Genesis 17 records when God spoke to Abraham and told him of His promise of a son and a nation, birthed through himself and Sarah ... (v.17) Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, “Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?”
Laughing at, not in ridicule, but in the awareness that what God is saying seems so impossible ... “a son born to a man a hundred years old?” — Laughable, impossible.
“Will Sarah bear a child at 90 years old?” — Laughable, impossible.
But it is God who is talking, and “nothing is too difficult for Him.” Obviously, it’s OK to laugh, I think God would probably expect man to chuckle when faced with a promise that seems impossible, by human standards, to fulfill. But again, there is nothing too difficult for God. Abraham walked in obedience, and God fulfilled His promise. I think the laughing probably continued — not in unbelief, but in joy.
Are there things God has said to you that you have laughed off and not embraced because they seemed impossible? Walk in obedience and let joy fill your heart.
Louie Locke is the pastor of Fountainhead Foursquare Church, 3690 U.S. Highway 395, Carson City, www.ffcwired.org.
