Early the next morning 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. She went on her way and wandered in the Desert of Beersheba. – Genesis 21:14

Today's Scripture Reading (October 2, 2024): Genesis 21

Every story has a beginning. For me, when I look at the back story of the Islamic faith, the beginning of the Islamic story can be found right here with a mother and her child who have been kicked out of the only home that they knew and left to fend for themselves in the desert. The mother was Hagar, and the son was Ishmael.

Abraham is not happy. He loved his son, and I think he loved Hagar. But God told him that this was okay; God said, "Do what Sarah wants you to do."

Abraham's reply to God is not recorded, but since I have a habit of putting words in Abraham's mouth, you have to wonder if the Patriarch's reply to God wasn't, "Do what Sarah told me to do? But that's how I got into this mess. She told me to sleep with Hagar, and I did; this was all her fault.

And so Hagar and Ishmael leave to go into the desert. As a result, the story of the Muslim faith starts right there in the desert. Part of what that reminds us of is that the struggle between the Jews, Islam, and Christians is a family fight. We all claim a connection with Abraham. Four significant events happened in this family during the two centuries before Christ and the first four centuries after his death and resurrection.

First, the Jews received their Book. Until then, it was a loose collection of books and writings that hadn't yet been collected together and authorized as the official writings of the faith. Finally, the Jews had a Book. They were still arguing about it, but they had a Book. Second, not long after the Jews received their Book, the Christians gathered their writings into a single volume. Christians became people of the Book, just like their older sibling, Judaism.

The third major event was that Christianity became a world religion during the reign of Constantine. The jury is still out as to whether that was a good thing, but it happened. The fourth major event was actually a non-event. The Arabs were utterly left out of this process. They continued to live in the desert, fighting with each other. They knew the terrain and how to live in the desert; the rest of the world just left them alone. Ishmael had left the home of Abraham for the desert with his mother, and his children had never left. They worshiped many gods there, but they possessed no government, unity, or economy. More than 2000 years after Hagar and Ishmael were cast out into the wilderness, there was still a reason for Hagar to cry. Her children were still in the desert, and the world had gone on, living out their lives and forgetting about their siblings wandering in the desert.

However, there was a persistent rumor. Ishael's descendants didn't know for sure; they couldn't prove it, and they didn't have a book that explained it to them, but they had a story that argued that there was one God of the universe and he was the God of Abraham. The story also revealed that Abraham had a son who had moved into the desert; he was their ancestor. His name was Ishmael.

They didn't know for sure, but maybe there was a history that went beyond their situation. The Jews had their prophet, Moses. The Christians had their Savior, Jesus. But the Arabs still lived in the desert like Hagar and Ishmael.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Genesis 22