Half Empty and Leaking

Impossible.

There is no way.

Forget about it.

Nobody forced these words or phrases on me… they happened; an accumulation of difficulties and challenges in life.  Hopes high and delivery under performance.

The glass that’s half empty has a leak.  Bad news just got worse.

Faithfulness does not punch my ticket out of hardship or pain… it doesn’t leverage outcomes in my direction.  Faithfulness is confessional.  It obeys even while it admits complete reliance and a powerless lack of control.

January began my biblical journey back to the book of Genesis.  Like many of the great Colorado trails that I hike, the words of the Bible seem fresh and unexplored every time I venture out.  There is familiarity but an amazing newness.  The light is different even if the pathway is the same.

It was in the 18^th chapter of Genesis that I was transported to new levels of impossible…

The LORD said, “I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah your wife shall have a son.” And Sarah was listening at the tent door behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in years. The way of women had ceased to be with Sarah. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, “After I am worn out, and my lord is old, shall I have pleasure?” The LORD said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?’ Is anything too hard for the LORD? At the appointed time I will return to you, about this time next year, and Sarah shall have a son.” (Genesis 18:10-14)

Prophetic words collided with physiology.  Decades of hope and anticipation had been doused… dreams were transformed into nightmares… barren, once a whisper, now a crushing reality.  Childless, once the fodder for gossip, now an indisputable reality.

Impossible.

Sarah’s body had punched the clock.  The shift was over.

Then the words.  The promise.

“A son.”  “Next year.”

A cruel joke?  An error in translation?  A metaphor?  A hoax with a timeline?

“And Sarah conceived…” (Genesis 21:2a)

The biological clock had been reset, and not one day before it was impossible.

It was game over when God hit the winning shot.  This was not a matter of looking at the instant replay.  Not only was the clock all zeroes, it had been unplugged and the stands had emptied.

But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” (Matthew 19:26)

All things are possible.  Jesus had a ticket to the front row seat of God’s miraculous work in Sarah… He knew what He was promising to His followers.

Impossible is the tilled and cultivated ground of the miraculous.

God has not checked out of this business… He’s not moved on… He’s not tired of delivering.  He does the impossible.

Bring Him the ashes wet with tears.  Bring Him the jeering.  Bring it.  All of it.

All things… yes, all things.  Even for Sarah.  Especially today.