“The portion contains some rather somber notes, as it records the deaths of Sarah, Avraham, and Yishma’el. Sarah lived to be 127 years old, the Torah tells us. In all of this time, we hear of only one semi-direct revelation to her from HaShem, and that is when she overheard the conversation between her husband and God, about Yitz’chak, and laughed. Other than that, we don’t have any recorded Scriptures indicating her direct contact with the Almighty, in the same manner as her husband. Why is this significant? Because it shows that even though she did not have the exact same revelations from HaShem that Avraham did, surely she had a genuine, living relationship with her God! This is proven by the quality of faith and support that she displayed towards her husband, amidst his unbelievable callings. Packing up and leaving the only home she had known for 65 years (she being 10 years his junior when they left; see 12:4; 17:17b), following him to lands unknown, and allowing him to take their son of promise to a distant mountain to slay him. All of these real-life circumstances required a considerable amount of patience and faith from someone such as Sarah.”