Wretched indeed it is to have to see such a thing as this. But the Spirit of God hides nothing. There it lies before us, this vile and wicked thing, in the pathway of the recording Spirit. We have, however, other happier objects.
The progress of Sarah's soul, under the light and leading of the Lord, is to be tracked in its own peculiar and instructive path. Under the influence of the flesh she had, at the outset, joined Abraham in this unclean compact, of which I have just spoken. In unbelief, she had afterwards, as we also saw, given Hagar to her husband; and then, in the haste and rebellion of the heart, she resented the effects of that unbelief, and cast out the bondwoman, whom she had adopted and settled in the family. But at the command of the Lord, Hagar had gone back to her; and now, at the time of this action, she had borne with her in the house for fourteen years. There was, however, no manifestation of the renewed mind, or the life of faith, in her. It was even during these years, that in unbelief she had laughed at the promise, behind the tent-door. But still, I may say, she had, during this time, in one sense, been at school; and she seems to have learnt a lesson, for she submitted patiently and unresistingly, to the presence of the bondwoman and her child in the house of her husband. We hear of no fresh quarrels between them. This was something. This was witness of her being in the hand of God, till at length, as we know, she was given faith to conceive seed. Heb. xi. A great journey, however, after all this, is now about to be taken by her spirit. She is to take the lead even of her husband. And happy this is--common enough, too, among the saints--but happy, very happy. And were we of a delivered heart--a heart given up to the desire of Christ's glory only--we should rejoice in these discoveries, made in the regions of the Spirit, though we ourselves would have to be humbled by them. "The last shall be first, and the first last." These are among the ways of "new-born souls," and to be discerned still by those who "mark the steps of grace." Paul could say of some, "Who also were in Christ before me;" but we may be bold to add, in that case, though he did not, "The last were first." And the generous liberty of the redeemed soul will but glory in these sovereign actings of the Spirit.
Sarah's elevation above Abraham in the things of the kingdom of God is now to appear in illustration of all this. In obedience to the command, Abraham calls the child that was born, Isaac. But Sarah interprets that name: and this is a finer exercise of soul over the gift of God. To obey a word is good; but to obey it in the joy of an exercised heart, and in the light and intelligence of a mind that has entered into the divine sense of that word, is better. Abraham called the child that was born to him, Isaac: but Sarah said "God has made me to laugh; and all they that hear it will laugh with me." The oracle of chapter xvii. 19 was made more to her than a command to be observed. It had springs of refreshing in it, and kindlings of soul. It was full of light and meaning to the opened understanding of Sarah. And this leads to strength and decision. This Deborah of earlier days will brace the loins of Barak. "Cast out this bondwoman and her son," says Sarah to Abraham; for she was happy in the liberty of grace and promise, while he was still lingering amid the claims of nature, and the desires which his own loins had gendered. "Cast out this bondwoman and her son; for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac." And this was Scripture, as we read in Gal. iv.; this was the voice of God. This decision of faith, in the liberty of grace, gets its sealing at once under God's own hand. "Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free," says the Spirit. And what met the mind of the Lord, in the days of His flesh, like the faith which was bold and free, after this manner? the faith which would use Him without ceremony, which reached Him through a crowd, which pressed in through the silent reproaches of a misjudging Pharisee, or through the injurious whispers of a self-righteous multitude! And how much of the energy of the Spirit in St. Paul is engaged in giving the sinner this precious boldness, this immediate assurance of heart in Christ, in spite of law, conscience, earth, and hell!
This boldness of faith in Sarah, this challenge of the bondwoman, this demand (in her own behalf too) that she might enjoy her Isaac all alone, is Scripture. Gal. iv. 30. She spake as "the oracles of God." But in Abraham nature now acts. He would fain retain Ishmael. This is no strange thing. Nature now acts in Abraham, and faith in Sarah; as, on an earlier occasion, which we noticed, nature had acted in Sarah and faith in Abraham. But nature in Abraham must submit. He must not let Sarah be entangled any longer as with this yoke of bondage. The house must be freed of Ishmael, for it is to be built only in Isaac. "The son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman."
But all this quickly bears its fruit. Hagar being now gone, and the house settled in Isaac according to this demand of faith, glory is therefore quickly ready to enter. For this is the divine order. Having "access into this grace wherein we stand, we rejoice in hope of the glory of God." Such is the order of the Spirit in the soul of such a saint; and such is the order now in the mystic house of our Abraham.
Abraham is sought by the Gentile. This is full of meaning. In the days of stress and famine, Abraham seeks the Gentile, whether in Egypt or in Philistia; but now, the Gentile seeks Abraham. This is a great change. Abraham's house, as we have seen, is now established in grace. Ishmael is dismissed, and Isaac is gloried in. In mystic sense, Israel has turned to the Lord, the veil is taken away, Jerusalem has said to Christ, "Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord," her warfare is therefore accomplished, and she is receiving the double. The Gentile seeks Israel. Abimelech and Phichol, the king and his chief captain, come to Abraham.
This is a great dispensational change. Israel is the head now, and not the tail. The skirt of the Jew is now laid hold on by the nations; for the Jew has, by faith, laid hold on the Lord, and the nations say, God is with you. Chap. xxi. 22; Zech. viii. 23.
This is full of meaning; and Abraham on all this (led of the Spirit) is full of thoughts of glory or of the kingdom. And rightly so. Because, when the Jew is sought by the Gentile, instead of being trodden down or degraded by the Gentile, the kingdom is at hand. Accordingly, on the king of Gerar seeking him and suing him, our patriarch raises a new altar; not the altar of a heavenly stranger, as in chapter xii., but an altar to "the everlasting God;" not an altar in a wilderness-world, but an altar beside a grove and a well; the one being a witness that the solitary place had been made glad, and that the wilderness was rejoicing; the other, that the peoples of the earth were confederate with the seed of Abraham.[11]
All this bright intelligence of faith in Abraham is very beautiful. We have already seen other actings of it in him. He knew a time of peace and a time of war, and acted accordingly in the day of the battle of the five kings with four. So, again, he knew his heavenly place, and took it, when the fire of the Lord was judging the cities of the plain. So, again, as this chapter xxi. very remarkably shows us, he also knew when to suffer wrong and when to resent, when to be passive and when to assert his rights. For now, in the time of this chapter, when the Gentile seeks him, he reproves Abimelech for a well of water which Abimelech's servants had violently taken away. But he had not complained of this injury until now; for Abimelech said to him, "I wot not who has done this thing; neither didst thou tell me, neither yet heard I of it, but to-day." And this is exceedingly beautiful. It is perfect in its generation. Abraham had till now suffered, and taken it patiently, because till now he had been a heavenly stranger on the earth; and such patient suffering in such an one is acceptable with God. But now, times are changed. The heavenly stranger has become the head of the nations, sought by the Gentile; and rights and wrongs must now be settled, and the cry of the oppressed must be heard.
All this has great moral beauty in it. I know not how sufficiently to admire this workmanship of the Spirit in the mind of Abraham. He was an Israelite who knew the seasons of the year--when to be at the Passover, and when at the Feast of Tabernacles. He knew, in spirit, when to continue with Jesus in His temptations, and then again, when the day arrived, how to surround Him with hosannahs as He entered the city of the Son of David. All such various and blending lights shone in the spiritual intelligence of his soul. God, by the Spirit, communicated a beautiful mind to Abraham. In other days, he would not have so much of this earth as to set his foot on--he would surrender the choice of the land to Lot--he would leave the Canaanite where he found him--he would refuse to be enriched by the king of Sodom even in so little as a thread or a shoe-latchet--he would wander up and down in his tent here, a stranger from heaven--but now, in a day signified and marked by the hand of God, he can be another man, and know his millennial place, as father of the Israel of God, and their representative as head of the nations. He can keep the Feast of Tabernacles in its season. His rebuke of Abimelech--his entertaining him--his enriching him--his giving him covenant pledges--and all this in such easy, conscious dignity--and then his new altar or his calling on God in a new character, and his planting a grove, all bespeak another man, and that a transfiguration, if I may so speak, had taken place in him, according to God.