And God said to Abraham, "As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover, I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall become nations; kings of peoples shall come from her." Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, "Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?" And Abraham said to God, "Oh that Ishmael might live before you!" God said, "No, but Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac*."
*Isaac means, 'he laughs'
Genesis 17.15-19a
I have often thought that Isaac's name is quite a charming one. 'He laughs.' What a delightful thing to be called. It seems Isaac is destined for an easy life, a charmed life- a simple, easy peace.
But reading this morning, I noticed something new. Isaac is not named for his own laughter, but for the laughter of his father, Abraham. Abraham is the one who laughs, and not for joy, nor for delight. Abraham laughs for unbelief, for the impossibility of what God has promised. How can a shild be born to 'two as good as dead', as Paul describes them? The whole thing is hopeless. What a joke! You see how far Abraham is from confidence in God's promise- Oh God, if only you'd take Ishmael. He's the only son I'll ever have. When Sarah hears the news, she laughs as well. Surely this cannot be so.
But God says no. No, Sarah will have a son. And you will name him 'he laughs'.
Abraham's laughter, and Sarah's laughter after him, are not signs of charmed joy and delight. They are the sad, perhaps slightly cynical laughter of those who can no longer believe a promise in which they had long given up hope. The laughter for which Isaac is named is a sign of the unbelief of his parents- and from his birth, every time they would call to him, they would be reminded that they thought his very existence laughably impossible. 'He laughs' is not a promise of a good life- it's an ironic reminder of Abraham and Sarah's faithlessness.
Yet his name is remarkable for one more reason, because it is indeed given to a child born to elderly parents. A full year from this announcement, Abraham and Sarah's first child together is given this name- and what laughter he must have been on that day. Hope, dead and dry, would be resurrected in his birth, and the promises of God be proven faithful above all the impossibilities of life. I image even God himself laughed for joy at the day Isaac was born, at the delight he would have brought to his incredulous parents, and at the secret knowledge of what other Impossible Child would one day come from his lineage. Isaac, it seemed is well named- this laughter is a reminder of the frailty of man's belief, and of the faithfulness of God to his impossible promises.
