Discover The Word

Wednesday, November 15, 2006, Part 1

“By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, ‘In Isaac your seed shall be called,’ concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense” (Hebrews 11:17-19).

IDEA: God’s tests may have many facets.

PURPOSE: To help listeners appreciate the ways in which God tests us.

Have you ever thought about how dramas take place?

The play begins, “Hah, it’s a nice day!”

That’s followed by “Whoops! It looks like a hard day.”

I. Look at how Genesis 22:1 begins.

“Some time later . . .” What does that phrase tell you as you begin to read the story?

Then the next phrase is “God tested Abraham.”

God said, “Abraham,” and he replied, “Here I am.”

What happened next? The test to which Abraham was subjected was the incomprehensible mandate to take his teenage son, Isaac, go to the region of Moriah, and there sacrifice his boy as a burnt offering on a mountain designated by God.

II. What made this test seem almost overwhelming?

The test asked Abraham to surrender his future to God.

When Abraham obeyed God’s mandate and left Ur of the Chaldees, he simply gave up his past. He cut his ties with his wider family and a familiar city (Hebrews 11:13-16). Was giving up his past a test of faith?

When Abraham was summoned by God to deliver his own son to God, he was surrendering his future as well.

How was that a fierce challenge to Abraham’s faith? The fulfillment of God’s promises of an innumerable posterity was tied tightly to the life of his son, Isaac.

Could we ever face any test even remotely like that?

The test threatened the integrity of God. It raised the question, “Can God be trusted?” in a most troubling way.

If God’s promises were not absolutely true or God changed His mind about the promise, then Abraham is a colossal fool for having staked his life on God.

We can look like fools when we refuse to play it safe and we take God seriously.

The test contradicted the character of God and plunged to the depths of human affection.

Would the God in whom Abraham trusted demand a human sacrifice as other gods did?

Soren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher, found this episode hard to accept because he felt that God’s request contradicted everything else he knew about God.

Would God demand as a human sacrifice a son that God had given Abraham and Sarah and that Abraham loved deeply?

This test produced a cruel conflict between what seemed like irreconcilable demands of conscience—Abraham’s faith in God and his love for his son.