The Impossible Promises of God

Genesis 15: 1-6

Antioch Christian Fellowship

August 12, 2007

The most difficult thing for human beings, even for those of us who love God and are committed to living lives devoted to Him, the most difficult thing for us, all of us, is to believe in the promises of God. 

We read in Matthew 8 (23-26), Jesus got into a boat and when he got into the boat, his disciples followed him.  We don’t know what they were thinking when they got in the boat, perhaps they were thinking that with Jesus in the boat, their ride would be smooth. But whatever they were expecting didn’t happen. We continue to read, “²⁴ And behold, there arose a great storm on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by the waves; but Jesus was asleep.  ²⁵ And they went and woke him, saying, "Save us, Lord; we are perishing."  ²⁶ And he said to them, "Why are you afraid, O you of little faith?" Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.”

Being in the boat with Jesus doesn’t mean that we will not be swamped by the waves.  But Jesus is not concerned because he knows the Father and when Jesus is in the boat, it is God himself who is with us.  (John 10:15,38)  But the boat is not in heaven, it is on earth and therefore, we will be afraid and we will most certainly disappoint Him. 

We are in the boat with Jesus and sometimes we know, sometimes we are confident that He is who He says He is.  Sometimes the sea is so rough, we wonder.  This tiny boat of faith that we have stepped into with Jesus seems insufficient on such a great sea in such violent storms.  It isn’t the size of our boat or the quality of its construction that carries us through these storms:  it is the One we ride with.

This is why Christianity is a religion that is easily ridiculed.  It is easily ridiculed because we place our trust not in ourselves, not in the tangible, in what can be seen, heard and touched, but in an unseen, unheard, untouched Spirit.  Our boat of faith may look a lot like the other boats on the sea.  And to those who don’t ride with us it appears a fragile, weak boat without an oar.  And we appear foolish trusting in the unseen One who rides with us. 

Faith has always been the most treasured gift of God to His people.  It is faith that gives Him the most pleasure.  The writer of the book of Hebrews gives a litany of those who are commended for their faith.  Abraham and Sarah (Hebrews 11:8-19) are a great part of this litany.  If you read the whole of their story that extends from Genesis 12 to Genesis 25 you will wonder that God considered such a family worthy of Him.  Many of their actions are unethical, lacking compassion and wisdom, and even though Abraham walked with God and heard his voice, sometimes he behaves as if he doesn’t know God at all. 

But Abraham was in the boat with God and because of His grace, God does not toss him out because he was not worthy.  When we decide that it is Jesus’ boat, we want to ride in, His promise is that He will never leave us alone; His promise is to endure the storm with us.  

Abraham did not live an ethical life for us to model.  Sometimes we even wish it looked like he had more faith.  But Abraham remembered the promises of God, and because he remembered them, Abraham could look on his life and see God at work.  He saw God at work in Egypt, (Genesis 12:10-20) protecting Sarah from his own lack of judgment and God even blessed his indiscretions with wealth.  He saw God at work in the war he fought to free his nephew Lot (Genesis 14:14–24) from captivity.  There are many boats we can travel in as we are beaten and brutalized by life.  But Abraham was in the boat with God and so he counted nothing to chance, fortune, luck, but he saw God at work in the details of his life and because of that he could draw on those experiences to trust in the promises of God that he had not yet seen. 

When God first spoke to Abraham, He made Abraham promises.  It was years after God first made promises to Abraham, that He comes again to Abraham in a vision and says, “Fear not, Abram!  I am your shield and the one who will reward you in great abundance.”  Abraham knows this, he has experienced God’s material blessings and his physical protection, but there is one thing God has not given him and so Abraham complains, “Sovereign Lord, what difference does it make, all these blessings you have given me when I don’t have a son to pass them on to?” 

God has previously told Abraham, “I will make your descendants like the dust of the earth so that if anyone is able to count the dust of the earth, then your descendants also can be counted.”  (Genesis 13:16)  And Abraham remembered the promise of God.  Neither he nor Sarah was getting any younger and there was still no heir.  So at his doubting question, God takes Abraham out into the night and again offers reassurance of his promise, “Gaze into the sky and count the stars—if you are able to count them!:  So will your descendants be.”

Then we read, “Abraham believed the Lord, and the Lord declared him righteous because of his faith.”  We look at the life of Abraham and do not always see a righteous man, but Abraham gets in the boat with God and God declares Abraham righteous; God declares Abraham righteous even though he was not.  Abraham was accepted not because of who he was, but because of who he would become “in Christ.”  Abraham was in the boat with God, but God was not finished with Abraham.

After ten years with no child in sight, Sarah takes action telling Abraham to have a child by her maid-servant, Hagar.  (Genesis 16:1-4)  This was a culturally acceptable way of handling the problem.  It is done and Abraham has an heir, Ishmael.  Sarah and Abraham have handled the problem of the heir.  But God is not finished with Abraham.

It was when Abraham was 75 years old that God first made promises to him (Genesis 12:4) Years later, long after God promises Abraham numerous descendants, God visits Abraham and tells him that Sarah, his wife who has not been able to have children for her whole life, she will have a son.  Abraham laughs and says to himself, “Can a son be born to a man who is a hundred years old?  Can Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?” (Gen 17:17)  God makes impossible promises.  As we ride out this storm of life, it is only impossible promises that can save.  Abraham is in the boat with God, but he is very content with his life, with Ishmael as his son, and finds God’s words amusing, but God is not finished with Abraham.

The life of Abraham and Sarah covers most of the book of Genesis.  They are models for our faith and we read that Abraham laughs at the promise of God.   Later, Sarah also laughs.  But their laughter, their doubt does not change God’s promise.  Their inability to be consistently faithful does not change God’s faithfulness to His promises.

Neither Abraham nor Sarah lived to possess the land   It was hundreds of years after God promised the land to Abraham that Joshua led the Israelites into the promised land.  There were a lot of good reasons to doubt God, but Abraham and Sarah were in the boat with God.  There were other boats they could have ridden, but Abraham and Sarah chose faith, they struggled with faith, laughed at faith and they were assured by faith.  In spite of his ridiculous promises, they could see what God had done and wanted to ride with no other. 

God makes ridiculous promises.  But those laughable promises are somehow believable because it is God who makes them, it is those impossible promises that bring life, hope and joy rather than the despair of skepticism.  There is nothing more difficult to do than to believe in the promises of God.  We must submit all we hold dear to hang on to our faith in Him:  our reason, our logic, our abilities, our skills.  But we gain what skepticism cannot give:  hope in the impossible.

A son was born to Sarah at precisely the time God said he would be.  He is named Isaac which means “he laughed.”  But God was not finished with Abraham.  We wonder what Abraham was thinking as he followed God’s direction in Genesis 22 (v. 1-2) “Abraham!. . . take your son—your only son, whom you love, Isaac—and go to the land of Moriah!  Offer him up there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains which I will show you.”  Being in the boat with God does not mean the storm is less, it does mean that we will be carried safely through.  Abraham had been in the boat a long time with God and as he traveled with God, he came more and more to know Him and in knowing Him more and more, to trust Him more and more.  This had to be the most turbulent storm for Abraham where God himself asks the unthinkable.  We wonder how Abraham made such a difficult journey.  We wonder what he was thinking when Isaac, his beloved son asks, “Father, where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”  Abraham replies, “God will provide . . . my son.”

Having faith in the impossible promises of God makes us subject to ridicule by those who don’t understand, those who see us riding in this boat but do not see that there is Someone with us.  Sometimes we don’t see Him.  But God is not finished with us

When Jesus lived on earth, He made laughable, impossible promises to us.  He told us how much He loves us. (John 15:13)  He promised to be with us always.  (Matthew 28:20)  He promised to prepare a place for us.  He promised to come again and take us there.  (John 14:2-3) Sometimes it feels no one loves us, it feels that we are alone, sometimes it feels as if we have no place to go and no one to come for us.  But Jesus is not finished with us.  We are in the boat with Him and His promises to us, just like those God made to Abraham are not given because we deserve them, because we are worthy of the promises of God.  They are not even dependant on our ability to envision them, they are not even dependant on our unswerving faith in them.  They are firmly rooted in the One who made them, and His ability to keep them.

But it does please Him when we trust in Him, when we believe what He has said is true.  What are the promises of God that you find hard to believe?  It is most likely those impossible promises that God would have you hear.  What is the promise of God that you need most to believe?