Redeemed Failures, Day 15: Sarah – When God's Promise Seems Impossible

Sarah’s laughter at God’s promise shows divine faithfulness despite human frailty, reminding us that nothing is too hard for the Lord.

Redeemed Failures, Day 15: Sarah – When God's Promise Seems Impossible

Genesis 18:1–15; Hebrews 11:11

God had spoken with crystal clarity to Abraham: he would be the father of many nations, and Sarah herself would bear the son through whom God’s covenant would be fulfilled. Yet the years passed. Decades slipped away, and with each one, Sarah’s hope thinned. Her body aged, her womb remained barren, and the promise seemed increasingly out of reach.

At one point, Sarah tried to take matters into her own hands, giving her servant Hagar to Abraham as a surrogate. The result was conflict, cruelty, and sorrow. Later, when the Lord visited Abraham and Sarah and repeated the promise of a son, Sarah (listening behind the tent's fabric) laughed. It was not laughter of joy but of incredulity, maybe even cynicism. She was nearly ninety. Her husband was nearly a hundred. Could God really do such a thing now?

God’s Gentle Rebuke

The Lord heard Sarah’s laugh and confronted her. She denied it at first, but God gently exposed the truth and pressed the matter with a searching question: “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” That question reaches the core of every human doubt. We often measure God’s promises by the limits of our own imagination. Sarah’s laugh was not joy but unbelief, a moment where human frailty judged God’s promise to be impossible.

Yet the Lord did not cast her off. His rebuke was gentle but firm. Sarah’s failure was real, but His promise was immovable. True to His word, she conceived and bore Isaac, whose very name means “laughter.” What had once been the bitter laugh of doubt became the joyful laugh of fulfillment.

Faith After Failure

The New Testament gives us God’s final verdict on Sarah. In Hebrews 11, she is commended for her faith: “By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised.” The same woman who once doubted is remembered in the “hall of faith” not for her stumble but for her trust in the God who overcomes all impossibility.

Sarah’s story reminds us that faith is not flawless. Even saints falter. But the God who calls is faithful, and He keeps His promises even when our laughter betrays our unbelief.

An Encouragement

If you find yourself doubting God’s promises, convinced that His timing has already slipped past, take heart. Sarah’s story shows that even when fulfillment seemed humanly impossible, God kept His word. He is still the God who asks, ‘Is anything too hard for the Lord?’ May the laughter of unbelief become the laughter of joy as He proves Himself faithful yet again.


Enjoy all 31 devotionals in the Redeemed Failures series here —stories of grace, second chances, and the God who still restores.