Childless...Waiting on a Promise

The word “childless” has a certain negative connotation all its own.  I have been revisiting II Samuel again (as I do around this time every year), and I noticed, for the first time I think, just how often the condition of childlessness appeared in these early books of the Old Testament.   Being “childless” has one inherent meaning:  waiting on a promise that has not arrived.   

Perhaps the most famous of childless couples is Abram & Sarai.  Abram had been promised that his descendants would outnumber the stars, and yet… here he was old, with no child.  Sarai was none too young herself, and though she too knew of the promise, she decided that perhaps God was waiting on her to come up with an idea to help out.  We all know the result of her brilliant plan – a conflict that rages on so many thousands of years later – but what of her childless state? When the promise finally came – in GOD’S WAY, in HIS time – it was one little boy named Laughter who fathered the nation that would change the world.

Rachel cried out to God in her childless state, voicing her frustrations to her husband.  Her waiting finally ended with the arrival of her first son.  Joseph represented the hope of Israel, for without his journey through God’s will from the prison to the palace, Israel would have been extinguished by famine.  The birth of her second son Benjamin ended her life, and in keeping, Benjamin’s descendants proved to be agents of destruction.

In Judges 13, we learn that Manoah’s wife was barren, until God sent a special boy who carried his power in his obedience to a seemingly arbitrary rule about his hair. Samson, the child of the promise, was a man who was swayed too easily by his emotions (I see more than mere lust in his motives), but in the end, he used his death to bring about destruction upon the enemies of God.

What does all this mean?  Well, thus far, we can determine that there is something special about the birth of a child –a promise, if you will – to one who has been declared “childless.”

In I Samuel, we find the story of Hannah, broken before the Lord in a prayer that has no words, crying out to God, begging for her promise.  And then, Samuel was born.  The first child of the promise was the beginning of the bloodline.  The second child of the promise was to protect the chosen people through a time of famine.  The third child of the promise was a warrior, who through his weakness and in spite of temptation, rose up to deliver his people from their oppressors.  And now, this Samuel, another child of promise, will remind his people of their loyalty to Jehovah and will anoint the first two kings of Israel…

By all rights, the child born of two kings should have reigned, but Michal’s refusal to let go of her bitterness, her refusal to rise above the pain her life had dealt her, left her childless…II Samuel recounts her story, one of the Bible’s saddest.  How many do we know like Michal, who have allowed the bitterness of their past to blot out their futures?

Then in II Kings, we find the story of the Shunamite woman, who after waiting her whole life, received her promise by way of the prophet.  And when that promise was ripped away from her, she rose up, saddled her donkey, and rode out boldly, proclaiming, my child will NOT die!  Her refusal to give in revived the dead promise, and with the prayers of the prophet, the child lived again.

And then the blessed story of Elisabeth, who in the book of Luke, has waited so long for a child that she has given up hope…when the promise arrives.  And that promise, John the Baptist, has a very special work to do, for he will announce to the world that the promise embodied within all of scripture, the hope of all mankind, lives and walks among us, if we will only recognize Him.  He will prepare the way of Christ.

So what of all this talk of childlessness, of promises unfulfilled?  Simple enough.  Are you waiting for a promise?  Have you waited long enough that hope has started to fade?  Do you feel as hopeless as these men and women who longed for the birth of a child, seemingly in vain?  The message is there for you in scripture:  HOLD ON.  For the child that is borne out of childlessness…the promise that is borne from the ashes… is particularly blessed, for it is the very progeny of faith, and its legacy will reverberate throughout the pages of time.

The Lord given, and He taketh away . . . blessed be

What if God gave you everything you ever wanted, and then said, “Give it back”? Sounds cruel, right? Like some kind of twisted game small children play? Back in a less politically correct age, you would have been subjected to a perjorative term like “Indian-giver.” Even as a mature believer - one who counts her servitude as a blessing - I occasionally look at the circumstances of life - simple (a fight with a family member) or complex (the death of a young person) and come to the place of questioning? What sort of God gives and then requires the return of the gift?

Sometimes I wonder if it isn’t in the hands of the receiver. Abraham spent 100 years trusting God for everything. His only hope was God - if God did not deliver an heir, the promise would be without hope! And perhaps God began to wonder, years after Isaac had been given, years after watching the light in Abraham’s eyes each time he viewed his son, years after the promise was re-born in Abraham’s heart in a million different ways - perhaps then God began to wonder . . . does Abraham still trust me, or has he given his heart, his faith, away? Has he transferred his belief to the gift, rather than the giver? So God tested Abraham. Abraham passed.

Other Biblical figures did not pass every test. Moses impatiently struck the rock. Solomon worshiped his wisdom to distraction. Peter got so caught up in rules about what to eat that God had to give him a vision to get him back on track. What does it all mean? Why does God put this . . . stuff . . . in our way, knowing the whole time that it will “trip us up”. Why does he place our very weaknesses right before us as a challenge? Why bother to give us anything? Surely He who is all knowing already knows if we will pass the test or not. So, if He knows, what's the point?

Complicated question. Simple answer. Because He wants to check us. Because allowing us to have truly free will requires that He let go of the reins of control. He lets us mess up. He frees us to fail, if that's what we want. Why? To make sure that our priorities are exactly where they should be. The day that we begin to worship the gift more than the giver is the day that the spirit of Lot has overtaken us all. Distracted by the blessings, we will be unable to worship in spirit, and in truth. We will be imprisoned by the very thing meant to bless us.

I love what God has given me - my friends, my family, my home, the second chance at a life I thought I had forfeited. But if He should require it of me today, I hope that I could stand and give Him praise knowing that He who gave will not require more than I can bear. That He loves me, His child, and the gift more than I can imagine. While I may never fully understand why God chooses to give and take as He does, I know this: I love the Giver more than anything else. Anything. It is enough.

Promises, promises . . .

Genesis 11 was quite personal to me today. God speaks to Abram and tells him to GO. Abram GOES. God makes promises:  

Genesis 11:7 And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said, "Unto thy seed will I give this land:" and there builded he an altar unto the LORD, who appeared unto him.  

If I were Abram, I would be so excited. I would be waking up every morning and looking around for all the great - stuff - that God was promising. I can almost hear Abram waking up and singing - This land is my land! This land is my land! God said it's my land! The land of Canaan! And for a childless man - that his children would have the land? WOW.  

And then . . . nothing. Crickets chirped. Famine ensued. And, yep, still no children for Abram and Sarai. Interesting incidents with Abram asking Sarai to lie about being his sister, but no land was his land. And even if it were, there weren't any children to give it to.  

Abram believed in the promise, but it gets harder to believe when you wait and wait and wait and wait - and it still doesn't happen. God kept renewing the promise and blessing Abram in other ways, but still no son. Not for a long time. And no land to call his own. For the majority of his life, Abra(ha)m was a nomad.  

Most of us would love for God to promise us something, but we would have the fortitude to wait on it the way that Abraham did? Would our faith grow faint in waiting? God has promised me some things, and I often find myself getting frustrated because it is taking SO LONG to get there. Why can't God just hurry up, or at least give me a peek at the blueprints so that I will know what to expect?  

God made some promises to me a few months back. And life has been good, but not without challenges, especially for my fabulous husband. He's had to adjust to life in a new area, and God has been making serious changes to who he is becoming. Gone is the BMW, the high-octane job, the freedom and money to take endless vacations. And he's had to learn to cook, because he can't stand anything I make. I have no doubht that he's looked up several times and wondered exactly what he's gotten into and wondered where the promise is. But, like Abraham, he's a faithful man. And God is going to be faithful to him. And since I'm along for the ride too, I guess that means that eventually it will all make sense.  

I guess the answer is that God always delivers on His promises, but not necessarily in our time frame. Not necessarily the way we want to see it. Not necessarily in the manner that we expect. But He delivers. Abraham kept believing, in spite of the waiting and in spite of his "mess ups". I'm trying hard to learn to do the same thing. I'd still like to see those blueprints, though?