2nd Sunday in Lent
February 25, 2018
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-17; Romans 4:13-25; Mark 8:31-38
This Lenten season we are examining some of the covenants
that God made in the Old Testament. Last week we talked about God’s covenant
with Noah, after the flood. God promised all creation that he would never again
flood the earth to the point of utter destruction and he hung his rainbow in
the sky to remind him. Today we read about God’s covenant with Abram. This is
actually the third time God makes a covenant with Abram. God had already
promised Abram and Sarai that they would have lots of children in Genesis 12.
The most notable thing from that covenant is that that’s where God tells them
they will be blessed in order to be a blessing to others. You are blessed to be
a blessing. Abram is 75 years old at this point in time and he left his home to
follow God to a land that God would show him later. Talk about faith! He didn’t
know where he was going when he started.
After
some adventures, by Genesis 15, Abram is starting to get worried about this
promise. He’s now about 85 years old and there are still no children, no heirs.
A servant in Abram’s household is going to have to inherit his estate. God
says, “No. Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count
them.” Then God tells Abram, “So shall your offspring be.[1]
You will have descendants as numerous as the stars.” And Abram believes God and
it is credited to him as righteousness.[2]
However, things get a little hinky in Genesis 16. Abram and Sarai are tired of
waiting, not having fun anymore trying to get pregnant, and they decide to take
matters into their own hands. Since IVF isn’t an option, they decide Abram should
sleep with Hagar, Sarai’s maid. Abram does, Hagar gets pregnant, Sarai gets
jealous and sends Hagar away. God finds her in the desert and sends her back.
Hagar has a son named, Ishmael. Abram is now 86 years old.
Fast-forward
thirteen more years and Abram is now 99 years old in today’s passage, this
final time that God makes the same covenant with him: “I will make you a father
of many nations. I will make you very fruitful. Kings will come from you. And
your name will no longer be Abram but Abraham, which means “father of many.”
Sarai’s name will change, too, she will be called Sarah, and I will bless her
and give you a son by her.” Now, our lectionary stops there, but in the very
next verse, Abraham laughs. “Really, God. A 100 year old man is going to have a
son. A 90 year old woman is going to have a baby. Are you sure you don’t want to just use Ishmael instead?” God says,
“I will bless Ishmael, too. But your wife, Sarah, will bear you a son whom you
will name Isaac.” Isaac means “he laughs.” Remember, Sarah laughs, too, when
she’s told she’s going to have a baby at her age. Yet God is serious and
Abraham fulfills his part of the covenant. Unlike the covenant with Noah, which
required nothing of Noah or any other living creature, the covenant with
Abraham required at least three things of Abraham. It required Abraham to have
faith, to have patience, and to be committed.
“Now
faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”[3]
It “is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.”[4]
That’s the definition from the bible, what the bible says faith is. “To have
faith is to be sure of the things we hope for, to be certain of the things we
cannot see.”[5] If
you can see it, then it’s not faith. If there is physical, tangible proof, then
it’s not faith. Abraham and Sarah have been childless their entire lives and
they have lived long lives. Even the first time God makes the covenant, when they’re
75 and 65 years old, respectively, there’s no proof that Sarah can get
pregnant. Yet God promises and Abraham believes him, when he’s 75 years old,
when he’s 86 years old, when he’s 99 years old. There’s no proof, there’s no
reason to believe, other than that it is God who says it. In Romans, we read:
“Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of
many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”
Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as
dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also
dead. Yet he did not waver through
unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith
and gave glory to God, being fully
persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.”[6]
Do
you believe that God has the power to do what God has promised? Regardless of
whether you’ve seen proof of it? I know seeing the proof and seeing God follow
through on his promises helps strengthen our faith. But what about when there’s
been no proof? Do you still believe? Do you still stand on the promises? It can
be even trickier when it’s a specific promise, like that Abraham would have a son by Sarah. Not just a child, and not just by any woman, but a son with
Sarah. I didn’t have a boyfriend in high school, didn’t even date much in high
school, but I really wanted to go to my senior prom with a date. About March,
two months before prom, I felt God promise me that someone would ask me to prom
and I believed him and I quit worrying about it. No evidence, no trend of guys
lining up at my door, but wouldn’t you know, about a month later, Lee called
me. We were friends, in lots of classes together, but he had never called me
before. He asked me to prom. He had no clue he was an answer to prayer, and I
never even told him that until ten years later when we re-met. Faith is
unwavering confidence in God. It is hope in
God, and not in yourself. It’s not something you can make happen. If it’s
something you can make happen, then you don’t need God.
Going
back to Paul’s description of Abraham’s faithfulness, “being fully persuaded
that God had power to do what he had promised. This is why “it was credited to
him as righteousness.” The words “it was credited to him” were written not for
him alone, but also for us, to whom
God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our
Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised
to life for our salvation.”[7]
We cannot save ourselves, as much as we might try. We cannot overcome death by
ourselves, no matter what new medicine, technology, or life-support is
developed. Only Jesus saves. Only because of Jesus can we face death unafraid,
with the faith that it is not the end, but that eternal life is waiting for us.
That’s all on faith. Not because of any evidence. Abraham and Sarah didn’t have
proof; they had faith.
However,
in spite of their faith, they still tried to make the baby happen on their own.
It’s easy to lose patience with God’s timing. His timing is not ours. Through the prophet Isaiah,
God says, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my
ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my
ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”[8]
God does not do things on our schedule.
I feel like I should say that again. God
does not do things on our schedule.
There are things we’d like done by a certain time, if not done yesterday! We
are impatient people. One of the biggest things you notice when you drive north
is how much faster people drive in the north. And I’ve noticed here how the
school buses wait for cars to pass them before putting out their stop sign and
flashing red lights for a bus stop. They don’t do that elsewhere. The cars have
to wait. But here, school buses pull over to the shoulder of the road for all
the cars to pass and then the bus pulls out onto the road. Have y’all noticed
that? Did you know that’s not normal compared to the rest of the country? Yet
patience is one of the fruits of the Spirit, just like faithfulness. Abraham
and Sarah believe God’s promise, but they try to help it along. And what
happens? A big mess. The best analogy I’ve ever heard for God’s timing is that
you can’t rush a sunset. It takes time for the sun to go down from the sky. And
there is nothing you can do to make that sun go down quicker. Yet isn’t it gorgeous
to watch the sunset? When it’s over, you feel sad and wish it would have lasted
longer. You can’t rush a sunset. You can’t rush God. As Miracle Max says in The Princess Bride, “You rush a miracle
worker, you get rotten miracles.” God will not be rushed, and his timing is not ours. I’m sure Abraham and Sarah
would have preferred to have a baby when they were much younger, or at least in
their 60’s, the first time God gave the promise. But no. Sarah was 90 years
old. Abraham was 100. It was not on their timing. It was God’s. You have to
wait for God to fulfill his promises.
Finally,
the third thing required of Abraham for this covenant was commitment. You may
have noticed that we skipped over seven verses in the middle of the Genesis
reading. I guess the lectionary creators thought talking about circumcision
would offend our delicate sensibilities. However, part of what Abraham had to
do for his part of this covenant was to undergo circumcision, both him and
every male in his household. This is a serious commitment. Yet this is the
covenant God asks of Abraham and Abraham does it. Abraham was required to
change for this covenant. His name changed and his body changed. Sarah’s name
changed, too. They were committed to this covenant to the point that they were
willing to change. Jesus asks the same thing of us: “Whoever wants to be my
disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever
wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and
for the gospel will save it.”[9]
Abraham and Sarah’s lives changed drastically because of their faith. They left
their family and their ancestral home. God said, “Leave your home and go to a
land that I will show you.” They went on a long journey. They were probably
shamed for not having any children. But they decided that following God was worth
the risks, worth the changes, worth giving up comforts. There were things that
were more important than life staying the same as always, and that was
following God.
This
is one of Jesus’ hard teachings. Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow
me. Lose your life for my sake. Give up your life for my sake. What does this
look like? It means holding all your things loosely, remembering that it was
God who gave them to you in the first place. It means being willing to change,
whether to move, or serve God in a new way, or worship in a new way. Our God is
one of eternal faithfulness and changelessness, and yet it is also our God who
says he’s about to do a new thing. Do you know what God says before he says
he’s about to do a new thing? This is from Isaiah 43. In the first part of the
chapter, God says, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you
by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you
walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you
ablaze. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior… I love
you… Do not be afraid, for I am with you.” Then, in the second half of Isaiah
43, God says, “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am
doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way
in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”
This
is why I came back from Nicaragua, where I served before seminary. It wasn’t
because I developed rheumatoid arthritis. It was because in the midst of
listening to God during the early onset, God said, “I am about to do a new
thing.” And that new thing was sending me to seminary, to become a pastor.
Jesus says, “Those who lose their life for me will save it.” Well, I gave up my
entire life to go serve God in Nicaragua. It was very clear God called me
there. Sold my car, left my job and my students in North Carolina, gave up my
financial independence to live off raised support, I lost my life only to find
it again in Nicaragua, where my mom said I was the happiest she’d ever seen me
in my life. And then, God calling again, “I’m about to do a new thing,” in the
midst of disease. Lost my life in Nicaragua only to find it again in the
States. Lee and I re-met within two months of my returning to North Carolina.
Unlike in high school, we started dating right away this time around. Lost my
life as a schoolteacher to find it again as a pastor, who is also a kind of
teacher. I found you all. God led us here and I’m so grateful. Being fully
committed to God means you’re willing to change if and when God calls you to
that. You face your fear of the unknown, because God’s about to do a new thing,
and you don’t want to miss that.
Abraham
didn’t want to miss it, even if he had some doubts about how a 90 year old lady
was going to get pregnant, even if God’s timing was not his timing, even if it
meant change. Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as
righteousness. Thank God he will credit righteousness to us, too, who believe
in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, Jesus who was delivered over to
death for our sins and was raised to life for our salvation. Have faith. Be
patient, with God, with yourself, and with others. Stay committed to the
mission, which is making disciples of Jesus Christ. There are lots of ways to
do it, we’ve got to pay attention to how God is calling us to do it, in this time, in this place. That’s the covenant, for
we also are heirs and children of Abraham. Thanks be to God.
[1]
Genesis 15:5
[2]
Genesis 15:6
[3]
Hebrews 11:1, NKJV
[4]
Ibid., NIV
[5]
Ibid., GNT
[6]
Romans 4:18-21
[7]
Romans 4:21-25
[8]
Isaiah 55:8-9
[9]
Mark 8:34-35
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