Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, Which am old?
The conflict between fear and faith
I. THE THINGS PROMISED SO FAITH ARE DIFFICULT OF RELIEF.
1. It is necessary that faith should be thus tried by difficulty.
2. We must be cast entirely upon the word of God.
II. FAITH MAY, FOR A WHILE, BE QUITE PARALYZED BY FEAR (Genesis 18:15).
1. In sincere souls this condition is only momentary.
2. To accept God at His word would save us from all foolish wonder.
III. GOD GRACIOUSLY GRANTS POWER TO OVERCOME THE FEAR. If only faith is real at bottom and in any way lays hold upon God, He will pardon its infirmities and repair its weaknesses. This He did in Sarah’s case.
1. By mild reproof.
2. By recognizing the good which is mixed up with our infirmity.
3. By repeating His promises.
4. By casting us upon His own omnipotence (Genesis 18:14). (T. H.Leale.)
Lessons
1. Gracious hospitality hath sweet returns from God as acceptance with Him.
2. Known to God are souls who entertain Him, better than He is known to them. Where is Sarah?
3. God calleth for the woman to be sharer in the promise with the man.
4. It is good to be at hand, near to God in our places, when promises are given out (Genesis 18:9).
5. God labours to put believing souls above all doubts concerning His promise.
6. God is punctual in His own time to perform His promise.
7. God will keep His saints alive to see the good which He promiseth them.
8. Weak saints may receive promises with their ears, and yet not believe nor digest them (Genesis 18:10).
9. Sensible objections may puzzle the weak faith of God’s servants {Genesis 18:11).
10. Weakness of faith and strength of sense may make saints despise the promise,
11. Nature’s defects are apt to question the power of God to help them. (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Lessons
1. God takes notice of the unbelief of saints, in word, and deed, to reprove them. Jehovah said, &c.
2. Good works toward God do not excuse from unbelief of His promises. Sarah’s feast stops not God’s mouth against sin.
3. Husbands should hear God’s complaints of their wives to amend them, so Abraham did.
4. God is displeased to have objections from sense set up against His promise (Genesis 18:13).
5. God is absolutely able to do anything what He please in heaven or earth.
6. God proposeth His absolute power for faith to rest on against all sensible objections.
7. God’s promise is joined with His power to take of weak souls from sinful doubting.
8. God tenders the weak in faith, and doubleth His promise for their support (Genesis 18:14).
9. Saints weak in faith, may be so overtaken as to seek to hide one sin by another.
10. Guilt and fear may lead souls to such transgression.
11. God will make His servants own their iniquities, though through weakness they had denied them.
12. God will be gracious to His saints in making them know their sins (Genesis 18:15). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Sarah’s sin
I. HER UNBELIEF.
II. HER UNTRUTH.
God’s promise treated with incredulity
Sarah does not appear to have been by any means a blameless character. Her conduct towards Hagar showed us that she was a woman capable of generous impulses, but not of the strain of continued magnanimous conduct. She was capable of yielding her wifely rights on the impulse of the brilliant scheme that had struck her, but like many other persons who can begin a magnanimous or generous course of conduct, she could not follow it up to the end, but failed disgracefully in her conduct towards her rival. So now again she betrays characteristic weakness. When the strangers came to Abraham’s tent, and announced that she was to become a mother, she smiled in superior, self-assured, woman’s wisdom. When the promise threatened no longer to hover over her household as a m ere sublime and exalting idea which serves its purpose if it keep them in mind that God has spoken to them, but to take place now among the actualities of daily occurrence, she hails this announcement with a laugh of total incredulity. Whatever she had made of God’s word, she had not thought it was really and veritably to come to pass; she smiled at the simplicity which could speak of such an unheard-of thing. This is true to human nature. It reminds you how you have dealt with God’s promises--nay, with God’s commandments--when they offered to make room for themselves in the everyday life of which you are masters, every detail of which you have arranged, seeming to know absolutely the laws and principles on which your particular line of life must be carried on. Have you never smiled at the simplicity which could set about making actual, about carrying out in practical life, in society, in work, in business, those thoughts, feelings and purposes, which God’s promises beget? Sarah did not laugh outright, but smiled behind the Lord; she did not mock Him to His face, but let the compassionate expression pass over her face with which we listen to the glowing hopes of the young enthusiast who does not know the world. Have we not often put aside God’s voice precisely thus; saying within us, We know what kind of things can be done by us and others and what need not be attempted; we know what kind of frailties in social intercourse we must put up with, and not seek to amend; what kind of practices it is vain to think of abolishing; we know what use to make of God’s promise and what use not to make of it; how far to trust it, and how far to give greater weight to our knowledge of the world and our natural prudence and sense? Does not our faith, like Sarah’s, vary in proportion as the promise to be believed is unpractical? If the promise seems wholly to concern future things, we cordially and devoutly assent; but if we are asked to believe that God intends within the year to do so-and-so, if we are asked to believe that the result of God’s promise will be found taking a substantial place among the results of our own efforts--then the derisive smile of Sarah forms on our face. (M. Dods, D. D.)