the same goal.

Maybe one of the most poignant moments I’ve had realizing that my blended families gave me certain strengths I would not have had otherwise was when I was volunteering at the Nehemiah House in Petoskey. The Nehemiah House is the homeless shelter in Petoskey.  I loved serving there.  I’d just show up and hang out for four hours with the guests.  If they wanted to talk, we’d talk.  If not, we just sat and read or listened to the radio.  One time the executive director told me that he thought I got along better with the residents than any of the other volunteers, especially in conflicts.  The first thing that came to my mind was, “Well, it’s just like being with my family.”  The messiness of my family prepared me well to be used by God in ministry to the hurting.  The messiness of your families is preparing you well for some special ministry too.

I don’t know that God’s original intent in Eden was for blended families, but now that we have them, God can certainly use them in extraordinary ways.  There is plenty of dysfunction to go around.  There’s even more of God’s grace.

Amen.