Waiting for Wonder by Schalesky Marlo;

Author:Schalesky, Marlo;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Abingdon Press
Published: 2016-09-27T00:00:00+00:00

1. John H. Walton, Genesis, vol. 1 of The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2001), 447.

8

Becoming Your True You:A New Name for Sarai

God said to Abraham, “As for your wife Sarai, you will no longer call her Sarai. Her name will now be Sarah. I will bless her and even give you a son from her. I will bless her so that she will become nations, and kings of peoples will come from her.”

—Genesis 17:15-16

Genesis 16 ended with Hagar bearing a son for Abram. Not for Sarai, for Abram. The text is clear. It ends with the consequences of Sarai’s least-finest hour, on the heels of her lost righteousness and her lost hope. Sarai was excluded and barren and had no cards left to play.

And then chapter 17 opens. But it doesn’t open with a reminder of Sarai’s failure. It doesn’t open with scorn or shame. Instead, the very next scene after Sarai’s greatest error begins with God revealing a name for himself that is filled with amazing hope, amazing promise. Not only that, God gives Sarai a new name too. He gives her a new hope, a new promise. Not because she’s earned it—hardly!—but because of grace. God follows up Sarai’s disgrace not with blame but with blessing. For the first time, she is included in the promises and covenant given to Abram.

God calls Sarai to a new relationship with her God, a full commitment, whole-self, everyday walk with the one who is able to do all that he has promised.

Sarai will be made new.

And that gives me hope. When I think all is lost, when I believe I’ve failed too badly, when I’ve become who I never wanted to be, God not only restores, he makes new. He makes me new. God calls me from my worst self to my true self, the self who is fully devoted to him, walking before him every day of my life, becoming the person he created me to be.

For Sarai, it may have happened something like this.

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