But Sarai was barren; she had no child. – Genesis 11: 30

The first mention of Sara in the Bible does not particularly put her in a positive light. First of all, she is not defined as a woman in her own right. She is described as the wife of Abram. Then, after she is so identified, follows a “but.” Yes, she may have been that rich man’s wife; she may have lived in his big house; she may have had a whole herd of camels to drive; she may have had a separate tent just for her clothes and shoes; still, there was a “but.” What was the but all about?”

(1). She was barren. It is almost as if the writer is lowering our expectations of Sara and suggesting that she should somehow be devalued as a woman because she was barren. Such thinking belongs in ancient biblical history. It sounds like something Fred Flintstone might say about Wilma before Pebbles! Thank God we have come to acknowledge and affirm the fact that there is more to a woman than her womb. Yes, women are the only creatures on the planet with the elements and equipment to carry and give birth to another human being. Nevertheless, it is an insult and a sign of ignorance to view a woman simply as a baby machine.

(2). She was not barren – period. We might be able to remove the chauvinistic sexist tag from the writer of Genesis 11: 30 if we pay attention to his punctuation. The text records: “But, Sara was barren…” Then, after the word barren (at least in the KJV) there is a semi-colon – NOT A PERIOD. Yes, she was barren, but that was not all to her. The writer quickly adds after the semi-colon, before closing the thought: “she had no child.” Scholars might see this additional phrase as Hebrew parallelism where it was common practice to repeat something in a different way for emphasis. But, this doesn’t sound like parallelism. This sounds like a qualification. Sara was barren, but only barren as it related to having a child. A woman can be full of life and give birth in more than one way. She can be fruitful and give birth through her words, her ways, her wisdom, her wit and her works – not only through her womb.

(3). She was not barren permanently. We are told that Sara was barren. This little line is not there to demean her. It is there to set her up for a miracle. The writer knows what is coming and in order to set up the story and properly prepare us for what is coming, he owes us this nugget about Sara. This is not an extraneous note or gratuitous dig on her. It is there for both her character development and the story’s development. Don’t you see that it says: “Sara was barren?” It does not say: “Sara is barren!” That is because she had been barren up to that point, but her future was about to erase her past. Just know that your past emptiness is not permanent. It is a prelude to your coming miraculous abundance.