Waiting on the Lord

Introduction

Good morning. If you will, open your Bibles with me to Isaiah chapter 40. Isaiah chapter 40. As you turn there, consider one of the most difficult things to do in all of life, and in particular in Orlando, Florida, is to wait. Of course, if you think about waiting, you think about waiting in traffic. You think about waiting for something you’re anticipating, or perhaps being stuck in a situation that you wish was more quickly finished or over. In Isaiah chapter 40, beginning in verse 27, Isaiah writes, Why do you say, O Jacob, and speak, O Israel, my way is hidden from the Lord, and my right is disregarded by my God. Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth.

He does not faint or grow weary. His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might, he increases strength. Even youth shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted. But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. I think one of the most difficult things to do is to wait on the Lord. Perhaps it’s not altogether different from the little boy who told his mom, I want patience and I want it now. You think about waiting. And oftentimes we think of stories like Joseph in Genesis chapter 39 and ongoing, and you think about Joseph’s Joseph’s whole life story.

And as it begins, of course, you run into him telling of his dreams from God to his brothers, and they’re jealous of him, and they cast him into a pit, and you think, where’s God’s plan? And Joseph being in a pit. And then the slave traders come and they pick him up, and he’s carried off to Egypt, where he grows in his reputation, and then for acting righteously for fleeing from Potiphar’s wife, attempt at sexual immorality. He is then rewarded with prison. And you think, where is God’s plan? And Joseph being in the pit first and now and in prison. And then, of course, he gets out. And what we know from the Bible story from the end of the book of Genesis is not only Joseph, a keystone member of the family of Abraham, but it is Joseph who, at the providence of God, is set up high in Egypt.

And when the Israelites come and there becomes a famine on the land and on his people, he is able to provide. And we say, There is God’s providence. We have to wait on the Lord. We have to trust in him. When you think about the words in Isaiah chapter 40 and verse 31, oftentimes we think of wait as some sort of delay, and that’s a true application. But really, the word is it’s a kind of wind or twist. You kind of think of a rope or a cord. And really the idea is we need to let God be our lifeline, let God be our refuge in God alone. That’s what it means to wait on the Lord, to trust totally and wholly in him. Of course, to be fair, waiting in the sense of delay and the sense of difficulty and the sense of needing to get something over with trusting in God.

That God will deliver, that things will be okay if you trust in him. And in Genesis chapter 16, if you’ll turn there with me, and if you want to leave a marker, we’ll spend the majority of our time in Genesis chapter 16 this morning. In Genesis chapter 16, you learn about Abraham and Sarah, or Sarai and Abram. And you learn that they neither waited on the Lord in terms of time or in terms of trust ultimately. Now I do want to say this, and in Genesis chapter 17, their names are changed from Abram to Abraham and Sarai to Sarah. So I’m going to say Abraham and Sarah, because I want to. But the text says, Abram and Sarai, these are the same people. If you look at chapter 17, you’ll see where their names are changed.

But in Genesis chapter 16 and verse 1. Now Sarah, Abraham’s wife, had borne him no children. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said to Abram, Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go into my servant. It may be that I shall obtain children by her. And Abram listened to the voice of Sarah. So after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarah, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife. And he went into Hagar and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. And Sarai said to Abram, May the Lord May the wrong done to me be on you.

I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me. But Abram said to Sarai, Behold, your servant is in your power, do to her as you please. And Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her.

In Genesis chapter 12 and verse 1. Now the Lord said to Abram, Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land, and I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, verse 2. And I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. If Abram was going to have a great nation made of him, he had to first have an offspring, a seed, an heir. And of course, reading the Bible story, much like with Joseph, we can look at these chapters and say, Abram and Sarai just really missed the picture. What were Abraham and Sarah doing? Why couldn’t they just wait and trust in the Lord? But the truth is they didn’t know exactly what was to be said.

It doesn’t seem to be specified that the heir actually would come from Abraham and Sarah, at least up until this point in the Genesis narrative. But if you think about what they should have known, it was found in verse 15 in chapter 15. In Genesis chapter 15 and verse 1. After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision. Fear not, Abram, I am your shield. Your reward shall be very great. But Abram said, Oh Lord God, what will you give me? For I continue childless. And the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus. And Abram said, Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, this man shall not be your heir.

Your very own son shall be your heir. And he brought him outside and said, Look toward heaven and number the stars if you are able to number them. Then he said to him, So shall your offspring be. And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness. Verse 6 is very telling because at this point it says very clearly, Abram believed the Lord. This was not some sort of phony belief. This was true because the last part of verse 6 says what? He counted it to him as righteousness. Not only in Genesis chapter 12 that God said, Go to the land that I will show you, and Abraham went out, not knowing where he was going. But now God has told Abraham, You’re going to have your very own son.

It won’t be some random member of your household. It is going to be your son. And Abram believed him. But we find in chapter 16 that things weren’t quite going on their time schedule. It seems that it was about ten years later in chapter 16, and verse 1 really sets the point. Now, Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. And thus the problem that we all encounter at one point or another in life, isn’t it? That there reaches a point where we know what God has promised. We know what our life should look like, or at least our vision of how it would be detailed and how things would play out. And then what happens is time passes, and my life doesn’t look like that.

It’s not working the way that I’ve been promised, the way that I understood things were going to go. Waiting on the Lord is very tough. Because we have our vision, and we even see God’s long-term vision. But what we see in the short term, much like Joseph would have seen when looking around the pit or looking around the jail cell, we see something that doesn’t match our expectation. The problem is we need to have a trust and a belief that God’s way will work, because if we don’t, it’s not just a lack of faith, it’s not just a lack of trust. And yes, we should have faith. Yes, we should have trust that God will provide, just like he did with Joseph, that God’s plan is clear for our lives.

1. What Sarah Did

But what I want to see this morning is there’s some consequences to not waiting on the Lord. First of all, I want to see what Sarah did. In verse 2, after it said that she had borne no children, the last part of verse 1 says she had this Egyptian slave named Hagar. Know what she does in verse 2. She tells Abram, Behold now the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go into my servant. It may be that I shall obtain children by her.

And the truth is, really, even for the time, for a child of God like Abram would have been, this is strange. And we’re going to address Abram at the end of verse 2 in just a moment, where it says, Abram listened to the voice of his wife. That’s really important. But if you know what happened is, Sarah says in verse 2, Behold, now the Lord has prevented me from bearing children, so I’m not going to wait. I’m not going to seek greater understanding. Here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to go with this plan that I’ve thought of. This plan that I have devised. And of course, the problems with this are all over the map. And we know how that would be. And we know what happens when we make impatient, hasty decisions, and when we don’t truly wait on the Lord in either sense.

But note with me the parallel in Genesis chapter 3. I think this is pretty similar. In Genesis chapter 3, I do want to read the story, and I think we’ll see some parallels between Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 and Abram, or Abraham and Sarah in Genesis 16. In Genesis chapter 3, note with me, beginning in verse, the latter part of verse 1. The serpent said to the woman, Did God actually say, You should not eat of any tree in the garden? And the woman said to the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden. But God said, You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.

But the serpent said to the woman, You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. Note verse six. So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate. What happened? Let’s let’s rewind a little bit. Eve is having this conversation with the serpent. He tells her, You’re not going to die if you eat of the tree that God told you not to. By the way, the very tree that God said, if you eat of it, you will surely die.

But in verse 6, what did Eve do? Verse 6, the woman saw that the tree was good for food. And at the end of verse 6, what happened? She also gave some to her husband who was with her. Now, as you flash back to Genesis chapter 16, you see what happens is in verse 1, Sarah says, The Lord has prevented me from having children. I’m looking at my situation, and I don’t like it. We need to get somewhere. We have to help God out a little bit. And what does she do? She says, Go into my servant to Abraham. It may be that I shall obtain children by her. This certainly, just like with Eve, was not God’s plan. You see, secondly, and here’s the biggest problem that we start to see is Sarah could not deal with the consequences of her hastily devised plan.

In verse 3, so after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarah, Abram’s wife took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife. Note verse 4 and 5. And he went into Hagar and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. And Sarah said to Abram, or Abraham, may the wrong done to me be on you. I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me. Do you think that maybe this is a natural consequence of this type of relationship? In verse 2, rather than waiting, rather than inquiring of the Lord or any number of steps, she gives Hagar to be Abram’s wife to conceive.

And guess what? Her plan works. This is exactly what she wanted. Well, until it actually happened the way she wanted. Because what happened at the end of verse 4? Hagar looked upon Sarah with contempt. And that’s a problem. Because in verse 5, she goes to Abram and says, May the wrong done to me be on you. You see, Sarah didn’t like the way this had gone. She said, I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. This was a problem. Sarah didn’t like the fact that Hagar was responding differently. And we could have a lesson on Hagar, and the rest of chapter 16 provides an interesting narrative on God’s expectation and care for Hagar.

But consider that Sarah was having to reap what she had sown. She was having to lay in the bed that she had made. This was exactly what she wanted. And when it came to pass, she had feelings of jealousy, undoubtedly, envy, undoubtedly, frustration, undoubtedly. She wasn’t prepared for what her plan had caused. In 2 Samuel chapter 12, I hope you’ll turn there with me. I want to make a delicate point this morning. In 2 Samuel chapter 12, one of the problems with not waiting on the Lord, one of the problems with not relying upon him entirely, is that God’s plan is set in order for a reason. It’s not just to keep us from doing some fun things. It’s not just to make our life more difficult or see how many rules we can follow and see if we can kind of make things right and earn our way into salvation.

That’s not the picture of God at all. God’s plan is the way it is because God’s plan works. And as we see in 2 Samuel chapter 12, when we see the story of David and Nathan the prophet coming before him and approaching him, saying, You are the man, pointing out his sin with Bathsheba, his murder of Uriah. You see, the consequences of sin were there. In verse 12 of 2 Samuel chapter 12. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun, as he concludes. David said to Nathan, I have sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said to David, The Lord also has put away your sin. You shall not die. After all this buildup, after all of what the Nathan the prophet has done, all the courage he had to approach David, the king of Israel, and say, You sin, you violated the will of God.

You are a murderer, you are an adulterer. David confesses. And he’s forgiven by God. But that next verse is so important in verse 14. Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the Lord, the child who is born to you shall die. Was David forgiven? Yes. In verse 13, Nathan says, So the Lord has put away your sin. You shall not die. David was forgiven. But the truth of the matter is when we do things our own way, particularly when we violate God’s superior way, it is a way of sin. And when we sin, can we be forgiven by God? Absolutely. But it does not remove our consequences. So many times, it is our sin that has put us in the very predicament that we’re wishing to be hastened out of.

The reason we have struggle waiting is because we’re dealing with the consequences of our poor choices. And the truth of the matter is, like David, Sarah had to face a high price. David’s price was, as recorded in verse 14, that his child would die. And he did. In the case of Sarah, she had to deal with Hagar now having the affection of Abram, the favor that perhaps Abraham was showing towards the woman who would have what he believed to be his promised seed, the promised seed that God had talked to him about in Genesis chapter 12, through whom would come this great nation to inherit the land. See, there’s something else that Sarah did in Genesis chapter 16 that’s important, is how she responded. Yes, she went to Abram.

Yes, Abram cowardly stepped back, and we’ll address that in a moment as well. But in Genesis chapter 16 and verse 6, when Abram said to Sarah, Behold, your servant is in your power, due to her as you please. It says that Sarah dealt harshly with her. The truth of the matter is this was Sarah’s decision. This was Abram’s decision. They made this call. They told Hagar to be Abraham’s wife. They told Hagar, You will provide the seed. You will allow us to have this great nation that God promised. And what does Sarah do when she can’t deal with the consequences? When she can’t stand the mess that she has made, she takes it out on somebody else. Yes, it violates the principle of Colossians chapter 4 and verse 1 that masters should treat their bondservants well, realizing that we too have a master in heaven.

2. What Abraham Did

But we need to realize this is another part of dealing with the consequences of changing God’s plan. Others are not to blame for our mistakes. Others are not at fault where I must take responsibility. What Sarah did was impatiently not choose not to wait for the Lord. She went ahead and gave Hagar to Abraham, and she couldn’t deal with the consequences that meant for her life, her standing, her emotions about her flawed plan. And in the end, not only was her life upset, but she upset the life of someone else, who was you might say, just following orders. Causing Hagar as the end of verse 6 records to flee from her. I want to see secondly, though, what Abraham did, because Abraham certainly had a major part in the story, or at least he should have, and he chose not to.

In verse 2, just like Genesis chapter 3, when Eve gave Adam the fruit, what did verse 6 say he did? He ate of what his wife had given her. But in Genesis chapter 16 and verse 2, Sarah comes up with this great plan. By the way, this is to the same Abraham who Genesis chapter 15 and verse 6 says, He believed the Lord, and he counted to him as righteousness. Now in verse 2, what’s the very last part of this? And Abram listened to the voice of Sarah. Can you believe that Abraham, this great man of faith, would go along with this plan? We can see that this was obviously not the plan of God, because we know the plan of God was for Abraham and Sarah to conceive and have Isaac, who they did have, who did have Esau and Jacob.

And Jacob had the twelve sons that we often consider the twelve sons of Israel. But in Genesis chapter 16, Abram, this great man of faith, had the same problem that Adam did way back in the Garden of Eden. He listened, as the text says, meaning he took the bad advice of his wife. Let me be abundantly clear here for a minute. I am not saying husbands do not listen to your wife. Let me did everybody hear that. I am not saying, ignore your wife. He listened, I said this very carefully to the bad advice of Sarah. I put that very carefully. But this is true because Adam, like Abram, should have known God’s plan, should have known to trust in God, too, as Isaiah chapter 40 and verse 31 says, be one who waits on the Lord.

There’s a big difference in going along with your spouse being supportive and going along with something that is not God’s plan. That was the clear problem with Adam, wasn’t it? When you read Genesis chapter 3, you say, where was Adam in all this? And you come down to verse 6 and you realize at some point he ended up right near Eve, who at some point was right near the serpent. And he never steps in and takes leadership. Abraham did not step up the way he should have. In fact, he went along for the wrong ride. And then we see that in verses 4 and 5, when Sarah comes to him and says, I’m very unhappy with the situation. This isn’t going well. He doesn’t make it right.

As we see in verse 6, even what is his response? In verse 6 he says, Behold, your servant is in your power. Do to her as you please. This is the consummate Bible example of passing the buck. Not altogether different from Genesis chapter 3 and verse 12. What happened when God approached Adam in the garden? He said, Well, the woman whom you gave me gave me the fruit and I ate. He blamed her. Abram’s saying, I’m not going to be a part of this. You take care of your relationship with your servant Hagar. Where was Abram’s leadership here? Was he setting a righteous example? No, I think it’s clear that he was not stepping up. He certainly was not in conjunction with the plan of the Lord, which was for Abraham and Sarah, as we know as it turns out, to have Isaac.

Now this is important because neither Sarah nor Abraham were willing to step up and deal with the consequences for their alteration of God’s plan. I say again, when we transgress God’s will, we have not only missed messed up what should be a good plan, but we’ve messed up what is the plan. Because God’s plan works. If we transgress it, if we change it, if we alter it, we will deal with the consequences. But even when the consequences are severe, tough, or emotionally draining, the right thing to do is not to treat others harshly. The right thing to do is to not step back and say, let other people kind of do what they want to do. If they want to do something wrong, that’s their business.

3. Trust in the Wisdom of the Lord

No, when we are in this type of relationship, particularly Abram as the husband of Sarah and the future father of Isaac, he should have stepped up and been the spiritual leader that Abraham was so many times throughout the Old Testament. I want to see some conclusions, though, from Genesis chapter 16 this morning. We need to truly wait on the Lord. We need to trust in the wisdom of the Lord. If you look in Proverbs chapter 2, in Proverbs chapter 2, beginning in verses 6 through 8, you’ll see that, of course, God is the giver of all wisdom. He has the perfect way. Because as we said many times, God’s plan works. But in Proverbs chapter 2, beginning in verse 6, for the Lord gives wisdom. From his mouth comes knowledge and understanding.

He stores up sound wisdom for the upright. He is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity in every good path. For wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you, delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech, who forsake the paths of uprightness, to walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil, men whose paths are crooked and who are devious in their ways. When you go back to verse 6, we know the Lord gives wisdom. We know from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding.

But note carefully in verse 7. Who does he store up sound wisdom for? The upright. Who is he a shield for? Those who walk in integrity. Who does he guard the paths of justice for? Who does he watch over the ways of the saints, the set apart ones? It’s at that point that we will understand his ways. We will understand righteousness and justice, equity in every good path. That wisdom will pour forth from our hearts in verse 10. We need to trust truly that God’s plan works. This is very easy to acknowledge on a factual basis. But if we think about people who should have and who did trust in the plan and the wisdom of the Lord, who’s at the top of that list? Abraham is.

Isn’t it in Hebrews chapter 11 where it commends Abraham for his great faith because he went out to a land not knowing where he was going? That was a bold step of faith. That was truly waiting on the Lord, trusting entirely in God’s plan to come to pass. And the truth is all of us would say, Yeah, we need to trust in the wisdom of the Lord. I trust in God, but do we act like that or do we behave as Abraham and Sarah did in Genesis chapter 16? Do we try to kind of alter it? Do we try to kind of hurry it up? The point of any lesson on waiting on the Lord does not mean sit back and do nothing and wait till God magically pops everything that’s difficult in your life out and showers you with physical blessings.

4. We Need to Be Willing to Wait on the Lord

That’s not the point of the lesson. But the truth is when we look at the story of Abraham and Sarah, we knew that God’s plan was for more time to pass first. If we trust in the wisdom of the Lord, we need to be like Abraham when he trusted in God to go out, not knowing where he was going, not like Abraham and Sarai in Genesis chapter 16, trying to change the plan to fit their conception of what God meant for their life. We need to be willing to wait on the Lord. In Psalm chapter 27 and verse 14, this means that in any time and in any way we trust God’s path. In Psalm chapter 27, note with me in verse 14, wait for the Lord.

Psalm 27 and verse 14, be strong and let your heart take courage. Wait for the Lord. Again, this idea of truly relying on God as our refuge. And here’s the tough question. Here’s the one that kind of hurts. Do I really trust God each and every day to allow me to do what it is that I do? Do I thank God for the job that I have, the family that I can be around, all of the blessings that I do enjoy? Am I thankful to God for the health and the wealth that I may have? God isn’t just some shower of gifts, and then if you follow after him, he’s going to give you great millions, many billions. But he does bless us with a lot of physical things, particularly in this nation.

5. Consider the Consequences of Our Sin

Each and every day, if we truly trusted in the Lord, we would thank him, we would praise him, and we would seek his guidance, not every once in a while, not when we come across Isaiah chapter 40 or Psalm chapter 27, but every single day. Because if we trust only in God, we will speak to him about it every day, multiple times a day. Why? Because if he is our everything, then our time will reflect that. And in everything, we will trust in the Lord. We need to be willing to wait on the Lord. I want to finish with two final points this morning. We need to consider the consequences of our sin before we do that. In Genesis chapter 3, going back to verse 12.

In Genesis chapter 3, when Adam and Eve of the fruit that they should not have, they were convinced by the serpent, who said in verse 4, You will not surely die. And the truth is in verse 6, Eve saw that the tree was good for food, and it was a delight to her eyes, and it would make her wise. And yes, Adam should have stepped in. Yes, Eve should have known better. But as we come and see what happens, the Lord approaches Adam and Eve, and in verse 9 he calls out, Where are you? And in verse 10, Adam said, I heard the sound of you in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked and hid myself. He said, Who told you that you were naked?

Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat? The man said, The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate. Now I will note verse 13 as well. Then the Lord God said to the woman, What is this that you have done? The woman said, The serpent deceived me, and I ate. The truth is they were unprepared for the consequences of what would come to pass. God had made the law clear. In the day that you eat of it, you shall die. And when God came to hold them accountable, they passed the buck. Not only did they pass the buck, but the truth is, as we know, what was the penalty for that?

They were cast out of the garden. And in verse 24, he drove out the man, and at the east of the Garden of Eden, he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to enter to the tree of life. He cast them out of the garden. I can tell you, Adam and Eve knew this was a bad decision. But we need to be thinking about that before it happens. In Genesis chapter 16, yes, Sarah had this plan. She was going to help God, she was going to help Abraham. Go ahead and have a son, and we’re going to push forward this great nation. But both physically and spiritually, when we alter God’s plan, we are waging war against our God.

We are going to face physical consequences of emotional struggle, physical pains because we’re not trusting in God’s way. And if God’s way is perfect, if we trust in the wisdom of the Lord, and we’re willing to wait on the Lord, we know that if we do exactly as he says, we will be okay. That doesn’t mean millions, that doesn’t mean billions, that doesn’t mean perfect health. It means that if you trust in God, you can be with him forever because he will be our shield, he will be our refuge, he will be our everything. We need to consider that the consequences of sin are not only just in this physical life, not only will they lead to feelings of jealousy, envy, strife, quarreling, but that also we will be separated from God.

6. Consider the Victory of Trusting in God

Just as Adam and Eve were driven out of the garden, we face separation from God when we alter or try to change God’s plan. I want to make one final point this morning and end on a positive note. We need to consider the victory of trusting in God. When you think about Joseph’s story, you realize that God had his plan all along. That Joseph was meant to be in Egypt and wall. No one would write a play that way, that he would be in a pit, he would be sold by slave traders, that he would go and serve in Potiphar’s household, then be thrown back in jail, and then he would rise up, and then Israel would have a famine, and it would all work out.

God did. God knows. God’s plan works. And when we see in Genesis chapter 21, when you read all the way up forward in Genesis chapter 21, you see the Lord visited Sarah as he had said. And the Lord did to Sarah as He had promised. And Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the time of which God had spoken to him. Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore him, Isaac. And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old as God commanded him. Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. And Sarah said, God has made laughter for me. Everyone who hears will laugh over me.

And she said, Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yea, I have borne him a son in his old age. When you look at verse 1, this is what we need to take away. That God will keep what he has said. God will keep what he has promised. And it doesn’t matter how ridiculous it may seem, it doesn’t matter how what type of scorn and ridicule man will pour on us. We trust in God’s ways in all aspects of our life. That means if you get married, you get married as God has said, one man and one woman. If you raise children, you raise children as God has said, with the husband as the head of the household, the wife teaching the children to grow up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and children honoring and respecting their father and mother.

It means when it comes to the church that we have elders, deacons, and we have saints who take part in the work, and that we all do what God has said in every aspect of our lives, because God’s way works. What God has said he will keep. What God has promised he will make good on. And just like with the physical consequences of sin being nothing compared to being separated from God, the true victory of trusting in God is not a happy marriage or a happy life, although that can come. The true victory that Christ offers, that God has made available to all of us is to be with him forever. That is our everything, to be with God forever. Then the question is, will I wait upon the Lord?

Conclusion

Abraham knew better. Sarah knew better. And yet in moment of weakness, in moment of not understanding ignorance or whatever word you wish to put upon it, they altered, changed, hastened to God’s plan. Do we truly trust in God? It’s not a mental decision, it’s a physical action. You look at your life. Have you trusted in God’s plan and every role that you play? Are you the employee? Are you the parent? Are you the child? Are you the friend? Are you the brother or sister in Christ? Are you a member of a congregation the way that God has planned? The way that God has ordained. Sometimes life is hard. Often we have to wait. But we know that our God is worth waiting for, and that in God and God alone is our refuge.

God is our shield to those who want to walk in his ways. Practice justice and righteousness today. Trust in our Almighty God. Consider this morning if you haven’t trusted in Him, He is the only shield. He is the only path to having your sins forgiven and to be wiped clean, to be as white as snow. If you believe in Him, are willing to repent of your wrongdoing, confess Jesus as Lord and Lord of your life, and you’re baptized having your sins forgiven. You can begin that walk, begin that trust, begin waiting on the Lord today. Or maybe as a Christian, we’ve been like Abraham or Sarah and not truly waited, not truly turned our life completely over. Realize that we can pray with you and pray for you.

As part of God’s plan, the church, the Christians here want to be with you. We want to encourage you. If we can help you in any way make your life right with God, come forward now as we stand and sing the invitation song.