Scripture: Genesis 12:1-5; Hebrews 11
Faith for Abraham was never a peaceful, gentle, thing. It was a disturbing force compelling him to venture into the unseen. Faith that does not involve risk is not faith. True faith can never be based on conclusive evidence or upon carefully calculated profits. Faith acts upon that which is unseen, yet real. Faith causes one to feel the pull of the beyond.
When we talk about operating on other worldly standards, we must look to Abraham’s wife, Sarah’s life and situation.
By faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born as many as the stars of the sky in multitude—innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore (Hebrews 11:11-12).
Of course, when Sarah first heard the news that she was going to have a child in her old age after never having been able to conceive, she laughed. The implication is that she laughed with some sense of skepticism at what she heard about God’s promise from the angel. Actually, Abraham laughed, too. We can likely assume they are laughing because the angel not only seems to believe it but seems to expect them to believe it too. They are laughing because with another part of themselves they know it would take a fool to believe. . . . Think about it . . . they are most likely laughing because if by some crazy chance it should just happen to come true, then they would really have something to laugh about, especially because of their ages.
But don’t let Abraham overshadow Sarah on this one. She’s in the faith hall of fame on her own. She was a woman who, as much as any man, longed for a world where things could be just the way God said they could be without any reservations or stipulations, even if the prospects did make her laugh.
Each of these notable persons lived by faith hoping for that which was unseen but promised; in one way or another, they were on pilgrimage looking for a homeland where the promises given to them could and would be fulfilled. Life at its very best is never whole this side of heaven. Even at the end of what we would all consider a full life well-lived, there remains unfinished business. Rarely, if ever, are all one’s dreams realized and promises fulfilled on earth. We are gifted through the grace of God many times over and blessed so richly that we often take our blessings for granted, but we will never be complete until we are at home with God, our Father. At the same time, we have pain that in this world is never absolutely relieved, questions that are never fully answered, grief that never goes away entirely, and a sense of inadequacy that is not put away with finality. These voids and others like them remain with us in this place through which we pass. As preoccupied as we can become with them, these burdens are not the absolute determinants of our quality of life in the present or the future. Do you remember another of the old spirituals?
I’m just a poor, wayfaring stranger,
A trav’ling through this world of woe;
But there’s no sickness, no toil or danger,
In that bright world to which I go . . .
I’m just a going over Jordan, . . .
I’m just a going over home. 1
As journeying pilgrims, that is our song, too; it was the song of the men and women of faith who inspired the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews. They were in search of their true homeland, and they “confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth” (Hebrews 11:13).
To Be Continued
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD 
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