So if you have your Bibles, let's look at the importance of Sarah first, I'm going to read verses 15 through 18 first
Verse 15 says, then God said to Abraham as For Sarah your wife you should not call her name Sarah, but Sarah shall be her name I will bless her and indeed I will give you a son by her Then I will bless her and she shall be a mother of nations kings of peoples will come from her and then Abraham fell on his face And laughed and said in his heart will a child be born to a man 100 years old and will Sarah who is 90 years old Bear a child and Abraham said to God, oh the Ishmael might live before you You see we look at see the importance of Sarah you see after this point God had been dealing with Abraham and Actually at the beginning Abraham assumed that Sarah had just as an important role as he did From the beginning he assumed that but it's time went on Sarah is not producing many children is if you've followed the story. She doesn't produce anything and So Abram gets this lower and lower and lower and lower view of Sarah's part in this whole gig That's why he he defaults to hey guard That's why he defaults to everything else and remember God came to Abram and he changed his name He says Abram. I'm going to change her name from exalted father to the father of a multitude of nations Why because you in fact are going to be a multitude of nations and then God changes Sarah's name or Sarah's name But the first thing before we look at her name changes you got to ask why does God change people's names anyway? The answer actually is pretty simple because God God changes names because your name is actually at the core of your identity Think about it. Whatever your name is you become that thing I remember when we named Flannery our middle daughter Flannery and many people the you know Bought at it and they said that's a huge name for such a little kid. She'll never be able to live up to it Well, those of you who know Flannery Flannery has definitely grown into her name and out of it even some You see this this idea of name is ultimately an infinitely important You know, it's like when we had I grew up in a family where my father left when I was five and I had Three sisters and I was raised by my mother and grandmother and so for my whole life I was the only male in my own in my whole house And I remember then I got married and everyone was excited that I got married and then Judy got pregnant And I remember soon as Judy got pregnant all of my sister said we hope it's a boy and Everyone was rooting for boy root root root. You know, there has to be another male in this family and Then we had a son of grand dad and we were so interested to see you know He's gonna be a boy or not and it was a girl on the son of grand and I remember sort of breaking the news to my sisters My family is pretty rowdy and you know my sisters got together and we found out what we're gonna have and everyone was sitting on the edge of their seats And I said it's a girl And ever you know sort of you know how this sounds like oh, you know the whole crowd sort of calm down and everyone was just silent for a minute And then one of my sisters the oldest one of them. I'm the oldest. She's right under me. She's a police officer She spoke up and she made this great comment She said well At least an Allen girl will have a daddy and that sealed it for me We must name this oldest girl Abigail because the word Abigail means the joy of a father That the father delights in you that will name this first child Abigail and she will be an everlasting witness not only to herself but to all children But in the Allen family the girls have a daddy So now God comes and he's gonna change Sarah's name and it's very interesting He changed his Sarah Abrams name from from exalted father to a father of a multitude And he changes Sarah's name from princess to princess It's pretty interesting Sarah is just some eukeritic Word for princess and her whole life she would have grown up and her life actually would have been a joke. Why? I mean she was named she was in princess and here she was living this nomadic lifestyle intense with this guy who you know kept on Messing up He was a loser if you will. It's like she should grow up in a trailer park and her name was princess and everyone looked at her and said what a joke your name is And God comes and says to her I'm changing her name It will no longer be eukeritic Sarah. It will be Hebrew Sarah but the reason Sarah will be called princess
God says I now define your name and you are called princess not because someone just named you that arbitrarily because it sounded cool when you're growing up But you will be called princess Sarah because you are a princess. Why? Because kings will come forth from you You see the importance of Sarah God doesn't say Abram You know you're the man. I could care less about your family. I could care less about the women that you come into to contact with They're simply there to provide children for you God says I'm naming this one to this female princess because she is the princess kings will come from her and Nations will come from her and her name and her life is not a joke Now the question of course is if her name Princess is not a joke. Why does Abram fall in his face and laugh? It's very interesting. Remember when God came and changed Abram's name It says Abram fell down on his face. Period He comes and changes Sarah's name and it says Abram fell down on his face and laughed Not only did he fall in his face and laugh, but apparently he was trying to hide it from God It says he fell on his face and laugh and said to himself in his heart Can a child be had by a man that's that's a hundred years old and a woman who is 99? Oh, may Ishmael live before you and and commentators debate why Abram is laughing and Some people say he's laughing because of skepticism and other people say he's laughing because of joy and frankly I think he is simply laughing at Sarah He's laughing at Sarah You know he's laughing at Sarah because of that last comment he makes. Oh, may Ishmael live before you God this woman you have given me this hopeless You see that's Abram's big problem was he believed the promise of the gospel God comes to him and makes all these great promises Abram believed the promise the promise But he didn't believe the power of the gospel And the promise of the gospel says I'll forgive all your sins and I'll embrace you and I'll never let you go The power of the gospel says this that nothing is impossible for me None of your sins are too big to overcome None of your situations are too big and which for me to work in and the first problem We all have is we we have trouble believing the part of the power of the gospel for ourselves Right, we look at ourselves and we say okay. I'm a Christian. I've come into the kingdom But but look at all of my sinful issues look at all the things I have to deal with there's no way I will ever change and we become very discouraged and thinking that we can never change and many people just frankly leave You know, that's what Sarah thought about herself because in the next chapter Sarah over here's God reiterating this thing That Sarah is going to have a have a child and it says that Sarah laughed to herself And you know what God responds to her and says I'll read it to you. It's in verse 18 She laughs when she hears this and God says is anything too difficult for the Lord You see, that's the question is anything too difficult Sarah didn't believe it for herself and the wonder Abraham didn't believe it and her response is beautiful She says I wasn't laughing And he says sort of I could imagine him in this Kramer-esque fashion goal. I heard you Because that's what he says. Oh you did you did laugh You see Sarah doesn't even believe the power of the gospel for herself And if you have power trouble believing the power of the gospel to change you or to work in you Guess what is even more difficult To believe in the power of the gospel to change all those people around you Think of your family members that you've just given up on that you look at them and you say thank God that that he saved me Thank God that I'm here But when I look at my mother when I look at my father when I look at my brothers when I look at my children It I am just hopeless and the reason that you and I are hopeless is one is we don't understand the power of the gospel and be We have a wrong focus on the power of the gospel because God you know in the Bible God never commands you are I to change You realize that he never says you are bad now be good He says you are bad trust me to make you good And so the question is you look if you look at all the people around you and do you have hope for them? That was Abraham's problem Abraham looked at Sarah and he frankly he was hopeless He thought God God may have intervened in my life. You know, I know I you know my I've had a kid Right I fathered a kid, but there's no evidence here and he doesn't know what to do And so what God does is he intervenes. He tells him the importance of Sarah But then he tells him the importance of Sarah's child, which means she's going in fact to have one look at verses 19 through 22 Says but God said No, but Sarah your wife will bear a son and you shall call his name Isaac and I will establish my covenant with him for never lasting Covenant for his descendants after him as for Ishmael I've heard you behold I will bless him and make him fruitful and will multiply him exceedingly and he shall become a father of 12 Princes and I will make him a great nation, but my covenants I will establish with Isaac from Sarah will bear to you at this season next year When he finished talking with him God went up from Abraham I mean imagine Abraham this is one of the most ironic passages in the whole Bible because Abraham has fallen on his face And he thinks he is laughing to himself and he forgets the name of his first child Remember the name of his first child Ishmael and what does that mean God hears? And what did haggar say God sees everything and so Abraham has fallen on his face And he is laughing and to himself and he thinks God can't hear he's trying to cover it And then imagine God's next thing no Sarah will have a child and his name will be laughter That's what Isaac means Isaac means laughter you see Abraham would have done sort of the doctor evil laugh You know he's laughing to himself Right yeah I would have just had to stop what do you mean? You see God sense of humor is this he says Abraham you're going to have this child Sarah is going to have it And the child's name will be Isaac and that name is laughter
And you see you get down to this identification of the name thing because the only time God laughs in the Bible You know God never it's I don't I imagine God has a sense of humor But whenever you see God laughing at the Bible what he laughs at Our human efforts of self-righteousness and self-salvation and anger at self-aggrandizement and trying to do something that only he can do That's what God laughs at And so it God says the Abrams Sarah is Sarah is going to have a child and that child's name is laughter Because this child will be an everlasting witness to you that I that that that human self-righteousness is nothing before me I laugh at that and if you need help if you need the power you come to me And you see that's why Jesus also goes by the name of Isaac Jesus ultimately is God's laughter why because Jesus on the cross is God's ultimate laughter at human self-salvation and human self-righteousness why Because if you could do it yourself he wouldn't have had to go to the cross If you and I had what it took to be in right relationship with God he wouldn't have had to go to the cross And so we see Jesus actually is God's primary laughter and you see the question Of course that Abraham would have asked is what about ishmael and God anticipates that and he says and he says but for ishmael He says as for him I heard you and behold that will bless him and they can fruitful and multiply him exceedingly you see ishmael Still gets this temporal blessing But think God says but what my covenant will be with Isaac What does he mean here? You see remember Abram was given this promise that Abram and you all the families of the earth will be blessed And whoever blesses you I will bless and whoever curses you I will curse and what God is doing is he is handing that torch from Abraham to Isaac And so now everyone not they will be judged on how they deal with Isaac And the torch continues to be passed and passed and passed and passed until we get to Jesus And Jesus is the final torch bearer of blessing and so ishmael is given this this temporal blessing But what ishmael's destiny finally will be tied up in is not as temporal blessing from God But his final destiny will be tied up in how he deals with Isaac And the sad thing if you look at Genesis 25 it says that ishmael moved away from Isaac and he went to the east towards what nation Egypt And it says he lived there in in in defiance of his brother You see ishmael got all these temporal blessings but ultimately his destiny would be tied up with the blessing bearer and he left And you see this is very instructive for us why Because all of us by nature and by by status are ishmael all of us All of us are ishmael why because we all enjoy some amounts of temporal blessing from God That's what theologians call common grace That all human beings get to enjoy except you know most of the time and see how you get to enjoy the sun coming up right that's the grace of God You have a decent job you have food to eat you have clothing That's all grace God gives you all of those things but ultimately he says Your final destiny is tied up not in your temporal blessings and not what you get for yourself But by what you do with the blessing bearer By what you do with Isaac And you hear Jesus in the background whispering you remember the the the thing from Parallandra with ransom fighting the devil and he hears in the background My name is ransom to Well, we hear in the background Jesus saying my name is Isaac too Ishmael ishmael, please come live with me dwell in my presence because I saw outside of Isaac that is Jesus. We have no blessing You have no salvation you have nothing and so the question is what do you do is your life defined as ishmael's was by this temporal blessing? I have everything I need What do I need Isaac for or is your life defined by where am I ultimately stand ultimately where does my blessing lie and the gospel says You're blessing lies ultimately with Jesus Remember at the beginning of Matthew God comes to Joseph and he says you're gonna have a kid And I want you to name him something and this name will identify him for eternity His name is Jesus Now imagine Joseph probably last two because Jesus would have been the most common name in the world in the engineering Tom dick or hairy, you know But God qualifies it and he says this kid's name will be Jesus because he will save his people from their sins So the question you have to ask yourself This week and frankly you have to ask it yourself every week and every day is what am I doing with Jesus? Where do I stand with Jesus my identify with Jesus? Let me close Father, we thank you that you have seen fit
To give us your laughter We thank you that you have seen fit To pass the torch from Abraham to Isaac all the way to Jesus And that you offer this this identification freely and without money and without works to anyone who would come and ask of it So I pray even today you would do that for us your name and then