To Magnify His Sovereign Grace

Excerpt from The Issac Factor by John Piper

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What promise? The promise that Abraham would have many offspring and become a great nation. Genesis 12:2, "I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing." That promise came after the knowledge that Sarah was barren. Indeed, God had closed her womb, and then made the promise. So now, if Abraham believes the promise, it will be a believing not just in the ability of God to predict the future, but in the power of God to create a future that is humanly impossible.

This is what I call "The Isaac Factor": God's purpose to do what is humanly impossible, so that we have to trust his power and grace, and he gets the glory. But we do not naturally trust God so easily. It goes against our fallen nature. Here's what usually happens: When we meet a situation like this, we try to think of ways that we can actually make it happen by ordinary human means.

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Why? Why won't God opt for anything less than the path of impossibility? I think he tells us in the next chapter (Genesis 18:10-14). God comes to Abraham and makes the promise again:

"I will surely return to you at this time next year; and behold, Sarah your wife will have a son." And Sarah was listening at the tent door, which was behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; Sarah was past childbearing [not only barren all her life, but now passed childbearing years]. Sarah laughed to herself, saying, "After I have become old, shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?" And the LORD said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh, saying, 'Shall I indeed bear a child, when I am so old?' Is anything too difficult for the LORD?"

There it is. That's the reason God will not settle for anything less than the path of impossibility: He aims to show that nothing is too difficult for the Lord. His purpose in all he does is

To magnify his sovereign grace And keep us in our humble place.

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