Genesis 17-18 Part 1

Is Anything Too Hard for the Lord?

Genesis 18:14

“Is anything too hard for the Lord?”

It is one of those questions God asks that is meant to remind us of our humanity and limited wisdom.

By the time we reach Genesis 18, Abraham and Sarah have been waiting twenty-five years for the child God promised. They have walked through obedience and failure, faith and compromise, hope and disappointment. Now they are old. Very old. From a human perspective, the story feels finished. When Sarah overhears the promise that she will have a son, she laughs while it is quietly and privately, it is still the laughter of someone who has decided what God can and cannot do.

And into her scepticism God asks a question: Is anything too hard for the Lord?

It is not just a rebuke; but an invitation. Sarah sees her barrenness, age, and therefore assumes impossibility. God does not see the future limited by us but rather redefined by his promises and his power. We often live closer to Sarah than we would like to admit. We think God is powerful in theory, but in practice we temper our expectations. We pray, but often cautious of a reality defined by a God who won’t act. We hope, but defensively. Disappointment can feel safer than trust.

But in this story the child is eventually born, and he is named Isaac which literally means ‘he laughs’. The name becomes a living reminder that God turned doubting laughter into a reminder of a promise kept. The same God still asks His people the same question. When strength is gone, when options are few, when the heart is weary is anything too hard for the Lord?

In Jesus Christ we have our answer.

Nothing is.