We can be tempted to laugh at God’s plans in our lives.  The human race has a bad track record on this.  Adam got the gift of life, with a simple command to never try to be God.  That’s exactly what he does.  Noah got a fresh start, to help the world get off on the right foot again.  He immediately gets drunk and falls into adultery.  Abraham and Sarah are promised millions of descendents who will bless the entire world, and he says disbelieves, has a child with a mistress, and laughs in God’s face.  Sarah encourages it, and then laughs at God, too.

Yet, God still blesses them, and the world through them.

Abraham and Sarah were promised their descendants would be numerous, and God would bless the entire world through them.  Years later, one of Abraham and Sarah’s descendants was told she too, would have an impossible baby, and he was the one who did bless the entire world.

Mary was a virgin, and knew it was impossible to have a baby, yet God said it would happen.  Her fiancé reacted poorly, ready to divorce her, but then was visited by an angel, who convinced him it would really happen.  And it did.  Jesus was born to Mary, centuries and centuries after Isaac was born to Sarah.  There are so many parallels in these stories.

God did bless the entire world through his descendent of Abraham.  He died and rose again, destroyed sin’s power over us, and incited us to new life in him.  He made it possible for anyone to know God personally, to have his Holy Spirit enter our hearts, as he committed to us in a new covenant.

In this story we see God chose to particularly bless one man, Abraham, so that another man could someday bless the entire world.

This blessing is freely offered to anyone in the entire world.  He simply asks for our commitment in return, that our hearts will be open to him, transformed by him, and that we will accept his invitation to be born again and start life over.

God makes promises about his kingdom and his desire for a relationship with us.  He makes promises about his plans for the world.  They may seem impossible, unworkable.

Don’t laugh, but trust.  This story shows us, he can do the impossible, even when it seems laughably unbelievable.

Challenge: Share the promises God has made to humanity with someone.

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