“Hope deferred makes a heart sick but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life” – (Proverbs 13:2)

There is a saying that delay does not mean denial. When God appeared to Abraham at ninety- nine years and promised him that he would have a child late in life, both he and his wife Sarah doubted. “Abraham’s face fell down; he laughed and said to himself, “Will a son be born to a man hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at ninety?” (Genesis 17: 17).

For Sarah, whose biological clock had long passed, she scoffed. After she too heard of the same, “Sarah laughed to herself, as she thought, “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?” (Genesis 18: 12).

All this did not please God. “Then the Lord said to Abraham, why did Sarah laugh and say, “Will I really have a child, now that I am old? Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year, and Sarah will have a son” (Genesis 18:13-14).

And who would have the last laugh! “Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant and bore a child to Abraham in his old age, at the very time he had promised” (Gen 21:1-2).

Here in these passages we see two things. First of all, the tendency to weigh things from a human perspective other than a divine appreciation of the matter. This couple based on their understanding of human reality had long given up. Yet their failing was to see matters only from a physical angle and not spiritual light.

Secondly, based on their limited understanding, they could not imagine that God could turn around an impossible situation. For them their case was beyond salvation. The chapter of child bearing had been lost. Yet how mistaken they were!

Like Abraham and Sarah, any of us, could be faced with a matter when from a physical look of it, all hope is lost. We are past the sale date. What happened to this couple shows that sometimes things may no longer make sense in a physical sense to us, and we are led to easily give in. Not so says the Lord. When we take such matters to Him, as we should, He breathes a new life and resurrects them to life. As it was written, “But those who trust in the Lord will renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not be faint” (Isaiah 40:31 NLT).

Prayer for today: Lord Father God of Abraham, maker of heaven and earth, for any matter that has delayed it is true that if it’s your will “delay is not denial” and so I pray to persevere in faith, waiting upon you, for that day when you will make me dance with laughter, this I pray in Jesus’s name!