Genesis 17:17 and 18:12, we read that Abraham and Sarah had the same reaction when God announced to them the news that they would finally have a son – they both laughed at that news, and God answered in Genesis 18:14 “Is anything impossible for God?” Their laughter and response to that impossible news is nothing unusual. They reacted as any of us would in that situation. ‘Will it happen? Let it happen to me! Well, don’t be ridiculous. God, you really have a great sense of humor.’
Abraham’s answer was: “Can a child be born to him who is a hundred years old?” Will Sarah give birth at ninety?” And Sarah’s reply: “How will I, an old woman, give birth?” How something will be and in what way, it is not up to us to find out and know.
What we can read from Sarah’s and Abraham’s answers is a realistic perception of things in and around them. And that is a challenge that the Lord puts in front of us, just as he put it in front of Sarah and Abraham. When God makes a promise, the Word, he does not give it to us as we would say from our perspective. It might even be impossible. It is not up to us to judge and determine whether God can or cannot do something. Unfortunately, we often do exactly what Sarah and Abraham did. We laugh. We laugh and in fact say to God, there is no chance for me. Sometimes we say that not because we don’t believe that God can do it, but because we don’t believe that God can do it in me.
Sometimes we laugh at the faith of the people around us. “What now he want? Now he prays. Now she believes.” Do you know why we do this? Because we alone with God are not where we would like to be, and deep down we know that we should be. Thank God that he does not respond to our laughter with laughter, to our impossible with the impossible. How did God respond to Abraham’s and Sarah’s laughter?
“Is anything impossible for God”?
Luke 18:27 says: “What is impossible with men is possible with God.” It’s impossible for me. That’s fine as long as I know it’s possible for God. But we need to get out of the thinking – It is not impossible for me, and that’s why it’s not possible for God. You get out of it by faith.
The Bible says in Hebrews: “Without faith it is impossible to please him, for he who comes to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who diligently seek him.”
Ballistic rocket pioneer Wernher von Braun said: “I learned to use the word “impossible” with the utmost caution”. We wonder who he is? The scientist who enabled the first man to walk on the moon!
What will you choose for yourself: laughter because it is impossible, or faith, because with God everything is possible?