Hebrews 11:11 counts Sarah among the heroes of faith, noting that she believed God. In Genesis 16:2–5, Sarai (Sarah) loses her mind in one of the Bible’s most tragic scenes since Genesis 3 and 4. Sarai is both/and, and the Bible consistently captures God’s working with flawed humanity, giving His people the victory and praise while encouraging those of us who follow that it is raw, messy people who are used mightily by God.

Now in her seventies, Sarai and Abram have endured decades of infertility. A shift occurred late in their lives when Abram began encountering God, resulting in a significant relocation and nomadic lifestyle in a foreign land. God’s meetings with Abram revolved around a specific topic: on three occasions, He references Abram’s future descendants. One potential issue in all of this—God never mentions Sarai. Not even once. So, while her husband is having private meetings with Deity, she is left with secondhand summaries and room for insecurities, left to wonder what to make of her absence.

After God’s third prophetic promise of descendants—seemingly apart from Sarai—and for the first time, a son from Abram’s body, Sarai has had enough. She has an idea and says, “It’s time to take action.” She will act to accelerate a prophecy, like Moses’ killing of an Egyptian after her. In fact, she herself will soon attack an Egyptian. And like Adam before her, she will blame her counterpart and turn the table on her spouse in the wake of disaster. The darkest hours for the matriarch of Israel are about to unfold.

It wasn’t always like this for Sarai. In her defense, the Bible’s first recorded dialogue with her is Abram instructing her to lie to the king of Egypt out of fear for his life. Their manipulation and deceit netted them plagues on their hosts and a forceful deportation from the region. Abram’s scheming laid a foundation for Sarai’s own craft all these years later. An Egyptian servant obtained from that brief trip answered her question of “how?” in regard to the promise of a son from Abram. She couldn’t imagine herself in that picture despite her right and legal standing as his wife. She needed to get creative, dismissing God’s capability of that same trait.

Sarai’s first recorded words in the Bible were not a good look. She blames God. She did not pioneer this practice, as her ancestor Adam did the same in Genesis 3:12: “The Lord has prevented me from having children.” This statement defines the attack of infertility as coming from her enemy: God. Jesus would later correct her and all the world’s confusion in John 10:10 by clarifying that “The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.” Good God, bad devil. It’s as simple as that.

In the very same breath as lying about God comes a perverted instruction to her husband: sleep with my servant. She explains that this is the indirect method for her obtaining children. And just as Adam stood idly by as Eve debated and dined with the devil, Abram offers no resistance to this lapse in judgment. Hagar is pregnant. Hagar torments Sarai. Sarai is furious. Hagar is to Sarai what Peninnah is to Hannah (see 1 Samuel 1:6). The weight of all this will fall on the man who should have stopped it. Now Abram finds himself separated and divided from his wife, as Sarai declares him the guilty party and God the judge between them.

Abram is the president and CEO of this large family ranching operation, and he does not want to intervene at the staff level. He reasons that Sarai is the supervisor of this problematic servant and commissions her to handle it. It is the finale in a series of poor choices that sees a hurting Sarai crush her adversary to the point that Hagar flees for some measure of peace and security. It takes a miracle for them to reunite and the drama to end—and that’s exactly what happens. An angel tells Hagar to return and submit. She does, and this chapter of the saga ends. It is thirteen more long years before God ever mentions Sarai.God is not angry with Abram and Sarai. He does not rebuke them for their actions in any way during or after this episode. In fact, God only discloses to Hagar that her son Ishmael and his descendants will cause problems. Contrary to human logic and reasoning, God continues to visit, bless, and help this couple in spite of their atrocious behavior. God is with them, and He is for them. He is determined, and thousands of years later reveals that He works all things together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28). To be clear, God doesn’t cause the bad things. But He takes them and works them into good. God restores and renames Sarah, blesses her with conception and pregnancy, and helps separate Hagar’s family from hers in a later flare-up. He is a good God, and He sets the stage for her divine dynasty: a Davidic descendant, and the destroyer of death. His name is Jesus!