Faith.In.Life
Faith Purified
As we move into Genesis 21 my bible describes the familiar story that is about to unfold as “Abraham’s Faith Tested,” and I was reminded about something that Peter much later wrote in his first letter in 1:6-7
1st Peter 1:6-7
6 So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while. 7 These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world.
It would seem that Abraham is not given very much time from the birth of Isaac, the child that God promised to Abraham and Sarah what now seems like ages before now - only to turn around and to wake Abraham up telling him to “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.”
The text itself seems to read as if God knows that Abraham is going to need convincing. God emphasizes which son He is ordering Abraham to sacrifice as if to suspect that maybe Abraham might confuse Ishmael to be the one God might be talking about - “Take your son, yes, that one and only son, yes - Isaac, whom you love so much…” and do the most unthinkable thing - sacrifice him as a burnt offering.
There are two significant perspectives that have influenced my reading of this narrative. The first one was found in the philosopher / theologian’s writings, Soren Kirkegaard, who suggest that Abraham is so obedient that what unfolds at God’s call for him to do the most unthinkable, actually obeys the Lord in an almost robotic fashion. Kirkegaard points out that there is no emotion connected to Abraham’s obedience, and in what feels like a blind faith he is going to take a step of extreme faithfulness where Abraham will surely kill his one and only son, the son he loved, Isaac. Apparently in early days this section of the Bible was not entitled the near death of Isaac, but the “Sacrifice of Isaac.” Kirkegaard seems to finish his writing with he speculation that Abraham was in fact faithful, and Isaac was in fact sacrificed leaving us a very sad end to what seems like a meaningless narrative (if in fact this is the way the story actually ended).
The second, though, is found in a song written by Andrew Peterson, a contemporary Christian singer/ songwriter, called “Holy is the Lord.” Now, as a slight tangent, this song originally came out on an album series called “City on a Hill” on the album “Gathering.” The story goes that Abraham was asked to do an acoustic song about Abraham and Isaac, which was released in 1994. While the song is pretty good, later Peterson was quoted to have hated the end result and ended up remixing the song in a greatest hits album in 2014 called “After All These Years: A Collection.” The song became a fantastic piano ballad, that seems to not only capture the tone of the thing God called Abraham to do, but also the heart of the situation. Andrew Peterson writes:
Wake up little Isaac
And rub your tired eyes
Go and kiss your mama
We'll be gone a little while
Come and walk beside me
Come and hold your papa's hand
I go to make an altar
And to offer up my lamb
I waited on the Lord
And in a waking dream He came
Riding on a wind across the sand
He spoke my name
"Here I am", I whispered
And I waited in the dark
The answer was a sword
That came down hard upon my heart
Holy is the Lord
Holy is the Lord
And the Lord I will obey
Lord, help me I don't know the way
Here, Peterson is able to capture what any father or mother might truly go through if in fact we were called to sacrifice our one and only child. Even in the song when Abraham arrives at the base of Mount Moriah Peterson has Abraham praying a prayer that sounds similar to what Jesus prayed at the Garden asking for the cup of his suffering to be removed from him - Peterson writes:
Maker of this mountain, please,
Make another way…
And yet, in all things, Peterson equally reminds us that “Holy is the Lord, Holy is the Lord, and the Lord,” we are called “to obey.”
Now, if you continue to read the biblical account of Abraham’s obedience it seems like Isaac is in fact placed - no tied as the text reads to the alter there on Mount Moriah so that he cannot escape (as he is at least old enough to speak at this point), Abraham lifts the knife, and he “picked up the knife to kill his son as a sacrifice” where one can picture the knife to rise up, maybe even the lightning striking in the background to offer a silhouette as if we might be watching a Hitchcock movie to emphasize the dramatic affect - to which God says through the mount of an angel “Don’t lay a hand on the boy…do not hurt him in any way.” To which God does in fact make another way by offering up the ran caught up in the thicket near by. Abraham names the place “Yahweh-Yirah (which means the “Lord will provide”).
We might find this whole narrative somewhat hard to swallow. That God would provide Isaac in such an amazing blessing upon Abraham and Sarah in their old age, only to give them just enough time to see Isaac become more than just a toddler, only to then threaten to take Isaac away at such a young age most likely still in his first ten years of life (although this portion is a little unclear how old Isaac is).
And I would say, yes, if in fact Kirkegaard was right, the narrative is very cruel depicting some type of fickle God that obetrarely gives and takes away. And often times this is how people who reject God depict Him - as if he is some bully in the sky frying we the ants with his microscope. Such a Diest god could care less about the day to day happenings of our lives - and such a God would be right and just in His judgment calling for our deaths in the midst of our depravity. We ought to be thankful that this is not how the story ends, and ultimately this seemingly random incident in going all the way back to Genesis will inform a greater understanding of who the God of the Bible really is. Paul speaks powerfully into the ever evident reality of the fall, while equally showing us the heart of the God of the Bible in Romans 8. First, Paul recognizes the cruel reality of this world in 8:22-23a when he says:
22 For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering.
As Paul continues to speak to who God is despite the present groaning, when he shows us that God is willing to do what he initially asked Abraham to do, but recanted at the very last moment. In Romand 8:31-32 that:
31 What shall we say about such wonderful things as these? If God is for us, who can ever be against us? 32 Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?
To which we are reminded again of Calvary, that Christ would be lifted up on an alter known as a cross - strapped, even nailed down - even though he himself had prayed that the cup would be removed, but “The Lord God he would obey,” or as he prayed “But Thy will be done.” That God, would love us so much, that he would not with hold his own son, that in Christ’s sacrifice it would not be only to atone for one sin or another - but for the sin of the entire world so that no one, no power, not even death itself, might stand against us - for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading, even interceding on His creations behalf. Oh what a just, gracious, and merciful God we serve - and this, this is the true hear too God of the Bible.