Delay is not Denial [pt.2]

This is part 2 in conjunction to “Difference is not Deficit”. If you haven’t read that one, I would encourage you to do so. While you’re here, I’d love for you to read and share this blog with friends, family and even people you don’t like. Now to the nitty gritty…

Let me start with this phrase: “God is faithful to His promise.”

God has promised us the things we desire if only we seek Him first, “Seek first the kingdom of God and everything will be added unto you.” (Matthew 6:33) I know you’re saying, “Well I’ve been praying forever for [insert want here], and I haven’t heard a thing from God. I’m waiting but He isn’t answering my prayers,” and so on. To that I have to sing, He may not come when you want Him, but He’ll be there on time.

This past Sunday I was sitting in church listening to the Word when God spoke to me and told me that this message is for someone you know. I love when He sends confirmation about things. I was looking for a verse to complete this blog and God sends it to me hand wrapped, signed, sealed and delivered.

The story of Sarah, Abraham’s wife, fits to illustrate God keeping His promise.

Genesis 18:9-12

⁹ “Where is your wife Sarah?” they asked him. “There, in the tent,” he said.  ¹⁰ Then one of them said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son.” Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. ¹¹ Abraham and Sarah were already very old, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. ¹² So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?”

God’s Promise to Abraham and his wife was that they will have a son. This story actually starts earlier in Genesis (12:2-3) when God told Abraham that He will make Abraham into a great nation, his name will be great. Between chapter 12 and chapter 18, Abraham and his wife grew tired of waiting for God’s promise to come. Being tired of waiting for God, Sarah took it in her own hands. She told Abraham that since God hasn’t let her have children he could sleep with their maid (Hagar) so that he could have his children that God promised. Abraham agreed and with that, the servant became pregnant with a child. Sarah became jealous and mistreated Hagar to the point she ran away. As she ran away, an angel found her and told her that her son will live in hostility toward all his brothers. We eventually get to chapter 18, where God says that Sarah will have a son.

We skip over to chapter 21:1-7.

¹ Now the LORD was gracious 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 very time God had promised him. ³ Abraham gave the name Isaac^[a] to the son Sarah bore him. ⁴ When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God commanded him. ⁵ Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. ⁶ Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.” ⁷ And she added, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

His promise was kept. Even in her old age, God blessed Sarah and Abraham with their own child.

Sometimes we try to rush what God has promised us and we get into situations that we wouldn’t have been in the first place. Sarah didn’t want to wait for God because she thought she was getting too old and God couldn’t possibly let her conceive at such an old age. With her putting things in her own hands, she cursed an entire people. We read that in Genesis 16:11-12, that “he [Hagar’s son] will live in hostility toward all his brothers.” If not for Sarah telling Abraham to sleep with the maid, there would not have been a need for Hagar to run away with her unborn child with this curse placed on him.

Think back to a time you asked God for something and instead of waiting for what He has already promised, you stop waiting and try to make a way for yourself. What was the outcome of your impatience? If God says that He will do something for you, you have to have faith in Him to know that it will be done. God is faithful to His promise.

I will leave you with this thought and I will be on my way:

If you could see everything that God has planned for you, there would be no reason for faith, and if you can’t believe in the unseen, you will be stuck with what you can see.

I don’t know about you, but I have faith for God to do just what He says…exceedingly, abundantly above all that I can ask for according to the power that works in me. I pray that you have found some peace in this today. God is faithful to His promise; you just have to put in the faith to believe it to be so.

Amen!