Title: STORIES OF FAITH: ABRAHAM AND ISAAC

Focus: Abraham—the father of all believers—points us to the nature and essence of faith. We are to live and act with deep trust in God’s Word and power.

Function: To encourage the people to trust God’s Word and work in Jesus Christ. God has provided salvation and will keep his promises.

Text: Genesis 22:1-19; Hebrews 11:17-19

Donald Kaul—a free-lance journalist working for the Des Moines Register—wrote an article on August 20, 1989. Donald Kaul reacted to the outcome of a so-called “Trust Poll,” where people were asked to answer the question, “Whom do you trust?” What Kaul could not understand was the most common answer given by Iowans: they trusted God more than the Iowa Highway Patrol, for example, and lawyers were dead last in the poll. Kaul argued that the reverse should be true.

Here are some excerpts from Kaul’s column: “God, depending on your vantage point, can be any of a number of things: just, loving, caring, vengeful, indifferent, mysterious, omniscient, ubiquitous, infinite or dead. But trustworthy? Never…At one moment (God) will reward the innocent and punish the guilty. At the next He will do the reverse…God will destroy nations of blameless people while allowing their evil oppressors to prosper. His sense of humor runs to earthquakes and typhoons. He is nothing if not capricious.”

Kaul then goes on in his article and he says: “Lawyers, though, are as trustworthy as sharks. If you fall bleeding into a shark-infested pool, you do not have to wonder what the sharks will do. It is the same with lawyers; only with them it’s money instead of blood…God? Trustworthy? No, no,” says Kaul, “God is far too interesting for that.”

Donald Kaul’s article illustrates the question that many people have today for Christians: “How can you believe in God and trust him in your daily living?” In other words, the Christian faith in God does not make sense to them.

I think, however, that Abraham’s life of faith can help us to come to grips with the question of trusting God. For Abraham, by way of example, teaches us a profound truth about the nature and essence of faith: we are to live and act with deep trust in God’s Word and power. Today, the Scriptures encourage us to trust God’s Word and work in Jesus Christ. God has provided salvation and God will keep his promises. God can and may be trusted with all our heart!

Today I’m beginning a series of messages on Stories of Faith. We’ll use the N.T. epistle of Hebrews chapter 11 as our springboard, and we’ll explore the stories of faith of some of those whose names are mentioned in Hebrews 11. I’m thinking, for example, of Rahab, the prostitute; the Israelites under the leadership of Joshua, conquering the city of Jericho; and Samson, the fickle and wild warrior Judge in his battles against the Philistines.

Today, however, we shall focus on Abraham and Isaac. Their story of faith calls us to live and act with deep trust in God’s promises and power.

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The story of Abraham offering his son Isaac as a sacrifice unto the Lord is dramatic and full of emotion. The inspired storyteller of Genesis 22 tugs at the snares of your heart as you absorb the story. Listen to the opening line of the story: (vs. 1-2) “Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied. Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there….” Try to let this command of God sink into your head and heart. And try to imagine Abraham’s bewilderment in response to this command. Surely, this is drama!

Listen again (vs. 7-8) “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?” Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.” It almost breaks your heart to imagine the dialogue and emotions between this father of all believers and his one and only son. This is drama of the highest sort.

Also, the story of Abraham and Isaac in Genesis 22 has a simple flow to it: the story begins with a Divine command: God orders Abraham to sacrifice his son. Then in vs. 3-10 we observe Abraham’s faith at work; he obeys God’s command. Then the story comes to its climax in vs. 11-12, and we notice that God intervenes by sending his angel. The story concludes with vs. 14-19 and we observe that God provides a sacrificial lamb or ram, and God reaffirms his covenant promises to Abraham and his offspring.

The writer of Hebrews 11 covers the story of Abraham and Isaac in about 3 verses. In vs. 17a he mentions the Test of Faith: “By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice.” In vs. 17b and 18, he points to the issue at stake: “He who had received the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, ‘It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.’” And in vs. 19 we learn that faith has its own reasoning, for there we read that “Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and figuratively speaking, he did receive Isaac back from death.”

Abraham’s story of faith in offering his son, Isaac, is filled with drama. And its movement or flow is clear. The story points us to the nature and essence of faith: we are to live and act with deep trust in God’s Word and power.

Let’s now dig deeper and pick up some insights from the story: First of all, the stakes are high: Isaac embodies God’s promises to Abraham. It is through Isaac that God would bless Abraham: (Gen. 17:6ff) “I will make you a father of many nations. I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.” Later on, when Abraham was 99 years old, God assured Abraham that his covenant promise would follow through the seed or line of Abraham’s and Sarah’s own offspring, through Isaac (Gen. 17:19).

So, when God commands Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, God was telling Abraham to give up his future. Isaac embodies God’s promise to Abraham, but when Isaac is no more, then there can be no fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham. That’s why I say that the issue or stakes are very high for Abraham. Will he trust God? Will Abraham put stock in God’s covenant promise, even when it seems that God is wiping out the possibility of a future offspring for Abraham?

Secondly, what stands out in this story is the faith or trust of Abraham. Abraham acts upon his trust in God’s word and power. And that trust comes to expression in the story when Abraham says to his servants, for example, (vs.5) “We will worship and then we will come back to you.” And Abraham expresses his trust in God when he says to his son, Isaac, in response to Isaac’s question: “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the inspired writer of Hebrews highlights Abraham’s faith when he says, “Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead….”

The essence or nature of Abraham’s faith points to God’s trustworthiness: we can trust God’s promises to us; and Abraham’s faith points us to God’s provision: God is able to keep his promises, for not even death can stop God from realizing his Word to us.

Thirdly, the story of Abraham and Isaac is full of shadows or types. The story prepares God’s people for things that are to come far into the future. The story shapes and helps the O.T. Israelites (and us today) to get ready for the coming of the eternal Son of God. The story points to Jesus Christ and his sacrifice and conquest of death.

For example, Abraham’s actions in this story reminds us of God the Father’s action toward his eternally begotten Son, Jesus. In some dramatic way, Abraham typifies God the Father who also sacrificed his Son.

Or take Isaac. In the story, Isaac is referred to as Abraham’s son, his “only son,” his “one and only son” (Hebr. 11:17). Isaac embodies all God’s promises. As such, Isaac is a shadow pointing to Jesus, the Son of God. Furthermore, Isaac fulfills the role of a sacrificial lamb. That role comes to fulfillment in Jesus, as he offered his life as the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”

Thus we see shadows in the story of Abraham; these shadows or types come to full expression and reality in Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God.

How rich, how deep, how wide the mystery and love of God shown throughout history, and shown especially to his people—who are the offspring and descendants of Abraham, including the Gentiles who turn to Christ in faith! Abraham, in his dealings with Isaac, shows us the nature and essence of faith: we are to live and act with deep trust in God’s promises and power. Those promises find their fulfillment in Jesus Christ. It is through Jesus that God has provided salvation to us today, and it is through Jesus that God will keep his promise to make all things new.

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So how shall we bring to bear this story of faith in our own pilgrimage of faith? What do we hear God saying to us today through Abraham and Isaac?

Let me emphasize two practical applications: Number one: The story of Abraham and Isaac calls us to put our trust in God’s Word and in God’s provisions. Donald Kaul—and so many others—may question the trustworthiness of God. But the Scriptures counter such questions by pointing to God’s actions and promises to his people.

God said “Yes” to Abraham. And God followed through: he spared Isaac; he gave Abraham numerous descendants. And God showed his power by making provisions—in Abraham’s days by providing a lamb or ram. And later, in the fullness of time, God provided his one and only Son as the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world. God raised his Son from the dead, and thus he has shown that he is trustworthy: we can live and act with deep trust in God’s promises and power.

Number Two: Whereas Abraham followed through with God’s command to sacrifice his only son, you and I today must follow through with God’s command to us from the Scriptures. That command comes to us from Paul’s letter to the church in Rome (Romans 12:1,2), and is in response to what God has done for us in his Son, the Lord Jesus. Listen: “Therefore…in view of God’s mercy…offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

God does not ask us to offer our children as a burnt sacrifice. That would be an atrocious act in the eyes of God. But God does ask us to offer ourselves: not as lifeless corpses or offerings, but as living sacrifices. He calls us today to love him and serve him with every fiber of our being: body, soul, heart and mind. Easy? No. But in the power of the Holy Spirit—and with the encouragement and examples of the heroes of faith that surround us in the great cloud of witnesses—we can live as sons and daughters of Abraham—as men and women of faith.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.