Laughing Out Loud at God!!??
REV. BILL BOWDLE
Armstrong Chapel United Methodist Church
09/14/2003
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Scripture: Genesis 15:1-6, 16:1-2, 17:15-19; 18:11-15, 21:1-3,5-6
INTRODUCTION
============
Do you trust God
or laugh him off
under your breath
as irrelevent?
ever laughed out loud at God?
I did, almost...
Six days ago, I laughed so hard
I could hardly breathe...
It was a scene from
Jim Carey’s movie, "Bruce Almighty."
Morgan Freeman portrayed God....
He got so fed up with
Cary’s negative complaints
that he gave Cary
a chance to be God.
Cary used his almighty power
to gain revenge
on a competitor
who got the news job
Cary wanted.
When his competitor started as news anchor,
Cary used his godlike powers
to make the fellow talk like
a hilarious, babbling idiot.
It was so funny,
I laughed myself breathless.
at Cary’s portrayal of God...
But Abram and Sarai
laughed at God!!
& God’s plan...!!!
The Movie Bruce Almighty &
Abraham and Sarah
all show God may get
the last laugh
in leading us
from Laughter to Trust.
1. They Trusted God’s Promise
==============================
Promise was simple, multiple to Abraham / Sarah.
Parenthood & plenty of it....
They would have Fertile,
prolific,
plentiful parenthood
Gen 12:2-3 I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. {3} I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
Gen 12:7 Then the LORD appeared to Abram, and said, To your offspring I will give this land., So he built there an altar to the LORD, who had appeared to him.
Gen 13:16 I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth; so that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring also can be counted.
Can,t you just picture Sarah:
Starts making excursions
to the blue light specials
at the closest Dessert Mart
to buy little nursery tents
Cheaper by the dozen,
for all children
they’re going to have.
Abraham thinks
No need for Social security for me....
With descendants by the dozen,
they’ll support me in retirement.....
So this couple
starts planning how
God must fulfill his promise...
................. BUT ...........
Then they got nervous!!
kids didn’t arrive
on their schedule..
So Abram called up heaven’s customer service:
"God remember the fine print
in your guarantee....
I’m here to collect....
but "You have given me no children..’"
God Reaffirms Promise:
Gen 15:4 "... a son coming from your own body will be your heir."
Gen 15:6 Abram believed the LORD
They had faith for future,
hope that it would happen....
Rubem Alves once said: "Hope is hearing the melody of the future. Faith is dancing to it."
Quoted by Pastor Bill Burnett June 8, 2003 THE RESTORING OF HOPE http://www.newlifechapel.com/sermonnotes/6-8-03.htm
But Abraham’s fast dance of faith
got slower and slower by the decade.
Before: They Trusted God’s Promise .... Now
2. They Bypassed God’s Promise
=====================================
Abraham and Sarah
nursery tents ...empty !
arms - childless !
hearts - aching !
God had promised
descendants
as numerous as stars.
He even changed Abram’s Name:
Abram to Abraham (= "father of a multitude")
W. each passing decade
Dreams Died harder
By now Sarah approximately
75 years old
What could they do?
Would they:
Call up heaven’s Customer Service,
and go to the top?
ask for someone w. real authority??
Company President??
No, They didn’t show negativity:
They’d show positive creativity thinking!!!
Abraham proposed to God
slave Eliezer of Damascus
become his heir....
But God - didn’t want
generic substitute
for his brand name promise...
Sarah got even more creative
Heaven silent,
She’d connect
husband & Hagar..
Hagar the handmaiden
could be Abraham’s
Platonic playmate
a surrogate lover,
a substitute mother
and Sarah would adopt
their child as her own.
Abraham = the only husband I know
who had his wife’s permission
for a mid-life fling at age 85.
What happened:
In rapid order
Hagar pregnant
Ishmael born
Hagar gloated
Sarah jealous
Hagar expelled
And the roots
of the Arab / Israeli tension
exploded across the centuries
Muslims claim
Ishmael as their ancestor,
but Jews would claim
Ishmael = plan of man,
not promise of God...
Friends,
the lesson is clear
point is plain....
When you try to play
God’s game
by your rules,
you’re playing with fire....
Creative substitutues
for God’swill
create catastrophe...
They Trusted & Bypassed God’sPromise
3. They Laughed at God’s Promise
======================================
13 years later
Ishmael = 13 Gen 18:25
Abraham = 99 Gen 17:1
Sarah = only 90
Medicine cabinet
lined with Geritol
arthritis medication,
brochures for cosmetic
wrinkle-removing surgery
Out on the counter
is the Senior Citizen
Golden Buckeye Card,
and brochures for
Twin Lakes Retirement Center
Viagra coupons?
He’d long since thrown in the trash
(Gen 17:1 NIV) LORD appeared to him
(Gen 17:15-16 NIV) "As for Sarai your wife ...{16} I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. ....
And Abaham
hit the deck,
rolling in the aisles,
laughing at the promise of God..
A little later,
Sarah hears the same message
from God
Gen 18:11-13
Abraham and Sarah were already old and well advanced in years, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. {12} So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, "After I am worn out and my master is old, will I now have this pleasure?" {13} Then the LORD said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh and say "Will I really have a child, now that I am old?"
God bless this couple....
They still have a sense of humor...
didn’t get bitter with age
" " brittle with disappointment
They got amused,
hilariously entertained,
absolutely bowled over
by the laughable notion
that two washed out,
wrinkled up
ancient history lovers
could find enough virility
and potency
to make a baby
after decades of disappointment.
If David Letterman
had a top ten list
of reasons
for laughing at God,
well this one went right to the top,
right to number one...
It appeared to them that God must have skipped
Biology 101
God never went
to Med School
They laughed at God’spromise....
They were in good company
with skeptics of this age ...
this age that laughs at God’sorder
Laughs at: Creation = primitive fairy tale
Laughs at: 10 Commandments - belong in the closet
Laughs at: Morality:
and says
Sexuality is ours to enjoy
at any time
with any gender
for any reason
with no limits
Laughs at: Eternity. heaven and hell
Rejecting it as future fairy tale
with no more substance
than the Wizard of Oz
behind a curtain with a
loudspeaker.
When Abraham and Sarah
laughed at God
..... "They are Us!!!"
They express our tendency to
Trust, Bypass, Laugh at God’s Promise
4. God Kept Promise w. a Laugh
===================================
Did God laugh at Sarah / Abraham?
Did God laugh with them?
Does God have a sense of humor?
Plato felt laughter was subversive,
According to following source:
In 1995, Barry Sanders (Beacon Press, 1995)
wrote a book called,
Sudden Glory: Laughter as Subversive History
He claims that Plato felt ,uncontrolled laughter could seriously undermine the authority of those who ruled over his idealized republic.,
Middle age religious authorities
seemed to think
God was without humor....
As early as the 4th century,
church leader John Chrysostom
declared that Jesus never laughed
In the 1400’s, the Council of Constance
rebuked any minister or monk
who spoke
"jocular words
such as to provoke laughter."
and concluded:
"Let him be anathema,"
http://www.baptiststandard.com/2001/12_3/pages/laughter.html
I am persuaded otherwise re: God’s capacity to laugh...
Gen 17:19 God said, "No, but your wife Sarah shall bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac."
Why the name: Isaac?
Isaac means "he laughs"
If they were going to laugh
at God’s promise
they were going to live with laughter,
every time they looked at their son.
If ever tempted again
to laugh at God’s promise,
just had to take one look at Isaac,
and "he laughs," (Isaac) would remind them as God’s
living object lesson, that it’s not wise to laugh at God’s promise.
Just think of this little kid,
if he had "parents day,"
in local gradeschool,
he could roll Abraham in
in a wheelchair,
and he’d have father, grandfather,
and great grandfather
all in one wrinkled
110 yr old package.
Gen 21:5-6 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. {6} Now Sarah said, God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.,
Conclusion
==========
Lesson of
Jim Cary / Morgan Freeman / Bruce Almighty
and the lesson of Abraham, Sarah , Isaac
is one and the same:
Trust God to be God,
and trust God’s
handling of his promises.
Don’t get overconfident
that you’re Almighty enough
to outthink
outperform God.....
because if you do,
God will surely have
the last laugh on you.
Hymn of Invitation
Trust and Obey # 467
1. When we walk with the Lord
in the light of his word,
what a glory he sheds on our way!
While we do his good will,
he abides with us still,
and with all who will trust and obey.
Refrain:
Trust and obey, for there’s no other way
to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.
2. Not a burden we bear,
not a sorrow we share,
but our toil he doth richly repay;
not a grief or a loss,
not a frown or a cross,
but is blest if we trust and obey.
(Refrain)
3. But we never can prove
the delights of his love
until all on the altar we lay;
for the favor he shows,
for the joy he bestows,
are for them who will trust and obey.
(Refrain)
4. Then in fellowship sweet
we will sit at his feet,
or we’ll walk by his side in the way;
what he says we will do,
where he sends we will go;
never fear, only trust and obey.
(Refrain)
