Genesis 22:1-14
After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you.” And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together.
When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. 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, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, “The Lord will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.”
Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The story from Our Old Testament reading today is, well, it's an odd one. Not just odd, though, but when we read a lot, actually, we read it today in Lent, we also will read it, or during our Easter Vigil. It's read on Christmas Eve as well. We get stories about this. Abraham offering the sacrifice of His son, Isaac. It's an important passage. But it's also super weird, right? You read it and you go what? God is saying, sacrifice your son. And then Abraham gets up the gumption to do it. And he's like, Nah, don't worry about it. It seems kind of weird, right? We know Abraham has gone through quite a bit leading up to this point. Abraham in Genesis 12, is contacted out of the blue by God and given an amazing promise. He says go to the land, I'll make a great a bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you, and all nations shall be blessed through you. And we see a promise that he and his wife would have a son. And it's through the sun that the nations would be blessed. And then, all of a sudden, Abraham is told to take his son, Isaac, His beloved Son, go to the mountain and kill him. And it's interesting. There's no bargaining. There's no questioning. We have that in other stories, where Abraham turns to God and says, No, right. When God wants to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham says, Wait a second. What if you find so many righteous people? And then you have a negotiation? Right? When Abraham has not had the promise of Isaac after more than a decade, he goes to God and says, Hey, God, what's with this promise. But all we got here is. So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him and his son, Isaac. That's it. God says sacrifice and the sacrifices. When we run into this story, I think we can ask a question. Who can trust a God like this? Right? Who can trust a God who would give you a promise, and then say, kill the promise? Right, because that's what it is the one and only son, his beloved son. The whole world will be blessed through him. And then God says, kill him. To understand how Abraham can do this, we have to understand Abraham's story a little bit better. Genesis 12, God comes to him and he gives them that amazing promise I already told you about. And then Abraham immediately forgets it. In the same chapter, there, it says that there's a famine in the land. An Abraham goes down to Egypt, and tries to fix the problem himself. He doesn't stay in the Promised Land and trust that God will provide. And then he gets to Egypt. And he looks around and he says, Well, they're gonna kill me. I know what I'll do. I'll marry off my wife to the Pharaoh. It's a great idea, right? He sees a problem. He does not trust that God will solve it tries to fix it himself. And well, it kind of goes badly, right? Except God uses that to enrich Abraham. It's so weird, right? He goes down to another her country married his wife to a ruler, God punishes that ruler for it. And then the ruler gives him stuff. That's not what I would do. If I were Pharaoh. God comes through. And he even uses Abraham's faithlessness his sin to enrich him. What about the next time? In Genesis chapter 16, Abraham and his wife, sarai decide to take God's promise into their own hands. And Abraham has a child with Hagar. They decide God is not coming through fast enough. So we're gonna have this baby with the servant, and everything's gonna work out great, right? Because when you introduce another woman into the marriage, everything is awesome. And of course, it's not. And there's problems in the family. But God protects them through it. In Genesis, chapter 17, Abraham goes to God and says, Wait a second, God, we've been doing this all this time, you gave me a promise, and it's not happening yet. And this servant of Mine is going to be my air, where is the sun you promised. And God makes a covenant cuts open the animals, and God Himself walks through them, to show that he has sworn by his own name that he will provide. The next chapter, three mysterious men come to Abraham. He feeds them under a tree. And they make a promise that went before the time they return, Sarah is going to have a child. And when they do, it happens. But in the meantime, Abraham does the same thing. He goes to a different place with a different King, and marries his wife off to her him. Again, can you believe it? And not only does this king not kill Abraham, he gives him stuff again. And then finally, they have a son. This little boy, Isaac, joy, and laughter. When Moses and Sarah are so old, that it should never be possible. years after when God made the promise. What we see during Abraham's life is Abraham's faithlessness not trusting when things are hard. And God's faithfulness is that even when Abraham has trusted in the promise, he says, Yes, I believe you. When the decision gets tough. He doesn't really. And he let sin get in the way. But God, not once turned from his promises. Even when Abraham sin, he was there, blessing him, enriching him, making him great. And giving him a son. Over and over, God proved faithful. And so when he comes to Abraham and says, kill the promise, Abraham has finally learned he's finally learned that no matter how bleak, how weird, how odd the situation God is putting him in. God will come through. Because God is always faithful. Who can trust a God like this? Well, Abraham could because God had proven himself over and over and over again. And so when they get up to the top of the mountain, and Isaac climbs up on the altar, Abraham knows that he's going to come down with his son, whether the angel is there or not. Hebrews tells us that Abraham had faith that God could raise even A dead
like Isaac, after a sacrifice. But God stops the sacrifice and provides a substitute for Isaac to be sacrificed there on the altar. Who can trust a God like this? Well, Abraham certainly could. Because he knew God keeps His promises. I think there's a similar experience. Many, many years later, as the people looked on, at another son, he was a son who was sent to earth and he did miracles. He preached, he had power, he could even stop the wind and the waves with his voice. And it looks like God had finally come through with the greatest promise of all, Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the Savior of the world. And he was going to take out the Romans and bring Israel to the top, and it's gonna be amazing. And there was this weird thing about, you know, he would say things like, be betrayed and suffer and die and then rise again. But it didn't worry about that. Right. And then the strangest thing happened. This guy who could do miracles, was arrested. And he didn't stop it. This one and only Son of God allowed the Jews to take him allowed Pontius Pilate to have Him whipped. And he carried another wood of sacrifice up a different mountain, outside the city of Jerusalem. And you can imagine what it would be like for the disciples, who looked at their Savior on the cross crown of thorns on his head, so beaten and bloody that he died from exhaustion only a few hours later. Who can trust a God who would do that to his son? Right? It looks like the end the end of the promised one the Savior, the Messiah, he was dead on across.
But God proves faithful with his promises, right? That thing that they may not have understood that they didn't really listen to, that it was necessary for the son to be betrayed, crucified. And then after three days rise from the dead. That thing that was the heart of it wasn't even when the one and only Son the son of the promise the Savior, Jesus Christ was dead on the cross, God proved faithful. He kept his promise. And after three days, he rose from the dead, our Savior, Jesus Christ. God was faithful. He kept his promises. Who can trust a God like this? What Jesus did and he trusted in a way that we cannot. Neither Abraham nor us can trust with that perfection of a Savior who climbs up on a sacrificial altar of a cross and offers himself for you. We have a faithful God. I think we can relate to pieces of Abraham's story. None of us have spoken to God and been told you have will have a son who will bless the whole world through you. And if you did, we might have some questions. But at the same time, we face problems that will make us doubt won't be part of the human condition. Looking ahead and seeing Well God's promises are there they're written in a book they're proclaim from the pastor but my life well sometimes God takes things away from me. Sometimes I get sick What about his promises? We learned from Abraham, that even when we doubt, and fear and worry, God is faithful. He keeps his promises even when you don't trust them. Even when you're worried about them and your heart turns away, and secretly you inside you say, I don't know about this. God still keeps his promise to you. He sent His Son Jesus to die for you, to rise for you. So that when you face your own grave, when you are lying there on your deathbed, wondering what is next, you know, like Christ, God will keep his promise to you and raise you on the last day. Who can trust a God like this? Well, we can because he proves Himself faithful over and over and over again. He did it with Abraham. He did it throughout the Old Testament. He did it with his son Jesus Christ when he offered him as a sacrifice. And he will do it for you every day. In Jesus name, Amen.