Genesis 18:1-15
I.
Last week we began the series, The God Story, where we looked at the story of God and God’s people as found in the Scriptures. We often wonder, what connects the biblical stories? Does the God of Adam have anything to do with the God of Abraham? And what does that have to do with Jesus? What does that have to do with me?
Last week we encountered Thread #1 and it was “God speaks to God’s people because God desires relationship with them.” It is found in all the stories; a God who speaks and God speaks because God desires relationship. And if it is true for the people of the Bible, it is true for us, too.
Today we will introduce a new thread, but first I want to remind you that if you want to find yourself in the God Story you have to be willing to admit that you have a story. To get caught up in the story you have to understand your story as well.
You may have to admit you didn’t necessarily think this chapter of the story would go in the direction it does. A common theme in the story of God is: things don’t always look the way you thought they would or thought they should. So I will need to ask you to do something that is essential not just for enjoying a story, but for being caught up in the story.
It is called the Suspension of Disbelief.
The idea of the Suspension of Disbelief was first introduced by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1817. He said that when reading fantastic or non-realistic elements of literature there is a Suspension of Disbelief that is necessary. In other words, you have to be willing to suspend your tendency to not believe the impossible to have any hope of enjoying the story.[1]
It is required in many of our favorite stories; you have to say to yourself, “Ok, I’m putting reason and logic aside for a moment, because the story seems better than reason or logic right now.”
So in the film, The Legend of Bagger Vance, I’m going to believe that a mystical caddy named Bagger Vance just appears out of thin air for the purpose of offering the main character, Rannulph Junah, a way to find his “authentic swing”. He does so through his wisdom and insights while caddying Mr. Junah through the Crew Island Invitational against the top professional golfers of his day only to walk away and disappear over the sand dunes before it’s over. So in the film, National Treasure, I’m going to believe that yes, the Founding Fathers of our country following the Revolutionary War buried the exotic treasures of world history several stories down below the many subway trains and Trinity Episcopal Church in Lower Manhattan.
I want to invite you into a fantastic story, it will require great faith and certainly the Suspension of Disbelief, but please understand fantasy does not necessarily mean its fiction.
What I was trying to introduce last week is all the great stories we have find their origin in the great Story which is amazingly and unbelievably true.
There will be times in your story when you will be forced to suspend your disbelief; so you can be caught up in the amazing, surprising, chapter that God holds next for you.
We learn this from Abraham and Sarah. In Genesis 12:2-3, God says, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, I will make your name great and you will be a blessing.”
At seventy-five, God is going to make Abraham’s name great? And the really unbelievable part is that God will make him a great nation. This implies Abram’s offspring will multiply and multiply and become a strong people. Trouble is, Abram has no sons and daughters.
The story continues in Genesis 15. It is eleven years later, Abram is now eighty-six, and still has no children, when God repeats the promise that Abram will be the father of countless children. So Abram and Sarah cook up a different plan, deciding to help God with God’s promise. Sarah tells Abram he must continue his heritage, so she gives him her servant Hagar. Abram and Hagar have a son Ishmael, but this does not seem to be the answer. At age ninety-nine, God speaks to Abram again, and changes his name to Abraham, which means “father of many,” and says you will birth many, and I will establish a covenant with you and your descendants.
Do you see how absurd this is? Suspension of Disbelief is necessary to continue in this story but it’s difficult. God sends the message again, and Abraham and Sarah just laugh, because God’s promise seems so implausible, so unbelievable. God is leading us to believe that the laughable dreams of our hearts might still be possible through God’s power.
II.
Here is Thread #2. If God makes a promise, it will come true.
It may not be in our time. It almost definitely will not be in the way we would draw it up, but God will not forget or go back on God’s word. And this was true for Abraham; everything God promised came true.
The question is, will we be willing to suspend our disbelief to be a part of the God Story, or are we too black and white, too realistic, too rational, maybe even too pessimistic to believe an incredible dream for our life?
What incredible dreams do you have? Once upon a time I had the incredible dream of playing shortstop for the Yankees. But after only tallying two hits in three seasons of Little League, I thought I should try something else. In high school, I dreamed of becoming a stockbroker. But after losing money in a regional stock market game with area high schools, again I thought I’d better look elsewhere. With my dream of going to law school and become a lawyer, more roadblocks and signs appeared. But I remained faithful to God knowing that if God makes a promise, it will come true. So when I began to consider a call to the ministry, all the doors of my other career aspirations were closed with this one left wide open. I’m right where I’m called to be serving God’s people and the world as a pastor of Jesus Christ. This is the part I play in the God Story.
Our story is the story of the God of Abraham, which I’m sure has meant a lot of different things for people over the centuries, but what it reminds me of is that we follow the God who took an old man whose dream was gone, and because he believed—because he suspended his disbelief—it happened. Abraham believed God’s dream for his life. His dream came true.
Paul says this is how we find life, salvation: “Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham's offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham. As it is written: ‘I have made you a father of many nations’” (Romans 4:16-17). We are a part of God’s Story! We are the extension of the promise God made through Abraham.
God wants to call some things in your life that do not exist as though they were. He wants you to suspend your disbelief and believe. And things that are not can become things that are.
Simply believe.
[1]
Coleridge expounded on his literary concept, the “willing suspension of
disbelief,” in his well-known autobiography Biographia
Literaria; Or Biographical Sketches of My Literary Life
and Opinions (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983).
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