Dying in Faith

How are you faithful to God when it seems like God is not being faithful to you? All the back in chapter 12, Abraham was promised by God to have a land, seed, and a blessing. Despite Abraham's foibles, God consistently worked out His promises, even though they were often at the last minute! There was, however, one promise that hadn't been fulfilled yet: the land. All of the other promises were fulfilled with Abraham and Sarah together, and I could imagine that he might have thought that the land would come through while she was still alive. 

Do we not do the same thing? Do you have ideas of not only what God has promised you but how He is going to fulfill them? Do we not sometimes feel betrayed when things don't go exactly as we imagine them? 

I can only imagine the despair that such a seeming betrayal contains, yet in this passage, we get to see Abraham reach this point. This chapter is about burying his wife, Sarah, the matriarch of Israel. She was the only woman who could bring in the promised son. Abraham's seed could be delivered only from her womb, a woman blessed with favor from God even if she did laugh at Him! She has been at Abraham's side ever since he left the homeland of Ur. She has seen the delivery of the promise of blessing and of a descendant, but she has not seen a land to call her own. She dies a sojourner. 

How does Abraham react to this new test of faith in God, and what can we learn from it? That will be our focus as we look at our two points today: Death comes for all in the end, but death isn’t always the end.