Do You Know God Like Abraham Did?

God’s Gradual Work with Abraham

Over the past several weeks, we’ve been in a teaching series, working through the life of a man named Abraham. And if you haven’t noticed already – it’s worth pointing out – God has been revealing himself to Abraham very gradually. It hasn’t been a quick process at all. It may not feel like God has been moving all that slowly from our point of view, because the book of Genesis gives us such a fast replay of Abraham’s life. But the events we’ve seen over the past 6 weeks or so – they were drawn out over the course of twenty-four years. As God made himself known, and told Abraham about the blessings he planned to bring – all that information wasn’t given at once. But giving of God’s special revelation has been a process. God has given light to Abraham like a slow but steady sunrise. First, with a faint glow in the East. Then, with an increasing intensity of deep pinks and brilliant oranges – and then with the piercing beams of the morning sun.

This shows us something about how God works. As God was shedding light on who He is, and how He would save sinners, he didn’t bring his people from midnight to noon instantaneously. But he revealed truth and knowledge about himself little by little, bit by bit. God brought little glimpses of sunshine to us through the patriarchs and the prophets. But it wasn’t until much later that he finally brought us into full daylight through the coming of Jesus Christ, who is the rising Son of our faith.

God’s patient-yet-persistent way of revealing himself is evident in the way He relates to Abraham. In Genesis 12, the LORD speaks to Abraham. He introduces himself as a God who calls sinners, and who extends promises. And in the text couple chapters, God shows faithful commitment, and his protective care. In Genesis 15, he draws near to Abraham to bring reassurance when he’s doubting. He does this affirming his promises with an oath – by entering into a covenant with him. In Chapter 16, he shows that he is a God who sees. And at the beginning of Chapter 17, he confirms that he has remembered his covenant, and that he wants his covenant with Abraham to be remembered for the generations to come.

And as we come to the next section of our text this morning, God continues to shine brighter light on certain aspects of his character and capabilities, in order to strengthen and sustain Abraham’s faith – and God does this, not only for Abraham – but to strengthen the faith of God’s people in every age, as we consider who God has shown himself to be.

So if you have a Bible nearby, please turn with me to Genesis, to the middle of Chapter 17 – I’ll be picking back up in verse 15 of our text. And I’ll be reading through Chapter 18, verse 21. If you’re using one of our church Bibles, you can find our text on page 11. But before I start reading from Genesis 17, verse 15 – let’s ask for God to bless our time together:

[Pray and Read Text]

A Son for Abraham

Last week, at the beginning of Chapter 17, God appeared to Abraham, and explained with greater clarity what he wanted his relationship with Abraham to look like. And in verse 15, God is continuing that conversation, but switches over to a significantly different topic, concerning Abraham’s wife and the promise of a new child. The birth announcement here gets quite a bit of attention in this section of text. It’s repeated twice – once to Abraham and then again to Sarah in Chapter 18. But it’s worth asking the question – why? Why does God give this piece of information in advance? Why does he interact with Abraham and Sarah here in the way that he does?

It’s actually really important to ask questions like this, because if you’re anything like me, when you read parts of the Bible like this, it’s easy to just focus on the people, on the events, on the dialogue. And we can forget to ask the question – but what was God doing in this part of history? What does God want me to see, by giving me a window into what’s happening here?

As we work through the text, we’ll see that God is shining greater light on a few of his personal characteristics, to further develop the faith of his people. There are three characteristics of God we’ll consider from the text: First, God’s power. Second, God’s prerogative – which is just a fancy way of talking about the authority he has to do whatever he wills. And third, we’ll see God’s presence. These three things will be my three main points this morning.

God’s Prerogative

So we’ll start by seeing what our text points out concerning God’s prerogative – the supreme authority he has to decide what will take place. In the second half of Chapter 17, we see this expressed in a few different ways: in God’s renaming of Sarah, in God’s promise of another child, and in God’s choice of Isaac over Ishmael.

We first see God exercising his authority in verse 15: “And God said to Abraham, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. [verse 16] I will bless her, and moreover, I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall become nations; kings of peoples shall come from her.”

The Lord starts here by saying that Abraham’s wife – who up to this point has been called Sarai – her name needs to be changed. And just as the first man, Adam, exercised his authority in Genesis 2 by naming the animals, God wields his authority by giving new names to Abraham (as we saw last week) and now to Sarah.

You may remember, Abraham’s name had been “Abram,” meaning exalted father. But that name had been too small to fit with God’s promises. So God renamed him “Abraham”, meaning father of a multitude, because Abraham would become the father of a multitude of nations.

And now God is doing something similar for Sarai. The name Sarai means “my princess,” or “my high-ranking woman.” In contrast, the name Sarah doesn’t mean “my princess,” but it simply means, “princess.” It may not seem like a big change at first. But you have to realize, that having the name “my princess” just indicated that there was someone out there who viewed her as a princess. You can imagine a dad telling his daughter, “You’ll always be my princess.” It’s a cutesy way to talk, but a title like that doesn’t convey any real weight. So God says, “Sarah, you are now objectively a woman of high rank. You’re not just your daddy’s princess anymore. I am making you truly royal.” God promises that “she shall become nations” and “kings of peoples shall come from her.”

So God exercises his prerogative – his Lordship – by giving Sarah a new name and committing himself to bless her in a way she didn’t expect or ask for. He’ll make her the mother of nations and kings.

But how will this happen? Up until this point, Sarah has been barren. But the Lord testifies to Abraham here: “… I will give you a son by her.” When God originally promised to make Abraham’s offspring into a great nation 24 years earlier, my guess is that at that time Abraham probably assumed that Sarah was going to be the mother. It maybe didn’t seem likely, since Sarah was in her 60s, but it still seemed possible from a human vantage point. After all, in modern history, we have examples of this sort of thing taking place. Just a few years ago, there was a woman in China who had a child at the age of 67 after applying herbal Chinese fertility treatments to herself. And a 73-year-old Indian woman gave birth to twins in 2019 after using IVF.

But now, after 24 years, Sarah’s no longer in her 60s, or even in her 70s – but in verse 17, Abraham notes that she’s 90 years old. She’s at an age where bearing children now seems to be entirely out of the question. It’s worth noting, as I’ve mentioned in previous sermons – the book of Genesis reports that human lifespans had the potential to be quite a bit longer than is true today. People maybe had fewer genetic mutations back then, and didn’t seem to experience the effects of aging as early as we do now. But even with this accounted for, it’s clear from our text that Sarah’s fertility was well past its expiration date.

So ever since Abraham had a son, Ishmael, 13 years earlier, through Sarah’s maidservant Hagar, he probably wasn’t expecting another son. He was likely expecting that God would keep his promises through Ishmael. But now the LORD explicitly says he’s going to give Abraham a son through Sarah.

And how does Abraham respond? Look at verse 17: “Then Abraham fell on his face, and laughed and said to himself, ‘Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?’” Abraham’s response here is interesting – it’s wonderfully realistic, actually. Because it’s a perfect demonstration of how the human heart can be torn between two very different feelings and impulses. On the one hand, when Abraham hears this Word, he falls on his face before God. He worships and believes God Almighty. But on the other hand, Abraham can’t help but find God’s plan is bizarre – it seems silly. Do 100-year-old men really have children with 90-year-old women? It’s not so much that Abraham believed that God couldn’t do what he promised. Romans 4:20 attests that, “No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God” – he knew God could do it. But to Abraham, God’s plan didn’t make sense. It seemed unnecessarily absurd.

So in verse 18, he says to God, “Oh that Ishmael might live before you!” As far as Abraham is concerned, he already has a son that God can bless. He doesn’t need God to do this ridiculous thing, and give his 90-year-old wife a son. He has Ishmael. To Abraham. that’s what makes sense. If it were up to him, God would just bless the son he already has.

But it isn’t up to Abraham. He isn’t the one in charge. We can’t even say that Abraham and God are two equal parties that are working to negotiate a compromise. Instead, God makes it clear here that He, the LORD, has the prerogative to act according to his ways and wisdom. And in verse 19, God exercises that authority by denying Abraham’s suggestion. He says, “No, but Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac.”

It shouldn’t escape our attention, that this is perhaps one of the clearest examples in the Bible where a righteous man asks God for something and God says No. And what’s comforting here is when God says no, it’s not to punish Abraham for his lack of faith. It’s not because He’s distant and disinterested in Abraham’s welfare. But in this case, when God says, “No,” it’s actually in order to bring Abraham even greater blessing than what he was originally asking for.

And the fact that God has the authority and the right to do whatever he has determined to do – that’s actually good news – for us and for Abraham. By overriding Abraham’s vote, and saying, “No” – by insisting on the birth of Isaac, God produced the family tree that ultimately brought forth Jesus Christ. God gave a strong No to Abraham, so that he would be able to give an equally strong Yes to every sinner who comes to him looking for forgiveness and eternal life.

Notice, though, this passage also draws attention to God’s decision-making authority – his prerogative – in one more way. Further along in verse 19, God gives some explanation about this new son, Isaac, and he says, “I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him. As for Ishmael, I have heard you: behold, I have blessed him and will make him fruitful and multiply him greatly. He shall father twelve princes, and I will make him into a great nation. But I will establish my covenant with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this time next year.”

God makes a distinction between Ishmael and Isaac. He doesn’t treat them the same way. They have the same father. Outwardly, they end up receiving the sign of the same covenant. But God chooses to establish his covenant with Isaac, and not with Ishmael. Isaac is the one who will inherit the promises. God ultimately has the right to decide.

And it’s important for us to realize this because this is part of what it means for God to be God. He’s the one who chooses who will inherit his blessings. From a human perspective, when you first trusted in Jesus Christ, there’s definitely a sense in which you chose to have a relationship with God. I’m not denying that at all. But this passage explains that the reason why you chose to have a relationship with God, is because God first chose to establish a relationship with you.

Just consider, here, Isaac hasn’t even been born yet! He hasn’t done anything sinful or saintly. He hasn’t chosen God yet. And yet God confirms that Isaac will enjoy the covenant bond and blessings – why? Because God says so. The decision doesn’t rest in us – it doesn’t depend on how deserving we are – but when blessings come, it’s because we have a God in heaven who is determined to show saving grace to crooks and clowns like us!

So if you’re trusting in Christ today, and resting in His promises, and eagerly awaiting the blessings of heaven, you can’t take credit for any of it. You can’t look down on other people, as though you’re better than them. Because the decision to rescue you from your spiritual blindness and deadness was God’s decision – not yours. The decision to bless you was God’s decision. Whenever one of our children grows up to walk with Christ – the parents weren’t the ones who ultimately made that decision. It’s not something for parents to brag about. But it’s a gift. It’s further evidence of God’s particular, persistent saving grace. All honor and glory and thanksgiving belongs to the Lord.

And this is why when we gather each week, we aren’t worshipping the pastor, for preaching a transformational sermon. We aren’t worshipping the musician, for causing people to feel the love of God. We aren’t worshipping ourselves, and how noble and good-hearted we are. Instead, we come to worship God, who has deliberately chosen to save his people.

God’s Presence

But let’s turn our attention to the beginning of Chapter 18. Because here God shows us something else about himself. We see a clearer picture of God’s presence.

The Manner of God’s Presence

The first thing I want to point out is the manner of God’s presence. Because the way that the LORD comes to be present with Abraham, here, in this text – it’s unique compared to the way that God has been with Abraham in the past. Back in Genesis 12, we saw that the LORD simply spoke to Abraham. Later, Abraham received a blessing from the LORD through a priestly mediator – through Melchizedek, in Chapter 14. In Genesis 15, verse 1, “… the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision.” And at the beginning of Genesis 17, we’re even told that the LORD appeared to Abram – though we’re not told what form the Lord took at that point.

But now, in Genesis 18, notice how the LORD makes his presence known to Abraham, starting in verse 1: “And the LORD appeared to him by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the door of his tent in the heat of the day. He lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing in front of him…” The LORD and two of his angels come to Abraham in a form that is distinctly, and yet mysteriously human-like.

We can figure out that these three men are the LORD and two of his angels based on the following context. Later in the chapter, in verse 22, we see that the men – two of the men – turn from there and go toward Sodom, while Abraham remains there before the LORD. And at the beginning of Chapter 19, we’re told that those two men sent to Sodom are two angels. So these three men are the LORD and two of his angels. The math isn’t too complicated here.

But the unthinkable, unbelievable thing here is that the infinite, everlasting God appears to Abraham in the form of a mortal man. The glorious Spirit who spoke the universe into existence – he lowers himself and comes to Abraham in the form of a lowly creature of dust. There’s a part of us that wants to deny that God would ever reduce himself to such a humiliating condition like this.

But this isn’t even the first time that the LORD has done something like this in the book of Genesis. When I preached on Genesis 16, the angel of the LORD appeared to Hagar. And at the time, I clarified that the phrase “the angel of the LORD” isn’t speaking about an angel at all, but it’s talking about the LORD himself, taking on the form of a messenger – the form of a man.

And now the LORD is appearing in a similar manner once again. He isn’t just appearing this way in the context of a dream or vision. He isn’t just appearing as a ghostly spirit that looks like a man. But from what we can see here, the LORD temporarily takes on a true human body, in all of its physicalness. In verse 8, the LORD and those two angels – they eat food. The LORD is drawing near here in a unique way.

And as the LORD comes and is present with Abraham’s household – who we could refer to as the Old Testament Church – the manner of LORD’s presence here is sweet and significant for a couple reasons.

For one thing, it shows us that God is willing to bring himself low to relate to his people. He’s like an adult who drops down on one knee to speak at the same level as a child – like a Dad who patiently listens to the excited babbling of the son he loves, even at times that it doesn’t make sense.

And for another thing, God’s presence here foreshadows how we will stoop down even lower for the sake of his people. God isn’t a white-collar executive who’s reluctant to get his hands dirty with us. But Jesus Christ, the divine Son of God, took on a human nature, perfectly and permanently. He came and died for his people once and for all, so that all who believe would come and live with Him forever. And even now, Jesus has given us the Holy Spirit to every Christian – God is present with us now, and is persistently working to make us more like Christ. God isn’t ashamed to relate to us. But the text gives us a preview of how God works. The way that God will bring his people to be with him, is by lowering himself to be with his people.

The Manners of a Guest’s Presence

As a brief sidenote, here, I also want you to notice Abraham’s manners, as he responds to the presence of these three men. There’s no indication that he knew who these men were. Even though Abraham greets them here by saying, “O Lord,” in verse 3, he’s not using the proper name of God “the LORD” – all caps. He’s using a different word, which generically means, “Master.” And by addressing them as “Master,” Abraham is showing that he views himself as their servant. If you look at Genesis 19, verse 2, Lot greets the two angels and shows them hospitality in the same way. And this humble mindset and eagerness to show hospitality is held out to us as an example worth following. Later in the Bible, in Hebrews 13:2, we’re urged, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” I think it’s pretty clear that Abraham’s example here is in view.

But even if the person we’re hosting isn’t an angel, any person we have in our home – any stranger or traveler we assist – that person is made in the image of God. Both in season and out of season, we should seek to have a readiness to serve the Lord, by showing regard for people made in his likeness. Hospitality shouldn’t be something that needs to be extracted from us. But as we consider how God was present for us, to care for us when we were strangers – and how God continues to care for us as we wander in the world, waiting for the land of promise – it should motivate us to show joyful hospitality to others, as well.

God’s Power

But now that we’ve considered what this passage says about God’s prerogative, and God’s presence, there’s one more thing we’ll consider from the text. Notice what we see here about God’s power.

In verse 9, these three men ask, “Where is Sarah, your wife?” And Abraham responds, “She is in the tent.” And the LORD says, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife shall have a son.”

It turns out that Sarah was eavesdropping, just inside the door of the tent. And the text points out, again, that Abraham and Sarah were old, and that the way of women had ceased to be with Sarah – she was no longer fertile and biologically, humanly in a condition to start or sustain a pregnancy. And so when Sarah hears this news – apparently she hadn’t heard this news from Abraham yet (so husbands, make a point of developing good communication with your wives) – when Sarah hears this news, she laughs to herself as we see in verse 12. This isn’t an audible laugh, but she’s inwardly amused.

And the main reason Sarah is laughing inwardly isn’t just because it seems like a funny idea (as in Abraham’s case), but it seems to be because she doesn’t believe it can happen. Sarah gives no demonstration of faith or reverence here. It’s quite possible that she assumes that these three men are random Bobs and Toms from who-knows-where. And so she asks herself, “After I am worn out, and my lord is old, shall I have this pleasure?” She assumes the answer is no.

But then the LORD challenges Sarah – he shows that he knows our inward thoughts and emotions – and he asks, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?’” Is anything too hard for the LORD? At this appointed time, I will return to you, about this time, next year, and Sarah shall have a son. Sarah tries to deny that she laughed about it. But the LORD knows he isn’t mistaken. He knows our hearts – and he knows what he’s going to bring about in the future.

But why would God choose to display his power in this way? Why wouldn’t God just bless Ishmael? Why does he insist on giving Abraham and Sarah a son after so many years, in their old age?

We could probably think of several possible reasons why. It’s possible that God was teaching Abraham that his promises often come later than we might expect. Or it’s possible that God was showing Abraham the incredible power of his grace toward Sarah, despite all her flaws and mistakes. It could also be that God was giving evidence that, He, the LORD, was the living and true God, in contrast to the idols, the Baals, and the false fertility gods of the Canaannites around him. All these things might be part of the equation here.

But more than all these things, this promise of a son – was a way of compelling Abraham and Sarah to recognize God’s power, and to rely entirely on it. Because you have to remember here – Abraham had been trying to have a child with Sarah for at least a quarter of a century. And he’s been unable to do it! Depending on human effort has produced nothing but failure over and over again. It has been impossible for Abraham and Sarah to produce a son! And so this is a perfect way for God to show them his power – in the very arena where they have been powerless.

And since the child of promise is coming from God, Abraham and Sarah are placed in a position where 100% of the credit for this baby’s birth will go to God. God is using this opportunity to say, “Abraham, Sarah, this child will come, not because of your good behavior, or because of your cleverness, or because of your strength or fertility, or anything else in you. I’m the one who will bless you.”

And in the same regard, any blessedness you and I likewise comes from the LORD. If you and I are recipients of salvation, if we’re growing in integrity, if we’re used by God to help someone trust in Jesus – these aren’t things to gloat about. They’re things to give thanks about. Because blessings like these don’t come through the power of man, but only through the power of God.

And we should be encouraged here: if God has the power to do what seems humanly impossible – if he can give Abraham a baby through a barren, 90-year-old woman – then He surely follow through on his other grand promises, as well. He can follow through on promises to multiply Abraham’s descendants, to make them into a mighty nations and kings, to give them the land of Canaan, and to bless the nations. He can bring every spiritual blessing in Christ, to fully forgive us of all our sins, to raise his people from death to eternal life, and to bring us into a new heavens and a new earth. “Is anything too hard for the LORD?” The answer is no! So as we work, worship, pray, and proclaim – let’s do all that we do with confidence in God’s power to bless his people. Let’s pray: