Our text is in Genesis chapter
18, but I'm going to read one verse from chapter 17, verse
9. And this is where the Lord had
made covenant with Abraham. He renewed the covenant to Abraham,
and gave him the covenant of circumcision, and changed his
name from Abram to Abraham, and changed Sarah's name from Sarai
to Sarah. And he gave this promise, saying
in Genesis 17, 19, God said, Sarah, thy wife shall bear thee
a son indeed, and thou shalt call his name Isaac. And I will
establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant,
and with his seed after him. Now, our text this morning, we're
going to be in Genesis 18, verse 9 through 15. And it describes
the renewal of God's promise, which he gave to Abraham concerning
his son Isaac. And this son would be born by
Sarah. And this is the son of promise,
son of promise. Now let's read Genesis 18 beginning
in verse 9. We're going to go through the
text and we'll have some comments first as we begin. And they said,
so here's Abraham, he's entertaining these angels unawares. I don't
know how much Abraham saw and recognized that this is the Lord.
This is Jehovah standing before him with two angels. I don't
know to what degree he understood, if anything, but they said unto
him, Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said, Behold, in the tent. Now here, one of them knew Sarah
by name. They said her name, and it tells
us something about our God. He knows us. He knows His people
by their name. And that's a happy thought. That's a delightful thought that
your God, the God, the true and living God, knows you. That look to Him, that believe
Him, that call upon His name, He knows your name. And He calls
you by your name. Now, they ask this. They ask,
where's Sarah? Because what they're about to
say to Abraham concerns Sarah just as much as it concerns Abraham. Now, you probably are familiar
with this. If you hear someone say your
name in a conversation that you're not a part of, it wakes you up. You begin to listen. Or if they're
describing something that you think or know, I think they're
talking about me. You listen up. I remember as
a young boy, if I was in the car or in the kitchen and my
mom was talking to my aunt or something like that, I'd know
if she said my name or if she said something that described
me, I'd listen up. I'd pay attention. What's mom
saying about me? What's she saying? Is it good? Is it bad? Because
sometimes it was bad. And sometimes it was good. And so they say her name. Now,
Abraham here is entertaining these strangers. And again, I
don't know how much he recognized them or not. But we are told
in scripture, in Hebrews 13, verse 2, that we're not to be
forgetful to entertain strangers, because some have entertained
angels unaware. Why is this important? Well,
our Lord tells us something. Turn over to Matthew chapter
10. Our Lord tells us something about
hospitality and about entertaining strangers. Matthew 10, and in
verse 40, he begins. He says, he that receiveth you
receiveth me. And he that receiveth me receiveth
him that sent me. And he gives an example. Verse
41 He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall
receive a prophet's reward. And he that receiveth a righteous
man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous
man's reward. And whosoever shall give to drink
unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the
name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise
lose his reward. And what this is teaching us
about is that if you entertain a prophet or a righteous person
or a disciple of the Lord, that treasure that they possess, that
errand that they're on, that reward that they possess, will
be a reward unto you. You'll be blessed by that same
reward, that same message. You're gonna hear that blessed
word that they speak. And that's what we see in the
next verse back in our text, Genesis 18, 10. This is their
reward. And their reward is the renewal
of the promise. The renewal of the promise of
the covenant that God made with Abraham. He said, I will certainly
return unto thee according to the time of life. And lo, Sarah,
thy wife, shall have a son. And wouldn't you know it, Sarah
heard it in the tent door which was behind him. She heard it.
He said her name, and she She listened, what's he saying about
me? Why is he talking about me out there? And she heard this
same promise, reiterated, restated, renewed again to Abraham. Now, she's out of sight, right? It tells us that she was behind
him. But are we ever out of the sight of our Lord, right? By man's standard, she's behind
him, and she thinks he can't see him, but we're never out
of God's sight. And what our Lord is saying to
us is He knows the thoughts and the intents of our hearts. He
knows what we're thinking. He knows what we do in secret.
scripture tells us that we could be doing something in complete
and utter darkness and it's like doing it in broad daylight before
the Lord, doing it right before Him. So He knows, He knows our
thoughts, He knows what we think and He knows what we do, thinking
we do it in secret, in secret. Now verse 11, Abraham and Sarah
were old and well stricken in age, and it ceased to be with
Sarah after the manner of women. In other words, she had gone
through menopause so that she could no longer bear children.
She wasn't producing any seed. She was unable to bear children
at this time. It seems that Abraham was 99
years old and Sarah 89, because when they had Isaac, Abraham
was 100 and Sarah was 90. So this is about almost a year
before. And the Lord is telling us this. The Spirit records this in the
scriptures to bring to our attention that what's being done is a miracle
of God. that this is not possible according
to the ability, the strength, the natural things that man expects
and what he knows. It's not according to the nature
of man. For a woman at this time who's
had gone through complete menopause, it's impossible for her to have
children and so this is impossible with man therefore verse 12 Sarah
laughed within herself she's thinking oh this man he's a silly
man that's silliness I'm not gonna have any children and she
said after I am waxed old shall I have pleasure am I Lord being
old also now back in In chapter 17, verse 17, we're told that
Abraham laughed when he heard this. But Abraham's laughter
was that of joy. It wasn't the laughter of unbelief.
It was of joy at the thought of having a child. I remember
Michelle and I actually had a little scare quite after some time when
Alyssa was older. And I was actually thrilled at
the thought that we would have another child. Now, it turned
out that that we didn't, but it joyed my heart. I was very
thankful in that little time of a thought there. And so Abraham
was thrilled at this thought that Sarah would have a child. But Sarah here, her laughter
is in disbelief. Her laughter is like we saw with
Zacharias. With Zacharias, it's one of doubting. It's one of not believing what
the angel is saying. And Zacharias, he doubted what
Gabriel said concerning the birth of his son John. Now verse 13,
the Lord said unto Abraham, wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, shall
I of a surety bear a child which am old? And the question that
comes to our mind is, did Abraham ever tell Sarah the promise that
God had told to him? Maybe there was a big commotion
over the fact that he was given circumcision. And now he and
every male in the household was going to be circumcised. And
maybe that's what Abraham told her about. But did he ever tell
her what the Lord told him, that she would bear a son? Why is
Sarah laughing at this? Haven't you told her what I told
you, Abraham? Because he asked it of Abraham
concerning Sarah. He asked Abraham, why is Sarah
laughing? Didn't you tell her of this? And it says to us that
we that possess this promise, that know the promise of God
concerning Christ, tell it to your loved ones. Be sure to tell
it to them plainly and clearly. Tell them what the Lord has told
you, what he's said to you. how he's blessed your heart in
and by the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't keep it to yourself, don't
decide who will hear it and who won't hear it, but tell them,
tell anyone, because you don't know whom the Lord is purposed
to save and to bless them with that word of grace that he's
filled your heart with. Now verse 14, is there anything,
he asks, this is the Lord now, is there, is anything too hard
for the Lord? And thankfully, the Lord here
brings to pass his purpose. Sarah's unbelief did not prevent
the Lord from bringing to pass the promise that he gave to Abraham
and the covenant of grace that he made with us in Christ. In Christ, he brought this to
pass. And he said, at the time appointed, I will return unto
thee according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a
son. And it's a picture there of the
triumph of God's grace. Though we have fallen in Adam,
though we ourselves are sinners, though we ourselves are found
to be unbelieving, distrustful, foolish, in our behavior, foolish
in our works and our thoughts, and sinners, sinful before God. Yet we have not altered the purpose,
the gracious will and purpose of our God who promised that
He would save His people from their sins in His Son. God has not changed or altered
His purpose. And so we see that to whom God
will be gracious, he will be gracious through the gift of
faith, which is wrought in them through Christ. Now about that. Oh, well, then it says, verse
15, then Sarah denied saying, I laughed not. I didn't laugh
for she was afraid. And he said, nay, but thou didst
laugh. In other words, we're not going
to deceive God. You may be a very gifted speaker,
and you're not going to deceive God. You're not going to fool
Him or outsmart Him. He knows the secrets of our heart. He knows the thoughts and intents
of our heart, whether we say them or not. He knows. He knows
exactly what we've done, what we've said, and what we've thought.
And so God is very gracious to Sarah, and he's gracious to every
one of his children. We've said and done foolish things,
and we've argued with God perhaps, but God is triumphant by his
grace over the hearts of his people. And I love what it says
concerning Sarah. Paul, in Hebrews 11, verse 11,
he writes that through faith, this is what it says, this is
the interpretation of grace, of what we're seeing here. Through
faith also Sarah herself received strength to conceive seed. And
you're thinking, Sarah's faith, what faith did Sarah have? Well,
faith is the gift of God. It's not of the strength of this
flesh. And so she received strength to conceive seed and was delivered
of a child when she was past age because, now listen to this,
because she judged him faithful who had promised. Isn't that beautiful? When you
read the Old Testament, it's very honest. in what we have
done. It's very honest about our actions,
our thoughts, our words. Even in the New Testament, we
see the sin and the folly of the disciples of Christ. And
yet, under the blood of Christ, We see how God sees things. We're made to know. We're made
to know that the scripture hath concluded all under sin. Galatians
3.22. The scripture shows us all are
under sin. Even the best of us are under
sin. We're sinners at best. But under
the blood of Christ, we see how God sees his child. they're faithful,
they're righteous, they're without sin because of Christ Jesus our
Lord and what he has accomplished in salvation for us. So that's what we see here in
this text here. That's just a brief overview
of this text. Now I want to bring you back
for a moment to verse 10, which is the promise renewed. This
is the promise of God renewed to us. And what's beautiful is
that this promise, it's a picture of the gospel. Let me just say
this. So verse 10, he said, I will certainly return unto thee according
to the time of life. And lo, Sarah thy wife shall
have a son. And Sarah heard it in the tent
door, which was behind him. And so here's a renewal of the
promise that God had made to Abraham. And in the context,
the historical context, this is speaking of Isaac. He's the promised son that God
had promised to Abraham and to Sarah. This is the promise referring
to Isaac. But we, by the grace of God,
are made to know and understand that this is speaking of the
promised seed. This is God reiterating his promise
from the foundation of the world to save his people from their
sins, to destroy the enemy who deceived Eve and who brought
Adam to sin willfully against God. And he promised to save
his people by the seed of woman. And so this is looking to the
Lord Jesus Christ, who would come and save his people, the
one to whom all the nations of the earth would be gathered,
and all the families of the earth would be blessed in. Turn with
me to Galatians chapter 3, and I'll show you this. Galatians
3, and we're going to read verse 16 through 18. Now to Abraham and his seed were
the promises made. He saith not, and to seeds, as
of many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ. And this I say, that the covenant
that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law which
was 430 years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise
of none effect. Even Sarah's sin could not disannul
God's promise, could not destroy what God had purposed to do.
For if the inheritance be of the law, it's no more of promise,
but God gave it to Abraham by promise. Brethren, this promise
speaks of God's purpose, His will and purpose to save His
people from their sins. This is the purpose of God in
salvation. We as sinners transgress the
law of God continually. So why did God give us the law?
What is the purpose of the law? Well, the purpose of the law
is to show us our sin. And it's to show us the depth
and the breadth of our sin. It's to show us how exceedingly
sinful we are by nature and how great our fall in Adam is, lest
we think that we could put our hand to save ourselves, that
we could do something to save ourselves. And the Lord's saying,
you cannot save yourselves. You cannot give yourselves life. You cannot give yourselves that
which you seek. Even Romans 3.20 tells us, by
the law is the knowledge of sin. The law shows us what sinners
we are. And so the law was not given
to man for him to save himself by that law. It was given to
show us what sinners we are, how greatly we have offended
God, that we are dead in trespasses and sins and have nothing to
offer to God, have no works, no righteousness to give to holy
God. It's to show us that we've died
spiritually. And that since our fall, all
we've done is sin. And we've earned the wages of
sin, which is eternal death and separation from God. But God promised salvation to
His people. by His Son. He is the seed of
woman, the promised seed that should save His people. God has
given His promise and He will not relent. He will not change
His mind and be turned from fulfilling His gracious word. to you who
hear him, who see I'm the sinner, I'm guilty before holy God, Lord
have mercy on me, save me. And God says I will not turn
away from my promise to bless you, to forgive you through my
son whom I've promised to give. He sent him, brethren. He sent
Christ into the earth in this flesh, in the likeness of his
brethren. He came in the weakness of this
flesh, in the humility of the flesh like unto us. And when
he came, he fulfilled that law. He was born of a woman, born
under the law to fulfill that law perfectly, which we could
not do. He did it. showing that He is
the perfect fit sacrifice for His people, that He is the Lamb
of God, sent of God to save His people from their sins. And He went to the cross willingly
as the spotless Lamb. as the sinless lamb to put away
the sins of his people, to be a sacrifice to the Father, to
make an atonement for our sins, a covering for our sins. And
it wasn't with the blood of bulls and goats under the law. It was
with his own precious blood. He took the place of his people,
though he didn't deserve it, yet he did it to save and deliver
his people from their death. from justice, from the punishment
that we deserved. And this He did just as the Father
promised, just as the Lord promised it. And so by our Savior, by
the promised Son, all you that believe on Him, He says, you
have life. I've given Him for you. He's
your Savior. He's your salvation. Believe
Him. Rest in Him. He is the comfort
and the peace and the joy of God for His people. He's the
very promise of God. And we know this by that new
birth which He's revealed in us because He gives His children
His Spirit to make this very thing known to us. To know the
promise and to know this promise was made unto me. And Christ
has satisfied. Holy God, my Father forever,
so that I am His and He is mine and I have an inheritance Christ
in Christ now this gift of salvation is Mysteriously pictured for
us here right in this text as well Everything I just said to
you is declared to us right here in this text where we look at
Sarah The salvation of God's people is revealed here to us
in what God said to Sarah. Sarah is a picture of us, brethren. You're pictured here. You that
believe Christ, you're pictured here in Sarah. And so this picture
is an allegory. It's also an allegory. It's everything
that we've discovered, it's also an allegory to us to show us
salvation, what our God does. And so I pray, I'm going to show
you this, and I pray the Lord blesses it to your heart, and
to bless mine. So back in verse 9, they said
unto him, Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said, Behold, in
the tent. She's in the tent. What the Lord
is doing here is He's calling your attention to your mortality. He's showing me, showing you
the brevity of our lives. Our bodies are tents. Our bodies
are a temporary household. I have some tarps at home that
I use, and I find that only after about a year or two, I got heavy-duty
ones, and those things are brittle, they're wearing thin, they're
getting holes in moisture, liquids getting through, they don't hold
up. That's what a tent is. Some are
better than others, but they eventually wear thin, they break
down, and they're discarded. They're discarded. And so the
Lord shows us in scripture that our bodies are likened to tents
that house our souls. They're a temporary housing for
our soul, this eternal living soul. Paul said, for we know
that if our earthly house of this tabernacle, right here,
this tabernacle, if it were dissolved, we'd be unclothed with this. Our souls would be unclothed
until we're clothed again in the promise of that body that
our Savior will put upon us. And that word tabernacle means
tent. It means tent. And a tent wears
out. Not the heavenly one, it won't
wear out. But this one down here wears out. Where moth and rust
and thieves break in and take it. That's what we see here in
this life. Like this word that the Lord
speaks concerning Sarah here in our text, the word of this
promise it concerns every one of us who are gathered here this
morning in the tent of our bodies. You whom God has purpose to gather
together to be here this day in the tents of your bodies,
just like Sarah, she heard that word, you're hearing this word
also. This is the word of promise,
which every time we preach it, is renewed again. It's declared
afresh what God has promised to do for sinners, for His people,
to you that believe Him. This is reiterated and declared
over and preached and proclaimed what God has done. God is done.
Verse 10, and he said, I will certainly return unto thee according
to the time of life. And lo, Sarah thy wife shall
have a son. He's saying she's going to have
life brought in her. Her that was barren, her whose
womb was dead, is going to bear life. and Sarah heard it in the
tent door which was behind it. Now, we have heard, proclaimed,
this morning even, and every time we gather here, how that
this promise speaks of Jesus Christ. He is the promise of
God who by the death of Himself and by His resurrection has obtained
eternal redemption for you that believe Him. That's the testimony
that God gives that this was done for you. He reveals and
manifests faith in you so that you that believe have the promise
of God. It's given unto you. given to
you so that you that believe him you have been delivered from
the wrath of God and you've been given life inheritance the promise
of his inheritance just like it concerned Abraham with his
son how shall I know Lord that I will inherit this promise that
you've given to me and he's he declared to him the son given
you a son and he brought on the past this is the promise it's
Christ it's Christ and Sarah heard it in the tent door what's
the tent door well what's the tent door of you what's the door
to your tent your heart it's your heart she heard it in her
heart that's where Christ enters with his word That's where he
enters his child and sucks with them. That's where he meets with
us. And he makes known his precious
word. He breaks that bread unto us. He gives us that heavenly
bread upon which we feed himself. And he gives us his blood. And
He teaches us and comforts us and speaks peaceably to our hearts
in the tent of the door. And so this is where God reveals
His promises to His people. What's that parable of the sower? It's a picture of our heart,
that heart that's not prepared, that stony heart, that weed-choked
heart, that hard heart that the birds take the seed from, and
then there's that prepared heart prepared by the Holy Ghost to
receive that word to hear it and receive it and to believe
on the Lord and it brings forth fruit fruit and you that hear
it so to you that are here this morning in the tents of your
bodies Romans 10 8 through 10 says that this word is nigh thee. God has brought this word near
to you, to your hearing, even in thy mouth and in thy heart.
That is the word of faith which we preach. That if thou shalt
confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine
heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be
saved. For with the heart man believeth
unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made
unto salvation. And so the Lord has brought this
word of promise to your hearing. Do you hear it in the door of
the tent like Sarah? All his people do. All his people
hear that. And though like Abraham and Sarah,
this old man of flesh barren, dead, a wasteland, unable to
produce life, to bear a son, to bear a child, and can bear
no, can bring forth no fruit, yet God has wrought life in us
by the seed of Christ, His Son, and given us that new man, that
new man of faith, born of His grace, born of His Spirit, to
hear this word of promise. to judge God righteously, to
know He's able to bring to pass that which He's declared to me
and said He will do, that He has wrought life and salvation
for me this day, and that He shall return and I shall be raised
from the dead to forever be with the Lord. And we believe Him,
we believe His word of promise. And He says to us, is there anything
too hard for the Lord? Is this impossible for God to
do? Not at all. With God, all things are possible. With you and me, yes, it's impossible. But with God, all things are
possible. All things are possible to Him. And therefore, at the appointed
time, God returns unto His people. They hear the word, and it could
be immediately. It might be weeks or months or
sometimes even years. But at the appointed time, He
returns according to the time of life. in the day of his grace,
and he brings this word near, and he causes you to hear it
in the tent of the door, the door of the tent, and makes you
to hear and believe his promise in Christ Jesus. And so he tells
us, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved
and thy house, and thy house. A picture here in this context,
meaning not only your soul shall live forever, but he shall give
you a new body, a new tent. one fashioned after Christ, one
which is like unto Christ, because we shall see him as he is, and
we shall live forever in the presence of the Lord. I pray
he bless that word to your hearts. Amen.