Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
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 one of the mountains I will tell you about.”
John 3:16
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Imagine there’s no heaven.
(It's easy if you try)
Would you still live for God if his promises were removed? Would you still give your life to follow in the footsteps of Jesus if God told you your obedience was for his sake alone, and you would receive no reward? Would your life on earth be different if you knew that you only had this temporal existence in which to honour and serve God? How would you live for today?
Isaac is more to Abraham than just a son. In Isaac, Abraham has seen the fulfillment of God’s promise to him. For the promise of Isaac, Abraham left his own country and family in Genesis chapter twelve. In the ten chapters since, he has tried to manipulate his circumstances in order to fulfill God’s promise to him in his own strength. God revealed that the son achieved from his own efforts was not the son he promised. Abraham and Sarah have agonized for years over her barrenness, and have waited for years before and after God’s promise for a child of their own. Throughout this time, God has been patiently revealing his nature to Abraham and Sarah, as they witness his mercy, his judgment, and his redemption. Now all they have hoped and dreamed for, their future and the promise of God for a lasting nation, is in Isaac alone.
All obstacles have been removed between Abraham and God's promised covenant seed at the beginning of this chapter. Lot is gone. Hagar is gone. Isaac is born. Boundaries of Abimelech's relationship are understood. Ishmael has been sent away. It’s all or nothing on Isaac. At this point, the test would not be to show that God can overcome obstacles to his promise. He has already shown this is true.
For Abraham to sacrifice Isaac is to obediently place before God all God has ever promised to him. It was for the promise of Isaac that Abraham first sacrificed to obey God. Now, it is for God that he will willingly sacrifice the promise. If Abraham were to refuse YHWH his son at this point, it would show that Abraham was moved more by the promise than by God himself. God gave the promise. God was the one to fulfill it. Abraham's faith was in God, not the promise or the hope.
Genesis 22:8
Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.
Notice Abraham's repetition of "my son" throughout the chapter. He does not try to distance himself from Isaac in any way.
Abraham speaks in faith about the sacrifice. He believes that God will provide a way somehow. His promise is true, no matter how the circumstance may appear.
Hebrews 11:17-19
By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring[b] will be reckoned.” Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.
Genesis 22:9-12
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.”
The story is explicit in its declaration of God's purpose in this chapter. God did this for his own benefit. God wanted to know by experience that Abraham was motivated by him, not by what he could do for him.
Without this story, every other motivation of Abraham up until this point and after could possibly be interpreted as being for his own gain. This story makes it absolutely clear that his faithful obedience is based in the character of the God he has come to know. This is the purest moment of faithful obedience demonstrated in Abraham's life. He belongs to God alone, no matter the circumstance or consequence.
John 3:16
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
God's promise to us is eternal life in heaven. When we recall the gospel of Jesus, we often consider the good news in terms of all it can do for us, for all we can gain. Of course, the New Testament writers are clear that we are motivated by another city that is not yet. Hebrews 11 and 12 say we run in faith, believing in joy that our reward in the next life will be worth everything it costs in this life.
But there is a potential danger in a misunderstanding of this Christian truth. Though there is truly a sense in which this world is not our home, God has not called us out of it. Jesus says explicitly in John 17 of his disciples that he will not take them out of the world. Instead, he has sent us into this world as salt, as light, as sowers of seeds of his kingdom here and now. The good news Jesus told his disciples to share in Matthew chapter 10 was that people should repent because the kingdom was near. He also said the kingdom had already come, and that the kingdom was within us.
This world is our home. We are not just passing through.
So do we live as Jesus did here and now, and suffer all the consequences of doing so only for some future reward? For whose benefit do we follow in the footsteps of Jesus?
Such questions may challenge our motivations for religious faithfulness. They fly in the face of a false Christian religion that would make temporal blessing our motivation. However Abraham’s story may challenge our understanding of the fear of God, it certainly leaves no room whatever for a Christian God who doles out worldly wealth and privilege in exchange for the faithfulness of his followers. God promises no way out to Abraham. Abraham believes that God will keep his promises, but it is not for his promises that he is motivated to act in this story. It is for the fear of God.
Jesus said that following him meant taking up a cross. It means sacrifice. It means a death of ourself, our own desires and motivations, completely exchanged for a life motivated by God’s passions. How would we respond if all was taken from us? What if all we hoped and dreamed for was gone? Our wealth? Our health? Our hopes of blessing from God?
Job found himself in that place. As far as he knew, there was nothing in his life or future that he could point to as a benefit of serving the Lord. Still, he called God his God. “Though he slay me,” says Job when all is taken away, “yet will I hope in him”. (Job 13:15)
This is what it means to fear the Lord. To follow God because he is God. This the purest faith.
We are fortunate to have a hope greater than this.
Hebrews 11:39-12:3
These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
God gives his blessing again. This time, he says it is because of Abraham's obedience.
Genesis 22:15-18
The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time and said, “I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 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, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”
In a reversal from Genesis 12:1-3, God now tells Abraham after he has been obedient that he will bless him and make him a great nation. In Genesis 12, Abraham believed God’s promises for blessing, and followed God, sight unseen. In Genesis 22, Abraham obediently sacrifices the very promises of God that he can now see before him. After his obedience, he is blessed. Either way, we see along with Abraham that it is God’s faithfulness, not our own actions, that will see the fulfillment of his promised blessing in our life. He allows us to cooperate with him, but in the end, it is all his work.
So let us live for God in this world, right now, today. Let us live each moment for the kingdom and the glory of God. Let us be salt and light, actively living as agents of Jesus’ love and justice in our communities and neighbourhoods at all times, everywhere. Let us see his kingdom here and now.
Let us take up our cross. Let us follow Jesus, for his joy that was set before him.
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