1/28/2024 0 Comments Sermon genesis 121 9 audioAnd when the visitor promises that she will bear a son in her post-menopausal years, Sarah, like Abraham before her, laughs ( tsahak) and says to herself, ““After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?” When he sets this hastily-prepared feast before the strangers, they eat and then ask after the missus - “Where is your wife Sarah?”Īs it turns out, Sarah is eavesdropping on the conversation from inside the tent entrance. He runs to meet them, bows down to the ground, runs to the tent to tell Sarah to whip up a good dinner, and runs to the herd to rustle up some good veal. He moves as fast as his 100-year-old legs will carry him. Because, while hospitality is quite literally a matter of life and death in that semi-arid climate, Abraham goes above and beyond the call of duty in his hosting of these guests. And he seems to know that they are no ordinary strangers. It seems likely that Genesis 17 and 18 were originally two different stories told to explain Isaac’s name but as we have them now, they function as “his” and “hers” equal-opportunity annunciations.Ībraham, by the oaks of Mamre, sees three men approaching in the heat of the day. And then God goes on to promise that Ishmael will become the father of a great nation, too, but God’s covenant will be with Isaac. God won’t have it: “No, but your wife Sarah shall bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac,” (17:19), which, of course, means “he laughs” ( yits-hak). At the thought of Sarah bearing a child in their golden years, Abraham falls on his face laughing (in Hebrew, tsahak) and reminds God that they’ve already solved this problem: “O that Ishmael might live in your sight!” (17:18). Except by this time, Sarah is 90 years old. I will bless her, and she shall give rise to nations kings of peoples shall come from her” (17:15-16). I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. God is a little more specific with his promises in Genesis 17. She has borne a son to Abraham and they have named him Ishmael. They have “given” Hagar, Sarah’s handmaid, to Abraham as a concubine. Of course, by the time Genesis 18 rolls around, Abraham and Sarah have solved the problem. If your parents didn’t have any children, you won’t either.” As one of my professors in graduate school was fond of saying in regards to this story: “Infertility is hereditary. It’s hard to be the ancestor of a “great nation” if you don’t have even one child. We don’t know much of anything about Abraham before chapter 12, but one thing we do know is this: his wife Sarai/Sarah is barren (Genesis 11:30). There is one major problem with this scenario - Abraham and Sarah have no children. And God makes a three-fold promise to Abraham, or Abram, as he’s called in chapter 12:ġ) That Abraham will have many descendants he’ll be a “great nation” (12:2).Ģ) That Abraham and his descendants will inherit the land of Canaan (12:7).ģ) That they will be a blessing to the whole world (12:3). The “back story,” of course, is this: God calls Abraham seemingly out of the blue in Genesis 12 to leave homeland and kin in order to go to a land he has never seen. As it is, the preacher should fill in some of the “back story” before talking about this particular text. If Easter (and thus Pentecost and Holy Trinity) had come earlier, we would have heard last week the story of the call of Abraham in Genesis 12. Due to the vagaries of the liturgical calendar, we have not heard in the last two weeks the other “semi-continuous” readings that lead up to this story. The story for this week is for those who think there is no humor in the Bible.īut first things first: We enter this week right into the middle of the story of Abraham and Sarah.
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