Bible Text: Genesis 22 | Preacher: Rev. Janet Hess | Series: Genesis | SERMON—THE WILLINGNESS IS ALL. @LIMA.

Abraham & Isaac: the Sacrifice.

February 23, 2020. Rev Janet K Hess.

 

Hear also these verses from Genesis 18: 10-14. Then one (angel) said to Abraham, “I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son.” And Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, “After I have grown old and my husband is old shall I have pleasure?” The Lord said to Abraham, Why did Sarah laugh and say,’shall I indeed bear a son now that I am old?’ Is anything too hard for the Lord? At the set time, I shall return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son.”

 

  And indeed it happened. The child of promise, the child of the covenant, the child of their old age, // the child of laughter, their only son, their son whom they loved, // Isaac was born as God had promised!  What joy, what happiness!

 

Abraham and Sarah are among the “Great Personalities of the Old Testament.”* We heard, last week, how when Abraham was 75 years old, God called him to leave his country and his kin to go to Canaan. God promised him blessings galore—descendants, a land, prosperity in a new place. We remember that Abraham, at age 75, left everything and set out, faithfully obeying God. We learned of their Covenant, the one between Abraham and God.

I quote God: “I will establish my covenant between me and you and your descendants after you. ..to be your God. And I will give to you and to your descendants after you, the land of your sojourning, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be your God.” (Gen 12)

 

WELL, 25 years have passed. Day after day, wandering, journeying, //foreign tribes, danger, hostility, //always on the move, nomadic life, herds and flocks,// negotiations, year after year. 75, 85, 95, 99 years old and no son born to Abraham and Sarah, and time has run out. Not Eliezer, the servant; not Lot, the nephew; not Ishmael, the son of the servant girl.

Instead, a renewal of the promise, the miracle male baby, Isaac, their own child, born of their union, the son through whom the covenant will be fulfilled. Isaac, the only begotten son, whom they love.

Isaac who is growing and flourishing, coming of age, following in Abraham’s footsteps.

Life is good.  R, yes, life is good.  //

 

Sarah looks upon Isaac, the beloved son she nursed,

The beloved son she burped,

The beloved son she swaddled,//

The beloved son she cuddled,

The beloved son she loved more than anything.

Abraham looks upon Isaac, the beloved son he bounced on his knee,

The beloved son he taught to walk,

The beloved son he took with him in his work

around the camp,//

the beloved son he introduced to all his people,

the beloved son he was teaching to be the next

chief, the next patriarch of the tribe.//

BUT, here and now, in this chapter, the 22nd chapter of Genesis, it all screeches to a stop. It all stops.  It all ends here, in these verses, on this mountain, at this altar.

“Take   your   son, your  only  son,  Isaac,  whom  you  love!  Take your son to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering upon the mountain I will show you.”

 

I wonder what happened between verse 2 and 3. Often I wonder about the space between verses in the Bible. Between the command from God and the start of the journey to MT Moriah, did Abraham go through the stages of grief? Did he deny what he had heard from God? Did he offer himself instead as a way to negotiate? Did he yell and scream in anger at God?

Did he leave the camp, too depressed to be around anyone? Did he seek help, advice, comfort—talk to Sarah, go for long walks, stare into space, // lie awake sleepless in the dark?

 

Because, because,

If Isaac were sacrificed, the Covenant would be broken—no heirs, no land, no inheritance. The covenant would be broken — by God.

If Abraham disobeyed God, if he did NOT sacrifice Isaac, then he would be the one who had broken the covenant. No land, no legacy.

It was a no-win situation. No-win. A literal “dead end.”  //

 

A side bar here, if you pease.

Altho WE know how this story ends, Abraham did not; he did not know the ending. We have heard this story over the years. We heard it again this morning. We know how the story ends—we know that at the last minute, at the very moment of no return, “the angel of the Lord” spoke and “stayed” Abraham’s hand in which was the knife he would use to kill Isaac, “his only son, whom he loved.” We know how the story ends with an animal, a sacrificial ram caught by its horns in the thicket, used instead of Isaac.          BUT,

Neither Abraham nor Isaac knew how the story would end. (And by the way, Isaac was a teenager, old enough to know what was happening, old enough to choose to obey God too, mature enough to consent to being the sacrifice!) Abraham did not know he would not have to sacrifice his beloved son. Isaac did not know he would be saved from death. All either knew for sure was that the word of God was to make Isaac the sacrifice.

There was no knowledge or expectation of a reprieve. There was only FAITH. ONLY FAITH. Only Faith that somehow, even with the death of the heir, the only son, even with Isaac’s death, the covenant would hold.

 

WE know how the story ends, and we are relieved and glad when we hear the final verses, when we hear God’s voice with the reprieve: “DO NOT, DO NOT lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him; for now I KNOW THAT YOU FEAR GOD, since you have not withheld your son, your only son from me.” //. Whew!

 

And, And what are to make of this? What are we take from this ancient, bloody, frightening story about a fearsome God who would demand child sacrifice from a loyal, obedient, faithful servant? What can we learn?

 

Certainly, as my sermon title today suggests, one lesson is that our WILLINGNESS IS ALL. After Abraham had lived and agonized thru the various emotions, he came to the final one: ACCEPTANCE, and he set off with Isaac in acceptance of their fate. Abraham and Isaac had strong faith, FAITH strong enough to OBEY the word from God, and they were willing to obey it fully. They were willing to trust and obey.

 

So too was Jesus’ mother Mary. She was willing to trust and obey. She had no idea what lay ahead for her when she answered the Angel Gabriel’s invitation to be the mother of the Messiah. She was willing to trust and obey, saying, “May it be to me according to your word.”

So too were Peter, James, and John.  So too were Peter, James, and John — willing to trust and obey. They had no idea of what lay ahead for them when they obeyed Jesus’ call, “Come, follow me,” as they immediately lay down their nets & went with Jesus. But they were willing to trust & obey.//

So too it was for Jesus. He did not know the details of all that his ministry & mission would entail. He did not know how deep would be the resistance from the authorities, that his would be a “kangaroo court” and unfair sentence, that he would die such an excruciating death. He would rather have returned to Nazareth, resumed making furniture in the carpentry shop, and lived to an old age. But he was willing to trust and obey God.

 

As it was for Abraham and Isaac, as it was for Peter, James and John, as it was for Jesus, so too it is for us. We are no different. For us too, the willingness is all. We too are called to be willing to trust and obey.

So it was for Pastors Dorry and Karen and me. We are no different. We did not know when we answered the call to ministry what it would involve, where we would be sent, who we would serve.

So too it was late last year for my stepson David, living in Ohio, when the pastor of the small United Methodist Church he attends, knowing he was the son of and stepson of Methodist pastors, asked,..maybe begged.. him to chair the Ad Council.

Perhaps you too have struggled recently with how to hear and how to recognize the voice of God, how to know some action presented to you is OF GOD. Maybe regarding your job, your location, your schooling// decisions about money, marriage, movement// relationships with children, parents, spouses, significant others, friends.

So too it is for YOU, for YOU-ALL, for all of you, for ALL of us.We are no different.

 

 

Jesus was willing to trust and obey. More than we, more than you and I, more than we, Jesus KNEW the possible, KNEW the probable, KNEW the likely outcome of HIS trust and obedience.

You see, Jesus had heard, had studied, knew this ancient, traditional tale of a parent’s abundant love for and joy in an ONLY SON, an ONLY, BEGOTTEN SON, called to be THE sacrifice for sins—sins of the family, sins of the tribe, sins of human beings, sins of the world. Jesus knew—all to well—the scriptures about Abraham and Isaac, knew that for them, for them, the human sacrifice was stopped. Jesus knew the prefiguration, knew the foreshadowing from Genesis, knew the possible, the probable, the likely outcome for him, for him. Jesus knew, he knew that THIS TIME there would be NO divine voice stopping the human sacrifice. Jesus knew THIS TIME there would be NO ram in the thicket to substitute for him. Jesus KNEW—

and in the Garden of Gethsemane, he prayed that the chalice laced with thorns would be removed from him. Like Abraham and Isaac eons before him, Jesus prayed for release. Jesus prayed—so earnestly that (and I quote) that “In his anguish his sweat became like great drops of blood falling on the ground.” (Lk 22). Yet Jesus’ trust and his obedience were so great, were so great that his words echoed his mother’s of 30 years previously, “Yet not my will, but your will be done.” “Your will be done!”//

 

This disturbing and unsettling old, old story about great love, great trust, and great obedience points us ahead, R thru thousands of years to the core of our faith—to Christ’s Passion, to Good Friday, to Easter Sunday, to Jesus’ sacrificial death and to his triumphal Resurrection.

 

Today/This evening, poised as we are on the peak of the Mount of Transfiguration, it behooves us to looks across the Lenten landscape to the shadowy Hill of Calvary and the sunny vista of Easter. During Lent as the tension increases and Jesus’ enemies plot his death, may WE remember the events on Mount Moriah and the faith of Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac. May we remember their trust and obedience, then and there, pointing to Jesus and his sacrificial love for us, here and now. May we meet our challenge to trust and obey God’s will for us with faith like theirs.

 

 

Truly, “God so loved the world, R that God gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world but in order that the world might be saved thru him.” R

 

Thanks be to God.  AMEN. And AMEN.

 

 

 

*”Great Personalities of the Old Testament:Their Lives and Times,” William Sanford LaSor, Fleming H Revell Co, 1969.