Walking by Faith - February 8 Readings: Genesis 18:1-15, 21:1-7, God’s Sends a Miracle Baby

The Story of the Bible from Creation to the Cross to Eternal Glory

In 72 daily readings, we will examine the overall story of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, seeking to get the big picture of God's work through Jesus Christ in this sinful world.

Today's Reading:  Genesis 18:1-15, 21:1-7

18 The Lord appeared to Abraham at the oaks of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance of his tent during the heat of the day. 2 He looked up, and he saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to meet them, bowed to the ground, 3 and said, “My lord, if I have found favor with you, please do not go on past your servant. 4 Let a little water be brought, that you may wash your feet and rest yourselves under the tree. 5 I will bring a bit of bread so that you may strengthen yourselves. This is why you have passed your servant’s way. Later, you can continue on.”

“Yes,” they replied, “do as you have said.”

6 So Abraham hurried into the tent and said to Sarah, “Quick! Knead three measures of fine flour and make bread.” 7 Abraham ran to the herd and got a tender, choice calf. He gave it to a young man, who hurried to prepare it. 8 Then Abraham took curds and milk, as well as the calf that he had prepared, and set them before the men. He served them as they ate under the tree.

9 “Where is your wife Sarah?” they asked him.

“There, in the tent,” he answered.

10 The Lord said, “I will certainly come back to you in about a year’s time, and your wife Sarah will have a son!” Now Sarah was listening at the entrance of the tent behind him.

11 Abraham and Sarah were old and getting on in years. Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. 12 So she laughed to herself: “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I have delight?”

13 But the Lord asked Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh, saying, ‘Can I really have a baby when I’m old?’ 14 Is anything impossible for the Lord? At the appointed time I will come back to you, and in about a year she will have a son.”

15 Sarah denied it. “I did not laugh,” she said, because she was afraid.

But he replied, “No, you did laugh.”

21 The Lord came to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. 2 Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the appointed time God had told him. 3 Abraham named his son who was born to him—the one Sarah bore to him—Isaac. 4 When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God had commanded him. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.

6 Sarah said, “God has made me laugh, and everyone who hears will laugh with me.” 7 She also said, “Who would have told Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne a son for him in his old age.”

Through the Bible Reading: Exodus 31-32, Matthew 24:15–35, Psalm 21:1–5, Proverbs4:23-24    

If you wish to read through the Bible in a year, follow these readings. 

Context 

When there is a problem in this world, God has a solution - he sends a baby! He called Abram to be the father of many nations, but he and his wife Sarai were old and unable to have children. God gave them a baby by miraculous (if frustrating) means. When the people of Israel were enslaved in Egypt, what did God do? He sent a baby, born into slavery but who delivered the people from bondage. And, of course, many years later, God sent another baby, born in Bethlehem, laid in a manger - a fully human baby but also the Son of God. He lived perfectly among us and he delivered us from our sins.

We see in today's reading the establishment of a pattern in God's activity in the world. God works by his miraculous power, but only in such a way that everyone knows that it was God who did it and that he gets the glory. God often does the absurd.

Devotional: Walking by Faith 

Do you believe what God says?
Do you believe what God says when the circumstances of life say loudly and clearly that the word of God is not true?

Abram received a promise of God, that he would be the father of many nations, and especially the father of the chosen nation, the people of God. There was one problem. When God gave him that command, he was 75 and his wife was 65, and they'd never been able to have children. Would you agree that if you've reached that age and not been able to have a child, that your chances of conceiving are, to say the least, remote.

So what did God do? He waited 25 years! Think about that. God waited not 5 years, not 10, not 20, but 25 years! Now the renamed Sarah is 89 and her husband is 99 and a couple of men (actually angels) appear to them and announce that she would have a baby.

Is it any wonder that she laughed?

But that is what God does, it's how God works. He is determined to work among us in such a way that it is clear that the power comes from God and God alone and that the glory properly goes to him. If 65 year-old Sarah had a baby, people would say it was an amazing thing - how strange. But by the time she was 90 and Abraham was 100, it was nothing but an undeniable miracle from God.

Unfortunately, along the way, Abraham lost faith one time, and rough his wife's handmaiden Hagar he fathered Ishmael, the ancestor of the Arab nations that have so plagued the Israelite people throughout history. His failure of faith caused him to act in the flesh and cause great problems.

Will you trust God? Often - VERY often - the events of this world will make it seem as if God's word is not true and God's promises will not be fulfilled. God has promised never to leave us, but sometimes we feel abandoned. God's provision sometimes seems as if it will never come. Some prayers seem destined to fail. But God is faithful no matter what your feelings or circumstances stay. What God says he will do. What God promises he will provide.

That is why we are called to walk by faith and not by sight. Sight told Abraham and Sarah that God was wrong and they would die childless. In fact, if they told someone they would have offspring who would become many nations, people would have rationally called them crazy. But they weren't crazy, they were faithful. God had spoken and they were simply walking by faith instead of by sight.

Father, help me to remember that your word is the truth in my life, not my feelings or circumstances. May I walk by faith and not by sight. 

Think and Pray:

Do you determine what is true or possible based on what your eyes see or your heart feels, or do you listen to God and his word? 
The real truth in any situation is what God says!
Think brought situations in your life and analyze the difference between what God says about them and what circumstances or your feelings any.