When You Hit A Wall, Look For A Door

“When You Hit a Wall, Look For A Door”

Gen 18:11-14

11 Now Abraham and Sarah were old and well stricken in age; and it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.

12 Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?

13 And the Lord said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, which am old?

14 Is any thing too hard for the Lord? At the time appointed I will return unto thee, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son. KJV

Intro: According to our text today, both Abraham and Sarah had hit a wall. They both knew that they were past the child bearing age. Sarah looked at the reality of what time had produced to both their lives. Sarah thought it comical and not knowing that the angel could hear her, she laughed. She saw the wall but she had no idea that there was a door. At the appointed time the door would open. Not only did Sarah bare a son, but after her death Abraham remarried and had six more children. I would say that When Abraham and Sarah faced the wall of “Old Age”, God didn’t just open a door, He opened a flood gate.

As we grow older we will face walls, walls that old age all by its self produces. Some may be walls that we may have thought that were only for other people, like the wall of “Old Age.” Old Age is for others and not me. We may have spent most of our adult life work for and looking forward to retirement and perils of old age kind of fell by the way side. We never looked forward to old age, just retirement and the so called, Golden Years. The “golden years” were not supposed to include the aches and pains and restrictions of old age. The stiff and inflamed joints, the dim eyes, the stopped up ears, and other things that were supposed to happen to our neighbor. Soon we learn and experience that old saying, “what don’t hurt, don’ work.”

The syndrome of old age has now, all of a sudden turned to reality. We may have let it slip from our mind but now, much sooner that we imagined there it is like a wall telling us that we are stopped, down to the last drop. It can be thought of as the end of things and life is over, or it can be thought of as a new dimension and we are still going forward.

Believing that we are entering a new dimension will open new doors and guide us on paths that we haven’t seen.

1. Ex 14:15-16. And the Lord said unto Moses, Wherefore criest thou unto me? speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward:

16 But lift thou up thy rod, and stretch out thine hand over the sea, and divide it: and the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

God said to Moses, why are you crying to me? Tell them to “Go Forward.” Stop your crying, lift up you rod, stretch out thine hand over the sea, and divide it: and the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

Sometimes we may not be able to see over our wall. But a wall is there for a purpose. Some say it’s there to keep others out. But every wall must have a door or a gate of some sort. Some walls are just a dividing line that helps us to know that we have entered a new territory. As it is with the walls that have been placed there by our God. The wall of old age is put there by God and is for all of His creation. Old age can be a stopping place where life begins to deteriorate and grows stale or it can be a launch pad that will launch us into a new dimension and we will discover that just on the other side of the wall there are treasures we’ve never experienced. The children of Israel could not see across the wall they faced. The challenge was monumental, they had never faced such a thing. But when God said, “Go Forward” He had already prepared a door.

Some murmured, they wanted to turn around and go back through the door of deliverance they had just passed through. Now at this time two doors were open and they had to make a decision. One door, the back door would be much easier they could just slide through it but it would lead back to slavery. The forward door meant, wrapping up, tying it up and walking forward with God. If we choose to go forward with Jesus, He will keep our back and He will destroy the enemy that is in pursuit.