Loving God, you promised that all the nations of the earth would be blessed through Abraham and Sarah and their offspring, and in Jesus you fulfilled that promise.  Help us to believe and trust in your promises to us, through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

    For many people, faith is a difficult thing.  Some want every conceivable discrepancy in the little details to be cleared up before they can believe.  Others find God responsible for tragedies in their lives and refuse to believe in a God who would allow such things.  Still others seek some sort of proof that God exists and that Jesus Christ is worth believing in.  And others are quite happy with themselves as the ones in control, and don’t find a need for God at all, perhaps until tragedy hits home.

    Faith can be difficult, and yet it is the number one thing that God asks of us: Abram “believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness” (Gen. 15:6).  In other words, God says to Abram, “You have believed my promises, and that puts you in a right relationship with me.”  Now, before you start thinking that Abram is from way back when and has nothing to do with us, think again.  In many ways, Abram’s experience of faith (and Sarai’s, too!) is not so different from our own.

    Take, for example, Abram’s apparent state of mind in the first reading that we heard today from Genesis (15:1-6).  Even though he receives what sounds like a marvellous promise from God, you can almost hear the despair in Abram’s reply.  Abram is given the promise of protection on his journey and great reward in the future.  However, Abram goes to God in prayer and says, “What good does any of this do me when I do not have a child to be my heir?  Woe is me - for a slave born in my house will end up inheriting all that I have.”

    Have you ever wanted one thing more than anything else and despaired of ever receiving it?  Well - you and Abram both!  You see, to Abram, a son would mean immortality.  His name would live on, and the inheritance would remain in his own family.  In Abram’s land and culture, to have a son was everything.  And so, when Abram saw both himself and Sarai getting older and older, and still no children, he began to sink into despair.

    However, then a truly amazing thing happens.  Abram is drawn out to look at the stars in the sky and is given God’s promise: “That’s how many your descendants will be!”  And Abram believes it!  Now there’s a leap of faith.  And it is that faith that is accepted by God as evidence of Abram’s right relationship with him.

    This is where we might begin to think again that Abram is so very different from us.  However, while it is true that Abram and Sarai have some amazing moments of incredibly strong faith, he and Sarai also have their moments of doubt and of despair and of unfaithfulness and even of incredulous laughter.  Their faith is not always strong.  When Abram is 99 years old and Sarai is 90 and they still haven’t had a child, there are certainly a few doubts there.

    And yet, in spite of the times when their faith wavers - in spite of the times when they sink into despair - in spite of the times when they try to take matters into their own hands - God keeps his promises.  Abraham and Sarah - who are given new names once they are into their nineties (Gen. 17) - do indeed have a son - Isaac - and many more descendants after him.  And long afterwards, Abraham and Sarah are named as the ancestors of all those who dare to believe God’s promises (Gal. 3:7).

    For our part, we have an advantage that Abraham and Sarah didn’t have.  We have the witness of the Scriptures, which include the stories of Abraham and so many others who strove to live lives of faith.  We have the advantage of being able to look back and to see that in every case, God was faithful.  All along the way, people do all sorts of things, both faithful and unfaithful.  In fact, many of the people in the Bible are far from being saints.  Yet, in all cases God is faithful, and God keeps his promises in spite of human frailties and failings.

    However, this doesn’t mean that everything we do is okay.  There are consequences in the Scriptures when people act in rebellious and unfaithful ways.  Moses, as great as he was, wasn’t allowed to enter the promised land because of his sin.  And it took the rest of the people over 40 years to get there because of their rebelliousness along the way.  God kept the promise of a land of their own, but many of the people never saw it for themselves because of their rebellion against God.

    For us, too, God will not go back on any of his promises, but we are free to reject them.  In fact, I wonder how many promises we have already heard in our worship together today.  There is certainly the promise of forgiveness.  Come to God, ready to change your mind and your heart and confessing your sinfulness and your need for Jesus Christ, and you are forgiven.  That’s one promise.

    And then there are all of the promises associated with baptism: God adopts us as his own children and gives us an inheritance of eternal life.  Death will not be the end for us, but resurrection, because we have been united with Jesus Christ.  God pours out his Holy Spirit on us and gives us gifts for ministry and service.  God sets us free from the power of sin, which keeps us totally turned in on ourselves, and instead fills our hearts with love for God and for the people around us.  These things God promises us in baptism!

    And how many promises did we hear today in our Scripture readings?  Hebrews contains the promise of a heavenly homeland for all those who put their faith in Jesus Christ.  The gospel from Luke promises that those who belong to Jesus have no need to fear.  We don’t need to fear whether we are in or out of God’s kingdom.  In fact, God wants us to be part of his kingdom, which begins during our life on this earth and then is fully experienced in the world to come.  Even if we were to sell our possessions and give the money to the poor, we still would not need to fear, for those who seek God’s kingdom above all else always have enough and will experience even more abundance in the future.

    Finally, there is an amazing promise in the gospel that communicates to us how highly valued we are in God’s sight.  Imagine that the master in the story is Jesus and that you have spent many years serving him.  You have always been aware of his presence and have watched for him in the people you meet and in worship and in answers to prayer.  One day, Jesus shows up, and rather than having you serve him, he seats you at the table and waits on you, serving you a marvellous feast.  This is how valuable you are to God.

    All of these, and more, are promises from God to us.  God will not withdraw them or go back on them, but we are free to reject them.  We are also free to claim them, which happens through faith in Jesus Christ.  At base, even faith is a gift, but it helps immensely when we open ourselves to the Spirit of God.  And faith, of course, leads to action – just as Abraham and Sarah set out from their homeland to travel to a new place, directed by God, but not knowing where they were going (Heb. 11:8).

    May we also look toward the kingdom that God has in mind for us, not always knowing where we are going, but knowing that God is faithful and does what he has promised, and God will lead the way.  Amen.

Lectionary 19(C)                            Genesis 15:1-6
August 8, 2010                            Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16
St. Luke’s Zion Lutheran Church                    Luke 12:32-40
Pastor Lynne Hutchison

© 2010 Lynne Hutchison  All Rights Reserved