I admit that I have trouble with this picture.A father, ready and willing to sacrifice his son - his only son - because God told him to do so.
WHAT?
Why would a God who is all about love and life, a God who gave Abraham the gift of an heir in his old age, turn and tell him to commit such a barbarous act?
Those who don't believe the Bible is God's revealed word to us say that Genesis 22 is simply a moralistic story against the practice of child sacrifice. But the text really has less to do with the "why" and is more concerned with the "what". Building on the blog yesterday, Abraham is having himself a desert experience. Can you imagine the angst and doubt as a man struggles between heeding His God's command and the love he has for his son? I think you can. I know I can. What is in view here is temptation - the temptation to place the most precious gifts of God above God Himself. In our age, in the current church, one sees a sort of worship of our personal salvation and a praise of new found glory placed above worship and praise of God. How? Ignore the cross and you're left with this "theology of glory". That is to say, when it's all about me and my decisions for God, my acceptance of His gifts, my choice to follow Jesus in order to receive the crown of life, we've missed the point. The point is a sacrifice, of an only Son, made for us. The point is a ram caught in the thicket - and a place so aptly named "The Lord will provide". On the mount of the Lord, it WAS provided - once and for all. The sacrifice of Jesus on the cross is not for us to decide, to accept or to follow - but simply to praise a God who loves us beyond our measure of love and provides the most needful thing - shalom...everlasting peace.
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Most of us know the story of Job and his sufferings. He, like Abraham, was tested in a manner that few of us can comprehend. Abraham and Job had to decide if they loved God above all else. It was not a philosophical discussion but a real life test. Every blessing was removed from Job one by one. Satan hoped that he would now curse God, but instead:
Job 1:20-22
Then Job arose, tore his robe, and shaved his head; and he fell to the ground and worshiped.
And he said:
“ Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
And naked shall I return there.
The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away;
Blessed be the name of the LORD.”
In all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong.
Even his health was taken from him. He went from a rich, healthy man to a poor, sickly man with not much left but life and his wife. Still he refused to curse God and honored Him above any blessings:
Job 2:9-10
Then his wife said to him, “Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!”. But he said to her, “You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?” In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
The final result of Job’s time in the desert is that he saw God, not through the gifts and blessings, but God himself. That perhaps was God’s greatest gift to Job.
Job 42:5-6
“I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear,
But now my eye sees You.
Therefore I abhor myself,
And repent in dust and ashes.”
If we truly see God, we cannot help but repent as our hearts and minds are purified.
Matthew 5:8
Blessed are the pure in heart, For they shall see God.
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