The ‘I will’ of God

Your plan B may be great, but God still works with His Plan A.

The following verses show that God will bless what we create, but He still asks us to trust Him for what He will create.

“Then God said, “Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac.I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him. ²⁰ And as for Ishmael, I have heard you: I will surely bless him; I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers. He will be the father of twelve rulers, and I will make him into a great nation. ²¹ But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you by this time next year.” ²² When he had finished speaking with Abraham, God went up from him.” (Genesis 17 v 19-22)

God tells Abraham he has been heard. Plan B has been seen, but God still wants plan A.

Suddenly, after years of waiting, the promise is given a timeline, ‘by this time next year’. God has increased the stakes of faith. Everyone can believe in something that will happen in the future, but when a time is given, it brings a challenge. If next year comes and there is no baby, then the promise is false.

God gives a time, and then at the end of v22 we have the hard part – ‘God went up from him’.

No more talking, confirming, negotiating. God has gone. God leaves Abraham with the promise for the next 12 months and then leaves.

This is faith, and where it lives in the waiting and in the silence.

Abraham is 100 years of age, and now he has to wait one more year. How did he wait?

All he had were the words that God said to him.

I will establish …

I will surely bless him;

I will make him fruitful and will greatly increase his numbers.

I will make him into a great nation.

I will establish my covenant with Isaac.

Perhaps today all you have is what God said to you, “I will.”

You’re not responsible for making His will work. You are responsible for holding the ‘I will’ of God in situations within your life.