Abraham's Faithlessness and God's Faithfulness

Abraham's Faithlessness and God's Faithfulness

09 November, 2025

Thesis: God remains faithful and fulfills His promises even when His people are faithless.

Summary: The sermon examines Genesis chapters 20 and the beginning of 21, contrasting Abraham's repeated faithlessness with God's unwavering faithfulness. The preacher recounts Abraham's lie to Abimelech about Sarah being his sister, a deception previously committed, and explains how God intervened to protect Sarah and the covenant promise despite Abraham's fear and scheming. The message highlights God's sovereignty, His use of flawed individuals like Abraham as a prophet, and the eventual miraculous birth of Isaac as a fulfillment of divine promise, independent of human performance. The sermon concludes by drawing a parallel between Isaac and Jesus as the "greater son of promise," asserting that God's grace and faithfulness are sufficient for salvation and overcoming sin, contrasting Jesus' perfect life and intercession with Abraham's failings.

Sermon

All right, good morning, everybody. Aren't you glad that God is good? God is good, and he demonstrates his goodness by being faithful. God is a faithful, promise-keeping God, and I praise him for that this morning.

As we turn to Genesis 20, let me clarify the focus of our time together: today, we'll explore how Abraham's faithlessness stands in stark contrast to God's unwavering faithfulness, as seen in the events of Genesis 20. So if you've got your Bibles, they're going to be in the book of Genesis chapter 20. We selected that song specifically because this morning we're going to explore God's faithfulness, but in contrast to Abraham's faithlessness. To give you the title of my sermon: Abraham's Faithlessness and God's Faithfulness.

We're going to see how the two contrast here in chapter 20 and then in the first section of chapter 21. And if you can't tell, I'm a little under the weather, so pray for my voice to hold out. Most likely it will not be as long as the sermon last week. You say, "Amen, praise God, hallelujah." Some of you may have prayed for that this week. I don't know. Just saying. I'm just kidding. You guys wouldn't do that, right?

We're going to be in Genesis chapter 20. Our theme today is God's promises. God's promises remain sure even when his people stumble. Even when we are faithless, God remains faithful. This covenant faithfulness brings joy and ultimate fulfillment.

Let's start here in Genesis chapter 20, verse 1. Abraham journeyed from there to the south and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur and stayed in Gerar. Now Abraham said of Sarah, his wife, she is my sister—this mirrors the earlier account in Genesis 12, where Abraham similarly deceived Pharaoh about Sarah being his sister. Sound familiar? And Abimelech, king of Gerar, sent and took Sarah. It also sounds familiar, doesn't it? This recurring pattern underscores the central theme of God's unwavering faithfulness, even in the face of human failure, as highlighted in our sermon's thesis.

But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said to him, Indeed, you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is a man's wife. But Abimelech had not come near her. And he said, Lord, will you slay a righteous nation also? Perhaps he had heard of God's judgment on Sodom. And did he not say to me, she is my sister? And even she herself said, he is my brother. So evidently Sarah was an accomplice with Abraham in this lie. Abimelech goes on to say, In the integrity of my heart and innocence of my hands I have done this. And God said to him in a dream, Yes, I know that you did this in the integrity of your heart, for I also withheld you from sinning against me. Therefore I did not let you touch her.

Now therefore restore the man's wife, for he is a prophet, and he will pray for you, and you shall live. But if you do not restore her, know that you shall surely die, you and all who are yours. Would that provide incentive to obey?

So Abimelech rose early in the morning and called all his servants and told all these things in their hearing. And the men were very much afraid, no doubt. And Abimelech called Abraham and said to him, What have you done to us? How have I offended you, that you have brought upon me and my kingdom such a great sin? You have done deeds to me that ought not to be done.

In other words, I and my people have not deserved this. And Abimelech said to Abraham, What did you have in view that you have done this thing? And Abraham said, Because I thought surely the fear of God is not in this place, and they will kill me on account of my wife. But indeed she is truly my sister. She is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife.

What a story! This deserves its own chapter in the annals of faith. And it came to pass, when God caused me to wander from my father's house, and I said to her, This is your kindness that you should do to me—protecting me by keeping my wife's true identity hidden. And in every place, wherever we go, say of me, He is my brother. So they had forged this lie from the very beginning.

Then Abimelech took sheep and oxen and male and female servants and gave them to Abraham, and he restored Sarah his wife to him. And Abimelech said, See, my land is before you. Dwell where it pleases you. And then to Sarah he said, Behold, I have given your brother a thousand pieces of silver, and I have given you a thousand pieces of silver. Indeed, this vindicates you before all who are with you and before everybody. Thus she was rebuked.

And Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, his wife and his female servants. Then they bore children, for the Lord had closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech because of Sarah, Abraham's wife.

Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Lord, we thank you for your word. Lord, we thank you for the giving of praise and worship to you this morning. Lord, we thank you for every person gathered here. And so, we see in Abraham's story that God remains faithful even when His people are faithless. God, we praise you that your word is so clear, it is so real, it is raw, it is honest, it is transparent. It does not gloss over the imperfections of your people. It shows us just how faithless they can be. And how often, Lord, we see ourselves in them. But through it all, Lord, we are reminded that you are faithful. That you are good when we are not. And that you are worthy of our trust. Lord, we pray that your name would be magnified. That our eyes would be upon Jesus. And I pray if anyone is lost, Lord, that they would come under conviction. They would see themselves as desperate sinners in need of the covenant faithfulness of God. And that they would call upon your name and be saved, we pray. Let your church be edified. Let your bride be beautified, Lord, through the preaching of your word, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

There is a philosopher named George Santayana, who famously wrote, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." And by the way, he was an atheist. But his words are nonetheless true. That's a sobering truth, isn't it?

How many times do we forget the past? And we are destined to repeat it. We see it in nations that forget the lessons of war. We see it in families that perpetuate the same dysfunction, generation after generation. And we see it in our own lives when we fall into the same sins again and again and again. Yet even in the face of such repetition, God's faithfulness remains unshaken, as seen in the story of Abraham, who, despite his repeated failures, still saw God's promises fulfilled.

But here's what makes this text so remarkable. This morning's text is so remarkable that Abraham, the father of faith, repeats a sin he committed nearly 25 years earlier. He told the same lie. He faced the same fear. He experienced the same failure. And yet in the very next chapter, chapter 21, we see the fulfillment of God's promise despite Abraham's repeated failure.

So in this chapter and in the opening part of chapter 21, we see really two parallel truths. We see human failure on one hand, and then we see divine faithfulness on the other.

Now remember, Abraham is the father of what? The father of faith. He's the only man to be called what? The friend of God. His faith is counted to him as righteousness. But even this giant of faith stumbles and falls into the same pit of sin. So here's the gospel reality that we need to understand this morning: faith is not the absence of failure, and faith is not perfect performance. Faith is not even sinless living.

Rather, faith is perseverance of trust in a faithful God even when we fall. And I want you to remember these two lines. Faith may stumble, but grace never fails even when we fall. And when our sin is great, God's grace is great. God's grace is greater still. Praise God for His grace that is greater than all of our sin. Praise God for His faithfulness that is greater than all of our unfaithfulness.

So here Abraham is. He's 99. He's fixing to celebrate the miraculous birth of Isaac in chapter 21. But before chapter 21, we encounter the uncomfortable chapter 20. And sometimes God has to expose our weakness precisely because He wants to demonstrate His strength. Sometimes He has to reveal our own sinful inability in order to show us His ability. This is the pattern: our frailty becomes the stage for His faithfulness, our failure the backdrop for His power. Abraham's fear overcomes his faith once again, and in doing so, God turns his moment of spiritual failure into a moment of divine revelation.

So let's begin here. Point number one, the faithlessness of Abraham. Or we can call it the failure of faith. Now beginning in verse 1 of Genesis 20, the story sounds very familiar because 25 years earlier in chapter 12, Abraham went down to Egypt during a famine. And remember, he told Pharaoh the exact same lie: "She's not my wife. She's my sister." Why? Because Sarah is a beautiful woman. And she still is. I mean, think about this. She's 89, 90 years old. And she is so attractive that a king would snatch her up and place her in the harem. Therefore, Abraham's fear overcomes his faith once again.

But think about the timing. Think about the context. Abraham has witnessed the terrifying power of God. He has had a meal with angels and God as they visited his tent. He saw the judgment of God rain down on Sodom and Gomorrah. He saw God's rescue of Lot. And you would think after all that he's been through, after seeing God provide time and time again, he would be stronger now. You would think he wouldn't have a problem with fear. But here he is again, a quarter century later, battling the same demons, the same sins, telling the same lie.

Friends, we can learn something from this. Past victories don't guarantee present courage; yesterday's faith doesn't automatically translate into today's obedience. We must always rely on the Lord, for we remain just as susceptible to sin today as we were a decade or even a quarter-century ago. We see a recurring pattern of sin and the persistent nature of the flesh. Abraham goes to Gerar, where fear grips his heart. He assumes there's no fear of God in this place—these people will do whatever they want to me, take Sarah, place her in the harem of Abimelech. Abimelech is not the name; it's the title used for the kings of this era, much like how we might refer to Pharaoh as "Pharaoh"—a title, not a personal name. He schemes, manipulates, lies. What we might call a gray area is, in reality, a whole lie. He puts Sarah—the vessel of the covenant promise—in a morally compromising position. He is more afraid of what might happen than he is confident in what God has promised. Sarah is to bear the promised seed by him, not by another man.

He says there's no fear of God in this place. But as we find out, there is more fear of God in the heart of this pagan king than there is in the heart of Abraham at this moment in his life. He makes an assumption based on fears. He calculates the odds based on human logic. He protects himself using human wisdom. And in doing so, he fails to factor in the faithfulness of God. Friends, that is the flesh at work, isn't it? That's what it looks like when we lean on our own understanding instead of the Lord. That is when we find our safety or our security or our blessing in our own cleverness or in our own schemes or our own ability to manage the outcome. This assumption is not only misguided but directly contradicts the promises of God.

But how often do we resort to scheming, manipulating, lying, trying to be in control of the situations? And it causes us to have a moral compromise. In this contrast, we see Abraham's faithlessness set against God's faithfulness. Unbeknownst to Abraham, God comes to the rescue because God appears to Abimelech in a dream. Moses refers to this as a dream. I would call it more of a nightmare, because when you have a dream that starts with you being a dead man, it's probably not going to end well.

Abraham had failed to protect Sarah, but God intervened to protect her. Abraham's fear endangered the promise, but God's power preserved it. Isn't it comforting to know that when we make a mess of things, God doesn't wash his hands of us and declare, "I'm done with you"? No, praise God—he comes through, coming to our rescue. When we go to great lengths to sabotage the work of God in our lives, God responds with a resolute, "Nope, I'm not letting that happen."

I praise God that he's sovereign and that he's in control. And that even when we make wrong turns and wrong decisions, God has a way of redirecting us and placing us on the right path again. God intervened to rescue him from his own failures and from his dumb decisions. Praise God. I'm grateful that God's patience enables him to deliver me from my greatest adversary—myself.

How many times have we just made stupid decisions? How many times were we going on a path of destruction, hanging out with people we shouldn't be hanging out with, going places we shouldn't have been going, and God says no, I'm not going to let you continue living that lifestyle. How many of us were headed to hell? That's every one of us. But God in his grace intervened. Long before we even knew what he was doing, he came to our rescue and he delivered us.

Abimelech says, he calls him Lord, I didn't know. I did this in the integrity of my heart. He said she was a sister. She agreed. I didn't know. And for that reason, God protected Abimelech. God protected this pagan king from committing adultery, but he also protected Sarah in order to preserve the covenant line to which the Messiah would come. Remember, Sarah's child could not be born from Abimelech. It had to be conceived from Abraham.

This is encouraging, isn't it? That God's plans and purposes cannot be overcome by human failure. Friends, his plans will not be derailed by our faithlessness. And when we make a mess, when we scheme, and when we try to do things our own way, God is sovereign. And all of his good plans and all of his purposes will be fulfilled. It doesn't matter if Satan opposes. It doesn't matter if governments and men oppose. It doesn't even matter if we, through our own faithlessness, fail to believe. God's plan will be accomplished. He is a sovereign God. All of his good plans will come to fruition.

Now, in this story, we learn several truths. We learn that when God's people sin, it brings trouble upon both the saved and the lost. Friends, God's people never sin in a vacuum. See, we are called to be salt and light. We are called to be a blessing to others. But when we compromise like Abraham did, we not only give unbelievers a reason to doubt our message, but we give them opportunity to blaspheme the worthy name of Christ. Abraham grossly misrepresented his God before Abimelech and his people. And we need to make sure that we do not misrepresent our King. Our sins, especially as believers, affect everyone around us. We never sin in a vacuum. Everything we do, whether it's a pastor, elders, deacons, church members, parents, school teachers, government officials, everything trickles down, right? Everyone is affected by our decisions.

We also see that God is sovereign over all life. We know that all life comes from God. He has the power to open and close wombs, and he has the power to close them. By Abimelech taking Sarah, God had to judge the people by closing their wombs. No people were being conceived, no people were being born. God has the power over life. And that teaches us that every single life is sacred because it comes from him. Friend, no child is born by accident. No conception is outside of his control. Every life is precious because every person is a person made in the image of God.

But the one I really want us to drill down on this morning is that although Abraham had failed, God is not done with him. Notice in the text what God calls him. God calls him what? A prophet. And by the way, this is the first instance in Scripture where the word prophet is used. Specifically, Abraham is called a prophet after he lied, after he misrepresented God, after he pawned off his wife. He says, he's still my prophet. He's still my man. After he's troubled an entire nation of people. After he has failed, God has not failed him. God is not done with him. He still calls Abraham, my man. You're my prophet.

And he calls Abraham to pray for Abimelech and his people. So what does he do? Abraham prays. And God opens the womb. Babies are being conceived and born. God answered the prayer of this prophet. Listen, was God done with Abraham because he sinned? No, he wasn't. Is God done with you because you sinned? Because you've blown it? No, he's not. Why? Because where sin abounds, God's grace abounds much more. When we are faithless, he is still faithful. Praise God for that.

But I want you to think—this was a test of Abraham's heart. He's praying for other women to have a baby. Had he not been praying that for Sarah for years? And how would that make him feel when other women are getting pregnant now? Friends, this is a test of our hearts. Can we celebrate others' answered prayers while we are still waiting for our own? Can we rejoice in the blessing of God in the lives of others when we ourselves are still waiting for that very same thing we've prayed for? Can we pray for others and rejoice with them even when it seems like God is making us wait? Because this is not just about patience—it's about trusting God's faithfulness. When we pray for others, we're not only interceding for their needs but also participating in God's work of bringing His promises to fulfillment. And in doing so, we're reminded that His faithfulness to keep His word is not diminished by our circumstances or the timing of His answers.

Let me tell you, Abraham's patience paid off. His intercession for others didn't slow down God's timing; in fact, it deepened his own faith. Instead, it prepared his heart for the moment God had in store. Because in the very next chapter, we see God proving His faithfulness to keep every promise, no matter how long we wait or how many times we doubt. Abraham and Sarah will finally have their own child, just as God had promised. But here's the thing—when we pray for others, it's often in those moments that our own faith begins to grow. And it's in those moments that our confidence in God's power and promises grows stronger for ourselves.

But in all of this, I want you to grab this. We see the faithfulness of God on display. The promises of God do not depend on Abraham's performance. They depend upon God's character. And I love how the Apostle Paul writes to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:13. He says, if we are faithless, he that is God remains faithful. He cannot deny himself. Friends, God cannot betray his own nature. He cannot break his own word. He cannot abandon his own purpose. And listen, He will never turn his back upon those for whom his son died. Even when you are faithless, he remains faithful. Even when we stumble and fall, he picks us up again. Even when we doubt, his promise remains sure and unmovable. The Bible says in Psalm 145:13, the Lord is faithful in all he does. Praise God that he is always faithful.

I want you to see the gospel in Genesis 20. And this is a picture of justification and sanctification by faith, isn't it? If salvation depended upon Abraham's consistent obedience, he would have been disqualified right here. In fact, he would have been disqualified way back in Genesis 12 when he said this same lie. Friends, if blessing came through human merit, Abraham would have forfeited everything. But that's not how God works. That's not how the gospel works. The Bible says in Romans 4:5, "But to him that works not, but believes on him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness." Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. Friends, not because his faith was perfect. We see here his faith was imperfect. But his God was perfect. And he was credited with a perfect righteousness.

Friends, our faith may not be perfect. That's the reason why I'm telling you this. I'm telling you, do not place your faith in your own faith. Do not place your faith in a prayer that you pray. Do not place your faith in an emotion or how you feel. And do not place your faith on how you perform, friends. Because all of those things are inconsistent. Place your faith in a perfect God and a perfect Savior who gives you a perfect righteousness, friends. Place your faith in a perfectly faithful God who will keep all of his good promises.

Friends, Abraham's obedience wasn't flawless. But the object of his faith was faithful. Friends, I want to encourage you. Your salvation this morning does not rest on the strength of your grip upon Christ, but on the strength of his grip upon you. Your salvation does not depend on the sincerity of your faith, but on the faithfulness of the God who promised to justify you if you will call out to him. Your justification and standing before God is not based on your obedience or mine. Because, I don't know about you, but I have lapses of obedience. There's times when I'm doing pretty well, and then there's times when I do pretty poorly. But I am counted righteous because of the obedience of Christ. I am righteous because of the obedience of Christ, and you are as well.

So, how do we see Abraham and Jesus? Well, there's a contrast, obviously, in this chapter. So let's contrast Jesus and Abraham. Jesus lived the perfect life of faith that Abraham, though faithful in many ways, ultimately failed to fully embody. Abraham's faith was genuine, as seen in his willingness to sacrifice Isaac, yet it faltered in moments of fear and doubt, such as when he lied about Sarah being his wife. In contrast, Jesus, who declared "I am the truth," lived a life of unwavering integrity. Whereas Abraham resorted to lying and scheming, Jesus always spoke the truth. Indeed, Jesus said, "I am the truth. I believe the truth and the life." Jesus is truth incarnate.

Whereas Abraham's trust in God kind of wavered and faltered here again, Jesus trusted the Father completely, even in the face of fear, even when fear may have caused him to turn back. Remember Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, when he was under so much stress that his sweat became as great drops of blood. Sure, his flesh was dreading the terrors and torments of the cross, but his spirit was under such agony because he was absorbing the sin of all of God's elect. And instead of running away, he faced his fear and he said, Not my will, but your will be done.

We also see a contrast here in the way of the intercessor. Because Abraham is called to pray for Abimelech. Even though he himself had just sinned. God uses a flawed man to mediate or to pray for others. A man marked by his own failure. He prays for the people of Gerar and God hears him. But friends, we have a greater intercessor, do we not? We have the Lord Jesus Christ. And he intercedes with us in perfect righteousness. He himself never failed. He intercedes with faithful, unwavering, perfect devotion to God. Therefore, he is able to save those who come to God through him. Abraham's intercession is tainted by his own failure. But friends, Jesus' intercession is backed by his own righteousness.

But I want you to understand one of the ultimate contrasts here is in how Abraham treats his wife. The Bible tells us in Ephesians 5:25, Paul writes, "Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her." Abraham's not doing that here, is he? Abraham's essentially saying, "You take my wife so I can live." Jesus says, "I lay down my life so my bride can live." Whereas Abraham said, "She's my sister out of self-preservation." Jesus says, "I lay down my life out of self-sacrificing love." Abraham sacrificed his bride to save himself, but Jesus sacrificed himself to save his bride. Friends, you will find no more faithful beloved than the Lord Jesus Christ. You will find no more faithful friend than the Lord Jesus. And even when you are faithless or inconsistent, he will always be there for you. He loves you so much he gave his life for you. How can he ever abandon you? How can he ever not fulfill all of his good plans and purposes for you?

So this morning, to bring it home, maybe you're sitting here carrying a heavy load of guilt over a failure. Maybe it's a failure in the past. Maybe it's been a recent failure. Maybe like Abraham, you've made a decision out of fear instead of faith. Maybe like Abraham, you've compromised your convictions when you should have trusted God. Maybe like Abraham, you've repeated a sin you thought you had conquered years and years ago. And you're telling yourself, man, I should know better. Why do I keep messing up in that area? Why do I keep failing? Why do I keep returning to that same sin over and over and over again?

Maybe that's you this morning. Maybe it's, perhaps, a bottle you can't put down. Pills you can't put down. A website you just can't keep from logging on to. A person you can't stop talking to. Whatever your besetting sin is, I want to assure you—there is hope, forgiveness, and deliverance in Jesus. Because, even when you're faithless, He's faithful.

Now, here's how the enemy works. He'll tempt you to sin. Then once you take the bait and sin, he'll accuse you. Then he'll say things like, "some Christian you are." You keep failing in that same area again and again and again. Who do you think you are? You're a failure. You think God could ever love you? You think you're really saved if you struggle with this besetting sin? You think you could ever be used by God? Keep messing up. Again and again. You're a fake. You're a failure. God must be so disappointed in you. Have you ever heard those things? Am I the only one? The devil ever talk to you?

Listen carefully. Our salvation does not depend on the strength of our faith. It depends on the strength of our Savior. Once again, I'll say, our salvation is not contingent upon our performance or our obedience. Our salvation is based on the one who obeyed perfectly in our place. Friends, Abraham failed, but God didn't fail Abraham. Abraham lied, but God's truth remained unshaken. So friends, if your hope for heaven rests on your consistency, if your confidence before God depends upon your performance, friends, you have no ground to stand on. But if your faith is rooted in the rock who is the Lord Jesus Christ, in His righteousness that's been credited to you by faith, friends, then you can rest assured God is not done with you.

You can fail and still be saved because salvation is not by works anyway. It's by grace through faith. Friends, you can stumble and still be secure. Why? Because He who began a good work in you will complete it. God doesn't start something He doesn't finish. He saves people. He sees all the way to glory. He does it. God never leaves anyone to their own devices, and He never abandons His people in their failure.

That's how you know you're a true believer. It's not the absence of sin, but it's the repentance of sin. And it's the fact that He picks you up and He restores you. He sees you through all the way to the end. So you might repeat the same sin, friends, and you can still be forgiven. I love what the Puritans call this. They call it besetting sin. I know that kind of sounds like an old term, but I'm going to use it. It's a besetting sin. It's a thorn in the flesh. As soon as you thought you had it licked, it's still there. It's like an enemy you thought you had him knocked out, but he gets up again before the count of ten and you're like, God, what's wrong with me? It's called being a sinner and living in the flesh. It's called needing the Holy Spirit to empower you.

Now let's talk about this, because the Bible tells us how we deal with these besetting sins. First, we acknowledge it. We agree with God concerning it. And then we confess it. We don't try to hide it away. We don't try to sweep it under the rug. We don't try to justify it and say, well, so and so is struggling with the same thing. No, we confess it before God and we say, Lord, this is sin. I'm struggling in this area. And then we turn from them, recognizing that these besetting sins are like a thorn in the flesh—persistent reminders of our struggle to live in the flesh, not in the Spirit. That's what repentance means. You turn. You have a change of mind, a change of heart. You renounce your sin. You confess your sins. You repent of your sins. And the Bible says in 1 John 1-9 that if we confess our sins, He's faithful and just to what? Forgive us of our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Now, some people will say this gives people an excuse to claim they're a Christian and live any way they want. No, it doesn't. Paul addresses that in Romans 6 when he asks, "Shall we sin so that grace may abound?" God forbid. How shall we who are dead to sin live any longer in it? What it does mean, though, is that when we sin, we have an advocate with the Father—the Lord Jesus Christ, the righteous. Because true believers hate their sin. You don't love your sin if you're a believer. If you can continue to sin and not feel any guilt, any remorse, if you don't feel like the fellowship with God has been hindered, that's a telltale sign that you are unregenerate and you are not a believer.

But if sin breaks you, if you can't stand that feeling of being separated from God, not even that you've lost your salvation, that you've lost your fellowship, you can't stand it. You hate your sin. You're at war with your sin. You're not gallivanting with sin. You're not walking hand in hand with sin. Right? You're at war with sin. And war is hard. It's a fight. It's a struggle. And you are striving against sin. So if you find yourself striving against it, that's good news. You're not whipped and you're not overcome. You're at war. But you are not a victim. You are a conqueror through Jesus Christ.

So if you've done like Abraham and you have a time of failure, confess it. Repent of it. And pray to God and cry out for forgiveness and cry out for divine help. Because friends, we are not left to live this Christian life on our own. We are empowered by the Holy Spirit who gives us new life, who transforms the nature and the desires and the affections of our heart.

The Bible says that we have been crucified with Christ. That is, our sins and our old life are dead to us and we are dead to them. And we are raised with Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, and the same Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead lives in us. And that is more than sufficient power to overcome besetting sins. What is our job? What is our role? We yield ourselves to God. We yield ourselves as instruments of righteousness. We say, Lord, I am going to yield myself to you. I am going to obey you. I am going to cut ties with these sins, these people that drag me down, these places that I shouldn't go. I am going to cut ties. Whatever you have to do, take drastic measures against it. Kill sin or sin will be killing you. Go to war and then yield yourself to the power of the Holy Spirit and watch Him transform you. Watch Him empower you to obey.

Keep in step with the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. Renew your mind with prayer and the Word of God, and watch your thoughts, your words, your behaviors, and your attitudes be changed and conformed to the image of Christ. So this morning, I want you to take a deep breath and rest in the truth that God’s promises do not rise and fall with your performance. They rest on His character. He never changes. When we are faithless, He is faithful. And where sin abounds, grace abounds even more. Grace forgives us of all our sins, and grace grants us victory over besetting sins. His grace is sufficient.

You guys got enough in you for seven more verses? I hope I do. What a contrast. Go to chapter 21 verse 1 through 7. After Abraham had failed once again, God is still faithful. Notice what does not happen in between these two chapters. Abraham does not climb the mountaintop of faith once again. Abraham does not have to prove himself to God somehow. No. Immediately after his failure, God proves Himself faithful. God fulfills His promise. And Isaac is born.

Isn't that amazing how the Holy Spirit put these chapters back to back? Isn't that amazing how the Holy Spirit put these chapters back to back? The Bible says, "I did not have a short life so that I then, at the time a son was born in man." Am I God's same son? We see it again and again—three different times in two verses—the text emphasizes that God does exactly what He promises: "as He said," "as He said," "as He said." When, at the set time, God visited Sarah. Now, this word "visited" appears several times in the Old Testament. Whenever God visits somebody, it's always intentional; it's always accompanied with some powerful act. God visits Sarah; Isaac is conceived later. God visits the Israelites in Egypt, and what happens? God delivers them. There's another fullness of time when a greater son is born—Galatians 4:1. God says to Him: "I sent my Son in the fullness of time, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who are under the law." God visits us again in the person of His Son, Jesus Christ, who was born to redeem not only Abraham's line, but the people from every nation and tribe and tongue. He's the greater Son of promise. Friend, God keeps His word. 25 years earlier, God called this pagan worshipper out of her: "I'm going to give you a land; I'm going to make you a great nation, and all the families on the earth are going to be blessed through you." Genesis 15, God makes a covenant with Him. Genesis 17, God gives Him a sign and seal of that covenant. Anybody remember what that was? Y'all trying to block that out? I know you're trying to block out the sermon, but guess what—I ain't gonna let you. Circumcision! That's right. 25 years of promises and covenants and brief appearances and circumcision—and now, now the promised son is born.

25 years of thinking, Lord, we're not getting any younger. 25 years of watching Sarah, even though she's still beautiful, right? Get older and older. And at the set time, God does exactly what he promised. Friends, I want you to know God's promises are reliable. And God's promises never expire. They never come with a best-by date. They never come with an asterisk that leads to fine print, if you do this, this, this, or this. They don't come with escape clauses or conditions that invalidate them. Friends, when God speaks, he performs. When God makes a promise, friends, you can build your life upon it. You can bank your soul upon it. But it comes, notice, at the right time. Many people become flustered and frustrated with God. Why doesn't God give me what I want, what I've been praying for, when I want it? Because God knows what's best.

Your children, they'll ask for everything under the sun, won't they? They don't even know what they want. But you know what's best for them, and you know when is best for them. So why did God wait 25 years instead of just giving him a son? Until this man was 100 years old. I feel for the fella. 34 years old, and sometimes I'm like, Lord, you've got to give me divine strength. I can imagine. 100 years old, and the wife is 90, and you're just starting out. Why did God wait? This waiting period illustrates God's perfect timing and unwavering faithfulness, as seen in His promises to Abraham. God's delay was not a failure but a deliberate act to demonstrate that His promises are reliable and fulfilled exactly when He chooses, not when we expect.

Well, it's to show us that salvation is by grace through faith, not by human ability. Now think about this. If God had given Abraham these promises when he was 50, 40, 30, he'd be like, that's no problem. I'm young, I'm strong, I'm vigorous. I'll help you out, Lord. You need a promise? I've got a Messiah coming right up. I've got you covered. No, God waited until it was humanly impossible for them to have a child. That is when God stepped in and did his work.

Friends, God delays to demonstrate that he alone is the source of blessing. He wants to allow God to do His work. He wants to remove every opportunity for human boasting, to prove that salvation and all the works of God are by grace through faith—not because we’ve worked for them, not because we deserve them, as Abraham’s faith demonstrated in Romans 4:19-21. Romans 4:19-21 says, “And being not weak in faith, Abraham considered not his own body now dead, when he was about 100 years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, giving glory, being fully persuaded that what he had promised, he was also able to perform.”

Friends, what God promised, he is able and willing to perform. We don't serve a God who is hesitant or reluctant to fulfill his good promises, because that is his pleasure to do so. He loves to demonstrate that he's faithful. He loves to prove that he's faithful time and time again. And by the way, Abraham's faith matured through his waiting. We also see Sarah's love for God. Sarah's laughter marked a journey from doubt to delight. Remember in chapter 18, when God said, this time next year, y'all gonna have a son? And Sarah's eavesdropping, she's kneading out the biscuits. She begins to laugh within herself. Ain't no way, Lord, ain't no way we having a baby. And the Lord says, no, why did Sarah laugh? I didn't laugh. No, you did laugh. Her first laugh was kind of cynical. It was a laugh of disbelief. Now it's a laugh of joy. Her doubt turns to delight. Friends, Sarah herself is a hero of faith. Hebrews 11, 11 says, Through faith also Sarah received strength to conceive seed and was delivered of a child when she was past age. Why? Because she judged him faithful who had promised.

If Abraham's the father of faith, I think it's safe to say that Sarah is the mother of faith. She received strength. She shifted her focus from her impossibility to God's capability, from her weakness to his power, from the deadness of her womb to the life-giving power of God. Friends, that's what faith is. Sarah never said that she wasn't barren. She knew she was barren. Friends, faith is not denying reality. It's not pretending that problems don't exist. It's facing them head on and saying, but God has promised.

Let's look at Isaac as we finish up here. Isaac's the son of promise. Isaac, his name in Hebrew literally means laughter. I can imagine that. Every time they called his name, Hey, Isaac, come over here. He said, Hey, laughter. You make me want to laugh. He serves as a reminder of the joy that God brought to that family. But friends, he is a type, a shadow of greater realities to come. Isaac's far from just being a miracle baby. He's a prophetic picture of a greater son of promise, the Lord Jesus Christ.

How so? Well, first we see that both were miraculously conceived. Isaac's birth was miraculous, accomplished only by God's power, working in a barren, dead womb. How so? Christ's birth was even more miraculous because he was born of a virgin after being overshadowed by the Holy Spirit. Second, we see that they both brought joy. Isaac brought joy and laughter to one family, but Christ brings joy to all nations. As the angels sang, "Fear not, for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy that should be to all people." Third, they both were appointed to carry the covenant. The covenant line continues through Isaac, but Jesus Christ not only continues it but fulfills the covenant promises.

What does all this mean? It means that the gospel is of grace, not of works. When we doubt, God still delivers, friends. If Isaac's birth depended upon Abraham and Sarah's ability, he would have never been born. And just as Isaac was born of a miracle, friends, we are born again of a miracle. We are born, the Bible says, not of blood, of the will of the flesh, or the will of man, but of God. This birth of Isaac was a miracle, but friends, our being born again is no less a miracle. Just as God brought life to a barren womb, He brings life to a cold, dead heart that is separated from Him because of sin. And He regenerates us and brings life—how? Not through our own efforts, but by simply believing in the promises of God. We are justified through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

I want to end this with a gospel connection, because in this birth of Isaac, we see an everlasting covenant. Because Mary, the mother of Christ, centuries later is going to sing about this covenant faithfulness of God as she reflects upon the birth of Isaac. She says that God has helped his servant Israel in remembrance of his mercy as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his seed forever. No doubt she was thinking, just as God gave Sarah Isaac a miracle baby, he's given me a miracle baby, a son of the promise. And through this baby's birth, God is keeping his covenant faithfulness with Abraham. He is sending the Messiah through whom all the nations on the earth are going to be blessed.

But we see Isaac as a down payment, a promise that all the Abrahamic covenant promises will be fulfilled. When Abraham looked at Isaac, he could say, "God gave us the son He promised. Surely He will also give us the land, provide for us, and bless all nations through this child." Similarly, Jesus Christ, the greater Son of Promise, guarantees that all God's promises are "yes" and "amen," finding their fulfillment in Him. If God has given us His own Son, can we not trust Him to freely give us all things? If He has secured our souls for eternity, can we not trust Him with our earthly needs? Friends, Jesus is the greater Isaac, the better Son of Promise. We know this because the same God who brought Isaac from Sarah's dead womb brought Jesus out of the borrowed tomb through His death and resurrection. This guarantees that if God has given us His promised Savior and His Son, He will see us all the way to glory. The same God who visited Abraham and Sarah in Christ Jesus has brought us salvation. So, as we sing our hymn of invitation, let our faith falter no more; His grace abounds much more than our sin. Trust yourself to this faithful covenant-keeping God, whether you have a need, besetting sin, or are lost today. You don't have to be perfect or fit to come as you are. Place your faith in the God who promises to save all who come to Him in faith. Join me here in prayer.