The New Life in the Testing of Abraham

The third lesson of the Easter Vigil is from Genesis 22:1-18.

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 one of the mountains 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?" 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."

It started off as the worst day of Abraham’s life. His precious son – his only child – had been a source of great joy for a few years now. God had promised that Abraham and his son would be ancestors of the most important person in the history of the world – Jesus, God Himself.

But then God threw Abraham a curveball. A big one. A sinking curveball, actually. God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son to him. It didn’t make sense AT ALL. God created life, He loves life and He protects life. God loved Abraham and his son deeply. Why would He end Isaac’s life so soon? How would he ever become a great-great-great-great-(fill in a lot more ‘greats’)-grandfather of Jesus? Isaac was only a boy; he hadn’t had any children yet.

How Abraham’s heart must have sank.

Yet Abraham trusted God and His promises. If there was a conflict between God’s command and His promise, resolving that conflict was God’s business. Abraham’s business was to put God first. Analyzing it all, Abraham concluded that God must be planning a resurrection of his son from the dead. “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, 18 even though God had said to him, "It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned." 19 Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.” (Hebrews 11:17-19)

That was the only way, Abraham thought, that God could fulfill His promise of blessing the whole world through the Savior that God promised would descend from Abraham through Isaac. So Old Abe told his servants, in complete honesty and faith, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”

So he marched up the mountain with his son, ready to do what God commanded, because he knew that he could count on God’s unchangeable promises.

Abraham was silent as he and his son walked to the place of sacrifice. It was Isaac who broke the silence and how Abraham’s heart must have sank when Isaac asked his dad, “Where is the lamb for the sacrifice?” The question must have cut Abraham like a knife. His answer was a combination of considerate love, which spared Isaac the brutal details, and of confident faih, which left the outcome to God. Abraham answered, “The LORD will provide.”

The angel of the LORD stopped Abraham just before he harmed his son. The angel of the LORD is the pre-incarnate Christ, the Son of God before He took on human flesh. The Son of God stopped the sacrifice of the son because He would later be the Son who was sacrificed by His Father.

The Lord also provided a substitute sacrifice – a ram. What a breathtaking blessing! Being able to sacrifice the ram instead of his son! Abraham gave the special place a name. He didn’t call it, “The worst day of my life” or “The day I almost lost my son.” No, not a self-centered name. Instead he named it “The LORD Will Provide.”

It is believed that the same mountain where Abraham took his son to be sacrificed is the same mountain in Jerusalem where the temple of Solomon was built to sacrifice lambs for generations.

The LORD has provided for us, too. He sacrificed his Son to die the death we deserved as sinners. As sinners, we don’t deserve to have the favor of the LORD, yet in Christ we do. We don’t deserve his forgiveness, yet in Christ it is ours. The LORD has provided a substitute for us. He is the Lamb of God. Jesus died to free us to live with the LORD forever.

God kept His promise to faithful Abraham and made him the father of many nations. Through the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, God increases His chosen people throughout the world. Through the Sacrament of Holy Communion, God feeds His chosen people on body and blood of the Substitutionary Lamb.

Christian Worship Supplement #714 — “The Lamb”

1 The Lamb, the Lamb, O Father, where’s the sacrifice?
Faith sees, believes God will provide the Lamb of price!
Refrain
Worthy is the Lamb whose death makes me his own!
The Lamb is reigning on his throne.

2 The Lamb, the Lamb, One perfect final offering.
The Lamb, the Lamb, Let earth join heav’n his praise to sing.
Refrain

3 The Lamb, the Lamb, As wayward sheep their shepherd kill
So still, his will, On our behalf the law to fill.
Refrain

4 He sighs, he dies, He takes my sin and wretchedness.
He lives, forgives, He gives me his own righteousness.
Refrain

5 He rose, he rose, My heart with thanks now overflows.
His song prolong ’Til ev’ry heart to him belong.
Refrain

As the Lord provided for Abraham a sacrifice in place of his son Isaac, so also he lovingly provides for us his own Son, Jesus, the perfect Lamb of God sacrificed for the sins of the world.

Text: Gerald P. Coleman, b. 1953 © 1987 Birnamwood Publications (ASACP), a division of MorningStar Music Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.