He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”

The Lord’s Covenant With Abram

After this, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.”

The angel of the Lord found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur.

Then the angel of the Lord told her, “Go back to your mistress and submit to her.”

The angel added, “I will increase your descendants so much that they will be too numerous to count.”

The angel of the Lord also said to her: “You are now pregnant and you will give birth to a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard of your misery.

Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, “I did not laugh.” But he said, “Yes, you did laugh.”

Sodom and Gomorrah Destroyed

The two angels arrived at Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gateway of the city. When he saw them, he got up to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground.

With the coming of dawn, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Hurry! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away when the city is punished.”

Lot and His Daughters

Lot and his two daughters left Zoar and settled in the mountains, for he was afraid to stay in Zoar. He and his two daughters lived in a cave.

Early the next morning Abimelek summoned all his officials, and when he told them all that had happened, they were very much afraid.

God heard the boy crying, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, “What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there.

But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied.

The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time

“The Lord, the God of heaven, who brought me out of my father’s household and my native land and who spoke to me and promised me on oath, saying, ‘To your offspring I will give this land’—he will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there.

“He replied, ‘The Lord, before whom I have walked faithfully, will send his angel with you and make your journey a success, so that you can get a wife for my son from my own clan and from my father’s family.

When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.” He thought, “The men of this place might kill me on account of Rebekah, because she is beautiful.”

That night the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham. Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bless you and will increase the number of your descendants for the sake of my servant Abraham.”

He had a dream in which he saw a stairway resting on the earth, with its top reaching to heaven, and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it.

He was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.”

The angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob.’ I answered, ‘Here I am.’

Jacob answered Laban, “I was afraid, because I thought you would take your daughters away from me by force.

Jacob Prepares to Meet Esau

Jacob also went on his way, and the angels of God met him.

Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children.

But Jacob did not send Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, with the others, because he was afraid that harm might come to him.