Part 1 – Flexibility Training – Reading
God’s time is not our time, and God’s ways are not our ways. Abram was almost 100 and Sarai almost 90 (and quite barren). It was then that God said that they would have a son through whom would come innumerable descendants.
Okay. They believed God, they just didn’t see how that was going to happen. How does a woman in her 90s, infertile all this time, have a child? Sarai got thinking along these lines: “If I can’t have a child, perhaps I can have one through my servant. She’s young. She should be able to have a baby. Abram can be with her just long enough to get her pregnant.” Only problem with that, two women make for a “crowded” home and jealous rivalries become almost guaranteed.
Read Genesis chapters 15 and 16.
ESV – Genesis 15 – BibleHub
NLT – Genesis 15 – BibleHub
A covenant is a vow made between two parties that brings them into a special relationship. One of the big differences between a covenant and a contract is that even if one party breaks the covenant, the other is still expected to be faithful to the covenant. Throughout the Bible, covenants that God makes involve a blood sacrifice. When God in the form of a smoking pot and flaming torch moved between the halves of the dead animals Abram had sacrificed, God was basically saying, may it be done to me as to these animals if I break this vow.
What was the vow? That Abram would have a son of his own blood whose descendants would be as numerous as the stars. Abram’s part of the covenant wasn’t told until chapter 17: Abram and all his descendants would wear the sign of circumcision, declaring an faithful obedience to God Most High. We also learn in chapter 17 that God had in mind all along that Sarai would be the mother, not Hagar.
Little did Sarai know that the sin of her impatience would set the world up for some spectacular clashes between her descendants and the descendants of Hagar. The conflict between Israel and the Arab nations is a direct result of Sarai’s sin. While she didn’t live to see this result, she did live to see the tensions created in her own home that would eventually lead to Hagar and Ishmael being sent away. Abram doesn’t get off the hook either. If he had been strong and encouraged Sarai to have faith that God would do what He covenanted to do, her house may have been much more peaceful. But like his father Adam, Abram silently went along with his wife into sin.
PART 2 – Strength Training – Memory & Thinking
Keep reviewing the previous verses you have already learned as you add to them this next verse. And with those you still need help, that’s okay. Keep working. Keep reading them and reviewing them. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you.
Genesis 15:6 And [Abraham] believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.
Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.
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.
Ask the Holy Spirit to teach you about the Covenants God has made with His people. Ask Him to show you how you fit in to these promises and responsibilities.
Hebrews 11:12 Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.
Hebrews 6:17-20 [We saw this in the last chapter. This time focus on God’s unchanging purpose and that He does not lie.]
So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.
Part 3 – Cardio Training – Prayer
As you pray today, ask God to show you where you are likely to run ahead of His purpose, where you are prone to being impatient. Ask Him to help you with that. You might start with something like this:
Father, forgive us when we try to make Your promises happen before Your chosen time. Forgive us for not waiting patiently. As Sarai learned, impatience puts our lives into tension and conflict that we could have avoided by waiting for Your perfect timing. Help me wait for You. Help me trust You.
Part 4 – Endurance Training
As Job found in the book bearing his name, living a life of patience is difficult – especially if it is accompanied by pain and suffering. But God’s plan is always the best plan, even if we can’t see how that is true. God is fully in control of EVERYTHING. That’s hard to hear, but no less true. As you wait for God to show up in your life, hang on. Hang on tenaciously, even if it’s by the fingernails. Ask God to help you.
Then come back and read more of Abram’s life and be encouraged to endure to the end.
An Extra Lap
Are you waiting for something? Write down what it is and how you are waiting.
Have you ever had to wait for something that finally came? Write that experience down, what it felt like as you waited, and what it was like when it finally happened.
Find someone who is in a season of waiting and encourage them with your story.
Faith Gym 