Unless they really trusted God, they would not have made such changes in their lives. But as we saw in the stories I talked about last week, living by faith is not something we humans do with great consistency. Like them, we make a mess of things, and God has to rescue us in order for us to have the possibility of receiving what God is trying to give us. Only by God's grace at work in our lives can we live as God intends. It takes God's help for us to live lives of faith.
Faith is tenacious.
Abraham and Sarah kept trusting year after year after year after year that God would someday, somehow, do what God had promised. Faith in God does not limit God to our human timetables. God's schedule is not our human schedule, and faith in God and in the promises of God involves a willingness to trust God without dictating deadlines or setting the parameters for the way God will do what God has promised. Faith is living day in and day out, year in and year out, tenaciously trusting God. The stories of Abraham and Sarah are clear in revealing that it is a struggle to trust God when, day after day and year after year, we cannot see the fulfillment of God's promises.