Genesis 21

And the Lord was good to Sarah, just as He'd said, and did for Sarah what He'd promised.

Sarah fell pregnant and had a son for Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had told him.

And Abraham named the son Sarah had for him Isaac.

And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac at eight days old, just as God had told him.

Abraham was a hundred when his son Isaac was born.

And Sarah said, “God has given me laughter. Everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.”

And she said, “Who would ever have told Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? And here I've had him a son in his old age.”

The boy grew and was weaned, and on the day Isaac was weaned Abraham put on a big feast.

But Sarah saw the son Hagar the Egyptian had had for Abraham, and he was laughing.

And she said to Abraham, “Get rid of that slave woman and her son. That woman's son is not going to share the inheritance with my son Isaac.”

This upset Abraham badly, because it was about his son.

But God said to him, “Don't be upset about the boy and your slave woman. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it's through Isaac that your line will be traced.

And I'll make the slave woman's son into a nation too, because he's your offspring.”

Early next morning Abraham took bread and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He put them on her shoulders and sent her off with the boy. She went and wandered about in the desert of Beersheba.

When the water in the skin was gone, she put the boy under one of the bushes.

And she went and sat down a good way off, about a bowshot away, because she said, “I can't watch the boy die.” And sitting there a way off, she started to sob.

And God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar out of heaven. “What's wrong, Hagar? Don't be afraid. God has heard the boy crying, there where he's lying.

Get up, lift the boy up and take him by the hand, because I'll make him into a great nation.”

And God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin, and gave the boy a drink.

And God was with the boy as he grew up. He lived in the desert and became an archer.

He lived in the desert of Paran, and his mother got him a wife from Egypt.

About that time Abimelech, with Phicol the commander of his forces, said to Abraham, “God is with you in everything you do.

Now swear to me here before God that you won't deal falsely with me, or my children, or my descendants. Show me and the country you've stayed in the same kindness I've shown you.”

And Abraham said, “I swear it.”

Then Abraham took it up with Abimelech about a well of water that Abimelech's men had seized.

And Abimelech said, “I don't know who did this. You didn't tell me, and I haven't heard about it until today.”

So Abraham brought sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelech, and the two of them made a treaty.

And Abraham set seven ewe lambs from the flock off on their own,

and Abimelech said to Abraham, “What are these seven ewe lambs you've set apart?”

And he said, “Take these seven lambs from my hand as a witness that I dug this well.”

That's why the place was called Beersheba — because the two of them swore an oath there.

After they'd made the treaty at Beersheba, Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his forces went back to the land of the Philistines.

And Abraham planted a tamarisk tree at Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the Lord, the Everlasting God.

And Abraham stayed in the land of the Philistines a long time.