Genesis 18:1-15
Abraham was 99 years old when God came to him and told
him that a son born to Sarah would be his heir. It would be Isaac, not
Ishmael, with whom God’s covenant of blessing would be made. And
Abraham, justifiably, laughed. The scripture says he fell on his face
and laughed!
How could Sarah, who was well past childbearing age, have a baby? He
already had an heir in Ishmael, whom he loved. Couldn’t God use
him instead? Abraham had become comfortable with a future of his own
making. He had resigned himself to a future that seemed closed to the
kind of wild imagining God was suggesting.
Perhaps it was that future—the one that he had in mind, with no
changes, no surprises, and no wide-open possibilities—he was contemplating
as he sat daydreaming outside his tent. He was comfortable and content.
He must have been daydreaming because he didn’t see the strangers
arrive. He didn’t see them first as small dots in the distance.
They simply appeared underneath the oak tree.
He noticed something strangely familiar about the men, as he invited
them to stay for supper so he called to Sarah and his servants to prepare
a feast.
Laughter is a gift from God. Have you ever known someone whose laughter
was so contagious you couldn’t help laughing also? My daughter
is that way. Her name is Larissa, which means “cheerful one”
and she has always been that way. She is a blessing to me, because I
have a tendency to be too serious, and she can often make me laugh,
especially when I’m taking myself too seriously. When she was
about two years old there was in our neighborhood a group of five-year-old
boys who would come over to our house just to see if they could get
her to laugh. They always could—deep belly laughs—and they
would all start laughing with her. It was laughter of sheer delight.
Laughter keeps us from taking ourselves too seriously and opens us up
to the grace and surprise of the moment. The Lebanese poet and philosopher
Kahlil Gibran wrote, “I would not exchange the laughter of my
heart for the fortunes of the multitudes; nor would I be content with
converting my tears, invited by my agonized self, into calm. It is my
fervent hope that my whole life on this earth will ever be tears and
laughter.”
Sarah’s tears were without end as the years passed quickly by
without a child, and she, too, had become resigned to a closed future.
When Abraham told her to prepare bread for the strangers, it was just
like any other day, and they were just like any other strangers on the
road to whom it was their duty to offer hospitality.
After Abraham and his guests had blessed and broken and eaten the bread
and all of the feast had been set before them, one of them asked Abraham,
“Where is your wife Sarah?” Abraham must have thought it
a very odd question, since Sarah was in her appropriate place, in the
tent.
Sarah, eavesdropping from behind the tent-flap, heard the stranger say,
“I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah
shall have a son.” From deep within her came laughter. It came
from a belly that had hungered to hold a child. It came with caught
breath as if afraid to dare to believe it would be filled. Laughter
at both the absurdity of the suggestion and the delight of the possibility.
The stranger left her denying the laughter, yet wondering at the future.
No longer was it closed, but open and beckoning, if not a little frightening.
We Christians are in the habit of taking ourselves too seriously and
of planning our futures so closely that surprises are left with few
openings to appear. But appear they do.
I happen to know there are women in this very congregation who through
an unexpected pregnancy saw their futures turn in new directions. Some
were mothers of teenagers to whom a baby was completely unplanned for,
others were teenagers themselves who experienced an unexpected pregnancy.
Still those unexpected children have brought unanticipated laughter
and tears and opened up new and different futures.
I happen to know there are people in this congregation who have been
victims of downsizing, who have lost jobs and thought that their futures
were ended, when a special class or a life-changing mission trip opened
up their futures in previously un-thought-of directions.
I happen to know there are people in this congregation who have suffered
great loss as the result of tragic accidents, yet through the suffering
and recovery have met the loves of their lives, and their futures have
been opened up in ways they could never have planned.
God makes us laugh even in the most trying and difficult of circumstances.
God gives us the desires of our hearts even when we have given up and
become comfortable without them. God introduces the absurd and impossible
into our lives and lifts us out of self-pity, self-satisfaction, and
self-indulgence, and keeps us from taking ourselves too seriously.
The child born to Sarah and Abraham was named Isaac which in Hebrew
means “he laughs.” Isaac was a child of laughter. We are
children of laughter. God’s laughter is laughter of delight. It
is that laughter that comes from deep within the belly. It is laughter
at the absurd, impossible, and impractical. It is laughter at the surprising
way in which God enters our lives and opens up futures we thought were
closed. It is laughter with us as we seek to make our way through our
lives and world with our eyes open and ready to see what new thing God
will do.
If you are comfortable with the future you have created for yourself,
watch out! If you are anxious about the future, trust in God! If you
are taking yourself so seriously that you think you can control everything
that happens to and for you, loosen up!
The God of Abraham and Sarah is faithful. The God we worship makes and
keeps promises. The God of Jesus of Nazareth gives us the desires and
delights of our hearts. This God, the God we worship today makes us
laugh!
Prayer: O God, you know us better than we know ourselves.
You promise us delight and blessing. You surprise us with laughter.
You open our futures in ways we cannot even imagine and you set our
feet on new paths. Open our eyes today to see the new possibilities
you set before us and lead us into the joy and laughter that comes from
loving you. Amen.