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Genesis 22:1-18
Abraham Tested
Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will tell you about.”
3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about. 4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”
6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, 7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?”
“Yes, my son?” Abraham replied.
“The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.
9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
15 The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16 and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”
This is one of those stories from the Old Testament that many Christian readers hate. It seems to me that’s especially true of female readers. One female theologian published an article about it that declared the story to be an example of “divine child abuse.” But despite the way it offends our modern sensibilities, this is a story about one of the central events in the history of the covenant people. In the Hebrew tradition, the story is known as “the Binding,” and the fact that Jewish readers have assigned it a name should probably indicate to us the importance placed on it in their tradition. It’s considered one of the most important stories in all of their scriptures. And since Jesus declared himself to be the fulfillment of ‘the Law and the prophets’ – of the history of God’s relationship with his people as told in the scriptures – then it’s important for us to ask what God intends to say to us through this story.
To get at the meaning of this story, we probably need to stop and think about what Isaac represented to Abraham and Sarah. As you probably remember from some of our recent Reflections, God had promised them many descendants, even though they were childless. The couple had waited for decades, struggling to hold onto hope as their childbearing years slipped away. In one of those recent Reflections, we thought about a story in which Abraham and Sarah tried to take matters into their own hands and have a child through Sarah’s Egyptian maid, Hagar. The maid did indeed have a child, but it was not through that child that God’s promise would be kept.
Eventually the idea of having a child in their old age had seemed so ridiculous to them that they laughed when God continued to insist that his promise would be kept. Finally, the promised child was born when Abraham was ninety-nine and Sarah was ninety. We noted the God apparently had a sense of humor about the couple’s laughter – he directed them to name the child Isaac – in Hebrew, Itzak – which means “he laughs.”
You probably have to keep all that story in mind to imagine the horror Abraham experienced when God commanded him to sacrifice the boy. Abraham was being asked to give up what was most precious to him in all the world — the son he had waited for for decades. The whole point of the story, it seems to me, is that Abraham’s willingness to obey that command and to make that sacrifice is probably the greatest act of obedience in the history of God’s relationship with humankind.
So today’s reading is a critical episode in the establishment of the covenant with Abraham and Sarah that would change history. That covenant would result in the creation of Israel as God’s chosen people. It would be an arrangement through which God would bless “all the families of the earth.” And the story of the binding is the story of a test of Abraham that would confirm that the covenant was being made with someone who trusted God so fully that he was willing to sacrifice what was most precious to him.
As much as we might hate this story, it’s one that seems to have some lessons for us, as followers of Jesus 3,500 years later. Two seem the most important:
First of all, it illustrates the truth that the greatest sign of faith is the willingness to give up what matters most to us. That became a central principle of the Hebrew people’s worship life. They were commanded to sacrifice only their best animals, and to offer the first fruits of every harvest to God. Genuine obedience to God is not about giving him those things you don’t really want, or about giving only your leftovers.
Of course, the power of this story is magnified when it’s read in the context of the death of Jesus on the cross. As agonizing as this story must have been for Abraham, he was actually stopped from sacrificing his son. It seems to me that we’re meant to understand that God would demonstrate his love for us on Calvary by doing something he was not willing to make Abraham do.
But of course, the idea that Jesus is “God’s Son” is just a metaphor. Jesus was God in human form, so the sacrifice God made on Calvary was a self-sacrifice. And by that act of self-sacrifice, God replaced the first covenant with a new covenant – a second arrangement for his blessing to flow into all the world.
There’s no denying that this story of “the Binding” is harsh and disturbing. But it’s probably true that it’s in harsh and disturbing circumstances that the greatest demonstrations of faith and love are made. And that’s what this story is ultimately about.
Let’s pray: Lord, we thank you for the obedience of Abraham, and for the covenant you established through him. We thank you also for the sacrifice you made on the cross, showing your great love, giving more than you were willing to ask us to give. Amen.
Blessings,
Henry
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