Faith and patience, like peas and carrots

Genesis 15:1-6
Afterward the LORD spoke to Abram in a vision and said to him, "Do not be afraid, Abram, for I will protect you, and your reward will be great."
But Abram replied, "O Sovereign LORD, what good are all your blessings when I don't even have a son? Since I don't have a son, Eliezer of Damascus, a servant in my household, will inherit all my wealth. You have given me no children, so one of my servants will have to be my heir."
Then the LORD said to him, "No, your servant will not be your heir, for you will have a son of your own to inherit everything I am giving you." Then the LORD brought Abram outside beneath the night sky and told him, "Look up into the heavens and count the stars if you can. Your descendants will be like that--too many to count!"
And Abram believed the LORD, and the LORD declared him righteous because of his faith.

Genesis 16:1-3, 15
But Sarai, Abram's wife, had no children. So Sarai took her servant, an Egyptian woman named Hagar, and gave her to Abram so she could bear his children. "The LORD has kept me from having any children," Sarai said to Abram. "Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her." And Abram agreed. So Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife.
So Hagar gave Abram a son, and Abram named him Ishmael.


GOD promised Abram that he would have many descendants - his own children, not those of his servants. Abram believed because he knew GOD's character and trusted HIM. But as time went on, it seems as if Abram and Sarai forgot about GOD's faithfulness to them in the past. (See Genesis 12, 13, and 14.)

I'm sure that both Abram and Sarai struggled in their faith while they waited. They had seen HIS faithfulness before... but what if? Sometimes the "what ifs" can be very persuasive. Many of you have been there and you understand perfectly how tempting it is to take the situation into your own hands and "fix it." I read a book recently that talked about our desire to be our own god, always trying to to gain control of things around us. That's where Abram and Sarai were, and that's where we are right now.

Unfortunately, Sarai did not wait on GOD's perfect timing and plan, but went to the drawing board and came up with her own. And equally unfortunate is the fact that Abram didn't step in to stop her and lovingly lead her back to HIM.

When Sarai came to Abram and said, "The LORD has kept me from having children. Go sleep with my maidservant..." (Genesis 16:2) she essentially assigned the wrong description to GOD's actions. Rather than trusting HIM with the big picture, she focused only on what she could see with her limited vision.

The story seems to end with Abram first having a son named Ishmael with Sarai's maidservant, and later the son GOD promised with Sarai, named Isaac. But what we know now is that the story is still unfolding today as Abram's desendants are still at war. Imagine how different their story, and history, and the present would be if Abram and Sarai had been patient and trusted in HIS faithfulness?

Hebrews 10:23
Let us hold unswervingly to the faith we profess, for HE who promised is faithful.

Pray that...
... we will be patient, trusting and fully relying on HIS faithfulness
... we do not take things into our hands, but leave our lives in HIS
... Jonathan will lovingly lead me to rely on GOD, and that I will respectfully and submit to his leadership