Sermon – The Seed of Promise
Genesis 25: 19-34
Sermon Preached by The Rev’d Tracey Gracey on Sunday 12 July, 2026
For the past six weeks, our Old Testament readings have taken us on a journey with one family through the book of Genesis.
At first glance, these readings can seem like six separate stories:
Abraham leaving home;
Sarah longing for a child;
Hagar and Ishmael in the wilderness;
Abraham and Isaac climbing Mount Moriah;
Rebekah waiting for a child;
And today, Jacob and Esau, two brothers whose rivalry begins before they are even born.
But these are not six unrelated stories. There is one thread that runs through every one of them. One question that keeps being asked:
“Will God’s promise survive?”
Or, if we use the image Jesus gives us in today’s Gospel, “Will the seed of God’s promise continue to grow?”
The story begins in Genesis 12, when God calls Abraham and says,
“I will bless you… and through you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
God entrusts Abraham with the seed of a promise that will take generations to grow; but almost immediately, the future of that seed appears uncertain, for Abraham is asked to leave everything he has ever known:
His home, his country, his security.
He doesn’t know where his journey will lead; yet he places his trust in God.
Then God sows that same seed into Sarah’s life.
She has carried the pain of childlessness for decades. She has long since stopped believing that the seed of new life could ever grow within her. When she hears God’s promise, she laughs.
Not because she is mocking God: but because, after so many years of being barren, she can no longer imagine that God’s promise could ever be fulfilled through her.
Yet God plants the seed of promise within her.
Then the story shifts to Hagar.
Sarah, impatient for the promise to be fulfilled, has Abraham sleep with her servant, Hagar, and Ishmael is born. But later, she and her son are sent away into the wilderness. Alone. Rejected. Afraid.
It would be easy to think the seed of promise had been overtaken by the pain of rejection and loss. Instead, God meets Hagar in the wilderness. God hears her cries. God plants a seed of hope where there seemed to be only despair.
Then Abraham and Isaac climb Mount Moriah.
Isaac, the long-awaited son born to Abraham and Sarah in their old age, is the child through whom God’s promise is meant to continue: the very shoot that has begun to grow from the seed God planted in Abraham. Yet Abraham is asked to place Isaac on the altar.
How can the seed of promise continue, if the actual life through which it is to grow is about to be sacrificed?
And yet, once again, the seed survives.
Rebekah enters the story.
She too is unable to conceive. Yet God plants the seed of promise in Rebekah too.
And today we meet Jacob and Esau.
Even before they are born there is struggle.
As they grow, rivalry divides the family. Isaac favours Esau. Rebekah favours Jacob. One brother despises his birthright. The other exploits his brother’s hunger.
This is hardly the sort of family we might expect to carry God’s promise into the next generation.
Yet even here, God’s promise continues to grow.
Again and again, it seems as though the seed will be choked, or wither, or fail to take root. Yet somehow, the promised seed continues to grow.
Six very different human stories.
Stories full of uncertainty.
Waiting.
Family conflict.
Poor decisions.
Broken relationships.
But one promise.
Through every story, God continues to sow the same promise.
The promise of God’s blessing.
The promise that God remains faithful.
The promise that God continues to bring life through ordinary, imperfect people.
And this is how the seed continues to grow.
Not because Abraham is always faithful.
Not because Sarah never doubts.
Not because Hagar never suffers.
Not because Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob or Esau get everything right.
They don’t.
And that’s precisely the point.
For these stories don’t try to explain every question about how or why God works. Rather, they bear witness to the character of God.
A God who remains faithful to the promise.
A God who refuses to abandon people, even when they lose their way.
A God who continues to sow hope into lives marked by uncertainty, disappointment and failure.
A God who is committed to bringing blessing, even through ordinary, imperfect people.
Genesis quietly reminds us that while our situations may change, God’s character does not.
The promise continues.
Not because life is easy.
Not because people are perfect.
But because God remains faithful.
And that is the seed of promise we are invited to receive today.
Amen.