And she called the name of Jehovah who spoke to her, Thou art the God who reveals himself, for she said, Also here have I seen after he has revealed himself.
Hagar is a pregnant runaway slave in the desert, mistreated and heading nowhere, when God finds her and speaks. She answers by giving Him a name, which raises two questions: who was the "angel of the LORD" she met, and how much did she come to know of Him?
The title "angel of the LORD" does not always mean a created being.
This expression, THE ANGEL OF THE LORD [Jehovah] occurs over 100 times in the Old Testament, meaning messenger or agent. Sometimes it describes an angelic messenger, and sometimes it refers to the Lord Himself. The context makes clear which one is meant. Genesis 16:7 is one example: the context there proves that The Angel of the Lord is the Lord Himself.
So the verse says she named "the LORD who spoke to her." She was naming God Himself.
Translators have rendered her words in more than one way. One writer sets the options side by side, with the meanings of the son's name and of the well:
The angel also foretold the future of the coming son, giving his name and describing his character. His name means, "God hears." Hagar spoke of God as "You God see me," or "You are the God who reveals Himself" (New Trans.). The well where the angel appeared to her became known as "The well of the Living who was seen." So even poor Hagar gained blessing from this painful episode.
Those renderings come from older translations; the ESV has "You are a God of seeing." Hagar had not seen a form or a face. One writer weighs what her words actually claim:
Hagar was so impressed by this intervention of God that she called Him "the God who sees." "For," she adds, "Have I also here seen Him who sees me?" She had not seen God in person. But she recognized Him in the words He had spoken to her, and she was clearly subdued. We cannot be certain whether she was born again. Yet no one is ever the same after meeting the Lord of glory.
Hagar is no hero here. Her trouble was partly her own doing, and she was not looking for God when He came.
In her own story Hagar is an example or picture — hardly a type — of how divine grace deals with a helpless and despairing sinner. She ends up in the worst misery and danger, partly by her own fault and partly through injustice and misfortune. Yet a God of compassion remembers her and sees her. She is dying of thirst, though a well of springing water stands at her side (Gen. 21:19). She does not seem to remember God or seek Him. But He sends His angel with the gracious question, "What ails you, Hagar? Arise."
Commentators differ on how much Hagar grasped. One writer weighs her words and finds them limited:
She was the slave woman, and knew nothing of the freedom of grace. She might look after God, but all she reached was this: "You God see me." The simple awareness that God sees us never goes further than this: that He is a Judge who notices our ways in order to deal with them, or, at most, a guardian who protects us in the hour of difficulty and danger. But love, liberty, rest, joy in God are never known through the bare truth that God sees us.
Another finds more in the name of the well:
How blessed to learn that God heard Hagar's cry! For her refreshment He provided the well Beer-lahai-roi, "Well of the living who was seen." God not only sees me. He has revealed Himself in grace so that I may see Him.
Readers take this verse two ways. First, as a restraint, when nobody else would know:
He can slip off to questionable places of amusement, and nobody be any the wiser. Nobody the wiser? "YOU GOD SEE ME" (Gen. 16:13) was a great deterrent and safeguard to the writer in his youthful days. God sees, God knows, God notes.
And as comfort, because the God who sees is not indifferent:
Can idols hear, or can they also look after men? No, the true God of heaven alone could hear and see when Hagar had run away. He is the same today. He hears you and sees you in the way you go. And not only that, but He loves you too.
- Sought — Hagar was not looking for God; He found her, "a helpless and despairing sinner" who "does not seem to remember God nor seek Him."
- Spoke — the "angel of the LORD" who met her was the Lord Himself, not a created messenger.
- Seen — she knew Him by His words, not by sight. Her son's name means "God hears"; the name she gave God says that He sees.
- Stored — the meeting left a landmark: the well "of the Living who was seen," where God revealed Himself in grace.
- Settled — God's seeing restrains us when no one else is watching. It also comforts us, because the God who sees hears and loves.
Therefore the well was named Beer-lahai-roi behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered.
God met a runaway slave woman alone in the desert. The well where it happened took its name from what she said about Him, and that name stayed on the map long after her.
Most English Bibles leave the Hebrew name untranslated. One reference work places the well and gives its meaning:
This means "well of the living and seeing one." The well lay between Kadesh and Bered, "on the way to Shur," and so in the south. It was here that the angel of the LORD met Hagar, when she fled from Sarai. Her cry at that moment, "You, God, see me," gave the well its name. Isaac lived near the same well Lahai-roi (Gen. 24:62; Gen. 25:11).
(The ESV renders her words in verse 13 as "You are a God of seeing.")
Commentators differ over which side of the name to stress — God seeing her, or her seeing God. One writer gives both readings, and notes that this hard episode still ended in gain for her:
Hagar spoke of God as "You, God, see me," or "You are the God who reveals Himself." The well by which the angel appeared to her became known as "The well of the Living who was seen." So even poor Hagar drew blessing from this trying episode.
One writer thought earlier English Bibles handled names like this better:
Some of the early versions wisely and correctly translated the Hebrew words that our present Bibles leave untranslated. It is true that many Bibles put the translation in the margin. But then the reader asks: is the margin correct? And if so, why is it not in the text? The well of "Beer-lahai-roi" (Gen. 16:14) is rendered in the old versions the well of Him that "lives and sees me."
One writer links the well to God's answer to her cry, and to what she could then see of Him:
How wonderful to learn that God heard Hagar's cry! For her refreshment He provided the well Beer-lahai-roi, "Well of the living who was seen." God not only sees me, but has revealed Himself in grace so that I may see Him.
Another writer sets a limit on how far Hagar herself got. He warns that the bare truth that God sees us brings no rest by itself:
She was the bondwoman: she knew nothing of the liberty of grace. She might look after God, but what she reached was this: "You, God, see me." The simple awareness that God sees us never goes beyond two thoughts. Either He is a Judge noticing our ways to deal with them, or, at most, He is a guardian to protect in the hour of difficulty and danger. But love, liberty, rest, joy in God are never known through the bare truth that God sees us. No one denies that it is true. But as believers we are entitled to something further and more precious: seeing God — seeing Him who is invisible.
Isaac later came from this well and settled by it. One writer draws out what that says about the One waiting at the end of a journey:
In all these wilderness scenes Isaac has taken no active part. Yet he kept in mind all that was happening. He comes from the well Lahairoi — a word of deep meaning, for it means "the well of Him that lives and sees" (Genesis 16:14). How good to know, as we travel on our way, that at the end of the journey we shall find One who has kept His people in mind. He sees and He lives — indeed the word is "He always lives" (Heb. 7:25).
One writer turns the name into a question about where we live:
Don't you think it would do us good if we as Christians dwelt more by Lahai-roi? If we knew a little better what our God has given us, and so knew better the blessing in it? Hagar called it "the well of Him that lives and sees"! That is what it is. It is the "well of Him that lives and sees" us, the well of God, the living water.
- Named — a runaway woman's words about God named the well between Kadesh and Bered: "well of the living and seeing one."
- Seen — Hagar found that God saw her in the desert. One writer adds that God also revealed Himself, so that she could see Him.
- Limited — the bare truth that God sees you gives you a Judge or a guardian. Love, liberty and rest come from seeing Him.
- Lasting — Isaac later came from this well and settled by it, so the name became a home address, not just a memory.
- Ours — the call is to live where Isaac lived: beside the well of the One who sees us and always lives.