Abraham and Isaac: A Dreadful Test Sermon Series: On the Road Again: The Patriarchs Sunday, June 8, 2003 Dr. Victor D. Pentz Senior Minister Scripture Lesson: Genesis 22 Being pastor of this church gets me into the strangest situations. During the last week I unexpectedly found myself in the public spotlight, and since I have received many questions about it, I thought I d say a brief word. On Tuesday night my wife and I, our daughter and some friends attended an Atlanta Braves baseball game. What made this outing a special event was our seats; the tickets were a gracious gift from John Schuerholz, General Manager of the Atlanta Braves. Schuerholz is considered the best GM in baseball, and more importantly, he is a strong Christian. I didn t realize until we arrived at the ballpark that our seats were located in the first row directly behind home plate, so we were looking right over the umpire s shoulder. It was too good to be true. What I also didn t realize was that during every pitch, my wife, Becky, and I were visible on national television. As soon as the game began, my cell phone started ringing as friends from California, Seattle and St. Louis called to tell me they were seeing me on TV. Then elders from this church started calling, warning me not to do anything to embarrass this congregation I can t imagine what they thought I might do! And the game itself turned out to be a great one, as Andruw Jones hit a home run in the bottom of the eighth and we beat the Texas Rangers. This morning as we prepare for communion, I would like us to do something a bit different. Please open the pew Bible before you and keep it open during the few minutes of this meditation, so that we may look together at a passage that has probably received more scholarly commentary than any other in the Old Testament: the story of the sacrifice of Isaac, which is found in Genesis 22. We are about to read one of the most brilliantly told stories in all of literature. But before we do, would you join me in prayer? Lord, this morning we come out of the shallow and empty world, filled with false promises, into your house, to sit at your feet and learn from your Word. And on this special Pentecost morning, we ve come to gather around your Communion table to receive the mystery of your presence in our lives. We pray that your Holy Spirit would come among us now and prepare us, so that we would be worthy to partake of the body and 1
blood of our Lord Jesus, for it is in his holy name that we pray. Amen. Because this story has raised questions for readers of the Bible and led to such debate among scholars, I would like us to look at it verse by verse, and I will comment on each verse as we read. Let s look first at verse 1: After these things God tested Abraham. One of life s inescapable realities is that God is always testing us. Testing is a part of life. In our family we have one daughter entering law school this fall and another daughter entering medical school. For them this has been a nerve-racking year in which they have been rigorously tested: one taking the LSAT for admission into law school, the other the MCAT for admission into med school. Here at the church I have even spoken to parents of tiny children who said to me, Vic, pray for us. This week our child is being tested for admission to a private kindergarten. And it was obvious to me that the parents felt their own worth and effectiveness as parents were being judged and tested. If you are being tested right now, take comfort in knowing that God tested even his own son Jesus by sending him out into the wilderness for forty days and forty nights. Human beings are like tubes of toothpaste: it is only when we are under pressure that who we are inside comes out, and we discover what we re really made of. Unfortunately, some people do not pass the test that God lays out for them. In the Bible there was a very gifted man named Saul, who was king of Israel. He failed his test and was passed over by God. Here in Genesis 22 Abraham is being tested. And what a test! In verse 2, God said, Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love [each phrase was like a dagger in Abraham s heart] and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on Mount Moriah to me. I don t know about you, but as a parent, when I read this my brain goes into overload and the circuits melt. I cannot even fathom the horror of what God was asking Abraham to do. Kill your son! And it isn t as if Abraham had not already proven his faith in God. He left his family, friends and all that was familiar him to set out into an unfamiliar land and claim a future about which he knew nothing except that God would be there as an unfailing friend. But now his friend was betraying him in the cruelest way, saying: Take the son I gave you after so long, Abraham, the one link you have to the promise I made that you would father a great nation the boy you did not have enough faith to believe would ever come along, and Sarah did not have enough faith to believe she would ever bear take the boy who is your dream come true, and slaughter him as an offering to me. Nonetheless Abraham did not blink, did not falter in his obedience. Verse 3 continues: So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt offering, and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him... Wait a minute. Maybe he did blink. Notice the sequence of Abraham s actions. Wouldn t it have made more sense for Abraham to cut the wood first, then saddle the donkey, take the two young men and set out on the journey? Listen again to what he did: First, he saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac, then he cut the wood for the burnt offering, and set out on the journey. Perhaps Abraham was postponing the most painful part the actual cutting of the wood for the offering until the very end. Or, more likely he didn t want Sarah to know what he was up to. He couldn t face any questions because he had no answers. Abraham was clearly struggling. We are given no record of any words spoken between Abraham and Isaac as they traveled those three days to Moriah. Then we read verses 4 and 5, On the third day Abraham looked up and saw 2
the place far away. Then Abraham said to his young men, Stay here with the donkey; the boy and I will go over there; we will worship, and then we will come back to you. Abraham did not say to his servants, I will come back to you but We will come back to you Either Abraham was lying through his teeth, to cover for the sacrifice he knew would occur, or in these words we are witnessing a flicker of faith from deep in Abraham s soul, his belief that somehow, some way, both he and his son would survive God s test. Verse 6 continues: Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. Then comes this heartbreaking line: So the two of them walked on together. Is there anything as touching as watching a father and son walking side by side? Often they have the same gait, the same stride. I have noticed one father and son in our church; when they re walking together, you can see that they even have identical cowlicks in their hair. So the two of them walked on together. Isaac finally begins to wonder about their journey. In verse 7, he questions some of the odd things he has noticed and we read this exchange: Father... The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?... Abraham said, God himself will provide the lamb for a burnt offering, my son. And again that haunting phrase is repeated: So the two of them walked on together. Verse 9 tells us, When they came to the place that God had shown him, Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order. [Now each phrase becomes very deliberate.] He bound his son Isaac, and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. [And I think we are meant to read the next sentence slowly and with a sense of great drama.] Verse 10: Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to kill his son. [And just as the tension grows to an unbearable level...] But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham! And he said, Here I am. He said, Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me. And Abraham looked up and saw a ram, caught in a thicket by its horns. Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called that place The LORD will provide ; as it is said to this day, On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided. The angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven, and said, By myself I have sworn, says the LORD: Because you have done this, and have not withheld your son, your only son, [Now God reiterates his great Abrahamic promise] I will indeed bless you, and I will make your offspring as numerous as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of their enemies, and by your offspring shall all the nations of the earth gain blessing for themselves, because you have obeyed my voice. So Abraham returned to his young men, [About this time I always imagine Isaac looking up at his dad and saying, You were only kidding, right? That was just a joke right, Dad? ] and they arose and went together to Beer-sheba; and Abraham lived at Beersheba. What can we learn from this terrible story with a happy ending? Let me suggest three things. First, when you follow the Lord, you must still expect your life to be difficult. As I mentioned, our daughter Jessica is going to medical school next fall. Everybody expects the next four years to be difficult for her. People keep telling her, Med school is going to be so hard! Yet for some reason, people expect the Christian life to be umbrella drinks next to the pool at the Ritz-Carlton, with a little guy coming by every few minutes to spray you with soothing mist. Scott Peck wrote a book called The Road Less Traveled, in which he became rich and famous by stating what would appear to be an obvious truth: Life is difficult. Only he goes on to say that once you acknowledge this truth, life isn t quite as difficult any longer. If God is testing you this morning, it s a com- 3
pliment. Through testing God promotes us in the School of Faith. One of my favorite thinkers is the great Christian existentialist Miguel de Unamuno. He often gave the following benediction, May God deprive you of peace and give you glory... Sometimes God takes away our peace so that he might give us an even greater gift the gift of his glory in our lives. A second thing we learn from this story is that God will never, ever ask us to sacrifice our children. If we conclude from reading this passage that it is wonderful to love God enough to sacrifice our children if He demanded it, we are missing the point. An understanding of the ancient context of this story will clarify that the opposite point is being made. In that day, children were sacrificed to the gods all the time in fact, it was part of business as usual. Indeed, the Jews were almost unique in that that they did not pay tribute Moloch, the god to whom children were sacrificed. We might imagine Abraham thinking as he climbed that mountain, Well, I might have known it would come to this. All the other gods demand that their followers sacrifice their children. Jehovah is just like those other gods. Abraham is like any typical ancient religious adherent as he trudges up Mt. Moriah. But in one terrible moment, in one split-second God reaches down and changes everything when He says, Abraham, hold on, don t even think about harming your son. Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him. That s where the power in this story lies not in the fact that Abraham was willing to slay his child, as so many did in ancient times. It s when God stays his hand, the powerful moment when God interposes himself between parent and child. Friends, this Old Testament story holds clear implications regarding the issue of abortion in our time. In the modern world our gods are sexual freedom, personal autonomy and material prosperity, and to these gods we sacrifice unborn children. We argue that it s up to the mother alone to decide what she does with her body, to decide the fate of the little life growing within her. But God always interposes himself between parent and child. No parent has absolute authority over the life of a child. Indeed, in the act of baptism, we take the baby out of the arms of the parents as a way of symbolizing God s declaration of ownership of that child s body and soul His statement that This is my child. Each child born into this world has a dignity and value even apart from whatever its parents may think of it. We must not sacrifice our children to any of the false gods, ancient or modern, or even to the one true and holy God, who, as we see in the story of Abraham and Isaac, does not want us to make Him a blood sacrifice of them. Our God is so worthy he does not require any sacrifice from us. Instead, he provides his own sacrifice for us. Searching for an animal to sacrifice in Isaac s place, Abraham found a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. Overjoyed, he built an altar to Jehovah-Jireh, which means The Lord will provide. In many inner-city churches today, Jehovah-Jireh is a favorite name for God. Congregations sing songs with the words Jehovah-Jireh, you are my provider. Friends, God does not require us to sacrifice something as precious as a son to Him, yet he willingly provides for us the sacrifice of His son, his only son, the son He loves: Jesus. Notice the parallels. Isaac carries the wood on his back up the mountain; Jesus carries the wooden cross on his back as he walks up mount Golgotha. Isaac asks Abraham, Father where is the lamb? John the Baptist points at Jesus and says, Behold the lamb... And in each story a broken-hearted father remains at his son s side on that difficult trail: And the two of them walked on together. The Apostle Paul wrote the truth in Romans 8:32, He who did not spare his own son but give him up for us all, can we not trust such a God to [provide] us all good gifts in him... Whatever you need this morning, Jehovah-Jireh The Lord will provide. What is the one 4
thing you ve never had the faith to ask for from God? Today, what you ask for is here for you, if you come to the table and say the words along with me. Jehovah-Jireh. The Lord will provide. Lord, some of us gathered here to day are being tested. In our weakness and self-doubt, we are reminded of our desperate need of you. In the viselike grip of painful circumstances, we come to your table. If our tests are not as obvious and painful as the one Abraham faced, in some ways they are even more subtle and insidious. We approach your table now in faith and say the words that Abraham said long ago: The Lord will provide. Bless our families as we partake of the body and blood of your Son together, as we ask these things in his holy name. Amen. 5
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