If you’re looking for a perfect mom, or even perfect person in the Bible; I’m happy to inform you that outside of Jesus Christ, you are not going to find one. Motherhood can be tough… it is tough. Being a mom is a never ending assignment with constant demands and ever shifting schedules. However, the rewards are numerous despite the struggles that sometimes seem daily. For some moms, motherhood seemed almost sprung upon them (like me!). For these moms, they neither tried to have a child nor had a strong desire for children at the time of their pregnancy. On the opposite end of the spectrum, there are mothers who longed for children and have tried everything in their power to have a child. These moms may have had multiple miscarriages before having their rainbow baby, went through many rounds of fertility treatments, or chose adoption as a means for having children. No matter what your route to motherhood was/is, babies are a blessing.
This week I’ve been looking at one of these mothers who longed for a child of her own. Unlike the women of today, fertility treatment was not an option. You either had your own child or you had to adopt an heir. So who was this mother who longed for a child? The Bible mentions a few women who were unable to conceive for many years, yet the Lord showed up and blessed them with a child of their own. The mom we are looking at today is named Sarah.
Who was Sarah? Sarah’s story can be found in Genesis 11:27-23:2. She is the wife of Abraham (11:29), who happens to also be her half brother (20:12). In Sarah and Abraham’s time, marrying a half sibling was culturally acceptable even though today it is viewed as repulsive. We know that Sarah was extremely beautiful (Gen 12:11, 14). We also can conclude from Scripture that Sarah was about 9 years younger than Abraham by comparing their ages in Genesis 17:1 & 17. We are also told that Sarah is unable to conceive (11:30).
It’s hard to talk about Sarah’s story without talking about her husband as well. According to the Bible when a man and woman become married they become “one flesh.” In other words, the two individuals become connected and their lives become intermingled. What happens to one spouse affects the other. With that being said, God speaks to Abraham (who is called Abram at this time) and tells him to leave his father’s house, his culture/country, and go to a place that God would later show him. In return, God promised to bless him, make him a great nation, give him a great name, and that he would be a blessing to others (Gen 12:1-3). So Sarah (named Sarai at this point) helps gather up all their possessions and they leave with their nephew Lot (Gen 12:5). Abraham was promised the land of Canaan (Gen 12:7) and later in Chapter 15, God comes to Abraham and tells him that he will become a great nation, more specifically, he would have a son.
Sarah concludes at this point, that since she is well past the age of carrying a baby and has not yet conceived a child, the promise must not include her. She tells Abraham that since the Lord has prevented her from having a child that maybe they can build a family through her slave girl (a common practice of the day), Hagar; which he does (Gen 16:2-4). However, the next time God speaks with Abraham, he is told that Sarah will be the mother of the child promised to them not the child Abraham had with Hagar and God makes a covenant with Abraham at this time (Gen 17).
In the next chapter Sarah hears that she will have a son of her own and laughs (Gen 18:9-15). She is recording as saying to herself “After I have become shriveled up and my lord is old, will I have delight? (Gen 18:12).” One year later Sarah has a child. The remarkable thing is that Sarah is 91 years old at this time!!!! And her husband is 100 years old! I think Sarah had every right to laugh. My grandmother is 88 years old and I can not imagine her giving birth to a child. in Telling an old woman that she is going to have a baby is ridiculous, not to mention IMPOSSIBLE! But yet the Lord had promised her a child and He delivered on His promise. Numbers 23:19 tells us “God is not a man who lies, or a son of man who changes His mind. Does He speak and not act, or promise and not fulfill?” That last statement is a rhetorical question; where the obvious answer to the one being asked is “no.”
When reading through Sarah’s story about eventually having a child, you may be quick to assume she didn’t believe she was really going to have a child because of her laughing about it and then her lying about her laughing (this was my thought for so long) but Hebrews 11 includes Sarah in it’s listing of Biblical characters of great faith that pleased God. In my last post I wrote how Rahab, the prostitute, was only one of two women included in this list. Sarah is the other woman who was included! This is what Hebrews 11:11 says about Sarah’s faith: “By faith even Sarah herself, when she was unable to have children, received power to conceive offspring, even though she was past the age, since she considered that the One who had promised was faithful.”
Sarah may have originally thought that she was going to have a child when God had first come to Abraham at age 75 and promised to make him a great nation but over time grew to believe the promise did not include her. After all, she waited 25 years to see the promise of a child fulfilled. I don’t blame her for getting weary in the waiting and coming to believe she would not be the one to give Abraham a child. She even tried to make Abraham a father by giving her slave as a wife to Abraham, which got them a child but also brought in another woman who may have tried to remove Sarah from her role as Abraham’s wife. Sarah even laughed over being told she was going to be a mother at the age of 91 but Sarah had 25 years of watching how God was fulfilling His promise to Abraham and ultimately to her as God had blessed them with livestock, gold and silver, and added a great many people under their care. Sarah saw how God had protected her honor every time she was taken away from Abraham to be another man’s wife (Gen 12 & 20). She saw how God used her husband to rescue their nephew from being a captive of war (Gen 14). She watched their economic power grow time and time again (Gen 12 & 20). She saw how God had prevented and them allowed women to have children in one situation (Gen 20). She saw many things over those 25 years prior to having a child. Sarah believed that the impossible was possible because God said He would do it for her! He had proven Himself faithful and this had filled her with faith.
Was Sarah a perfect woman? No, she wasn’t. She had her on faults and flaws. She learned that her extreme beauty seemed to get her into trouble and did not ensure her of having children. Her relationship wasn’t perfect with her husband but she loved him so she did follow his requests and he loved her and followed her requests. Both lead to issues later: Sarah being taken as a wife for two other men and Abraham sleeping with a slave girl and then having to later send her and his son away. Not to mention how Sarah blamed him for her trouble with “the other woman,” and it was her idea! Sarah mistreated Hagar, was possibly jealous of her and her son, and made sure that Issac would be the sole heir to Abraham’s possessions. In the end God over looked their faults and at times their moral failures because they put their trust in God and His words to them. Gen 15:6 says “And Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.”
Hebrews 11:39-40 says “All these were approved through their faith, but they did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, so that they would not be made perfect without us.” Sarah and Abraham did receive their promised son but not their promised land. Sarah died before they ever owned a single piece of property in Canaan and Abraham died with only owning the small plot of land he purchased to bury his beloved Sarah (Gen 23). However, they still believed that the land God had promised them would belong to their family in the future. Ultimately, Hebrews 11:39-40 is pointing to the promised messiah, Jesus Christ, that would make all who believe that His death and resurrection settles the cost that God demands for the sin in a persons life.
Maybe you are like Sarah who has longed for a child and all the evidence points to the “fact” that you will never have one. Maybe you already have children and there are other things in your life that seem impossible. Has God given you this promise and you still have not seen it fulfilled? Sarah waited 25 years, not to mention all the years she may have tried to have a baby prior to ever receiving this promise. God is still the God who preforms miracles. My younger brother and I are both “faith” babies. My parents tried for 3 years to have children before having me, once it was discovered that my father had an extremely low sperm count and they wanted to preform all kinds of testing on him, he confidently declared if God wanted my parents to have children than we would have them and he was not going to go through any more testing. Three months later they were pregnant. A cousin of mine tried and waited over 10 years to have a child with her husband. Eventually they adopted their eldest daughter after a few rounds of failed fertility treatment and around the time she turned 8 years old they found out they were going to have another daughter! Another girl I know had cancer as a child and was told she would never be able to have children due to the intensive chemotherapy she had, she is now married with a beautiful and healthy little girl. A couple we know and are good friends with had their daughter at 24 weeks gestation due to eclampsia which resulted in the mother having a seizure right when her doctor walked into her hospital room from coming home early from vacation to check on her. Their daughter is now 2 years old and thriving, she has some problems due to being born so early but she can breathe on her own and swallow some liquids without aspirating (getting it in her lungs); they are believing for complete and total healing and that one day soon their daughter will be like any other child. They are also grateful that the mother is still alive.
What’s your “impossible” situation or circumstance? Are you facing deportation due to something you did over 20 years ago, even though you’ve had a clean record since, have a child who is a citizen and are now married? Do you feel trapped in a job because of the economy or in need of a job in a poor economy? Maybe their are strained relationships in your life that seem like reconciliation will never come (I’m facing that one)? Maybe you feel you’ve been given a death sentence due to a physical ailment or disease? Maybe your “impossible” is your marriage. You look at it and think, how can this marriage ever be repaired? How can anything good every come of this relationship again? Will there ever be love and respect again? Can we ever trust each other again? Maybe you’re facing slight odds of getting into the college of your dreams or see no way into the career field that you have worked hard to get into but don’t know the right people who can help you get the experience you need in order to even get into the graduate program you need to in order to accomplish that dream. Maybe your impossible is feeding your children and paying the bills this month. Maybe it’s making it through this school year with distance learning!
My God is the God of the “impossible.” He allowed a 91 year old woman to have a child, a virgin gave birth to a son, many mothers have received their children back from the dead, an iron ax head floated after sinking in a river, a man outran a horse drawn chariot, a boy untrained for war killed a highly trained and champion fighter who happened to be a giant with a sling and a stone. My God can part the sea, send a giant fish to swallow and then spit out a man alive 3 days later. My God can make a small jar of oil fill up many large jars to pay a widow woman’s debt. My God can heal the sick, give sight to the blind, and forgive any and every person who has sinned no matter how “big” their sin seems. He is loving and kind, compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love. My God is the god of the impossible. Can you step out in faith today, like Sarah, and believe the One who has promised is indeed faithful to you right where you are? He is faithful despite our short comings. Whatever is your “impossible” today, talk to God about it. Be honest about your feelings on the issue but also remind yourself that God is able, He is faithful, and He is willing.
Now to Him who is able to do above and beyond all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us— to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. Ephesians 3:20
The Ruby Blossom 