Self-Emptying Power

⁹ They said to him, “Where’s your wife Sarah?” And he said, “Right here in the tent.” ¹⁰ Then one of the men said, “I will definitely return to you about this time next year. Then your wife Sarah will have a son!” Sarah was listening at the tent door behind him. ¹¹ Now Abraham and Sarah were both very old. Sarah was no longer menstruating. ¹² So Sarah laughed to herself, thinking, I’m no longer able to have children and my husband’s old. ¹³ The LORD said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Me give birth? At my age?’ ¹⁴ Is anything too difficult for the LORD? When I return to you about this time next year, Sarah will have a son.” ¹⁵ Sarah lied and said, “I didn’t laugh,” because she was frightened. But he said, “No, you laughed.”

¹ The LORD was attentive to Sarah just as he had said, and the LORD carried out just what he had promised her. ² She became pregnant and gave birth to a son for Abraham when he was old, at the very time God had told him. ³ Abraham named his son—the one Sarah bore him—Isaac. ⁴ Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old just as God had commanded him. ⁵ Abraham was 100 years old when his son Isaac was born. ⁶ Sarah said, “God has given me laughter. Everyone who hears about it will laugh with me.” ⁷ She said, “Who could have told Abraham that Sarah would nurse sons? But now I’ve given birth to a son when he was old!”