2 Kings 2:1-12
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.”
Welcome to Getting ready for Sunday, a podcast of first Lutheran Church. Each week, I introduced the readings for the upcoming Sunday with some notes and explanation so you can be ready for worship when you arrive. I look at the Old Testament, song, epistle and Gospel reading for the upcoming Sunday and offer a few notes and explanation. The Old Testament reading for Sunday, February 18, comes from Genesis chapter 22, verses one through 18. 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 of 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 plays from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, stay here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the fire 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 an 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 mound of the Lord, it shall be provided. And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven, and said, by myself, I have sworn declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you. And I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of the heaven. And as it stands on the seashore, and your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice. Here ends the reading, or reading begins with a weighty phrase, after these things. That helps us see that we're looking back and a lot of has happened in Abraham's life. God came to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12, he called him and gave him promises. He would make his name great, he would give him a land, he would make his name his children, like the sand of the seashore, that all nations will be blessed through him, that whoever blesses him would be blast, whoever curses him would be cursed. Lots of cool stuff. Abraham tested God's promises over and over again, he put himself in terrible situations. When there was a famine in the land, he goes down to Egypt, and marries his wife off to another man who then gets in trouble with God and God uses it to enrich Abraham, instead of getting Abraham killed. Crazy, right? Things like that happen over and over again. He runs into conflicts with people, and then God shows up and saves him he there's Sodom and Gomorrah happened and God speaks with him and Luke go back and forth and God protects lot in this destruction. One more time, Abraham marries off his wife to another man and And the man gets in trouble. But Abraham gets enriched instead of being killed. It's all sorts of crazy stuff happens. But the best part is that after all of the years of waiting, God came through on his promise to give Abraham and Sarah, a son named Isaac. And his birth is what is told right away in the chapter prior to this, the promise of the son comes, Isaac, Isaac, is there, he's ready to go. And then we get these words, after these things. Now, we don't know how much time passed between the story of the birth of Isaac, and what is happening in this story. The chapter 21 ends with and Abraham sojourned amongst the Philistines many days, which is a great phrase, that means a long time, but we don't know how long could have been a week could have been a couple of months could have been several years. We don't know. There are some clues, though. We have a suggestion that the Isaac is old enough to carry a lot of wood, because Abraham gives Isaac the load of the wood to go up to the top of the mountain. And so it seems like it is likely that Isaac is a like a teenager, to be able to carry enough wood to be able to haul it up a mountain, that they can do a burnt offering. So God comes to Abraham after years, maybe of life with Isaac and says, sacrifice your one and only son. Now, the Abraham, of many years ago, would have freaked out at this request. The Abraham who decided that God wouldn't protect him when he went down into Egypt. So he gave his wife as to be the wife of someone else. He didn't trust God's promises, the Abraham who married off his wife again, in a different place, the Abraham who, who hedged and tried to have a baby with his servant girl, that Abraham would have freaked out about this. But after years and years of God proving himself of God coming through, it doesn't say anything. There's no question. It says. So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey and took two of his young men with him and his son, Isaac. So they take the burnt offering the wood, and they bring Isaac and they go to the mountain, and they leave the two young men behind, and they go up to the top of the mountain. And there, they took take the wood of the burnt offering, and he lays it on Isaac, his son who carries it. And Abraham gets the fire and the knife and they go up together. Isaac has a worthy question. Here's the fire and the wood. But where's the lamb? Abraham says, God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering my son. So they go together. Isaac is, you know, confused, as you would be to we're going up to the top of a mountain to give a burnt offering but we don't have an offering. That's what you think, Isaac? Abraham knows what's going on. So they get to the place. Abraham builds an altar. And then it says, And he lays the wood down and it says, And he bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar on top of the wood. We have to remember, Abraham is a very old man. He is likely about 100 years old at this time. And Isaac, if he is old enough to carry a whole pile of wood up a mountain means he is probably stronger than Abraham. Which means that either Abraham drugged his son or Isaac was bound willingly carried the wood up willingly got onto the altar willingly. So Abraham reaches out, takes the knife, and the angel goes, Stop. Don't kill him. I now know that you trust God. This interaction gives people some pause. God didn't really want his son, Isaac to be killed. Why did God put Abraham through all of this? Isn't this kind of, well, a little abusive? Almost.
What we see here Is is Abraham is finally displaying the trust that God's plan is always good. In fact, what he trusts is that when Isaac goes to the sacrifice that even should Isaac die, he will come back from the dead. And here Abraham is expressing the kind of faith that says, no matter what God wants, God, His promises will come true. And so it's not just a test of faith, but it is a place for Abraham to prove that he has learned from his life and experience of receiving God's promises and hearing it over and over and over again and actually seeing it come to fruition. And so what what they get then is a ram gets continents, they get in, in a thicket by the horns, and they offer that as a sacrifice. Now we see in this, an expression of Christ here, Abraham offers his son whom he loves his one and only Son, as a sacrifice. And God allows him to come out. But in Christ, we see a one and only Son on whom the wood of a sacrifice was laid, as he carried his cross up to the top of a different kind of Hill, outside of Jerusalem, where he wasn't spared, where the Father gave up his one and only son. Abraham could offer Isaac because he was he knew that God could raise someone from the dead. That's what it says in Hebrews chapter 11. It says, By faith when he was tested, offered up Isaac, who had received the promise, in the act of offering up his only son of whom it was said, through Isaac shall your offspring be named, he considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead. So Abraham, he knew that no matter what would happen, he would actually come down with his son Isaac, because Isaac was the son of the promise. And similarly, Jesus could go to the cross and willingly die, just like Isaac willingly climbed up to the top of that, that altar, and willingly die, knowing that God would raise him from the dead, to give him life, so that we could have life too. And so now the angel says, in response to Abraham, by myself, I have sworn declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you. And I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of the heaven. And as the sand that is on the seashore, and your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice. So here, God repeats the promise that He has given Abraham over and over again, and will multiply our offspring, stars of the heaven, sand of the seashore, your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. Same thing that God promised him in Genesis chapter 12. And so the Abraham is simply showing trust in the promises that God has already given him. Trust in the promises that God has carried out and kept this whole time. And we see, we can look at what God has done in Christ, and have trust in the promises that God gives us. Because we had a Savior who obeyed the voice of his father and gave up his life, gave himself up so that he could possess the gate of his enemy death itself. Those roll the stone away over the tomb, and give us life that lasts forever. And because Jesus is raised, we know that we are raised to that Jesus was the sacrifice for us so that we can be like Isaac and not have to die forever. That's all we have for today. We'll see you on Sunday. Bye
Transcribed by https://otter.ai