God's Faithfulness
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Have you ever had someone promise you something very important to you and you had to wait a long time for you to get it?
Q: What did it feel like when you finally recieved that?
Was the wait worth it?
John - Waiting for his house.
James - Waiting for a new place and the job
James and Brandon - Waiting to find a wife
Marzell - Waiting for his girlfriend to get the job, waiting for himself to get the job and waiting to find the right place for themselves.
I was waiting for the benefits of all the studying after getting my certifications.
The Lord visited Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did to Sarah as he had promised. And Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the time of which God had spoken to him. Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore him, Isaac. And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.
When God called Abraham and promised him land and descendants, that was when he was about 75,
God appeared to Abraham 3 times in total to tell him of the promise and the promise will not be fulfilled until when he is 100 years old.
25 years after he left.
Back to the passage, we see that it is said 3 times over that God did what he promised.
God visited....as He said
God gave to Sarah.....as He said
Sarah gave birth....in the time God said it would.
Point is, when God promises something, He will deliver.
Q: Does it help seeing events in the Bible like this to trust God more with your own life?
Why is it still hard to put the trust in him?
Back to the passage
And Sarah said, “God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh over me.” And she said, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”
Where else have we see laughter as a theme in the story of Abraham?
When the 3 visitors went to Abraham and Sarah and she heard the promise she laughed.
This laughter was from unbelief
Their son is born and his name means laughter.
Sarah now says that everyone who hears will laugh over her, in a state of shock over God doing the impossible
Although Sarah said this, in the very next passage we see Ishmael doing the very thing she said would happen and Sarah does not respond well.
And the child grew and was weaned. And Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, laughing. So she said to Abraham, “Cast out this slave woman with her son, for the son of this slave woman shall not be heir with my son Isaac.”
There is a big feast for Isaac, and everyone is celebrating the miracle baby and Sarah see’s Ishmael laughing.
What kind of laughter is this? According to it is a mockery
But just as at that time he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so also it is now.
Who’s idea was it for Abraham to have a child with the servant?
Sarah
It was her idea now why is she mad about it?
When you take things into your own hands instead of fully trusting God, you may eventually regret your decision.
Man’s ideas seem wise to him in the moment but we do not have the full picture.
We will see that this decision will also cause Abraham pain because he listened to Sarah
Q: Have you ever experienced the consequences of your own action because you did not wait on the Lord?
I did and it brought pain an misery
And the thing was very displeasing to Abraham on account of his son. But God said to Abraham, “Be not displeased because of the boy and because of your slave woman. Whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for through Isaac shall your offspring be named. And I will make a nation of the son of the slave woman also, because he is your offspring.”
We know that there was always tension between Sarah and Hagar. God agrees with Sarah to send Hagar away but He still blesses them.
Why? Because of His promise to Abraham.
God promised that Abraham’s descendants would have the land, that land is Israel.
The descendants of Ishmael are the Muslim people, the descendants of Isaac are the Jewish people.
We see that the great grandchildren of the half brothers are to this day fighting for their fathers land.
Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise. But just as at that time he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so also it is now. But what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit with the son of the free woman.” So, brothers, we are not children of the slave but of the free woman.
Q:We are gentiles. Do we fit into this at all and how?
This is why the three greatest religions on earth exist because of this moment, the Abrahamic religions are Judaism, the Jews, Islam and Christianity.
We disagree about the meaning and some of the points but
How can this be a coincidence?
back to the story.
So Abraham rose early in the morning and took bread and a skin of water and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba. When the water in the skin was gone, she put the child under one of the bushes. Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot, for she said, “Let me not look on the death of the child.” And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept. And God heard the voice of the boy, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Fear not, for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.
She was about to give up and let her child die, but then who shows up?
The Angel of the Lord
This may have been just an Angel but it may be Jesus like we saw with the 3 visitors
What happens then?
Up! Lift up the boy, and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make him into a great nation.” Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. And she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink. And God was with the boy, and he grew up. He lived in the wilderness and became an expert with the bow. He lived in the wilderness of Paran, and his mother took a wife for him from the land of Egypt.
God provides, he like He promised Abraham. And somehow, not just water but food and continual protection.
Is anything too difficult for the Lord?
When God calls you to wait and you do, the reward is great.
Wait on God and be faithful in your waiting, do not neglect him