Text: Hebrews 11
Key verse: “By faith, Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age since she considered him faithful who had promised.”
God has created every man with a measure of faith, we don’t need any physical effort to believe that the sun will rise the next day, neither did we have to worry about our identity, we simply believed that the names we were called were our given names and we grew with it. We also do not stand to watch over the seeds we bury in the ground, we simply believe they will grow. In the same way, faith grows.
Sarah, the wife of Abraham, did not start her walk with God as a woman of great faith, we recall she was the first one who got tired of waiting for God’s promised and she asked her husband to take her maid for a wife to bear children. She was also the one who laughed when God told Abraham she would bear children according to the time of life.
The Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?’ 14Is anything too hard for the Lord? At the appointed time I will return to you, about this time next year, and Sarah shall have a son.” 15But Sarah denied it, saying, “I did not laugh,” for she was afraid. He said, “No, but you did laugh.” Genesis 18:13-15
How then did she grow her faith to the point of believing God and considering him faithful to keep his promise?
“Your faith will grow not by chance but by choice.”
Neil Andersen
I saw this quote somewhere and l agree with it. Every believer has received a measure of faith from God, we have a responsibility to grow that faith until it begins to produce in our lives the results that we desire.
I realize how kind God has been to me, and so I tell each of you not to think you are better than you really are. Use good sense and measure yourself by the amount of faith that God has given you. Romans 12:3
Sarah started out believing her husband that God had spoken to him and made him a promise of a land of inheritance. She followed him in all his journeys, through thick and thin. Even when Abraham asked her to disguise her real identity as his wife, she obeyed. She watched the promises of God come to pass in other areas of their lives; how God provided during the famine, how God fought for her when Pharoah took her as his wife, and the second time when Abimelech also married her because Abraham lied she watched God show up to defend her; and of course Abraham’s prosperity was not hidden from her eyes.
“But the Lord sent terrible plagues upon Pharaoh and his household because of Sarai, Abram’s wife.” Genesis 12:17
These thoughts gave her insight into the abilities of God and may have produced the seed-faith in her heart that helped her consider God faithful to do the impossible. Everyone has faith, but not everyone engages or deploys their faith. The definition of faith in our text Hebrews 11:1 says, “Faith shows the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see.”
Our faith must have an object, what we hope for; It must be something we truly desire to have. Our faith reaches out to receive what we have seen in our hearts that are yet to physically manifest. Sarah considered him able to make her the mother of nations, a name she had come to accept as her own, therefore she no longer looked at her signs of an aging body, but rather at the abilities of a tested God.
What has God done for you in the past that made you praise God? What have you heard he did for someone else that made you scream? You can access the same things if you grow your faith.
There is great faith in the bible, and there is faith as small as a mustard seed, you choose what you live with. Sarah models for us, not a woman who had no challenges but rather one who grew in faith through the difficult seasons of life until she received that which she had seen in her mind’s eye as a reality. What do you see, is it specific, can you describe it? God described the number of children Abraham would have, as numerous as the sand on the seashore, how do you describe your tomorrow?
I leave you with a question, the one God asked when Sarah laughed. Then the Lord said to Abraham, “Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return about this time next year, and Sarah will have a son.” What you are hoping to see amid this COVID crisis does not have to depend on your abilities, consider God faithful, and watch him show up for you as he did for Sarah!
Faith grows!
Roses & Thorns