#116: Giants of Faith VIII: Sarah received strength...

It was by faith that even Sarah was able to have a child, though she was barren and was too old. She believed that God would keep His promise. Hebrews 11:11

Praise the LORD for another opportunity to study scriptures together. Today we look at the final character in our giants of faith series. Sarah stands out in scriptures as an example to women even in the context of faith among several other virtues she had.

Sarah found herself in a very impossible situation. She had been waiting for a child of her own her entire life. She was obedient to her husband when he told her about the call upon his life to go to a far away country that he did not know. Sarah had also come to believe in the God of her husband. She must have been waiting patiently for the day that God would hear her heart desire and give her the child of her dreams.

It came to a point that she gave up and she felt that probably God was going to give her a son, but not through her bosom and so she offered her maid to her husband. Sarah was willing to support her husband as the father of many nations even if the child was not going to be her offspring. Then one day, God visited Abraham and reminded him of His promise and when Sarah heard of it, she laughed. She laughed because she just discovered the problem was with her and not Abraham (Abraham could have children, but she was barren); she laughed because she was too old to fall for inspirational speeches and was not ready for unnecessary emotional drama.

But the transition occurred when God confronted her with a question in Gen 18:14

is anything too hard for the LORD? I will return about this time next year, and Sarah will have a son.

Somehow, Sarah was taken aback with this question from God. And I sense God putting the same question to us today: is anything too hard for the LORD [to do]? Sarah must have thought about this question over and over and over. This was God speaking authoritatively and definitely. Faith began to build up in Sarah's inner man and she believed that God would keep His promise. She knew she was barren, but she drew strength and assurance of God's faithfulness from the Word of God. The writer of Hebrews tells us that the victory, the final result portrayed in her ability to give birth, though she was barren and very well advanced in age was a miracle that was possible because of her faith in God's faithfulness in keeping His promise. By faith she received strength... finally she could do the previously impossible by virtue of her new found faith in God.

It is okay to have doubted God in the past. It is okay to have laughed at the promises of God over your life as if to mock its possibility. But today can you consider the faithfulness and supremacy and potency of God? Is there anything too hard for the LORD? Can you dare to believe? God would rather not speak than to fail to fulfil what He has promised to do.

Thought: Is your situation like Sarah? Are you in the tightest impossible situation where you are convinced that there is no remedy? God is confronting you today as He did to Sarah. Do you think that there is anything that God cannot do? If you believe in the God of all possibility, that faith can make the impossible to become possible. Faith in God will give God the opportunity to come into your present situation and turn things around. Only believe!

Hello friends, join us next week as we conclude on this series. God will be helping us to see how all these stories of faith apply to  us living today. God bless you.