Perhaps in your circle of acquaintances you might know a 90 year old woman. Or you probably know some 90 year old female celebrities, such as Barbara Eden from I Dream of Jeannie fame. Comedian Carol Burnett is 89, which is close. How surprised would you be if you heard on the news tomorrow that either one of these women was pregnant?! You would think that the news made a mistake, or that this was some kind of April Fool’s Day joke. Our Scripture for today gives the account of just such an occurrence. Let’s look into this Scripture to see how they reacted.
Prior to the opening of our Scripture passage, God had given elderly Abraham the promise of a son (Genesis 15:1-6). After years of waiting, with no child to show, Abraham’s wife Sarah gave her servant girl to Abraham to have a child with, and Ishmael came from that. However, that was not what God wanted, and He did not count that illegitimate child as fulfillment of His promise to Abraham of a son and heir. Years have passed, and now Abraham is 100 and his wife Sarah is 90. At Sarah’s age they most certainly have given up hope of having any children. The oldest verified case of a woman giving birth naturally, without any type of medical procedures, was a woman at age 59. Sarah had passed that age by over 30 years earlier.
As our passage opens, Abraham is visited by three men, who are actually the Lord God and two angels, though Abraham didn’t immediately realize this. He offers them hospitality, allowing them to rest in the shade of his tents, and has a meal prepared for them (vs. 1-6). While they ate, the Lord God renewed His promise to Abraham that he would have a son by his wife, Sarah (vs. 9-10). This time He was specific about the time, stating that by this time the next year she would already have given birth.
Sarah was inside their tent nearby, and she heard what was said. She knew that 90 year old women don’t have babies, nor do 100 year old men! This was preposterous! Even when she was young enough to bear children she hadn’t, so how in the world could she bear a child now, at 90! And Abraham, well, he was old too! Yeah, right! Sarah quietly laughed to herself (vs. 11-12).
Though this wasn’t a loud laugh, and wasn’t actually heard outside the tent, the Lord knew that Sarah had laughed, that she had doubted (vs. 13). We can’t hide anything from God, including our private thoughts and emotions. He knows everything about us (Psalm 139:1-4). When Sarah was questioned about her laugh, she got nervous as she was beginning to realize Who it was who was out there with her husband, so she told a lie, denying her laughter. God gently reprimanded her, that yes, she had laughed (vs. 15).
God also asked both Abraham and Sarah if there was anything too hard for Him to do (vs. 14). For God to work a miracle in Sarah’s body, enabling her to have a baby, was not too hard. The Lord God created our bodies, and if He so chooses, He can have them do some things that it normally wouldn’t do, such as a 90 year old woman conceiving and bearing a child naturally.
The Lord asks us the same question He did to Abraham and Sarah. Is anything too hard for God? The answer is a resounding No! We can insert any problem we might have into that question, and the answer is still no. Abraham and Sarah did not have the written Scriptures to turn to in order to boost their faith. They didn’t have multiple hundreds of examples in the Bible to reference where God provided miracles for His children, like we have. Yet how often do we doubt and laugh, just like Sarah did?
Things that we find impossible to do, God finds very easy (Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:37). This should remind us that God is personally involved in our life, and we can always ask for His power to help us. We can always trust every one of His promises to us.
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