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Find Hope When It Seems Impossible

  • 4 hours ago
  • 14 min read

Genesis 18:9-15 NIV 

[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?” [13] Then the Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really have a child, now that I am old?’ [14] Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year, and Sarah will have a son.” [15] Sarah was afraid, so she lied and said, “I did not laugh.” But he said, “Yes, you did laugh.” 

Have you ever seen a promise from God in the Bible that seemed to be completely wonderful, but you didn’t yet seem to be experiencing it? 


Now, we need to be careful with this. There are plenty of conmen out there who take Bible verses and twist them into something they are not. Paul warned us of this:


Acts 20:29-30 NIV 

[29] I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock. [30] Even from your own number men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them.  

However, there are plenty of Scriptures that can point to a better life we don’t yet see,


Scriptures like: 


Isaiah 40:30-31 NIV 

[30] Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; [31] but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. 

Jeremiah 31:16-17 NIV 

[16] This is what the Lord says: “Restrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from tears, for your work will be rewarded,” declares the Lord. “They will return from the land of the enemy. [17] So there is hope for your descendants,” declares the Lord. “Your children will return to their own land. 

Proverbs 3:5-6 NIV 

[5] Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; [6] in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/pro.3.5-6.NIV)


And there are many, many more. 


Now, again, we must be very careful quoting verses out of context and claiming them as ours. That’s a bit like walking into a restaurant cloakroom and claiming someone else’s fancy jacket is yours.  


However, it is quite possible for us to correctly understand and apply Bible verses, but for them to not yet be our lived reality. 


I know I have been there. More often than I would like. 


The Bible story we are looking at in this study is a picture of two people who had received some incredible promises from God. They had suffered. They had suffered long. Their suffering cannot be minimised. They waited for longer than many of us would wait for those promises to be fulfilled. 


Yet they still seemed a long distance away.  


We are looking in this study at the lives of Abraham and Sarah. 


Now, I am sure that you already know the outcome. Abraham is the father of three of the world’s biggest and most dominant religions. It isn’t hard to work out what happened next. In fact, it’s almost impossible for me to spoil it. 


The purpose of this study is not to surprise you with some spectacular twist or to keep you on tenterhooks, waiting on the outcome of a huge cliffhanger.  


No, it’s to point out lessons we can learn from these two great heroes of the faith who endured through one of the most difficult and heart-rending times any human being can face. 


Let’s start, then, by looking at The Problem. 

 

The Problem 

Genesis 11:30 NIV 

[30] Now Sarai was childless because she was not able to conceive. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/gen.11.30.NIV)


I will never underestimate the pain of childlessness or barrenness. My wife and I did not suffer from this pain: we got married in May and she was pregnant by September. 


However, I have close relatives who waited ten years and endured multiple IVF treatments before they had children. We also have a family in our church who have three children, but due to their physiology, each birth put not only the child’s life on the line, but also that of the mother. 


Every human birth is a miracle from God. Some people get to experience that miracle quickly. Others much later. Some not at all. 


And that is very sad and difficult. 


No-one should underestimate the pain of childlessness for those who want to bear children. 


And in ancient Middle-Eastern culture, even more so.  


They had received this command centuries earlier from God through Noah: 


Genesis 9:1 NIV 

[1] Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/gen.9.1.NIV)


But for women like Sarah, that was impossible.  


She was barren. 


The Bible tells us that by the time Abraham and Sarah obeyed the call of God and headed for the Promised Land, Abraham was already seventy-five and Sarah was sixty-five (Genesis 12:4). They had received this amazing promise from God: 


Genesis 12:2-3 NIV 

[2] “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. [3] I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/gen.12.2-3.NIV)


But even if Sarah had not been barren, her child-bearing years had already passed. 


It looked like she could not be the means of this blessing being fulfilled. 


Yet both Abraham and Sarah still obeyed God and did what He told them. 


Their situation appeared humanly impossible. There was no clear path to seeing God’s promise to them fulfilled. They lived with what seemed like a serious inadequacy compared to their peers and to what God had promised then would happen, yet they still obeyed. 


That is what made them heroes of faith: 


Hebrews 11:8 NIV 

[8] By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/heb.11.8.NIV)


We can often find ourselves in this position. I know I have – on very many occasions. You find yourself staring into an unknown future, barely even able to see one step into the future, and the only thing sustaining you are God’s promises when you can’t see how they will ever be fulfilled. 


The way ahead – the only way ahead – is to move forward in faith, no matter the cost, and to trust God.  


That is how the problem begins to be overcome. 


But things do not always go as smoothly as we would like. We have seen the problem, now we need to look at The Intervention. 

 

The Intervention 

Genesis 16:1-3 NIV 

[1] Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; [2] so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said. [3] So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife.  

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/gen.16.1-3.NIV)


Nowadays in the UK it’s pretty common to see health warnings on products – not just on cigarettes (where they are necessarily graphic), but also on food and drink. Some people may see this as an intrusion of the so-called ‘Nanny State’. I don’t. I see it as ensuring that we have the information in front of us in an easily digestible format for us to decide what we want to put into our bodies. If there are warnings on the product that it’s harmful for us and we consume it anyway, that’s our decision. 


Abraham and Sarah’s story comes with a massive health warning, and once we must heed. 


Now, I completely understand where this problem came from. At the time, Abraham was eighty-five and Sarah seventy-five. By now, God’s promise was already ten years old. There was no sign of it coming true. 


Given their advancing years, that would try the patience of any of us. 


So what did Sarah do? 


She appeared to have given up. It wasn’t going to happen through her, or so she believed, so she told Abraham to take Hagar as a secondary wife and have a child through her. 


As a slave and the property of her mistress, Hagar would have had no say in the matter at all. 


While we may well be scandalised by this – and are completely correct to feel this way – what we see is just how utterly wrong this decision was. It may have seemed to Sarah as if it was the only option available to her, but at the same time, it meant pushing down someone else to raise herself up. 


That can never be right. 


And the outcome of this intervention on their part still reverberates down through the centuries, even now. 


Hagar’s son was Ishmael (Genesis 16:11-16). He became the ancestor of the Arab nations. And then the forefather of Islam.  


Their intervention was serious. Very serious. 


It led to Abraham losing his first son (Genesis 21:8-21). It led to centuries of animosity (Nehemiah 2:19). 


It was a very bad idea. 


And it teaches us a very important lesson: it is always better to wait on God than run ahead of Him and make a mess. 


Psalms 27:14 NIV 

[14] Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/psa.27.14.NIV)


Lamentations 3:25-26 NIV 

[25] The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; [26] it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. 

Psalms 37:3-7 NIV 

[3] Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. [4] Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart. [5] Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: [6] He will make your righteous reward shine like the dawn, your vindication like the noonday sun. [7] Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when people succeed in their ways, when they carry out their wicked schemes. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/psa.37.3-7.NIV)


Maybe we think this doesn’t apply to us, because we’re not thinking of having a baby while we’re on the way to pick up our pension. But think of this: how many of us are tempted to take a shortcut to business success by dodging taxes or indulging in questionable business practices? 


Or resolving obstacles by paying bribes? 


Or cheat at school by getting AI to write your essays? 


Or not waiting for God to provide us with a partner and instead jumping into bed with the first person who shows us any affection? 


It’s all part of the same idea. 


No-one said it would be easy to wait on God. It wasn’t easy for Abraham and Sarah. It won’t be easy for us either. We can be sure of that. 


But still, we must wait. 


Because the prospects if we don’t can be shockingly bleak. 


So we see the problem, which was very serious. I don’t think we can ever downplay it. We see their intervention, which went seriously wrong. Lastly, we see The Solution. And it is really quite special. 

 

The Solution 

Genesis 21:1-5 NIV 

[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 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. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/gen.21.1-5.NIV)


I am, let’s face it, no longer a spring chicken. But I’m inspired by some of the people I see online who are older than me, and yet are able to travel and document their travels on YouTube. It’s quite something to see how many people watch them.  


Nowadays seniors have more possibilities for adventure than they ever did. 


Yet Abraham and Sarah experienced the greatest adventure of all when they would think most of the people we call seniors were spring chickens. 


Let’s review the timeline again. Abraham was seventy-five years old when he left Haran (Genesis 12:4). Let’s be serious here: at seventy-five years old, most people are settling into an easy chair with a TV remote and a tray full of food. And they are entitled to take things easy. They have made their contribution to society. 


But not Abraham. He was travelling on foot for hundreds of miles from southern Turkey to what we now call Israel. 


Sarah was sixty-five years old. That’s bus pass territory, not nomad territory.  


That is already extraordinary. 


But then, twenty-five years later – let me reiterate: twenty-five years later – God’s promise is fulfilled to them and they become parents when Abraham is one hundred years old and Sarah is ninety (Genesis 21:5). 


That is just extraordinary. 


No wonder Sarah laughed when she heard it (Genesis 18:10-15), and laughed again when it happened (Genesis 21:6-7). 


Now, of course, Abraham and Sarah's story doesn’t end there, but the factor I want us to concentrate on is this: they faced an impossible problem, their conniving made things worse, they were far from perfect (as their relationship with surrounding kingdoms and Hagar show all too clearly – see Genesis 12:10-20, 16:5-16, 20, 21:8-21), yet God still kept His promise: they still had Isaac at a time when it was just not possible. 


Hebrews explains why: 


Hebrews 11:11-12 NIV 

[11] And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise. [12] And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore. 

Genesis, however, shows that (quite understandably given their circumstances) Sarah also struggled with unbelief, and with the very idea that God would come through for them. 


But He did. And then some. 


This reminds me of this verse: 


2 Timothy 2:13 NIV 

[13] if we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot disown himself. 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/2ti.2.13.NIV)


When I was a child, we used to go for long walks through the countryside and up hills. We were poor. Walking is free.  


Some people bound up hillsides as if they are mountain goats. Some people (like me nowadays) go up a mild incline and start to wonder why no-one thought to build a cable car or an elevator. They struggle. But they keep going. 


The thing is, whether every step in life is a joy or a struggle to you, the main thing is that you reach the top, that you make it to the end. You will see the same view. You will bask in the glory of the same vista.  


And do you know something? You will appreciate it a lot more if you have to struggle for it. 


Abraham and Sarah struggled. There can be no doubt about that. But God rewarded them for their faith to keep going through their struggles and gave them their reward. 


Now is not the time to give up. 

 

Conclusion 

Hebrews 11:8-12 NIV 

[8] By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. [9] By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. [10] For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. [11] And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise. [12] And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore. 

In May 2001, I met a girl. I was on a leadership training course in the Philippines. As part of that course, I was told that even when looking for a life partner we should have a checklist of what we are looking for. I found that a little cold, as if I was buying a piece or electronics or a holiday, but my attempts at finding a wife had proved so utterly unsuccessful that I was willing to try anything at this stage. 


Well, she ticked all my boxes, even the ones I thought were a little silly. And she was very pretty, which always sweetens the deal when you’re a young man looking for love. 


But there was still a bit of a nagging doubt. 


I lay on the bottom bunk of my tiny cabin of the MV Doulos. A thought popped into my head: ‘She’s the one’. It almost felt like it was the voice of God. 


I argued with it. ‘Come on! I’m a penniless missionary in Romania. She’s an accountant in the Philippines. How is this supposed to work?’ 


She argued with it a lot more, apparently. I think my dress sense may have played a role in that. 


Yet now we have been married for more than twenty years. We hit hurdle after hurdle to be together. God blew them all away. 


I know precisely how it feels to face impossible barriers, to wonder if the vision God has given you will ever come true. 


It isn’t easy. It’s not supposed to be easy. 


Because faith does not prove its worth on Easy Street. Faith proves its worth on Trouble Lane, Impossible Avenue, Chronic Lack Boulevard, Inescapable Reality Cul de Sac, Not-Gonna-Happen Road. Faith does not shine in the light but glimmers and glistens in the darkness. 


Faith craves the flame of trial because only then is it proven to be real. 


There is little doubt that Abraham and Sarah’s faith was proven in this way. They faced a really impossible situation. There is no doctor in the world who could have reversed Sarah's barrenness – and why would they anyway? She was already sixty-five when they even arrived in the Promised Land! Most people would have told her to just forget the idea of having children, give it up as a bad loss and lean into retirement. 


Yet she still believed. She struggled with that belief. That much was plain. The Bible seems to indicate that she was like the father with a demon-possessed son who cried out to Jesus: 


Mark 9:24 NIV 

[24] Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” 

(Read the full passage at: https://bible.com/bible/111/mrk.9.24.NIV)


This appears to also be true of Sarah.  


Why else would she have intervened in her own situation and came up with the idea for Abraham to marry and impregnate Hagar? 


Yet in this decision and the chaos that ensued, we see the beautiful hand of grace. 


You see, God did not cut them off for their conniving. He did not scold them for their unbelief. Instead, He rewarded their faith and He kept His promise. 


There is a word for all of us here. Hard times often bring struggles. These struggles are not always just with our external reality. Often they are with our internal reality: our struggles to believe that God will come through for us, that He is righteous, that He is holy, that He is all-powerful, that He is good, that He is love, that He is working all things our for our good. 


These things are so easy to say, but when the chips are down they are often so hard to believe. 


Here’s the thing, though: 


God knows. 


Hebrews 4:14-16 NIV 

[14] Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. [15] For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. [16] Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. 

We do not have to hide our struggles. It’s pointless anyway. He sees them. 


Instead, we can be honest with God. We can confess them. We can repent of our wrongful thoughts.  


We can strengthen our belief in Him once more. 


And the beauty of it all? 


The story of Abraham and Sarah teaches us that God’s promise is unchanging. He will come through for us. 


All we need to do is have faith and remain faithful. 


Because nothing is impossible for God. 

 

Prayer 

Lord Jesus, I believe in You; forgive my unbelief. Forgive, I pray, my struggles with my situation. I know that nothing is impossible for You. I believe that You are working everything for my good and You will come through for me. Amen. 

 

Questions for Contemplation 

  • What impossible situation did Abraham and Sarah face? What impossible situations do you face? 

  • How did they respond to their impossible situation? Did they always get it right? 

  • What can we learn from them that applies to our situation? 

 

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