SARAH – HOPING AGAINST HOPE
Genesis 21:1-7
Did you know, there are almost 300,000 people named Sarah in the United States. 99.9% of them are female. That’s what Google said when I looked it up. Apparently, there is one or two guys answering to the name of Sarah out there!
Today we are going to look at a woman by the name of Sarah from the Book of Genesis. It is second in our summer study of extraordinary women in the Bible. I am using a book called Twelve Extraordinary Women by John MacArthur, who is an American pastor and author, as a backdrop to my message.
Sarah, who was called Sarai until she was 90 years old, was the wife of the great Biblical patriarch, Abraham. Because of this, we tend to think of her with a degree of dignity and honor. But by reading the biblical account of her life, it is impossible not to notice that she sometimes behaved badly. She could throw fits and tantrums. She knew how to be manipulative. She even knew how to get mean. She was in no means the perfect model of Godly grace and meekness.
But pretty! Scripture tells us numerous times how stunningly attractive she was. Wherever she went, she instantly received favor and privilege because of her good looks. The Biblical account of Sarah’s life doesn’t really even begin until she was 65 years old. Amazingly, even at that age, her physical beauty was so remarkable that Abraham regularly assumed other powerful men would want her for their harems. And he was right! First a pharaoh, then a king, neither who realized she was Abraham’s wife. From the Biblical account alone, it is clear that Sarah was an extraordinarily beautiful woman.
But there is more to Sarah than her beauty. She has important strengths as well as glaring weaknesses. Scripture commends her for her faith and steadfastness. Although there were terrible flashes of moodiness and even cruelty, reminders that Sarah was human like us, Sarah’s life on the whole is actually characterized by humility, faithfulness, deep affection for her husband, sincere love toward God, and hope that never died.
From the time that she became Abraham’s wife, Sarah desired one thing above all others, and that was to have children. But she was barren throughout her normal childbearing years. This is one of the first things we learn about Sarah. She was tortured by her childlessness. It ate at her. She spent years in the grip of frustration and depression because of it, and she finally concluded that God Himself was restraining her from having children. So badly did she want her husband to have an heir that she concocted a scheme that was immoral, unrighteous and utterly foolish - She rashly persuaded Abraham to father a child by her own housemaid, Hagar.
To understand Sarah, we have to look at her background. Sarah was half-sister to her husband Abraham and she was ten years younger. Being married to a sibling wasn’t deemed incestuous in Abraham’s time. Such marriages to close relatives were not the least bit unusual or scandalous. If you think about it, since Adam and Eve were the only humans God originally created, it would have been absolutely essential in the beginning for some of Adam’s offspring to wed their own siblings. No legal prohibition against incest even existed until the time of Moses, at which time incest, even between half-siblings was explicitly forbidden.
We know nothing about their early marriage, except for the fact that Sarah was barren. This one fact sums up everything Scripture has to say about the first 65 years of Sarah’s life! It is no wonder she occasionally exhibited frustration and resentment.
To understand Sarah, we also need to look at her husband, Abraham. Abraham’s story in Genesis doesn’t really begin until he was 75, at which time he was called Abram. Abraham’s hometown was a famous urban center known as Ur of the Chaldeans. Ur was the heart of a sophisticated pagan culture, with plenty of gods and pagan temples. Abraham may have had some knowledge about the true God passed down from his ancestors – he was only a ninth-generation descendent from Shem, the son of Noah. But having grown up in a pagan culture, Abraham was himself a pagan until the Lord called him out of Ur.
God had a plan for Abraham! The Lord’s purpose in choosing and calling Abraham was to make him the father of a great nation that would be His witness to the world. Israel’s purpose was to lead people to God, whom they called Yahweh. Through their lineage a Deliverer, the Messiah, would arise. And in this Messiah, all the nations of the world would be blessed! Genesis 12:2-3 God says to Abraham: “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” This is part of the Abrahamic Covenant, if you remember when we looked at Biblical covenants.
Sarah obviously had a key role to play in God’s plan. Abraham could never become the patriarch of this great nation if she did not first become mother to his offspring. She was surely aware of the Lord’s promises to Abraham and would have longed to see those promises fulfilled. But as long as Sarah remained childless, this promise could not be fulfilled.
God calls Abraham out of the Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan, making it a journey about 1,000 miles on foot – it would be a long a difficult journey. Sarah at this time is 65 years old, the age when most people today think about retirement. Sarah was no means a young woman, even though people were living a great deal longer at that time. She was living a life of a nomad, in order to be with her husband Abraham. What we know of her is that she went eagerly, gladly, and enthusiastically.
There is so much to this story, that it could take us numerous Sundays if I went into detail. But today, I want to focus on Sarah’s yearning to have a child. Sarah understood the promise that God had given to Abraham; that he was the human channel through which the world would see the outpouring of God’s redemptive plan. Sarah understood that and embraced it. Hebrews 11:11 says “she considered him faithful who had made the promise.” Who had made the promise? God. She considered Him faithful. He would do what He said!
But despite her faith, she knew from a human perspective that her long years of childlessness were a threat to the fulfillment of God’s promise. She must have constantly thought about these things, and as time went by, the weight of her burden only increased. But God kept giving her reasons to hope. If Sarah could only have realized that God was in charge of the situation, and they did not have to do anything to make the promise come to pass. God’s plan all along was for Sarah to have her first child in her old age, after every prospect of a natural fulfillment of the prophecy was exhausted and after every earthly reason for hope was completely dead.
But, so desperate was Sarah, that she took it upon herself to fix the situation. At age 75, she unwittingly stepped into the role of God and says to Abraham: “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said.” It was not uncommon for wives to give their husbands their slave girls to bear children. Abraham, not his finest moment, goes along with Sarah’s plan, and Hagar, her maid, becomes pregnant.
This starts a whole very difficult relationship between Sarah and Hagar, and Sarah knows she made a grave mistake. Hagar suddenly became haughty and contentious towards Sarah and Sarah becomes unreasonable and eventually tells Hagar to leave. God sees Hagar’s situation and an angel speaks to her saying that she is to go back to Sarah, that she would have a son and she would call him Ishmael, and although God would bless this child, he was not the child of God’s promise. That son had to come through Sarah.
Thirteen more frustrating years passed for Sarah after the birth of Ishmael! Thirteen years! And Sarah remained barren. She was 89 years old now. If her hope was not utterly shattered, it must have been hanging by a very thin thread. But here is where the greatness of Sarah’s faith shines through. She’s an old woman now, but God’s promise is still unfulfilled. Most woman would have given up a long time ago. This is what made her so extraordinary.
Finally, when Abraham was 99, God comes to him and renews His covenant with Abraham. Then the Lord turns the subject to Sarah. “Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant…”
The next time the Lord visits Abraham, He is with two angels. Abraham, probably not realizing who they were, has Sarah prepare a meal for them. And the Lord says “Sarah your wife shall have a son.” Sarah was listening at the tent door and she laughed within herself! I think I might have laughed too! She is no spring chicken!!! And now she’s going to have a baby! 89 years old!
Another year passes and finally Sarah conceives and bears Abraham a son, at the time that God had chosen. Sarah named him Isaac, meaning “laughter.” The promise has finally come to pass! Abraham has the son of God’s promise!
The title of this message is Hoping Against Hope, because truly Sarah kept hoping for this child of the promise, even when everything looked as though it would not come true. What can we learn from Sarah?
Often, we pray for things and when they do not happen right away, we think God’s not listening, or God is saying no, and we give up. But not Sarah! She could have turned back to her pagan gods, but she didn’t! She stayed the course! She believed that Jehovah would provide what He had promised to Abraham!
What are you praying for today? Does it seem like days, months, years and still no answer! Do you know that I have been praying the same prayer for 35 years and I still have no response? Stay the course! Don’t give up! God will come through! Use Sarah as your example!
Genesis 21:1-7
Did you know, there are almost 300,000 people named Sarah in the United States. 99.9% of them are female. That’s what Google said when I looked it up. Apparently, there is one or two guys answering to the name of Sarah out there!
Today we are going to look at a woman by the name of Sarah from the Book of Genesis. It is second in our summer study of extraordinary women in the Bible. I am using a book called Twelve Extraordinary Women by John MacArthur, who is an American pastor and author, as a backdrop to my message.
Sarah, who was called Sarai until she was 90 years old, was the wife of the great Biblical patriarch, Abraham. Because of this, we tend to think of her with a degree of dignity and honor. But by reading the biblical account of her life, it is impossible not to notice that she sometimes behaved badly. She could throw fits and tantrums. She knew how to be manipulative. She even knew how to get mean. She was in no means the perfect model of Godly grace and meekness.
But pretty! Scripture tells us numerous times how stunningly attractive she was. Wherever she went, she instantly received favor and privilege because of her good looks. The Biblical account of Sarah’s life doesn’t really even begin until she was 65 years old. Amazingly, even at that age, her physical beauty was so remarkable that Abraham regularly assumed other powerful men would want her for their harems. And he was right! First a pharaoh, then a king, neither who realized she was Abraham’s wife. From the Biblical account alone, it is clear that Sarah was an extraordinarily beautiful woman.
But there is more to Sarah than her beauty. She has important strengths as well as glaring weaknesses. Scripture commends her for her faith and steadfastness. Although there were terrible flashes of moodiness and even cruelty, reminders that Sarah was human like us, Sarah’s life on the whole is actually characterized by humility, faithfulness, deep affection for her husband, sincere love toward God, and hope that never died.
From the time that she became Abraham’s wife, Sarah desired one thing above all others, and that was to have children. But she was barren throughout her normal childbearing years. This is one of the first things we learn about Sarah. She was tortured by her childlessness. It ate at her. She spent years in the grip of frustration and depression because of it, and she finally concluded that God Himself was restraining her from having children. So badly did she want her husband to have an heir that she concocted a scheme that was immoral, unrighteous and utterly foolish - She rashly persuaded Abraham to father a child by her own housemaid, Hagar.
To understand Sarah, we have to look at her background. Sarah was half-sister to her husband Abraham and she was ten years younger. Being married to a sibling wasn’t deemed incestuous in Abraham’s time. Such marriages to close relatives were not the least bit unusual or scandalous. If you think about it, since Adam and Eve were the only humans God originally created, it would have been absolutely essential in the beginning for some of Adam’s offspring to wed their own siblings. No legal prohibition against incest even existed until the time of Moses, at which time incest, even between half-siblings was explicitly forbidden.
We know nothing about their early marriage, except for the fact that Sarah was barren. This one fact sums up everything Scripture has to say about the first 65 years of Sarah’s life! It is no wonder she occasionally exhibited frustration and resentment.
To understand Sarah, we also need to look at her husband, Abraham. Abraham’s story in Genesis doesn’t really begin until he was 75, at which time he was called Abram. Abraham’s hometown was a famous urban center known as Ur of the Chaldeans. Ur was the heart of a sophisticated pagan culture, with plenty of gods and pagan temples. Abraham may have had some knowledge about the true God passed down from his ancestors – he was only a ninth-generation descendent from Shem, the son of Noah. But having grown up in a pagan culture, Abraham was himself a pagan until the Lord called him out of Ur.
God had a plan for Abraham! The Lord’s purpose in choosing and calling Abraham was to make him the father of a great nation that would be His witness to the world. Israel’s purpose was to lead people to God, whom they called Yahweh. Through their lineage a Deliverer, the Messiah, would arise. And in this Messiah, all the nations of the world would be blessed! Genesis 12:2-3 God says to Abraham: “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” This is part of the Abrahamic Covenant, if you remember when we looked at Biblical covenants.
Sarah obviously had a key role to play in God’s plan. Abraham could never become the patriarch of this great nation if she did not first become mother to his offspring. She was surely aware of the Lord’s promises to Abraham and would have longed to see those promises fulfilled. But as long as Sarah remained childless, this promise could not be fulfilled.
God calls Abraham out of the Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan, making it a journey about 1,000 miles on foot – it would be a long a difficult journey. Sarah at this time is 65 years old, the age when most people today think about retirement. Sarah was no means a young woman, even though people were living a great deal longer at that time. She was living a life of a nomad, in order to be with her husband Abraham. What we know of her is that she went eagerly, gladly, and enthusiastically.
There is so much to this story, that it could take us numerous Sundays if I went into detail. But today, I want to focus on Sarah’s yearning to have a child. Sarah understood the promise that God had given to Abraham; that he was the human channel through which the world would see the outpouring of God’s redemptive plan. Sarah understood that and embraced it. Hebrews 11:11 says “she considered him faithful who had made the promise.” Who had made the promise? God. She considered Him faithful. He would do what He said!
But despite her faith, she knew from a human perspective that her long years of childlessness were a threat to the fulfillment of God’s promise. She must have constantly thought about these things, and as time went by, the weight of her burden only increased. But God kept giving her reasons to hope. If Sarah could only have realized that God was in charge of the situation, and they did not have to do anything to make the promise come to pass. God’s plan all along was for Sarah to have her first child in her old age, after every prospect of a natural fulfillment of the prophecy was exhausted and after every earthly reason for hope was completely dead.
But, so desperate was Sarah, that she took it upon herself to fix the situation. At age 75, she unwittingly stepped into the role of God and says to Abraham: “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said.” It was not uncommon for wives to give their husbands their slave girls to bear children. Abraham, not his finest moment, goes along with Sarah’s plan, and Hagar, her maid, becomes pregnant.
This starts a whole very difficult relationship between Sarah and Hagar, and Sarah knows she made a grave mistake. Hagar suddenly became haughty and contentious towards Sarah and Sarah becomes unreasonable and eventually tells Hagar to leave. God sees Hagar’s situation and an angel speaks to her saying that she is to go back to Sarah, that she would have a son and she would call him Ishmael, and although God would bless this child, he was not the child of God’s promise. That son had to come through Sarah.
Thirteen more frustrating years passed for Sarah after the birth of Ishmael! Thirteen years! And Sarah remained barren. She was 89 years old now. If her hope was not utterly shattered, it must have been hanging by a very thin thread. But here is where the greatness of Sarah’s faith shines through. She’s an old woman now, but God’s promise is still unfulfilled. Most woman would have given up a long time ago. This is what made her so extraordinary.
Finally, when Abraham was 99, God comes to him and renews His covenant with Abraham. Then the Lord turns the subject to Sarah. “Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant…”
The next time the Lord visits Abraham, He is with two angels. Abraham, probably not realizing who they were, has Sarah prepare a meal for them. And the Lord says “Sarah your wife shall have a son.” Sarah was listening at the tent door and she laughed within herself! I think I might have laughed too! She is no spring chicken!!! And now she’s going to have a baby! 89 years old!
Another year passes and finally Sarah conceives and bears Abraham a son, at the time that God had chosen. Sarah named him Isaac, meaning “laughter.” The promise has finally come to pass! Abraham has the son of God’s promise!
The title of this message is Hoping Against Hope, because truly Sarah kept hoping for this child of the promise, even when everything looked as though it would not come true. What can we learn from Sarah?
Often, we pray for things and when they do not happen right away, we think God’s not listening, or God is saying no, and we give up. But not Sarah! She could have turned back to her pagan gods, but she didn’t! She stayed the course! She believed that Jehovah would provide what He had promised to Abraham!
What are you praying for today? Does it seem like days, months, years and still no answer! Do you know that I have been praying the same prayer for 35 years and I still have no response? Stay the course! Don’t give up! God will come through! Use Sarah as your example!