When You Can't Trace God, You should Trust God– Genesis 20

When You Can't Trace God, You Must Know to Trust God
We've all been there—that moment when everything seems aligned spiritually, when we've spent quality time in God's Word, when our hearts feel close to the Father. And then, in a flash, we blow it. A careless word. An angry reaction. A fearful decision. Suddenly, we're face-to-face with the uncomfortable truth that the flesh is only "reckoned as dead," and just waiting for an opportunity.
This tension between our spiritual aspirations and our human frailty runs throughout Scripture. Perhaps nowhere is this more evident than in the life of Abraham, the father of faith himself, whose story in Genesis 20 reveals both the depth of human weakness and the astounding faithfulness of God.
The Father of Faith's Familiar Failure
Fresh from witnessing God's judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham relocates his family to Gerar. You'd think that after seeing fire rain from heaven, Abraham would be walking in unprecedented faith. Instead, he falls back into an old pattern—one he'd already stumbled into years earlier in Egypt.
When King Abimelech notices Sarah's beauty, Abraham introduces her as his sister rather than his wife. It's a half-truth (she was his half-sister), but spoken with intent to deceive, making it a whole lie. Abraham's reasoning? "I thought there is no fear of God at this place, and they will kill me because of my wife."
The irony is staggering. Abraham judges an entire people group as godless while simultaneously acting without any apparent consultation with God himself. He operates from fear rather than faith, pulling Sarah into his faithlessness and creating a crisis that threatens the very promise God had made about their coming son, Isaac.
Our Default Settings
Abraham's failure reveals something important about human nature: we all have default settings we revert to under pressure. For Abraham, it was self-preservation through truth-bending. For others, it might be anger, withdrawal, control, or any number of protective mechanisms we've developed over the years.
These patterns don't disappear just because we've had a powerful spiritual experience or spent hours in prayer. The flesh remains the flesh, always looking for an opportunity to reassert itself. One moment we're spiritual giants; the next, we're operating from fear and faithlessness.
The question becomes: Are God's promises to us based on our performance? Does our failure disqualify us from His purposes?
God's Unwavering Faithfulness
Here's where the story takes a remarkable turn. God intervenes—not to condemn Abraham, but to protect His promise. He appears to Abimelech in a dream, warning him that Sarah is married and that taking her would be sin. God acknowledges Abimelech's integrity and reveals that He Himself prevented the king from sinning.
But the most stunning moment comes when God tells Abimelech to return Sarah to Abraham, "for he is a prophet, so that he will pray for you and you shall live."
Read that again. In the midst of Abraham's failure, while his sin is being exposed, God calls him "a prophet." Not a liar. Not faithless. Not a failure. A prophet.
This is how God sees His own—not according to their present performance, but according to His calling and promise. The gifts and calling of God are irrevocable. When God sets His love on someone, He doesn't withdraw it based on their stumbling.
The Ministry of Reconciliation
This truth extends to everyone who belongs to Christ. Scripture tells us that God "was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them." We are called ambassadors for Christ, ministers of reconciliation, a royal priesthood—not because we've earned these titles through flawless performance, but because God has declared them over us in Christ.
Like Abraham, we may find ourselves in situations where we've clearly blown it. The enemy, our flesh, and even our own conscience will line up to condemn us, to tell us we're disqualified, that we've lost our standing with God.
But what does God say?
He says we are justified by grace. He says we are sustained to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. He says there is a crown of righteousness laid up for all who love His appearing. He says we will be pure and blameless.
These aren't promises contingent on our performance. They're declarations of what God Himself will accomplish in us and for us through Christ.
When You Can't Trace God
There's a powerful phrase that my dear brother in Christ, Bishop Way, told me when I was struggling. This phrase is worth embedding deep in our hearts: "When you can't trace God, you must know to trust God."
So often, we find ourselves in situations where we cannot understand what God is doing. The circumstances don't make sense. The outcome seems contrary to His promises. We're tempted, like Abraham, to take matters into our own hands, to operate from fear rather than faith.
This is precisely when we must remember that we walk by faith, not by sight. God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and self-discipline. The fear of the Lord—that proper respect, honor, and positioning before Him—should define all our other fears.
Abraham's contrast is striking: the same man who led 318 men on a nighttime raid to defeat multiple kings now trembles at the possibility of being killed for his wife. Faith and fear warred within him, just as they war within us.
The Collateral Damage of Faithlessness
One sobering aspect of Abraham's failure is how it affected others. Sarah was pulled into his deception. Abimelech and his entire household were placed under a death sentence for something they did in innocence. The unintended consequences of operating from fear rather than faith are rarely thought through in the moment.
Our faith failures don't just impact us. They ripple outward, affecting those around us—our families, our communities, those who look to us for spiritual leadership. This isn't meant to paralyze us with fear of failure, but to remind us of the importance of bringing everything before God, of seeking His wisdom rather than relying on our own understanding.
The God Who Redeems Our Failures
The story concludes with Abraham praying for Abimelech's household, and God healing them. Despite Abraham's failure, God still used him in a priestly role of intercession. The very thing Abraham feared—death at the hands of godless men—never materialized. Instead, he found himself blessed by a king who demonstrated more integrity than Abraham himself had shown.
This is our God. He doesn't excuse our sin, but He doesn't define us by it either. He remains faithful even when we are faithless. He works His purposes even through our failures. He calls us what we will be, not what we currently are.
The day is coming when we'll stand in glory and so much will make sense. Until then, we press on, knowing that the One who began a good work in us will complete it. When we can't trace what He's doing, we trust who He is.
Because God's promises aren't based on our performance—they're based on His character. And that makes all the difference.