God Can Fulfill Impossible Promises
Pentecost + 15 – September 15, 2019
“God Gives a Promised Child”
• B/c I was 41 – and we had planned to only have 2 kids, mainly because we started late;
• And here we were, with bonus baby #3 on the way, so unexpected, so unplanned! and I couldn’t help but think of this story of Sarah and Abraham
• Of course, our unintended pregnancy was very different than their story b/c…
Abraham and Sarah were soooo old that it was really impossible that they would have children.
• God has been showing up to Abraham in various ways for many years – in person, in visions, in the form of 3 human beings, strangers, in this story
o Last year heard the call of Abraham back in Genesis 12, and the promise came from God – to bless Abram, so that he would be a blessing – and along with that promise came the promise that God would make of him a great nation
o God promises to give his offspring the land of Canaan, that they will be like the dust of the earth
o Comes again later, and Abram complains about his heir – not his own child – And God promises again that his very own offspring shall be his heir – that his descendants shall be as numerous as the stars in the sky
o And still, Sarah is barren (that’s how she’s first introduced into the story – as a woman who is barren)
o And so Sarai and Abram are about 75 & 85(before the name change God gives them) hatch a plan to give him an heir – through Sarai’s slave Hagar, and so finally Abraham has a son, Ishmael
o But then God appears to Abram again, when he is 99 years old, and makes a covenant with him, that Abram, now to be known as Abraham, shall be the ancestor of many nations – through Sarah – and Abraham laughs, because he’s nearly 100, she is 90 years old
• And that’s where we pick up the story, where these 3 strangers approach, and Abraham rushes to greet them and welcome them and entreats them to stay for a while, to refresh themselves
• And over this lavish meal that Abraham and his household provide (several loaves of bread, from the finest flour; milk and curds/yogurt; fresh veal), the 3 strangers, the LORD, promise again that Sarah shall bear Abraham a son
• And she can’t help but laugh – because she’s far too old, and they’ve heard this story before – 25 years God has been promising they’d have a child together; and it’s clearly impossible! No wonder she laughs;
Sometimes it is hard to hold on to God’s promises because they seem so impossible and improbable
• We can all relate in our own ways to the delays God’s promises sometimes seem to take
• But it got me to thinking particularly of CTV, of our congregation, which is solidly middle-aged at this point – about, what, 56 years old?
• And all of the ideas and hopes and dreams the charter members of this congregation had back in 1963 when CTV formed
• the promises God made to those people – the future that was wide open ahead, so many possibilities and plans for growth and expansion – like a family just starting out
• and then those things don’t come to pass just like you think they will
• and now here we are – older, a little worse for the wear; tired out, like Abraham and Sarah, feeling worn out, used up, wondering what happened to those visions for the future that is our present
• Maybe some of us are wondering if God is done with us, feeling like some of those dreams are dead, wondering if we should just resign ourselves to moving into our senior years, content with what we have, and not aspiring to more
• Because what can God do with us – smaller congregation that we are, filled with mostly middle-aged and older folks
• Hearing this promise of new life in the story of Abraham and Sarah and wondering if we’re just gonna wither and die away as a church or if God still might possibly have some new life to breathe into us still – and laughing at the thought, maybe
But that’s the thing about this story – God hears Sarah laughing at the flap of the tent and says, “Is anything to wonderful for God?”
And the answer of course, echoed in the words of Jesus in our gospel this morning, is “No! Nothing is impossible for God.”
• God is able to fulfill God’s promises, even when they are long delayed, even when it seems impossible, even when the promise involves a baby being born to a 90 year old woman who has long-since entered menopause!
• Though Abraham laughed in chapter 17 when God promised him an heir through Sarah
• And though Sarah laughed too when she heard the strangers promise that she would bear a child to Abraham in her old age
• We see the fulfillment of this promise in Chapter 21, when Sarah conceives and ultimately gives birth to Isaac
o Can you imagine her wonder and amazement as she begins to see that it’s really happening for real this time? No wonder she laughs again – in joy and delight this time – when she gives birth and Isaac is handed into her arms!
God fulfills seemingly impossible promises for us too
• Sometimes we aren’t even sure what the specific promise is that God has for us
• But we know that God has promised to walk with us, to lead us into God’s future – guiding us step by step
o When God called Abraham, God just said, “Leave your father’s house and land and kin and go to the land that I will show you” – God didn’t give him a map
• God has not given up on us
• God calls us to have trust, to be faithful, to be obedient
• To be on the lookout for visitors and strangers, like Abraham, to welcome the weary and worn out and hungry
• To provide lavishly out of the amazing abundance that God has given to us (and we do have an amazing abundance – of financial resources and dedication and joy in this place)
• God calls us to be the kind of people Abraham and Sarah were – listening to and following God even when we can’t quite envision the future God is leading us into, laughing together, maybe, at the preposterous future God envisions for us, but daring to hope and believe one more time
• May we seek God’s promises for us and for this congregation, and may everyone laugh in joy with us as we see what God can and will do.
• Amen.
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