When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless. Genesis 17:1
After thirteen years of silence, God appears to Abram in a new revelation and with a new name—God Almighty. In the Hebrew it is El Shaddai, which essentially means the God who is sufficient,
the all-competent God, the adequate God who knows what He is doing and how to do it. This is an indication that Abram has learned something from his recent bitter experience. God says, in effect, You have been learning for thirteen years the total inadequacy of your own efforts through Ishmael….Now learn a new thing about me. I am El Shaddai. You have discovered by sad experience how futile your plans and efforts can be without me. Now learn how capable I am to do everything that I desire to do, whenever I desire to do it.
Would that we could all discover this truth! We need desperately to recover the reality of El Shaddai, the God who is sufficient for whatever we are going through right now! This is what Abram learned.