Wounded by God's People

by Anne Graham Lotz

  Hagar gave Abraham one descendant. His name was Ishmael. For fourteen years he was Abraham’s only son. It doesn’t require much imagination to know that Abraham, a very wealthy man whose holdings rivaled that of a small nation, lavished everything on Ishmael. He must have spent hours talking to Ishmael, playing with him, teaching him about managing a large household, and instructing him in sound business practices. Abraham loved Ishmael! And because God was central to his life, Abraham surely told Ishmael about the One who had leaned out of heaven to speak into his life when he had been living in Ur of the Chaldeans. The One who had promised to bless him and make him a channel of blessing to the world. The One who had called Abraham to a life of obedient faith; the One who had appeared to him again and again when he built his altars; the One who had spoken to him, comforted him, and delivered him from danger. I expect that Abraham confided to Ishmael that he, his firstborn, was the fulfillment of God’s promise to bless him with descendants as numerous as the stars. Abraham surely grew increasingly attached to the boy as he wrapped years of longing around Hagar’s son.

  For fourteen years, Ishmael lived as a virtual prince, the beloved only son of a wealthy, powerful, well-known, and well-respected man. Rather than being humbly grateful for his privileges, however, Ishmael seemed to have inherited his mother’s arrogance. It may not have been readily apparent when he was young and unchallenged in his position, but it became blazingly obvious when Sarah miraculously conceived and gave birth to her own son — at the age of ninety! Ishmael’s world was rocked. No longer the sole focus of his father’s attention and love, Ishmael nursed his wounds and patiently bided his time. Then he hit back. Hard.

  On the day Sarah and Abraham’s miracle son, Isaac, was weaned, Abraham threw a great feast to celebrate. Ishmael chose that moment to take revenge on the little boy who had dared to upset his world. While we don’t know the exact form of the attack, we know it was brutal and likely focused on God’s unique plan for Isaac’s life, because the New Testament describes it as “persecution.”4

  One can only imagine the damage Ishmael’s bullying would have done to his younger sibling had it remained a dirty little secret. It no doubt would have developed into a pattern of abusive behavior, perhaps even becoming life-threatening to Isaac. And it certainly would have been emotionally, spiritually, and psychologically damaging to the development of a little guy who was destined for a unique role in God’s great plan of redemption.

  But the persecution did not remain a secret for long, because Sarah caught Ishmael persecuting her boy. For years she had lived in silent acquiescence, patiently enduring the daily presence of Hagar and Ishmael. Now she broke her silence with the mother-of-all temper tantrums. Erupting in an explosion of pent-up rage, she let loose, wrapping her fury in righteous indignation and a mother’s protective instincts for her child. In a tone that surely allowed no room for disagreement, she demanded that Abraham throw both Hagar and Ishmael out of the house: “Get rid of that slave woman and her son, for that slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac.”5 The issue was laid out in harsh reality under the glaring spotlight of truth — because Hagars son, Ishmael, was not the son God had promised to give Abraham. He was not heir to the promised spiritual birthright, which was Abraham’s most valuable treasure.

  Ishmael had been born as a result of Abraham’s self-effort and in accordance with Abraham’s self-will. When Abraham had grown impatient waiting for God to fulfill His promise of a son, Abraham had taken matters into his own hands. At eighty-five, Abraham had known he was running out of time to have children and perhaps thought God had forgotten His promise. So Abraham had run ahead of God. He had ignored God’s principles for marriage,6 in essence committed adultery, impregnated his servant, then hoped that God would retroactively bless everything. Even before Sarah had pronounced judgment, Abraham must have known deep in his heart that one day the rubber would finally hit the road. Now he could no longer keep hoping or pretending that everything was all right. It was impossible for both boys to have the same inheritance. They couldn’t even live peaceably in the same home. The axe must finally fall. It was time for the Gardener’s shears.

  Wounds have a way of festering, don’t they? Hagar, Sarah, Abraham, and now Ishmael and Isaac were all wounded. And wounds don’t really self-heal. They seem to lie dormant, and then at an unsuspected moment, in an unexpected way, they erupt.

  What wounds have been festering in your heart and life? Perhaps they’ve been lying dormant but now are beginning to surface, and you realize you are still hurting.

  Sometimes our wounds, like Abraham’s, are self-inflicted. They are the result of choices we have made according to our own self-effort and self-will. According to what we want. According to what we were convinced we had to have to be happy and fulfilled.

  If we are honest, I expect all of us would admit to running full speed ahead at some point in our lives, praying for God to bless whatever it was that we were doing — or bless that relationship or bless that decision — all the while pretending, even to ourselves, that everything was okay and that God would let us get by with it. But deep down we know better. We have an uneasy feeling that this isn’t right. Our conscience is warning us that we have run ahead of God and seized something for ourselves that we wanted. Maybe even something we believed God wanted to give us. We have felt we just couldn’t wait one more day for God to keep His promise, whatever it was. With time seemingly running out, we may have jumped into a marriage, a career, a ministry, a pregnancy, an adoption, a business contract, or a second job.

  So instead of waiting on God’s time and for Him to give it to us in His way, we get it for ourselves. As a result, whatever we jumped into never works out like we had hoped. Actually, we can make a royal mess, as Abraham did.

  If Abraham had been suppressing an uneasy feeling deep down in his spirit, it now erupted violently to the surface. His face must have turned white, then a deep red as he faced up to the fact that Sarah was right. This contrived arrangement was a mistake and not at all what God wanted. The shards of his shattered heart are evident in this poignant phrase from Scripture, “The matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son.”7 Although Isaac was the adored miracle child and the fulfillment of God’s promise, Ishmael had been Abraham’s beloved only child for fourteen years. How could throwing Ishmael out of the house be the right solution? And even if it was, how could he possibly do such a thing? He loved Ishmael!

  As Abraham’s love for Isaac, Ishmael, and Sarah all collided in an epic conflict of interests, he must have agonized over what to do. The turmoil in his home and in his heart surely paralyzed him, because God Himself leaned out of heaven to shake things loose. God first reassured Abraham and then told him exactly what to do: “Do not be so distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned. I will make the son of your maidservant into a nation also, because he is your offspring.”8

  As stunningly incompatible as it seems with our human understanding of justice, God Himself, the Divine Gardener, confirmed that removing Hagar and Ishmael from Abraham’s home was exactly the right thing to do. What Abraham might otherwise have disregarded as Sarah’s irrational overreaction to Hagar and Ishmael was actually wise and godly counsel. It would protect Isaac, who no doubt would have been emotionally devastated and spiritually destroyed had he been left to the mercy of an antagonistic, arrogant, jealous older brother. And it would release Ishmael, already a young man, to discover and fulfill God’s unique purpose for his life.

  Once God clearly made His will known, Abraham exhibited no procrastination or hesitation in obeying. He could have resisted God’s directive, complaining that, at nearly 105 years of age, he was much too old for a confrontation like this. But he didn’t. Though it was surely the hardest thing Abraham had ever done, at this point in his life he did exactly what God had asked of him: “Early the next morni
ng Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy.”9

  I wonder what this moment must have been like for Hagar and Ishmael. I believe it’s no exaggeration to say they were wounded to the extreme. By Abraham — a man of God and the friend of God! And here is the kicker: it was the right thing to do. But we also know that it wasn’t just hard on Hagar and Ishmael; it was also hard on Abraham. Sometimes doing the right thing wounds others — and also wounds the wounder.

  Are you having a difficult time accepting the fact that God can command us to do something that will hurt someone else? But sometimes He does. God’s ways are not our ways and His thoughts are not our thoughts.10 There are times He leads us in paths that go against conventional wisdom and the advice of those we might otherwise consider experts. He may direct us to make decisions that go against our own strongly held opinions or feelings. But when we choose to do what Abraham did — simply trust and obey — in time, we will discover that God always leads us on the right path.11 Pruning produces a healthier, more vigorous, and more fruitful vine.

  Sometimes obeying God carries collateral damage. I recall experiencing this myself when I taught Bible Study Fellowship in my city for twelve years. The class consistently maintained an active membership of five hundred women and approximately two hundred small children. Using the example Jesus set when He trained twelve disciples and then in turn used them to reach the world, I poured myself into the training of over seventy leaders who then were responsible for discipling a smaller group of either women or children entrusted to their care so that each class member, whether young or old, received individual attention and shepherding.

  The leaders and I became like sisters. We grew together in our knowledge of the Scripture, our love for Jesus, and our desire to get others into God’s Word. I truly loved those women. To this day, when I encounter one of them in a restaurant or at a meeting, the strong bond that was developed through our frequent interactions is still there. I feel the joy of the Shepherd when I hear that they are now teaching their own Bible classes, or serving in significant ways within their own churches, or writing Bible lessons for children, or organizing evangelistic outreaches. Some have gone on to write books. Some have written curriculum for other Bible studies.

  Because the health and spiritual well-being of the entire class was my ultimate responsibility, I worked tirelessly to make sure that each leader was growing spiritually, was vibrant in her own faith and relationship with the Lord, and was fully engaged in discipling those she was responsible for. And I was ever mindful that I could not lead others farther than where I was myself, so I was constantly motivated to grow spiritually.

  Because our class was the first such class in our area, the women who made up the leadership were good, churched women, but very few had deep roots to their faith. Very few had ever been in a Bible study before becoming a member. Their freshness, their lack of preconceived ideas about the Scripture, their eagerness to learn, their teachability made my role a delight. Truly a privilege.

  So I don’t want to tarnish the beautiful reflection of Him that I saw in my leaders’ circle, but on a handful of occasions during those twelve years, a few of them stumbled. Badly. One confessed to me that she was struggling in her marriage, and as I looked into her eyes, I knew she was involved with someone else. She was. Another leader was unable to fulfill her role but lied to cover up her failure. When I confronted her, she tried to defend herself to me by lying again. Another leader was revealed to be a secret alcoholic.

  At those times, I was confronted with a choice. I could compromise the holiness and righteousness that I believe God requires of His leaders and put my love for the leader, as well as my concern for her feelings, before the well-being of the entire class. Or I could remove her. I knew if I didn’t take drastic action, the entire leadership would be infected, which would in turn infect the overall class. Quietly, lovingly, carefully so that few people, even within the leaders’ circle, knew why the leader was no longer present, I removed each of them by asking them individually for their resignations. But in each case the offending leader was deeply hurt. Even though she knew her removal was justified, she was still wounded. By me. My heart was broken. I grieved for her and for myself and for the other leaders and for her class. Even though removing each one from leadership was the right thing to do, it hurt.

  The only reason I would ever wound others whom I love and work with is because I love and trust God more, and He said so. And the only reason Abraham wounded Hagar and his beloved Ishmael was because he loved and trusted God more, and God said so. In each case, someone was wounded because God said so.

  Does it surprise you that God sometimes commands us to do things He knows will result in others being wounded? You and I can delude ourselves into secretly hoping that a loving God will overlook the wrong that we, or others, have done if righting that wrong means wounding someone. We can falsely believe that a loving God will protect those He truly loves from this kind of hurt. We can buy into a prosperity message that convinces us that God’s desire for us is to live pain-free, carefree, happy lives.

  Sometimes our view of God seems to be the same view we have of a genie. We think that if we rub Him the right way with prayer and faith, He will pop up and give us what we want. It’s a view that is drastically wrong. God’s purpose for us is not to make us healthy, happy, prosperous, and problem-free. His ultimate purpose is to conform us to the image of His own dear Son, that we might bear much fruit to His glory.12 And sometimes, in fulfilling that purpose, He allows us to be hurt.

  There are times when the Divine Gardener cuts everything out of our lives except our relationship with Jesus. This kind of wounding not only hurts God, but hurts us as well. Maybe you haven’t recognized it as pruning because it was an illness that landed you on a hospital bed, a termination from your job, a removal from your church position, a collapse of your business, a rejection by your peers, a dream that hit a dead end, a calling-out or a dressing-down.

  Whatever it was or is, the wounds of divine pruning force us to pay attention to our relationship with God because He’s all we have. And in the process, He strengthens our connection to the Vine, softens our hearts, and delights in our growth as our lives produce a greater harvest of spiritual fruit.

  When have you been cut back to the nub? How did you respond to the pain of the wound? I wonder … how much more fruit would you and I produce if we were totally submissive to His wounding? If we embraced it instead of fighting it …

  Because your purpose and mine is to bring glory to God, fruit-bearing is not an option. We must bear fruit. And like a grapevine, in order to be fruitful we must submit to pruning. When we resist and fight back, what we are really doing is refusing to glorify God, thereby thwarting the very purpose for our existence.

  We can trust the Gardener to use the shears in our lives skillfully, lovingly, and effectively. Trust Him. He’s been pruning for years. He knows what He’s doing.

  We can also take comfort in knowing that Jesus Himself submitted to divine wounding. God the Father not only allowed but destined His Son to be wounded for a greater glory. Long before Jesus walked the earth, the prophet Isaiah described the Messiah as a suffering servant:

  Surely he took up our infirmities

  and carried our sorrows,

  yet we considered him stricken by God,

  smitten by him, and afflicted.

  But he was pierced for our transgressions,

  he was crushed for our iniquities:

  the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,

  and by his wounds we are healed … .

  Yet it was the LORD’S will to crush him and cause him

  to suffer.13

  It was the Lord’s will to crush Him and cause Him to suffer? How is that possible? Who will ever fathom the love of a God who intentionally wounded His Son so that you and I might be healed of our own wounds! Surely the Father
’s great heart was broken; surely tears were flooding down the divine countenance; surely there were sobs choking the voice that had thundered from Mount Sinai — even as “he gave his one and only Son” to die on the cross so that “whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”14

  Jesus, the Son of God, “did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.”15 Because He loves you and me. As a result, He bore much fruit. He …

  defeated the devil,

  conquered the grave,

  atoned for sin,

  redeemed sinners,

  opened heaven,

  and triumphantly brought many sons and daughters to glory!16 Following His death on the cross, the Son of Man rose up from the dead17 and returned to heaven to claim all of His former glory as the Son of God.18 He now sits at the Father’s right hand, with all authority in the universe placed under His feet.19 No wonder the writer to the Hebrews exhorts us to, “Fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”20

  Praise God that Jesus embraced the pain of divine wounding for the glory that would follow. He never confused Him with them.

  I cannot comprehend such love for a wretched sinner like myself. But I can worship the One who loved me so much He wounded His own Son that by those very wounds I might be cleansed, forgiven, and healed. I can submit myself to the beloved Son who Himself submitted to God’s wounding. And I can obey God’s directives even when that obedience hurts someone else … and me.

  EIGHT