March 26, 2006 Sermon

The Hardest Test Ever
Genesis 22

We just read how God tested Abraham by telling him to sacrifice Isaac, his son. Since we have followed Abraham’s story from the start we know how dearly he loves his son. He and his wife, Sarah, could not have children until after they had grown old. Now they have a son. His name, Isaac, reveals how they feel about him. (Isaac means “he laughs” in Hebrew.) His birth fulfills God’s promises. Yet God now tells Abraham to kill this laughing, blessed boy. God now tests Abraham’s faith and obedience in the hardest possible way.

This story makes me angry. I think it always has. My children’s Bible had a picture showing Abraham binding Isaac to a rock. When I first saw it I was about the same age as Isaac in the picture. It horrified me. It made me think about Fathers, including God, in new and frightening ways. I hated this story and I did not like God much for making it happen.

Soren Kierkegaard, the great nineteenth century existentialist theologian, wrote of this episode, “Though Abraham arouses my admiration he at the same time appalls me. He who has explained this riddle has explained my life.” God promises Abraham and Sarah a son. God gives Abraham and Sarah a son. God tells Abraham to kill his son as an act of worship to God. Abraham nearly does so, stopping only when God tells him to stop. What sort of man can come so close to killing his own son? Why should we admire such a man?

This hardest test ever ultimately makes us ask the hardest question: what would I do in Abraham’s place?

Do not answer too quickly. On the surface it looks like a simple question. What would I do in Abraham’s place? We now know that during the Vietnam War many parents secretly helped their sons move to Canada to avoid the draft. “Why,” they reasoned, “should my son get killed fighting a war we don’t support halfway around the world?” On the surface it would appear these parents would fail the Abraham test. But the two cases do not match. In the one parents seek to protect their sons from avoidable danger for a cause in which they do not believe. In the other, a parent faces a command from the Lord God, Almighty, who has kept every promise and provided endless blessings.

What would you do if God told you to make the ultimate sacrifice?

Abraham and Sarah have obeyed God’s every command. They have left behind a comfortable life, crossing the desert with their flocks and slaves and setting up camp on left-over land. They have believed God’s impossible promise that they will have a son long after they have grown too old for it to happen. They have survived famine and war. They have become rich. They have a son. God’s every word has come true.

Now God gives Abraham a clear order. Genesis 22:2: “(The Lord) 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 upon one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.’” What would you do? Abraham immediately starts on his way. He gets up early one morning, gathers in a couple of servants and his son, splits some kindling, loads his donkey, and starts walking. Three days later he sees the place “afar off”. He takes the boy, the kindling and “the fire” (a smoldering ember used as a portable starter) and climbs the mountain.

You know Mount Moriah . It is possibly the most holy spot on the face of the planet. Islam considers it the spot from which the Prophet Mohammed ascended into heaven. Christianity believes Christ rose to the Father from that same spot. Judaism knows the Temple once stood atop it. We know it as the Temple Mount . It hovers over the Old City of Jerusalem. One day about 4,000 years ago Abraham and Isaac climbed it. Along the way Isaac, by now a young boy, asks his father, “I see the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

Abraham is looking at the lamb for the burnt offering. But he says, “God will provide himself the lamb for a burnt offering.” God will provide. God has provided all along; why fear God will stop providing now? Why? Because never before has God ordered that Abraham sacrifice his son! What would you do? Abraham keeps climbing. When he reaches the top he builds an altar, presumably of stones. He builds a fire beneath it, ties his son up, and lays him down. He grabs a knife, draws his arm up high…

And hears the voice of the Lord. “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear the God, seeing that you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” Does this not make you mad? Why does God put Abraham to such a severe test? This is not fair. God is supposed to be a god of justice. This is not justice. God is supposed to be a god of love. This is not love.

Why does God test Abraham so harshly? What would I do in Abraham’s place? I do not know. All I do know is this: the whole situation makes me angry. Abraham seems to take it all in stride. He sees a ram conveniently snagged in a nearby bush and calmly sacrifices it in his son’s place. He names the spot The Lord Will Provide and home they all go.

The Lord will provide. Abraham’s test has a clear lesson: trust in the Lord and the Lord will provide. But we struggle to believe it—especially when we must make deep sacrifices in response to God’s provision. We would prefer to test God. But God tests us. No wonder we get mad.

One of the office supply chain stores has a series of commercials featuring an “Easy Button”. People face impossible situations—in life and at the office. They struggle to solve their problems until they push the Easy Button. All becomes magically and instantly well. We want God to serve as our personal Easy Button. We want God to solve our problems. Right now. And we want control of that button.

The consistent message of Genesis is that God is in charge, not us. God has a plan. The plan ultimately blesses those who trust God, but in the short term we often must make sacrifices. The Lord will provide. But when and what the Lord provides may not seem right to us—at first.

From Abraham we can learn the hard lesson of trusting in the Lord to provide. Week after week, in Genesis we have seen how God’s promises eventually come true. We have seen that the blessings God gives do not always impress the world. Yet the Lord does provide. The Lord provides peace, purpose and hope.

What would you do in Abraham’s position? What do you do?

What do you do when illness strikes? Do you lose faith? Do you wonder why God allows suffering? Or do you keep plodding, keep climbing that mountain, trusting that the Lord will provide once you reach the top?

What do you do when people gossip about you? Do you gossip back, defending yourself against personal and even financial loss, or do you keep plodding, keep climbing that mountain, trusting that the Lord will provide once you reach the top?

These are tough questions. Real life tests us plenty hard. There is no Easy Button. There is only faith in God. Trust in the Lord. God does not promise comfort and riches. God promises peace, purpose and hope. And God provides. All the time, every time. The Lord will provide. The Lord has provided by sacrificing his only Son. Can we not respond by trusting the Lord?