Waiting on God to act or trusting His promises can be challenging. Sometimes we feel the need to take matters into our own hands, but the Bible shows us this doesn’t work out well. This four-week series, Waiting on God: Patience While Waiting For The Promise, looks at four times when people took matters into their own hands rather than waiting on God—and the fallout from those decisions.
God’s timing requires our patience. Since God first showed up and called Abraham in Genesis 12, God has been promising Abraham that he would have a son (12:2). By the time of Genesis 16, eleven years have passed. However, in those eleven years, Abraham and Sarah remained childless. Imagine waiting eleven years for God’s promise to come to pass. That is the situation Abraham and Sarah find themselves in. Rather than fully trust in the promise of God, Sarah and Abraham take matters into their own hands.