Join us as Kent dives into Abraham’s crazy journey. The burning question: Why would God ask such a thing? Tune in and let’s unpack it together. 🤔🔍 #SermonSunday #FaithJourney. EASY TO GIVE at Harmony, text any amount to (859) 459-0316 to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give ). Get the fill in the blank bulletins my.harmonychurch.cc/bulletins.
OPENING ILLUSTRATION:
So, I don’t know if everyone is like this, but my brain doesn’t work for some things. Pretty much anything that starts with a G that isn’t bible related. When I was in High School I failed geometry one semester and got a D the second semester. In bible college, I got a D in Grammar & Geography… Serious… And it’s not like I didn’t work hard, I worked crazy hard and still I got an F… In Grammar, I would literally watch Conjunction Junction… It was like the information would go in my brain and would not stick. It’s probably some sort of learning disability…
Sometimes things just don’t make sense, right?
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Some of you had a relationship that you thought would last for your whole life and in one turn, your spouse went a different direction and you were left holding a bag that you don’t know what to do with…
You’re left saying, “it just doesn’t make sense…”
-I’ve been passed over for jobs that it didn’t make sense, “I crushed that interview”
-You worked your tail off, showed up early, stayed late, and still they laid you off…
We all know what it’s like to have things that just don’t make sense.
Today, we are going to look at a moment in the life of Abraham that doesn’t make any sense, then we’ll look at how God made sense of it.
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We’ll see how God is always tying threads from the history of the Old Testament into the life of Jesus and making sense of things.
SCRIPTURE:
So, part of this series is helping you get a sense of who biblical characters – people are. It has roughly been a few hundred years since the flood. Noah is still alive. There is an ancient document Jasher (in chapter 9) that actually says that Abraham, who we are about to talk about, lived with Noah and his son Shem for 39 years learning the ways of Yahweh God. Abraham sticks out in this post flood world. Everyone has immediately gone back to their own way – they are humans after all. Abraham is called by God – you should study Genesis 11-25 this week. Abe is called to leave his country, his family, and everything he knows and he does it. He follows God. 3 times God will promise to Abraham to bless him, to make his name famous, to give him land and to bless the whole world through him. Abraham. Abe will have all kinds of crazy things happen, two times he will almost lose his wife to foreign kings, he will build up an empire and risk it all to rescue his nephew. Abraham will be involved in crazy things like his wife telling him to sleep with her servant to have a child because God had promised him a child and Sarah could never get pregnant.
God will eventually promise Abe that He will have a child, even when he is old and Sarah is old – Sarah was 91 and Abe was 100… Can you even imagine…
There is all kinds of drama that happens during this time – it is worth a biopic movie. Sarah kicks her servant and son out, God intervenes. There is drama upon drama
Abraham isn’t perfect either, we catch him lying and being deceitful, we catch him being manipulated by his wife.
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But what Abraham is most known for is his faith.
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The faith part is what brings us to our story that you just can’t understand.
Genesis 22:1-2
Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
2 Then God said, “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.”
What??? This doesn’t make sense and if you know the story, Abraham just takes God at his word. He doesn’t try and find an alternative explanation… “Maybe he meant to take him up there TO sacrifice – not TO sacrifice (him).
Abe doesn’t question, he just does. This has been who he has always been. He has been reckless in his abandon when it comes to following Yahweh – maybe it’s because he had heard the stories from Noah… He knew to take Yahweh at His word…
Abraham loads wood up on the back of Isaac, his one and only son. He takes him up to the mountain. They have gone up the mountain all by themselves. Can you picture it? Abe looking over at this son that he’s waited a hundred years for. The promise he’d put all his hope in and finally got. Now
He’s being called to give up the promise and follow the promise maker.
Listen to the tension in this moment…
Genesis 22:6-8
6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, 7 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?”
8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.
I can imagine Abe looking over and thinking about the child – thinking about that time after he was born that he cried all night, or the moments when he would get up early in the morning to watch him just breath and amazed… now he’s about to take that breath away
It just doesn’t make sense, right?
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Why would God require something of someone? Doesn’t this feel wicked instead of right?
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What is going on here?
They reach the spot and Abe builds up the wood. He places his son Isaac on the wood. Abe has bound up his son. Oh my goodness, my heart can’t take it. There had to be some, “dad, what are you doing?” “just trust me son..” Abe places his son on the wood… what do you think Isaac is saying now, “dad, I promise, I’ll be better…” I picture Abe just weeping while this next part happens, listen to it…
10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.
I have to just read that one verse because it needs a pause a breath… Because Abraham has committed. His hand is raised to end his son’s life…
What in the world is going on here? I just don’t understand it… Am I wrong here? Does this mess with anyone else?
Genesis finishes with this:
11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram[a] caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.
At the last second, God rescues Isaac and stays Abe’s hand. he provides a lamb for the sacrifice which takes Isaac’s place…
You can finally breathe…
But again I ask
What is going on? I just don’t understand “why”?
I told you at the beginning of this sermon – the bible has a thousand threads that link between the Old Testament and the New Testament…
There is a thread tied directly between this passage and the one I’m about to read.
John 3:16
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
Abraham’s whole life was not about Abraham, it was about Jesus and God making good on His promise that He makes over and over again to Abraham.
The promise looks like this – here is how God said it to him right after this episode with Isaac:
Genesis 22:18
and through your offspring[b] all nations on earth will be blessed,[c] because you have obeyed me.”
One day, Jesus will come into the world – he will be a direct descendant of Abraham. And Jesus, who is actually the one and only son of God will give Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of the world. There will not be a ram that takes his place, instead, He will take the place of us and our death. He will place Himself on the alter, God himself will do it for all of us. He does it so we can find life through Christ.
That’s how it makes sense. God is foreshadowing what He himself will do.
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I think God wants you to not understand the sacrifice of Isaac so you will understand how monumental His own sacrifice for YOU was…
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Do you get it?
He did exactly the thing that felt so wrong to you, and He did it for you and for me.
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It is what we call “Grace” – an undeserved goodness given freely…
Today is the day for some of you. Today is the day to give your life to Jesus. To pray and invite Him to be the lord of your life. To die to your old life and embrace His new life…
