The Lord appeared to Abraham near the great trees of Mamre while he was sitting at the entrance to his tent in the heat of the day. Abraham looked up and saw three men standing nearby.…
Then one of them said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife will have a son.”
Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. Abraham and Sarah were already very old, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing. So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, “After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?”
Genesis 18:1-2a, 10-12
During 2026, Peachtree Church is inviting everyone into Cultivate, a churchwide discipleship plan centered on the fruit of the Spirit and the kind of life God longs to grow in us. Throughout the year, we’ll explore how love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control take shape in everyday life through the Spirit’s work. Cultivate brings together worship, Scripture, group guides, and meaningful practices designed to meet you where you are and support growth in ways that fit your season. These twice-weekly devotionals are one way to stay connected, offering reflection and grounding for daily life with God. Whether you engage in many ways or just one, you’re invited to be part of this shared journey of becoming more rooted in who God has created and called you to be.
Devotional
There’s always been an aspect to the passages that we have for this week that have brought a smile to my face. Much like Sarah, there have been moments when God’s will for my life has been made abundantly clear, and all I have been able to do in response was to laugh. The laughter has never been intended to be disrespectful or irreverent; rather, it is the kind of laughter that comes from knowing God’s plan is much greater than my understanding, even as I ask, “Why are you choosing to do things in this manner?” In this case, Sarah and Abraham had been promised for years that God would make their family line fruitful and they would have more descendants than there are stars in the sky, yet Sarah had remained unable to have children.
Then the moment occurs when three Angels of the Lord come to visit Abraham and Sarah, and as they are preparing to leave them, one of them says that in a year’s time, Sarah will have the promised son. Yet in that moment, there was the simple fact that she had been waiting twenty-five years for this news, a moment about which my occasionally cynical side can sometimes question whether she thought it would ever occur. God wasn’t testing Abraham and Sarah. He wasn’t making them wait unduly to see the fulfillment of a promise that they had been given. God was simply waiting for the time to be right as he understood it.
And those moments are hard for us. The reminder that God’s timing is very rarely our timing is one that we need more often than we want to admit. I have to regularly remind myself that as much as I think that all of life would be easier if it worked in accordance with my plan, I know that is false pride and hubris.
The trick for many of us in these moments, as it was in the time when Sarah and Abraham had to wait to see the fulfillment of God’s promise of children in their lives, is to be willing to trust with patience. Our Lord is at work, not only in our own lives, but throughout the world, even in the moments when his voice seems silent. Our God is laying the foundation of what will allow his plan to succeed in the most natural way possible, while we are called to wait, to trust, to look towards him and say, “Thank you God for being with me, even when I struggle to hear your voice.”
For Reflection
- What has been a time in your life when you have not been able to see God’s hand at work?
- What does it look like when you reflect on that time with hindsight?
Prayer
Lord, we trust that your plan is greater than our own, even as we often grow impatient during the times when we must wait for its fulfillment. Help us to rest in the knowledge that your will is working towards a greater glory than we can understand and help us to give you thanks and praise on the other side of our waiting. In Jesus’ name we pray; amen.
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Devotionals