Two Boys, One Tender Father

A year after the smoke went up over Sodom, at the very time God had named, a baby cried in Sarah's tent. It was her own son.

Abraham was a hundred years old. (Most men are grandfathers long before they turn a hundred. Abraham was just learning how to hold a baby.) He named the baby Isaac, which means "he laughs," and soon the whole camp could hear Sarah doing just that.

"God has made me laugh!" she said. "Everyone who hears about this will laugh with me."

But Isaac was not the only boy in Abraham's tents. Years before, when Sarah thought she would never have a child, she had given her Egyptian servant Hagar to Abraham as a second wife, so Hagar could have a baby for the family. Hagar's son was named Ishmael, which means "God hears."

When Isaac was done with his mother's milk, Abraham threw a great feast. But at the feast Sarah saw Ishmael, a teenager now, laughing at Isaac, and it was the mean kind of laughing.

"Send that slave woman and her son away!" Sarah told Abraham. "Her son will never share what belongs to my son Isaac."

Abraham was very upset. Ishmael was his son too.

But God said to him, "Do not be upset about the boy and your servant. Do what Sarah says, because your family will be counted through Isaac. I will make a nation from Ishmael too, because he is your son."

Early the next morning Abraham put some bread and a bag of water on Hagar's shoulder and sent her away with the boy.

They wandered in the desert near Beersheba, over rocks and sand and more sand, until the water bag hung flat and empty. Ishmael could not go on. Hagar laid him in the shade of a bush and walked away, about as far as an arrow flies. "I cannot watch my boy die," she said, and she sat down and sobbed.

Under the bush, Ishmael was crying too.

God heard Ishmael, and the angel of God called to Hagar out of heaven. "What is wrong, Hagar? Do not be afraid. God has heard the boy crying, right where he lies. Get up! Lift him up and hold his hand, because I will make him into a great nation."

Then God opened Hagar's eyes, and there was a well. She filled the bag until it sloshed and gave her boy a long drink.

God stayed with Ishmael as he grew up in the desert, where he became an expert archer.

A bag of water lasts about a day. Ishmael got thirsty again the next afternoon, and the one after that. Wells dry up and boys grow old, and one day, as an old man, Ishmael died.

Long after Ishmael, God called out through the prophet Isaiah: "Come, everyone who is thirsty! Come to the waters!" People waited for someone to bring that water.

Ishmael had been sent away from his father's tent. Then God sent his own Son out into the dry places, on purpose and out of love. At Abraham's feast, a boy had been pushed out. At another feast, on its last and greatest day, God's Son stood up and called out to everyone, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink!" He heard every cry, just as his Father had heard a boy under a bush.

"Whoever drinks the water I give," Jesus said, "will never be thirsty again."