Unwavering Faith (Romans 4:13-25)

For the last few weeks I’ve seen a jigsaw puzzle in the bargain bin outside of our local newsagent. It’s a 1000-piece puzzle with dozens of Marvel superheroes as the picture. What intrigues me most about this puzzle is the claim at the top right-hand side of the box saying that it is an ‘impossible Puzzle!’

Labelling a puzzle as ‘Impossible’ might be a challenge for many people who like doing jigsaws to try it and find out if this claim is true. However, I wonder if it is really impossible, or just very difficult?

For something to be impossible, by definition it can’t be done. Any jigsaw puzzle, no matter how ‘impossible’ it might seem, can be completed with enough patience and persistence. However, some things in life are literally impossible. These are things that people cannot do no matter how much patience or persistence they pour into the task. We are often capable of doing more than we imagine with a positive mental attitude or a growth mindset. However, we all have limits and there are some things in life that can be impossible for us.

In this morning’s Old Testament reading, we hear the story of God calling Abraham, the patriarch formally known as Abram, to leave his home and family and travel to a place that God will show him. The promise God gives him and which he repeated a number of times in the coming years, was that God would make Abraham into a mighty nation and bless all the peoples of the world through him (Genesis 12:1-3). This might sound difficult enough, but what made this promise even more improbable was that at the time Abraham was 75 years old and his wife, Sarai, whom God would rename Sarah, was 10 years younger. Not too many couples aged between 65 and 75 are able to have children, even with modern reproductive technology. So from the point of view of Abraham and Sarah, what God was promising sounded impossible.

However, we read a little later in the story that ‘Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted him as righteous because of his faith’ (Genesis 15:6 NLT).

Abraham’s faith that God could do the impossible was something that made a profound effect on the Apostle Paul two thousand years later. After the risen Jesus met him on the road to Damascus, Paul re-examined everything he thought he knew about how a person becomes right with God. As a Pharisee, Paul believed that people are made right with God by obeying God’s law. He saw Abraham as someone who was obedient to God’s commands and was made righteous through his obedience. However, meeting the risen Jesus challenged him to re-read the Scriptures and re-think his beliefs. He discovered that Abraham wasn’t made righteous by obeying the law, but by believing God’s promise to do the impossible for him and Sarah. We find this shift in Paul’s words in Romans 4:13…

Clearly, God’s promise to give the whole earth to Abraham and his descendants was based not on his obedience to God’s law, but on a right relationship with God that comes by faith. (NLT)

He goes on to write,

Abraham never wavered in believing God’s promise. In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God. He was fully convinced that God is able to do whatever he promises. And because of Abraham’s faith, God counted him as righteous. (Romans 4:20-22 NLT)

For Paul, this was much more than whether or not a couple who are well past the age of having children can have a baby. He was reflecting on all of God’s promises in Scripture and telling us that we can trust God to do what he promises, even when it seems impossible, because our God is the God ‘who brings the dead back to life and who creates new things out of nothing’ (Romans 4:17 NLT).

We see God keeping his impossible promises most clearly in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. A virgin birth without the help of modern reproductive technology seems impossible, yet God kept his promise to Mary and Jesus was born. Throughout his earthly ministry, Jesus did the humanly impossible by healing the sick, restoring the blind and lame to full health, driving out demons, forgiving sinners, welcoming outcasts, and loving people who were considered unlovable by his society. The ultimate display of God keeping his promises and doing what seems humanly impossible was raising Jesus from the dead. This is God’s guarantee once and for all to every one of us that God can and will keep his promises to us, no matter how impossible them might seem. Like Abraham, when we trust him and believe his promises by living like what God says is true, he will lead us into a new way of living as we follow him into the future.

This is why it is so important for us to constantly be in God’s Word and listen to his promises. There are times when we are capable of more that we think we are if we approach problems and challenges with a positive mental attitude and a growth mindset. However, there are also times when we need to admit that somethings are impossible for us because of our natural human limitations and weaknesses. That’s when God’s promises become liberating and life-giving to us. God makes us promises that seem impossible to us, such as forgiving us, loving us unconditionally, accepting us as we are, or giving us all we need for life in this world and the next, with no strings attached and no hidden catches. We find God’s goodness when we listen to God’s promises in his Word, the big ones about forgiveness and eternal life in Jesus, as well as his everyday promises about so many smaller issues in our lives. When we hear God’s promises to us, even when they seem impossible to us, we receive everything that God promises us through faith in his promise and by trusting the One ‘who brings the dead back to life and who creates new things out of nothing.’

Doing a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle might be challenging, but with enough patience and persistence, it’s not impossible. No matter how much patience and persistence they might have had, it was humanly impossible for Abraham and Sarah to have a baby. However, they believed God and 25 years later they received what God had promised. God continually keeps his impossible promises in the stories of the Bible, culminating in the resurrection of Jesus and the redemption of the world through him. Imagine what God might be able to do in our lives, as he keeps his impossible promises to us in Jesus.

More to think about or discuss:

• Do you find it easy or difficult to believe people when they make promises to you? Why do you find it easy or difficult to do that?
• How do you tend to react when you hear God’s promises in the Bible? Do you find them easy or difficult to believe? Can you explain why…?
• How might your life be different if you listened for God’s promises in the Bible and then trusted them by living like he will do what he promises, even if they seem impossible?