Bigger than your faults

There's at least one place you want to read in the Bible before the kids do -- Genesis 20.  You want to be ready when they ask the obvious question.

Abraham lies -- he says his wife Sarah is his sister.  He's done this before.  He's afraid the king might hurt him to get to his wife.  So thinking Sarah is Abraham's sister, the king takes Sarah into his house.

After awhile, God tells the king -- you are a dead man if you touch her!

The king goes to Abraham and says, Hey, why didn't you tell me she was your wife?!

Then the king tells Abraham to beat it, and gives him a whole bunch of sheep and cattle and servants and money to take with him.  He tells Abraham to go anywhere in the king's kingdom that he wants -- he gets to pick.

Abraham just got blessed big time.  Even though he lied!

Now, he wasn't blessed because he lied, but despite it.  But, still, shouldn't there be some consequences?  Maybe not an angel of death swooping down or the earth opening up, but at least a minor case of boils or your pants catching fire?  Anything but blessing.

This is mighty encouraging to me. 

Only God knows everything going on, everything he's doing, and everyone's heart.  He doesn't have to turn over his sovereignty to some automatic cause-and-effect machine that he's created.  He can decide, case-by-case, the best way to bring about what he has in mind. 

And apparently, when your heart's right, if God has something he's going to do and he's decided to use you, he doesn't have to let your faults stop him.

Comments

[emily]

love this post, dad. Sometimes I find myself waiting for my pants to catch on fire. Not because I lied necessarily, but because I did something else equally as stupid. What a great reminder that he doesn't have to let my faults don't have to get in his way.