12th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

So Abraham rose early in the morning, and took bread and a skin of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered about in the wilderness of Beer-sheba.
~Genesis 21:14
 
Hagar’s experience of being expelled from the security of Sarah’s tent to the  uncertainty and vulnerability of the wilderness exposes something deeply troubling in our shared human experience. Her story highlights the universal reality of conflict, suffering and injustice that we both experience in our own lives and, if honest with ourselves, are sometimes complicit in causing in the lives of others, especially those who seem to stand in the way of our own security and those whom society pushes to the margins.
 
Her story also compels us to wrestle with why God seemingly permits such injustices to occur. Likewise, Jesus does not promise his disciples safety from the unjust oppressive systems in which they find themselves but rather calls them to wield a sword of truth in confronting systemic injustices that will inevitably cause fractures but ultimately lead to freedom. Though we are not protected from conflict, we are protected by God in those wilderness places of our lives. Just as God opens Hagar’s eyes to see the provision of a hidden well, so too we are provided God’s living water that sustains life and empowers us to participate in God’s redemptive work in the world.
 
We welcome Rev. Erin McArdel to worship today.  Erin serves as the Palliative Care and Hospice Chaplain at the Seattle VA Medical Center in Seattle and is a colleague of our old friend, Linda Conyers. She strives to balance her chaplaincy ministry with her very important call as mother of 3 school aged boys. She and her husband are raising their family in Maple Valley. When not ushering kids around or at the bedside of seriously ill veterans, it is likely Erin is outside enjoying the beauty of God's creation!
 
Enter into worship.
 
Readings: Genesis 21:8-21 † Psalm 86:1-10, 16-17 † Romans 6:1b-11 † Matthew 10:24-39
 
About the Art: Hagar in the Desert, from WikiArt. https://www.wikiart.org/en/marc-chagall/hagar-in-the-desert-1960 [retrieved June 8, 2026]. Original source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ravenna_Basilica_of_San_Vitale_mosaic2.jpg.

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