19 ABRAHAM TESTED

When Abram left for Canaan land it appeared that he loved God more than he loved his father. Now he is given another test as to whether he loves God more than he loves his son. Did Abraham’s faith continue so strong, vigorous and victorious, after a his long travels and experiences with God? Abraham surely dearly loved the son of his old age so this was an unusually difficult test. Praise the Lord, Abraham passes it.

We have been examining Abraham’s adventures for some time recorded in nine chapters. Now, “Some time later” this test occurred. After all the other exercises he had had, all the hardships and difficulties he had gone through. Now, perhaps, he may have thought the storms had all blown over; but, after all his other tests, this most difficult encounter comes, which is sharper than any yet. Many former trials do not eliminate problems or secure us from further trials. When the battle is over, soldiers take off their armor, but Abraham’s battles were not over. “The king of Israel answered, ‘Tell him: “One who puts on his armor should not boast like one who takes it off”’” (1 Kings 20:11). David too was perplexed when new problems arose. “When I felt secure, I said, ‘I will never be shaken.’ Lord, when you favored me, you made my royal mountain stand firm; but when you hid your face, I was dismayed’” (Psalm 30:6&7). Many times I have felt the same way and asked, ‘Haven’t I had enough training?’ Just as Abraham’s trials were not over neither are ours.

It was God who initiated this test. Anything God does is good. So when we see that God tempted him we can expect a good result. This test was not to draw Abraham to sin as Satan would want. Actually, if Abraham had sacrificed Isaac, he would not have sinned. His orders, having come from God, would have justified him. We may assume that God’s reasons were good, designed to discover Abraham’s graces, how strong they were, that they might bring praise, glory and honor to light, as 1 Peter 1:7 says, “These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed” (1Peter 1:7).  In the same way God tempted Job, that he might become not only a good man, but a great man. God tested Abraham or we may say God lifted Abraham to a higher level as a scholar that learns well is lifted when he is put into a higher grade level. Strong faith is often produced by strong trials and is developed by hard assignments. This process will occur in you too if you expect to become a strong and valiant high-achiever for God.

In this trial God appeared to him as He had done before calling him by name, the new name God had given him. Abraham, like a good servant, readily answered, “Here I am.” Abraham may have expected more of the affirming statements he may have become accustomed to hearing; “What does my Lord say to His servant?” Possibly he expected some renewed promise like those in Genesis 15:1, “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.” or like Genesis 17:1 “I am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless.” But no, to his great amazement, what God has to say to him this time is, in short, “Abraham, Go kill your son.”

“Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.” When God speaks, Abraham, undoubtedly, takes notice of every word, and listens attentively to it; and every word this time is a sword in his bones: the trial is steeled with trying phrases. Is it any pleasure to the Almighty that he should afflict? No, it is not; yet, when Abraham’s faith is to be tried, God seems to take pleasure in stating it harshly. Ouch!

Not his cattle, lambs or any other possession, “Your son, Isaac!” Abraham would have willingly parted with his animals or possessions by the thousands to redeem Isaac!” Psalm 50:9 says, “I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens.” It was as if to say, “No, I don’t want even one cow. I must have your son: not your servant, no, not the steward of your house, nothing else will do, I must have your son.” Jephthah, fulfilled a vow he had made and offered a daughter; but Abraham must offer his son, in whom the family was to be built up. Not an adopted son, not Ishmael whom Abraham had recently lost and now with only Isaac left with Abraham, God wanted him. He too must go.

Remember as we try to feel the pain of the father who was shaken by the news he was to lose his son that he is a mere representative picture of God the Father who felt all of this as He gave His son. We know the end of the story. We know that God sent an angel to rescue Isaac and that Abraham did not have to kill his son after all, but Abraham did not know the end of the story! It would have been very difficult!

“But, Lord, I love Isaac, he is to me as my own soul. Ishmael is not here any more, and will you take Isaac also? All this is against me:” Yes, That son whom you love. It was a trial of Abraham’s love for God, and therefore it must be in a beloved son, and that place in Abraham’s heart must be touched. God knew that Abraham loved his son, Isaac, yet he says, “. . . your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac . . .” God’s command had to overrule all other considerations.

Abraham was required to go to “the region of Moriah,” three days’ journey away; so that he might have time to consider it, and, if he did it, must do it deliberately, that it might be a service the more reasonable and the more honorable. Abraham had three days to reverse his decision.

“Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering” (2), He must not only kill his son, but kill him as a sacrifice, kill him devoutly, kill him by rule, kill him with all that pomp and ceremony, with a worshipper’s composure with which he normally lovingly, humbly and sincerely offered his burnt-offerings.

Abraham evidently did all this with such dignity and sincerity that Isaac also agreed. Isaac was young and strong. Isaac was surely stronger than Abraham who was well past 100 years old by now. Yet centuries later Hebrews could record in chapter 11:17 “By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son,” Isaac had to have obeyed cooperatively.

Oh the difficulties Abraham had to break through in this act of obedience. Many were the reasons NOT to do it. It was directly against the clear law of God, which forbids murder, under a severe penalty, “And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, according to Genesis 9:5&6, “I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being. ‘Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind.’” How can the unchangeable God contradict himself? He that hates robbery cannot delight in murder. How would it be consistent with natural affection to his own son? It would not only be murder, but the worst of murders. Abram wants to be obedient but he must be unnatural? If God insists on a human sacrifice, is there none but Isaac to be the offering, and none but Abraham to be the offerer? Must the father of the faithful be the monster of all fathers? Couldn’t a servant do it in Abram’s place? 

God gave him no reason for it. When Ishmael was to be cast out, a just cause was given, which satisfied Abraham; but here Isaac must die, and Abraham himself must kill him, and neither the one nor the other must know why God was requiring this. If Isaac had been to die a martyr for the truth, or his life had been the ransom for some other life more precious, it would have been another matter. Or if he had died as a criminal, a rebel against God or his parents, as in the case of the idolater, or the stubborn son, both of whom were to be killed for their sins, then it might have been acceptable as a just sacrifice. But the case is not like that: Isaac is a dutiful, obedient and hopeful son. “Lord, what profit is there in his blood?”

How would this request be consistent with promise to Abram? Didn’t God promise that Abram’s descendants would be established through Isaac? But what comes of that seed if this bud is to be broken off so soon? How should Abraham ever look Sarah in her face again? With what face can he return to her and his family with the blood of Isaac sprinkled on his garments and staining all his raiment? Moses’s wife, Zipporah, called Moses a bloody husband when she had to circumcise their sons. What would Sarah say? It would be likely to alienate her affections forever both from Abram and from his God. It is possible that he said nothing about it to Sarah. This is a journey which she must know nothing of, lest she prevent it. There is already so much in our own hearts to hinder our progress in duty that we need, as much as possible, to keep away from additional hindrances.

What would the Egyptians, Canaanites and Perizzites who lived then in the land say, think or do? It would not make God look any better than their cruel gods. If this is grace, give me something else. Many similar objections might have been raised but he was infallibly assured that it was indeed a command of God and not a delusion, and this was enough to answer them all. God’s commands are not to be disputed, but obeyed.

We notice several steps of obedience, all which help to magnify it, and to show that he was guided by prudence, and governed by faith, in the whole transaction. He rises early in the morning and began the trip. Possibly the command was given in the visions of the night, and early the next morning . . . and he even cut the wood himself. Verse 3 says, “When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.” He set himself about doing it. He did not delay, grumble, complain or deliberate. Evidently the command was clear enough that the decision would not admit a debate. If we delay, our hearts can become hardened.

Abraham had walked about in the land and may have known the place. Or maybe not. God told him, “the region of Moriah,” but not yet the exact location. God had also said, “. . . on a mountain I will show you” (2). Did Abraham carefully look about him, to discover the place appointed for this sacrifice, to which God had promised to direct him. Was the direction to be given by an appearance of divine glory, a pillar of fire reaching from heaven to earth? We don’t know these details, but we know God said He would show him.

Verses 3b-5 tells us “. . . he set out for the place God had directed him. On the third day he looked up and saw the place in the distance. Abraham told his two young servants, ‘Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I are going over there to worship; then we’ll come back to you.’” He left his servants at some distance off, lest they should interfere, and make for him some disturbance with his strange proposal to sacrifice his son. Isaac was, probably the darling of the whole family. Similarly, when Jesus was entering upon His agony in the garden, He took only three of His disciples with him, and left the rest. It is our wisdom and duty, when we are going to worship or offer some unique service to God, to lay aside all potential interruptions, thoughts, cares and persons which may divert or distract us from the service we know before God that we must do. We leave them at the bottom of the hill, that we may give our attention to the Lord without hinderance.

Isaac carried his own wood for burning the sacrifice and Jesus carried His own cross. Isaac carried his wood, then laid down his body. He obedience proceeded from the easier to the more difficult. God prepares us along the way.

Verses 6b and 7 say, “. . . As the two of them went on together, 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?’” Can you imagine how Isaac’s question pressed mercilessly at the heart of his father Abraham? Did Abraham wonder how he should answer? We can only imagine what he thought, we know what he said: “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” It was the perfect answer. Just as God provided a ram so Isaac could live, so God provided a “Lamb” so all mankind could live.

Can you imagine, feel or sense what Abraham felt as he laid the wood, embraced and then bound his son? Did Abraham think Isaac was less resolute than himself so he bound him? Abraham lays the wood in order for the burnt offer of his own son Isaac and tells him the amazing news: “Isaac, you are the lamb God has provided.”

Abraham must do it, God will have it done, and Isaac has learned to submit to both. Abraham no doubt comforted him with the same hopes with which he himself by faith was comforted. Yet it is necessary that a sacrifice be bound. The great sacrifice, which in the fullness of time was to be offered up, must be bound, and therefore so must Isaac. But with what heart could tender Abraham tie those guiltless hands, which perhaps had often been lifted up to ask his blessing, and stretched out to embrace him, and were now bound with the cords of love and duty! However, it must be done. Having bound him, Abraham lays him on the altar, his hand upon the head of his sacrifice; and we may suppose, with floods of tears, he gives, and takes, the final farewell of parting kisses. Perhaps he gives another one for Sarah’s sake and then receives another one for her from her dying son.

Abraham knew how to kill an animal. It is by slitting its throat. Any other use of the knife would inflict delayed results and far more unnecessary pain. Can you see Abraham placing the knife on Isaac’s throat preparing to give the fatal jerk that would take Isaac’s life? With tears streaming down his cheek, body trembling with emotion, we might see a partial picture of God that will help us understand God’s love and sacrifice when He gave His only begotten son.

Isaac’s submission, though secondary in this story of the Father’s sacrifice, helps us to also understand Jesus’ submission at calvary. Father and son were both cooperating with God the Father’s plan. Isaac, from all that appears, is as willing as Abraham; we do not find that he raised any objection against it, that he petitioned for his life, attempted to escape, struggled with his aged father, or made any resistance: Abraham resolutely forgets the affections of a father, and puts on the awful gravity of a sacrificer.

Somehow Abraham resolutely lays aside the affections of a father and clings to his devotion to the God of Glory whom he loves and obeys. Those that through grace are resolved in the matter of any service or suffering for God must overlook the little circumstances which make it doubly difficult to flesh and blood. When earthy and heavenly affections collide and we are forced to choose, to select one and reject one, which will we follow? Abraham made his choice, his hand is clutching the knife which is at the throat of his son the sacrifice. He is ready to press and pull it violently. With a fixed heart, and an eye lifted up to heaven, he is prepared to give a fatal cut to Isaac’s throat. Be astonished, O heavens! at this; and wonder, O earth! Here is an act of faith and obedience, which deserves to be a spectacle to God, angels, and men. Abraham’s darling, Sarah’s laughter, the church’s hope, the heir of promise, lies ready to bleed and die by his own father’s hand, who does not shrink from doing it.

Now this obedience of Abraham in offering up Isaac is a lively representation of the love of God for us, in delivering up his only-begotten Son to suffer and die for us, as a sacrifice. “Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer” (Isaiah 53:10).

We have two major applications from this lesson. 1. appreciate what God has done in loving the world and giving His Son and 2. resolve to be as determined as Abraham was to obey God’s every instruction. A useful Christian leader will learn and apply both of these two important lessons from Abraham’s story.