Take your son, your only son
“Take your son, your only son—yes, Isaac, whom you love so much—and go to the land of Moriah. Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you.” Genesis 22:2
This is an incredibly tough passage to cope with. My wife and I have three children. The thought of offering one of them as a sacrifice is well beyond my power to comprehend. I really struggle with every part of it. But Abraham agreed to do exactly what God had asked him to do, as terrible as it sounded. I feel sure that, if I had been Abraham, I would have assumed I had misheard God, eaten too much cheese or spent too much time in the sun. Not Abraham. God told him to offer his precious son, Isaac, as a sacrifice, and off he set.
This account tells me a great deal about Abraham’s faith. He was absolutely convinced that God could be trusted and that, if God called him to do this hideous thing, it must be for the best. No wonder Abraham was seen as the father of faith! He set the benchmark.
To everyone’s relief, God didn’t actually ask Abraham to kill Isaac. But he took him right up the point where Abraham had the knife in his hand and was about to do the dreadful deed. Abraham had no doubt that God knew exactly what he was doing.
Abraham wasn’t perfect, but he trusted God because he knew that the one who had led him on this incredible adventure of faith would stand by him, whatever happened. Imperfect as we are, God also invites us to set off on the journey of faith, too. And, like Abraham, we can be absolutely sure that God will not let us down.
QUESTION
Are you willing to trust God whatever he asks you to do?
PRAYER
Thank you, loving Lord, that you can be completely trusted, even when you ask me to do things that seem hard at the time. Amen