July 2, 2023
Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church
Lakeland, Florida
Psalm 45:10-17
Genesis 12--25
Grace to you and peace from God and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Please pray with me. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
So, when people ask me how many children I have, my response is, “It depends on how you count them. When I married my husband, I inherited two sons and then I gave birth to another.” Not nearly as complicated as those heard about today in the generations of Abraham.
As I pondered over the Matriarchs these last couple of weeks, I was taken by the complicatedness, to be honest with you. And I wondered about all these convoluted relationships. And I thought rather wryly about “biblical family values.” And I thought, “Huh. These are our forebears in faith.”
What do these three generations of people offer us?
Abraham shows us deep faith. Faith that propelled him into action. Faith in a God who made amazing promises to him. Faith that accompanied him on a long trek from one home to another. Faith that sustained him his 175 years. Faith that endured despite disappointment, family discord of major proportion. Faith that impelled him to look up each night to the stars in the sky.
Sarah was oh so human wasn’t she. She hung in there with a husband who had seemingly impossible dreams in a land far away. She had a sardonic sense of humor and laughed at the seeming impossibility of God keeping God’s promise to her. Sarah didn’t see things working out the way she thought that God would have them, so she took things into her own hands, or rather Hagar’s. Faithful over the decades despite her doubts.
Hagar. A handmaid. One of no importance. Yet one who gave Abraham his first son. Hagar who went into the desert in despondency because life was so difficult what with Sarah’s hatred and jealousy. Hagar, to whom God appeared with words of comfort and provision.Rebekah. Rebekah who met a man at the well and then bid good-bye to her family and traveled to another land to marry Isaac. Rebekah who birthed twins and loved one more than the other. Rebekah who joined into the schemes of her favorite. Rebekah who was a master of deception herself. Yet, Rebekah stood in a line of faithful ones.
And then the sisters, Rachel and Leah, Rebekah’s daughters-in-law. Leah always knew that Jacob loved Rachel more. Rachel who suffered the shame of infertility. Each of them uncertain of God’s faithfulness and so, like Sarah, they tried to handle things on their own. Because they, too, had learned the story of the stars in the sky. And were determined to help God bring it about. Talk about a complicated family! What with 2 wives and 2 surrogate wives. And 12 sons – oh yes and one daughter, Dinah but we don’t hear much about her except for one horrible episode in Genesis 34.
So, this is what I want you to know about the Matriarchs. They lived complicated lives. They made many mistakes. They had times of faltering faith. Yet, God never left their side. God was persistently present with them. And God is persistently present with us as well. Each of us and all of us together. We too have lives that are complicated. We too have times of faltering faith. We too have made decisions that have long-reaching impacts. And some of those decisions have not been the most prudent.
Yet, God’s promises are sure. I rather think that like Abraham, God would take us by the hand in the middle of the dark of night and tell us to look upward at the stars in the sky and tell us that as many as those stars are so are the pieces of God’s grace in our lives -- the pieces of God’s grace lived out and touching others.
God made a covenant, a heartfelt promise, with the Patriarchs and the Matriarchs. And God has made a covenant promise with us as well in the waters of our baptisms. God keeps God’s promises. May we walk daily in the grace of those promises.
Thanks be to God.
