Patience and Faith for the Promise

Genesis 15

Key Statement: Patience and Faith go hand in hand as we await the promise of God.

Ah Recess. It seems like forever ago that I was last able to enjoy recess. Remembering back to elementary school, I lived for recess. The one time of the day where we could get out of that hot classroom, get food, and go outside to burn off all that stored energy we hadn’t spent throughout the day. Most of the kids didn’t even want lunch. Only one thing was on each kid’s mind: I gotta get outside. I remember thinking back then that that playground at young elementary was the most glorious, most massive, most enjoyable place anyone could ever find. Once I went outside, I would start running in any general direction except back towards the school. There was just so much to do out during recess! Over to the left was a field with two trees with the whirly helicopter leaves where we often played kickball or threw the helicopter leaves into the air and just watched them fly back down to the ground. Next to that was this awesome playground with slides, climbing walls, and poles; climbing bars, more slides and more walls, monkey bars, swings, and all kinds of other stuff. And next to that was a pavilion where kids could sit down and talk. Of course, no kid was ever there though because why would any kid rather sit down and talk than to play on this awesome playground! And there were also basketball courts and pavement that kids could race on. It was the most blissful and exciting part of the day, everyday. And it was right outside the one place I dreaded most: school. Recess gave me hope like nothing else during those days in elementary school.

However, there was only one issue, one gripe I ever really had with recess. It was only a half an hour! When you are in school for six or seven hours each day and you don’t even get one of those hours for recess, you begin to question this thing called fairness. I can remember being sad nearly everyday after recess was over because I had to go back to sitting, listening, reading, doing math, and all kinds of other boring school stuff. Looking back, I recognize how important school was for me, but back then, that was how I thought. I think that learning to wait each day for recess was probably one of the first experiences in my life that really taught me patience

Like waiting for recess, I think that sometimes we play this sort of waiting game with God. The fact of the matter is that in life, not everything is instant. Sometimes things take time. We wait because it takes time for us to be made more like God on our journey with him. We wait sometimes for God to heal us from sicknesses. We wait sometimes for God to deliver us from hard situations where we might not have much financially. Beyond us, we also wait for God to save our friends, coworkers and relatives as we try to show them Jesus. And more than everything, we wait for God to return and make everything right as only he can and will do one day. In all this, we wait for God’s blessing upon our lives. The good news for us today is that Patience and faith go hand in hand as we wait for the promise of God.

Let’s look at Genesis 15:1-12 and 17-18 to hear a passage where we learn about this patience and faith in the promise. The passage is about a man named Abram and God’s promise to give him a son. The Scripture reads,

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

2 But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.”

4 Then the word of the Lord came to him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir.” 5 He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”

6 Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.

7 He also said to him, “I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it.”

8 But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?”

9 So the Lord said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.”

10 Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half. 11 Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.

12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him.

And jumping down to verse 17, it reads,

17 When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces. 18 On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, “To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates

So, in this passage, we see Abram ask God what God could give him since he had no children. In Abram’s time, a person lived on through their descendants, so continuing his line was extremely important. Now Abram was over 70 years old at this point, so he was probably thinking that he was already too old to have children. And he probably was too old to have a child at that point in his life. But God had promised him a son. In fact, in God told Abram three times already that he would have many descendants and that they would have the land he promised Abram. But if God was going to give him a son, he had to give Abram a son soon. Now up to this point, Abram has only been in the past 3 chapters. In those three chapters, Abram moved across the desert, fought in some battles, and became very wealthy. Genesis tells us that Abram had many livestock, gold, silver, and servants. Abram seems to have it all. Yet what he still does not have is someone he can pass his legacy onto, a son. Abram still saw no fulfillment of this promise so far. So why was God not fulfilling his promise? Did God forget? Or did he simply change his mind? Abram could see no physical signs of the promise, and he wanted to ask God why. It’s important to note that Abram was not doubting God’s ability to give him a son, but he wasn’t sure how God would accomplish it.

God tells Abram that he would not have to pass of his inheritance to some other relative, but to someone who was his own flesh and blood, his own son. God then takes Abram outside and shows him the stars in the sky. Now to us, we can’t see as many stars in the sky because of all the light pollution we are used to from the urban and suburban areas. We might see a few of the brightest stars outside during the night. But if you’ve ever seen the stars outside in the country, you know how much more beautiful it is because you can just see so many more stars. It’s the difference between having ice cream with just a couple sprinkles and ice cream with so many sprinkles it’s like eating a rainbow. So when God asks Abram to count the stars in the sky, he knows that Abram can’t do it. There are just way too many stars in the sky, like way too many sprinkles on ice cream to count them. God tells Abram again and reminds him that he will have many descendants, as many as the stars he can see in the sky. Each star he could see would be one of his descendants, someone coming from him.

How in the world could Abram respond to this? Well, he really only had two choices. He could either trust that what God said was true, or he could doubt that God could do it. Abram chose to believe God. Abram showed hope in the promise of God and trust in the person of God. That is why so often we look to Abram as a shining example of faith in the Old Testament. The promise was eventually fulfilled and Abram had a son named Isaac. But Abram still had to wait another twenty or so years. Isaac was born when he was 100 years old. Abram didn’t just show faith in the promise of God, he also showed patience in the promise of God. Christians often look to Abram as an example of faith, but we should also look to Abram as an example of patience. What we see from Abram is that Patience and Faith go hand in hand as we wait for the promises of God. Like Abram, we have the same choice facing us, even now. Do we trust in God that he is enough to carry out what he said he will do? Or do we doubt that God is able to really bring about true life change? Is God’s word enough for us? And also, like Abram, we sometimes find ourselves in this place of questioning.

Do we believe that God will help us become more like him on our journey with him? Or do we think that God will just leave us where we are at? Do we believe that God is able to heal us from physical, mental, and spiritual sicknesses? Or do we think that our health is not important to God? Do we believe that hard times are not the end for us when we have God? Or do we think that we will be stuck forever in our hard times? Do we believe that God is working in the lives of our friends, coworkers, and relatives to bring them to him? Or do we think that they are forever too far from God? And finally, do we REALLY believe that God will one day come back to redeem the whole creation as we see heaven meet earth? Or do we think that the creation is too far gone to be saved? All these questions may fill our mind, and that’s okay. But our response to these questions must be by faith. And sometimes God doesn’t work as fast as we want him to. That’s okay also. But we must learn patience. Again, the good news for us today is that we can believe that patience and faith go hand in hand as we wait for the promises of God.

But I still have more good news for us today. There is some comfort for us as we wait for God to fulfill his promises. Now back in Genesis, we see God promise Abram that he would have many descendants, that they would have the land, and that he would have a son. However, there is still one more promise that is not explicitly stated, but that is clear. In the first verse, God comes to Abram and says, do not be afraid, I am you shield, your very great reward. You see, Abram was waiting on the promise of God to give him a son, but already he had another promise fulfilled in his life, an even better promise. What could possibly be a better promise to Abram than having a son? The greatest promise, the greatest blessing God could give Abram was the promise that God himself would be with Abram. The greatest promise God could give Abram was not that he would be wealthy, or have lots of land, and it wasn’t even that he would have a son. The best thing that God blessed Abram with was his presence.

You see that same blessing God gave Abram of being there with him is the same one he gives to us today. We have the presence of God with us because as Christians, his Spirit lives in us. Now as I said earlier, Patience and faith go hand in hand as we wait for the promise of God, but let us not forget that right now, right here, we have God with us. So even as you go with God and are being made more like God on your journey with him, don’t forget that God is with you on the journey. Even as we wait for healing from God, don’t forget that God is there even in your sickness. Even as we go through those hard times and deliverance seems so far away, don’t forget that God is with you in those hard times. Even as we long for our friends, coworkers, and relatives to find God, don’t forget that God’s presence is in your midst as you talk to them and show them who God is. And even as we eagerly want and expect God to fix this messy world, don’t forget that we still have a mission now and God is with us every step of the way. So, I encourage you to look through scriptures and see where God makes promises to us. God wants to give good things to us, and those promises in scripture are there to provide us with hope. But right now, you can be sure of that if you belong to Christ, then the greatest blessing God could ever give you of himself is already upon you.

So finally, during this Lenten season, as we journey to the cross, we remember the life and ministry of Jesus. We remember the one who came as one of us, who lived a perfect life and showed us the proper way to live, who gave his life for everyone, who was raised again from the dead and ascended into heaven, and who gave us his Spirit so that God might now and forever be with us. Remember then this Lent that we can have faith in the promises of God, that we need patience as we wait for God’s promises, and that the greatest promise God could give us is the blessing of himself.

Let’s pray

“Gracious God, I thank you for this day and that I have the opportunity to bring your word to your people. Thank you for the passage about Abram in Genesis 15 and about your great faithfulness to the promise. Remind us of the promises you made to us in the Scriptures. Help us come to believe that patience and faith do go hand in hand as we wait for your promises. But never let us forget that the greatest promise you could ever bless us with is yourself. And you did bless us with yourself. Thank you, God. In Jesus name and in the power of the Spirit I pray, AMEN”

Our blessing for today comes from Psalm 27:4-6. The Psalmist reads,

One thing I ask from the Lord,

this only do I seek:

that I may dwell in the house of the Lord

all the days of my life,

to gaze on the beauty of the Lord

and to seek him in his temple.

5 For in the day of trouble

he will keep me safe in his dwelling;

he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent

and set me high upon a rock.

6 Then my head will be exalted

above the enemies who surround me;

at his sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy;

I will sing and make music to the Lord.

And to make that our blessing for this week:

May you find what you are looking for in life is the real, glorious, and gracious presence of God.

May you come to realize the safety and comfort that we have by being with God.

Finally, may you discover the overwhelming joy that is renewed each day because God is with us and he loves us.