Sherry Sterling

Dear friends,

Today’s New Testament reading has me thinking about God’s promises, and my trust in them. 

God promised Abraham, a childless 100-year-old man, and his childless 90-year-old wife, the seemingly impossible: so many descendants that they would outnumber the stars. And Abraham believed him!

How could he believe? By already having a relationship with God, and knowing the trustworthiness of the one making the promise. 

This is the point Paul makes in his letter to the Romans, where he writes:

…the fulfillment of God’s promise depends entirely on trusting God and his way, and then simply embracing him and what he does. God’s promise arrives as pure gift. That’s the only way everyone can be sure to get in on it, those who keep the religious traditions and those who have never heard of them. (4:16)

Receiving God’s blessings does not hinge on being good, 

but rather on faith that God will make good on his promises.

So if you still claim that God’s blessings go to those who are “good enough,” then you are saying that God’s promises to those who have faith are meaningless, and faith is foolish. (v. 14)

It’s the faith in God that matters. 

And what is faith? Faith is “confident trust in the unseen God.” (v. 16) Even when we don’t have much confidence, God still works with our doubt-laced attempts at faith, as told in the gospel of Mark, in God’s honoring of a father’s prayer seeking healing for his son, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.” 

I keep coming back to the grace of God meeting me where I am, with however much belief I can muster. I keep coming back to learning that my relationship with the Divine is not a test, not a proving ground of performance. It’s about intention—my wanting to believe—and somehow that opens the door to receive God’s ever-eager action of reaching toward me with love and care. 

That’s the promise I’m still working to really let in, the one I learned in Sunday school, “Jesus loves me, this I know.” To let in that I’m loved by the Creator of the Universe. Each one of us is.

That’s life changing. Day by day.

Peace and love,

—Sherry