The Promise of New Life

Scripture:

Genesis 17:1–16 NLT

When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am El-Shaddai—‘God Almighty.’ Serve me faithfully and live a blameless life. I will make a covenant with you, by which I will guarantee to give you countless descendants.” At this, Abram fell face down on the ground. Then God said to him, “This is my covenant with you: I will make you the father of a multitude of nations! What’s more, I am changing your name. It will no longer be Abram. Instead, you will be called Abraham, for you will be the father of many nations. I will make you extremely fruitful. Your descendants will become many nations, and kings will be among them! “I will confirm my covenant with you and your descendants after you, from generation to generation. This is the everlasting covenant: I will always be your God and the God of your descendants after you. And I will give the entire land of Canaan, where you now live as a foreigner, to you and your descendants. It will be their possession forever, and I will be their God.” Then God said to Abraham, “Your responsibility is to obey the terms of the covenant. You and all your descendants have this continual responsibility. This is the covenant that you and your descendants must keep: Each male among you must be circumcised. You must cut off the flesh of your foreskin as a sign of the covenant between me and you. From generation to generation, every male child must be circumcised on the eighth day after his birth. This applies not only to members of your family but also to the servants born in your household and the foreign-born servants whom you have purchased. All must be circumcised. Your bodies will bear the mark of my everlasting covenant. Any male who fails to be circumcised will be cut off from the covenant family for breaking the covenant.” Then God said to Abraham, “Regarding Sarai, your wife—her name will no longer be Sarai. From now on her name will be Sarah. And I will bless her and give you a son from her! Yes, I will bless her richly, and she will become the mother of many nations. Kings of nations will be among her descendants.”

Lent is a Season of Death to Self

It is a difficult season for most of us to live into, especially if our idea of spirituality is that it should be something positive, uplifting, and fun. Lent is more about growing pains, putting away childish things, not just learning but living better.

It is going on a spiritual diet and exercise routine, not just as a time to be healthy to make up for the rest of the year, but in the hopes that the habits will stick and you will be a better person, maybe even continue some of the habits you are building.

It’s a time to hear from God and receive the life He is giving us to share.

That happens when we take the time to put to death all the things that get in between us and God.

Most of the time God will not do that for us. He is waiting for us to decide how much we want the life He has to offer us.

Thesis: God promises us life that flows from Him to and through us.

Touched by Death

God gave Noah the covenant of mercy in the face of judgment

To Abraham and Sarah, God gave the covenant of new life out of death.

Abraham and Sarah first faced death through infertility

Infertility

Infertility is a struggle for millions of people, from every generation.

In some times and places it is mostly the loss of the opportunity to have children of their own, and many choose to share that love through adoption.

In other times and places, it has meant a loss of living standard, and even a shorter life altogether. In farming communities, families depend upon children to care for the farms as they become unable to do the work themselves. Abraham and Sarah lived in a society like this.

Abraham was not an only child. He had siblings, and a nephew Lot that traveled with him. He was the child of his family that had no hope of growing or sustaining the family. To him, he had already been touched by death, and it was just a waiting game until it overtook his branch of the family.

Loss of Purpose

With that touch of death that infertility brought, comes a lack of purpose as well.

Out of respect for those who are sick or hurt, or who have just lived a long life and cannot do what they used to, we do not ask them what their purpose in life is.

But they do. They ask that question all the time. Why am I still here? I cannot do what I used to do. I have nothing to contribute anymore.

I say “they”. I should say “we”. We have all struggled with some kind of loss of purpose. We have all asked those questions. Some of us even got answers.

God loves answering those touched by death

Abraham’s answer was to leave the comfort and security of home and trade in the normal reliance on others taking care of him for a trust that God would take care of him and Sarah. Just like the early disciples of Jesus, Abraham sold or gave up his home and possessions, gathered up his family and what little he could take, and followed God into the unknown.

Abraham followed God, not out of fear, but for the sake of a promise that God would give him a family that would be so big, it would need its own country to hold it.

Promised New Life

Not a Remodel

I often wonder if Abraham’s father, Terah, regretted letting him go. Or perhaps he was ashamed of Abraham. Or maybe the blame for their infertility was taken entirely Abraham’s wife, Sarah.

Sarah saw it that way. When she did not become pregnant during those first few years on the road, she decided that maybe they just needed to switch out some of the parts. She gave her servant Hagar to Abraham to have a child with instead of herself, hoping that she could adopt that child and make God’s promise come true. Things just needed to be rearranged or remodeled and they could step back into the light of life and out of that shadow of death.

It didn’t work though. God reminded them that the promise was for them as a couple, not working through someone else.

Not a ReCharge

The detail of this story that sticks with us the most is that God did not send Abraham and Sarah on this adventure in parenting when they were young. He sent them out when they were 80 and 60 years old. And then God waited. Abraham would not have a son with Sarah until he was 100 years old.

God was not simply re-charging them with enough life to get them over this hurdle that death landed in their path. It was not about gathering enough strength to be able to do what they were used to doing.

Just the opposite. God was wringing out every bit of their own strength before moving in to work the miracle Himself. Touched by death or not, they were relying on themselves and what they knew too much to be the parents of God’s Holy nation.

God’s Life Flowing through Us

Romans 8:35–39 NLT

Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.

God doesn’t want to just remodel or recharge us. He wants to pour His eternal life into us until we overflow with it and cannot help but share it.

Moving from Battery to Current

The kind of life that God has prepared for us is more than we can hold. It is the difference between relying on a battery and being plugged directly into the current.

The Jewish leaders in the New Testament were confounded by the Christians who were not acting like the normal people of God. They were no longer like our phones, going through life, having our spiritual batteries drained, to come back once a week to the Temple of God for a recharge and go back out to do it all over again.

No, these first Christians were walking around like they carried the Temple of God with them, wherever they went. The Presence of God, which the Jews thought lived in the Temple, was somehow living inside the Christians. They were plugged in and were running at 1000%.

That’s what God wanted to do with Abraham and Sarah. He wanted to work a miracle in their lives.

Circumcision - Marking the Gifts of God

In between the promises given to Abraham and Sarah, there is a brief explanation of circumcision. This is not just a random aside.

The gift that God gave to Abraham and Sarah was not a spiritual gift, it was a very real gift: it was a baby. Just like all the things God gives us, He wanted them to remember that baby came from God. It was His, not something they had made themselves. Through circumcision, God asked them to mark that gift as God’s forever.

Just like Abraham and Sarah, we too are tempted to claim the things God does through us as our own, and it gets us into trouble every time. God wants us to make that distinction between what is ours and what is His.

God wants us to mark all the gifts we get from God so that it does not go to our heads.

If we can put aside our excuses and trust God enough to receive that life, we will have more life than we know what to do with, more than we can hold.

What would you be willing to do with that life?

CTA

Will you follow Jesus?

Will you let Him live through you?

Will you mark what belongs to Him?

Will you give it back when He asks for it?