If you are living in New Testament times and want to write a little treatise to convince your Jewish friends that eternal life and salvation from sin and death come not by keeping the laws of Moses, but merely by trusting in the faithfulness of God and his son, what argument do you use?

You know that "salvation by faith" is not an Old Testament concept, but you also know there are many examples of people doing what God is said to have asked of them. So you argue that if people do what they are asked to do while believing they will be rewarded if they do it, they are acting by faith—as they act before receiving the reward, trusting they will receive it—whether or not they themselves called it faith.

This is the argument used by the anonymous author of Hebrews in the famous "faith chapter." We have read Hebrews 11 over and over, drawing inspiration from these "heroes of faith"—or perhaps feeling discouraged because their faith seems to exceed our own. But the author of Hebrews deliberately chooses positive examples while failing to mention the evidence of lack of faith.

Abraham gets more space in the chapter than anyone else (verses 8–22). But is he indeed a "giant of faith"? Luke reports Jesus saying, "If then God so clothe the grass, which is to day in the field, and to morrow is cast into the oven; how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith?" (Luke 12:28). Abraham doesn’t seem at all sure that God will clothe him.

I would like to assert here that Abraham does help us learn about the relationship between our own faith and God’s faithfulness, but he does it by being one of our most prominent examples of a man "of little faith." If he is indeed a man "of little faith," even though God calls him righteous, then this is good news for us, given that few of us are more faithful than Abraham. It seems that "little faith" is sufficient faith.

As we saw last week, God tells Abraham to leave Ur and go to Canaan. Abraham does leave Ur and travel up the Euphrates River, but he stops and settles in Haran, hundreds of miles north of Canaan (Gen. 11:31). In doing this, he is disobedient, but God doesn’t give up on him. In Genesis 12:2, God promises to make Abraham (then Abram) into "a great nation." But Abraham takes things into his own hands, as usual, and tries to make himself "a great nation" by buying slaves (Gen. 12:55). A few years later, he has a private army of 318 trained male slaves, and no doubt there are many women and children, as well. Is this trusting God to make him "a great nation"? It is not.

When there is famine in Canaan, Abraham fears for his family and wealth—not trusting God to provide and make his name great—and flees to Egypt. He seems to go without permission, doing what is right in his own eyes, as usual. Entering Egypt, Abraham asks Sarah to lie to the Pharaoh about him, not revealing that he is her husband. Again he doesn’t trust God to keep him safe. But God is faithful and sends plagues to rescue Sarah from the Pharaoh’s women’s quarters.

In Genesis 15, we learn that Abraham has so little faith in God that he has named Eliezer of Damascus as his heir. Then God shows Abraham the stars and again makes promises. We are told in Genesis 15:5–6 that Abraham "believes" God, and this is "counted as righteousness." Clearly, Abraham’s actions have seldom been righteous, yet God counts his puny belief as equivalent to an unswerving walk with God. Lest we think that surely Abraham must have enormous faith—at least at this time—he immediately asks God for proof! Does true faith demand signs? No, it accepts without demanding evidence. "O ye of little faith!"

We now move on to this week’s lesson. In Genesis 16, Sarah gives up on God and asks Abraham to take her Egyptian slave Hagar as a surrogate through whom Sarah can give Abraham the son he wants. Abraham accepts, again revealing his lack of faith. A sometimes-passive man, Abraham doesn’t keep Hagar from despising Sarah and acting disrespectfully when she becomes pregnant. He also lets Sarah mistreat Hagar. This is not righteous behavior.

In Genesis 16:7–13, Abraham’s failure to do what is right leads to Hagar running away, taking with her in her womb Abraham’s son—the baby he now thinks will be his heir. But where Abraham has little faith, God is again faithful. He sees Hagar, hears her cry for help, and provides for her. To remind her that he hears, God tells Hagar that her son will be named Ishmael (that is, "God hears").

Ishmael will not be a slave and not be Abraham’s heir or Sarah’s son-by-surrogate, but he will be a hostile loner. "He shall be a wild man; His hand shall be against every man, and every man’s hand against him." How would you feel if God told you your son was going to be a sociopath? Hagar is grateful. We see, thus, that God cares even for an Egyptian slave woman who isn’t nice to Sarah and is so lacking in faith in Abraham’s God that she runs away from Abraham.

In Genesis 17, God makes another covenant with Abraham and promises that he will have a son by Sarah. Abraham demonstrates his doubt by actually laughing at God. In Genesis 18, three visitors arrive, one of them the Lord. There is another promise of a son, and this time Sarah laughs, also doubting God’s faithfulness.

When we compare Genesis 18 with Genesis 19, we learn something else about the righteousness and faithfulness of God. We know that the men of Sodom and Gomorrah are so wicked that God plans to destroy them. Yet God allows Abraham to plead for Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham doesn’t plead for the life of Lot, but for the lives of the Sodomites! Is this because Abraham hates to see people killed? Perhaps, but he has also had a treaty with the Sodomites and rescued them before. Evidently he isn’t too concerned about their practices compared to his security agreements.

We should be cautious about assuming that God speaks ironically when he promises to save Sodom if ten righteous men are found there, knowing the righteous men cannot be found. The principle here is illustrative: God may be willing to save all if there are even a few who are righteous. As it is, he saves Lot and Lot’s daughters, but nearly against their wills. Lot, who lets his daughters get him drunk and use him as their stud, is righteous only perhaps in relation to the Sodomites.

Perhaps we should say that Abraham is the father of those who say they will be faithful but fail over and over. This should give us hope! The God who loves and chooses Abraham knowing Abraham will be unfaithful more often than he will be faithful also chooses you and me.

"O ye of little faith," take heart! God is faithful, and he promises to save.

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