The Faith of Abraham and Sarah

Bible Passage: Hebrews 11:8–12

Christian Standard Bible Chapter 11

By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he stayed as a foreigner in the land of promise, living in tents as did Isaac and Jacob, coheirs of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

By faith even Sarah herself, when she was unable to have children, received power to conceive offspring, even though she was past the age, since she considered that the one who had promised was faithful. Therefore, from one man—in fact, from one as good as dead—came offspring as numerous as the stars of the sky and as innumerable as the grains of sand along the seashore.

This is the Word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God.

Today we continue through this list of those whom the author of Hebrews establishes as ones whose lives were defined by faith. In previous weeks we have seen the author mention Abel, Enoch, and Noah. And now, we will take a few weeks to go through how the author describes the faith of Abraham and Sarah.

The two aspects of Abraham’s faith that we will look at today are his belief in God providing a land and inheritance for him and his offspring, and his and Sarah’s faith that God would give them offspring who could inherit that land. An inheritance to pass on is great, but if there are no offspring to take that inheritance, your line ends and that inheritance becomes associated with someone else.

Abraham and Sarah needed faith in God to walk forward in obedience to what God was calling them to, which is not easy.

Instead of a “big idea” today, I want to work through this passage similarly to last week, and give 6 major points that I believe the author of Hebrews is trying to teach his readers in the first century.

1. Faith Takes Action

Hebrews 11:8

By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out, even though he did not know where he was going.

As the author now turns to Abraham, we see that Abraham followed the call of God to leave his father's land and go to a place that the Lord would give him as an inheritance. Let’s take a look at that call from the Lord to Abraham in Genesis 12.

Genesis 12:1–3

“The Lord said to Abram: Go from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

When the Lord told Abram, who would later be called Abraham, to leave his homeland, did Abraham say, “Nah, I am good where I am at.”? No! He took a step of faith and followed God’s directions. Gold told him to leave the land that he knew, to leave his family, to leave his father’s household, in order to follow where God was directing.

How many of us have had a time where we knew God was calling us away from the things we were comfortable with? Perhaps God asked you to leave your job. Perhaps he asked you to leave the neighborhood you lived in that you loved.

When God calls us away from good things, it is because he is bringing us to better things.

The author states that Abraham did not know where he was going, and yet he still followed the commands of God, believing in his promises. Do we follow God in the same way? Can you say that you trust that God is leading you even though you don’t know what direction that might be?

Trust the Lord, and believe that he will lead you exactly where he want you.

2. Faith obeys without owning

Hebrews 11:9

By faith he stayed as a foreigner in the land of promise, living in tents as did Isaac and Jacob, coheirs of the same promise.

As Abraham lived in Canaan, he lived as a Nomad in tents. He did not live in cities but stayed as a foreigner in the land. Though God had promised the land to him and his descendants, Abraham (along with Isaac and Jacob) did not live as if he owned the land. They all lived as sojourners, as foreigners and aliens.

This is how we are called to live as Christians today. In speaking to fellow Jewish Christians who had been scattered throughout the Roman Empire in one of his letters, the Apostle Peter tells his readers that they are strangers and exiles in this world.

1 Peter 2:11–12

Dear friends, I urge you as strangers and exiles to abstain from sinful desires that wage war against the soul. Conduct yourselves honorably among the Gentiles, so that when they slander you as evildoers, they will observe your good works and will glorify God on the day he visits.

Peter is writing this letter to Jews who no longer had a homeland. They no longer lived in Israel. They may have felt abandoned by God. They may have trusted that God was leading them.

A couple of weeks ago, we looked at Hebrews 11:6 which says:

Hebrews 11:6

Now without faith it is impossible to please God, since the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

In his own commentary on Hebrews 11:6, Charles Spurgeon says this:

Without faith we are without Christ and, consequently, without a Savior. It would be infinitely better to be without eyes, without hearing, without wealth, without bread, without garments, without a home rather than to be without the faith that brings everything the soul requires. Without faith we are spiritually naked, poor, miserable, lost, condemned — and without a hope of escape.

Do we understand that the “possessions” that we claim as our own today, are not really ours?

Psalm 24:1–2

The earth and everything in it, the world and its inhabitants, belong to the Lord; for he laid its foundation on the seas and established it on the rivers.

We do not own anything in this world except our own choices. We are not told to control anything in this world except ourselves. Everything that we have belongs to the Lord because he is the one who created everything.

So when God tells us to go, to leave our homes, our jobs, our places of comfort, those weren’t yours to begin with. God allowed you to steward those things for a time.

Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob living in tents as foreigners was a symbol of anticipating the fulfillment of a promise from God. That promise was not fulfilled in their lifetimes, but they lived as though that promise was sure. The end was not in their grasp, but they trusted the Lord anyway.

3. Faith looks beyond what it can hold

Hebrews 11:10

For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.

The author states that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were all looking forward to a Heavenly Homeland, a city not built by the hands of men, but by God himself.

“Waiting for God to provide them with an earthly inheritance, the patriarchs came to realize that this life is not an end in itself but a pilgrimage towards a future that God alone can construct for his people.”

New Bible Commentary

Do we put all of our hope into this world, only making plans for the here and now? Or do we see that there is something better beyond this world? (Proverbs 16:9)

I love living in the United States. I believe we are very blessed to have the opportunity to live in this nation, and at this time where we got to celebrate 250 years as a nation yesterday.

With all that being said, I do not view this country as my ultimate home. While the USA can provide so many opportunities for success and prosperity, it will never match the beauty and splendor of being with Christ when I leave this world. Like I said earlier, we should consider ourselves foreigners and exiles in this world, a world that is dying as it turns away from the Lord, and remember that there is a better home for those who have put their faith and trust in Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 11:11–12

By faith even Sarah herself, when she was unable to have children, received power to conceive offspring, even though she was past the age, since she considered that the one who had promised was faithful. Therefore, from one man—in fact, from one as good as dead—came offspring as numerous as the stars of the sky and as innumerable as the grains of sand along the seashore.

4. Faith believes against the body's verdict.

In the various translations of this text from the Greek to English, some interpreters have made Sarah’s faith as simply an extension of Abraham’s faith. However, the Greek is adding Sarah’s faith to the case of faith that the author is building for his Hebrew Christian readers.

The author states that not only Abraham, but Sarah also believed in God’s ability to fulfill his promises. She believed God would do what he says he will do.

That belief was in spite of the fact that she was well beyond the years of being able to conceive. Scripture says that Abraham was 75 years old and Sarah was 65 years old when they were originally called by God from Ur (Southeastern part of modern day Iraq). It was then 25 years until God fulfilled his promise to give them a child, making Abraham 100 and Sarah 90.

The author of Hebrews actually gives a strong statement about Abraham’s body in verse 12, where he says:

Hebrews 11:12

…from one man — in fact, from one as good as dead — came offspring…

How would you like to be described like that in Scripture? Paul actually mentions both Abraham and Sarah when talking about their faith to have an heir in Romans 4.

Romans 4:19 CSB

He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body to be already dead (since he was about a hundred years old) and also the deadness of Sarah’s womb.

Now, many skeptics will look at this part of the story of Abraham and Sarah and say that it is medically impossible for a 90 year old woman to conceive and give birth, even with the advanced medical abilities we have today. A story like this points them to seeing this as myth, and not as history. However, the numbers can still work.

If we look at the ages of people in the Bible before the flood, comparing them to after the flood, we see that while people were not living as long, Abraham still lived a very long time compared to our modern life spans.

(Insert Age Graphic Here)

What many scholars assume is that either the flood destroyed a lot of vegetation or food that helped humanity live longer lives, or that the the way that the flood transformed the planet may have had an effect on the atmosphere, making it harder for humanity to live as long.

The average lifespan for women in the United States is 81 years. Sarah had Isaac at 90 years old. Scripture says that she lived to 127 years. And while this is not a direct comparison and there are a lot of other factors involved, if we took Sarah’s death at 127, equated that to today’s average of 81 years for women in the United States, she would have had Isaac at an equivalent of about 57 years old.

Now, while that may still seem like an impossibility, or at least a nightmare to have to deal with (pregnancy in your mid-late 50s), the modern record in the Guinness Book of World Records is 66 years old by a woman in Spain who gave birth to twins by c-section in the mid 2000s.

Now, again, there are so many factors that are not equivalent in this scenario, but it the comparison should give a window for skeptics to see that there is a physical possibility for Sarah to give birth at 90, even if our modern sensibilities want to deny it.

But as Christians, we also believe that God can work miracles where we only see the physical impossibilities.

In his commentary of Romans 4, where Paul writes about the deadness of Abraham, biblical scholar Douglas Moo says this:

CSB Study Bible: Notes Chapter 4

“It is Abraham’s conviction that God is fully able to do whatever he promised, that enabled his faith to overcome the obstacle of the tangible and visible ‘facts’ ” (Douglas J. Moo).

God can work beyond human facts. As creator of the world, he has full sovereignty and dominion over all creation, able to bend or maneuver it as he wills.

The next thing we must understand about faith from this story is that:

5. Faith moves from doubt to trust.

Sarah did not always believe that she was going to give birth to a child, even after God gave the promise to Abraham. At one point, she viewed her inability to have children from her own body to mean she would have to gain children in a different way. This is where Hagar and Ishmael come in.

We see in Genesis 16, that Sarah still was not able to bear children for Abraham. See, in ancient cultures, if a woman could not bear children, she would give her slave to her husband as a wife or concubine. Then, any children that came from that union would belong to the owner of the slave girl to raise as her own. Can everyone see that this is a recipe for disaster?

So she gave her slave girl Hagar to Abraham as a wife so that Sarah could have children that way. But when Hagar became pregnant, Hagar lorded it over Sarah that she was able to give Abraham children. Our translation of the Bible that we are using today says that Sarah became “contemptible” to Hagar. That word can also be translated as cursed, insignificant, or made small.

Trying to fulfill God’s promise on her own terms caused even more heartache for Sarah. I am sure that she became even more jaded. And then we see in Genesis 18, Abraham has three visitors come to him. As we read it in Scripture, it seems that two of these visitors are angels, and one is called “the Lord.” Some scholars believe this could be a “Christophany,” or a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus in the Old Testament.

Genesis 18:9–15

“Where is your wife Sarah?” they asked him.

“There, in the tent,” he answered.

The Lord said, “I will certainly come back to you in about a year’s time, and your wife Sarah will have a son!”

Now Sarah was listening at the entrance of the tent behind him. Abraham and Sarah were old and getting on in years. Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. So she laughed to herself: “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I have delight?”

But the Lord asked Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh, saying, ‘Can I really have a baby when I’m old?’ Is anything impossible for the Lord? At the appointed time I will come back to you, and in about a year she will have a son.”

Sarah denied it. “I did not laugh,” she said, because she was afraid.

But he replied, “No, you did laugh.”

Does this story make it sound like Sarah believed that God would provide her a child? No. She laughed when she heard the Lord tell Abraham that she would have a child. Mind you, this is 13 years AFTER Ishmael was born. So, not only has she not given a child to Abraham, she is now 89 years old, and the slave girl that she gave to Abraham has given Abraham a son. It had been 24 years since God told Abraham that he would be the father of many nations. I can see why she would laugh.

Which is likely why Isaac was given his name. The name is a form of the Hebrew word for laughter.

Abraham and Sarah had been waiting for so long to have a child, but no child came. I have known many couples who have gone through infertility issues for years and years. When a couple wants, as Sarah states in her laughter, the “delight” of having a child, but deal with negative pregnancy tests, or the sorrow of miscarriages, that can absolutely devastate your belief that you will have a child.

Sarah was 89 years old. She was past the age of child bearing. But Sarah did not stay in unbelief. She still moved forward in faith, not allowing her unbelief to hamper her trust in the Lord.

Have you waited a long time for something that you thought the Lord had promised you? Have you wondered why the Lord takes so long to fulfill his promises?

Perhaps the Lord is teaching us to draw nearer to him, to trust him more, and to desire him more than anything else.

6. Faith believes a promise too big to be self-generated.

If we look at the promise made to Abraham, it seems insanely big. It was too much for Abraham and Sarah to do on their own. This promise was so big that Abraham would never see it fulfilled in his lifetime.

He was told he would be the father of many nations. There has to be lots of generations of people to build up the population enough to create one nation of people, let alone many nations of people. That is bigger than Abraham and Sarah.

Even some of the wildest dreams that we may have for our own lives are too attainable for us. They often do not need God to intervene or do anything to make it possible for us to achieve, though I believe that he does work in even our small dreams to bring about his purposes.

Only God can take a man who is, as the author of Hebrews stated, “as good as dead” along with a woman who was past the age of child bearing, having a “dead womb” as Romans 4 stated, and make many nations with descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and sand on the seashores. Only God can do that.

Do we believe that God can work that type of miracle in our lives, or in the lives of those we love and care about? Who is that person that you have prayed for that you think, “It would take a miracle of God for that person to come to faith in Christ”? That was the Apostle Paul.

He was a persecutor of the church. He oversaw the death of Stephen the Martyr. He was spouting out murderous threats against the church, and was on his way to Damascus to arrest more Christians when Jesus appeared to him on the road, blinding him, and calling him to be the apostle to the Gentiles, declaring the name of Jesus to Europe.

Who is that “only God can do it” person in your life?

What is the “only God can do it” situation for you personally? Is it your finances? Is it your health? Have you been traveling a hard road for years with no end in sight?

Trust that the Lord will bring you through it.

I want to close this sermon with a passage from 2 Corinthians 4 that speaks so well to what Abraham and Sarah would have been dealing with, and should be an encouragement to us who have faith in the Lord, but struggle to see how he will it out in our lives.

2 Corinthians 4:7–18 CSB

Now we have this treasure in clay jars, so that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us. We are afflicted in every way but not crushed; we are perplexed but not in despair; we are persecuted but not abandoned; we are struck down but not destroyed. We always carry the death of Jesus in our body, so that the life of Jesus may also be displayed in our body. For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’s sake, so that Jesus’s life may also be displayed in our mortal flesh. So then, death is at work in us, but life in you. And since we have the same spirit of faith in keeping with what is written, I believed, therefore I spoke, we also believe, and therefore speak. For we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you. Indeed, everything is for your benefit so that, as grace extends through more and more people, it may cause thanksgiving to increase to the glory of God. Therefore we do not give up. Even though our outer person is being destroyed, our inner person is being renewed day by day. For our momentary light affliction is producing for us an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. So we do not focus on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

When we have Jesus, our struggles are not forever. They are temporary. They are light. Because we know that there is life beyond this.

If you do not have that hope in Jesus, call out to him today. Trust that he will sustain you, protect you, and provide for you. Repent of your sins, submit your life to him, and find life that can never be taken away.

(See me after service)

Let us pray.