Journey Through Lent Day 13

God laughs and His laughter is infectious. Get one person laughing, really laughing. And if you're anywhere in the vicinity of that person, you'll likely start laughing too. It's funny how infectious laughter is. Well, Sara wasn't the first one to laugh. God was.  Not because he's laughing at her or us. He's not cruel like that. He's not looking at Sarah and saying “that poor girl. She can't have a baby. She feels so much shame. So much despair, because of it. Haha. Isn't that funny?” No, that is nothing like God. He's laughing with us. He's laughing with her. He knows what will come to be of her life. The import the significance of her life, the absolutely important role that she plays in the history of mankind, and that she has joined today. But one day, the joy she'll know what he thinks of that it just makes him laugh. Because he knows that Sarah will be satisfied. Sarah will have a son. She'll name him Isaac. Isaac means laughter. And it will not only make Sara laugh, the beautiful absurdity of being 100 year old mother. That is indeed hilarious. But it will also make all those who hear about it laugh too. And that fact, as incredible as it is, is not the half of it. 

Sarah will not only be the mother of one, Isaac. No, she's going to be the mother of countless billions. Because it is through her descendant Jesus. That all the people of the earth will be blessed. God's going to do something, because it is through her descendant Jesus, that people from every tribe and race and nation will be drawn into the family of God. God's going to do something so far beyond what Sarah or you are I can ever fathom. He's going to draw people into the familial family relationship that is shared between his Son and the Holy Spirit. all of humanity will be drawn into that story of family and love. 

And when we begin to catch even the slightest glimpse of it, we are likely to bust out into the biggest belly laugh you'll ever experience. I'm guessing that when we die and are face to face with our Lord, the first thing no doubt will be us being face down in worship, and gratitude for who he is and what he has done. But my hunch is that the next thing that takes place is that we will look around and see the multitude of lives, embraced in his love. And we will break into the most infectious laugh ever. And that will spread and God will laugh, and heaven will have and we will know joy like never before. 

Sarah laughs But God laughed first. Because he knows. He knows your story. He knows the significance of your own life. And how it goes so far beyond what what you can see even now. He felt the same way about Abraham, just to try to give Abraham a sense of the importance of his life. He took a walk with him in the night and had him look up into the sky and told him to look up. Look at those stars. See if you can count those stars. Because that's how big the family is going to be. So maybe today, if the skies cooperate with you. Maybe you can go out into the night sky. Take a good long look at the stars if they'll show themselves and have a laugh. Listen to what God is saying to you about the importance of your life. How it goes far beyond anything that you can ever imagine. Or conceive of. Because that's who he is. That's the prayer that I have for my own soul. That's the prayer that I have for my family for my wife and my daughters and my son. And that's a prayer that I have for you. Maybe so. 

You are loved!