Taking Matters Into Our Own Hands (Genesis 16)

February 26, 2017

When Abram and Sarai took matters into their own hands and tried to achieve God's plan by man's means people got hurt. Everyone in this narrative gets hurt and everyone hurts someone else. We live in the same sin-stained world they did, and we sin and suffer in many of the same ways. Every time we try to get what we want on our terms people get hurt. The great temptation (and the "trick" in this week's sermon) is to take a hard look at our own lives, God’s word, and align our ways with his ways, or we’ll never know happiness. But if that's all we do we'll end up in the same spot the Pharisees did. We can't separate God's laws from God himself. Genesis 16 - and our lives - only work when God is there. So our first priority when life is hard is to walk with God. That's when we will have the strength and desire to live it out  so God's law becomes our rule of life.