Beloved, let us turn in our Bibles this morning to Genesis chapter 22. And we'll read the first 14 verses. And it came to pass after these things that God did tempt Abraham and said unto him, Abraham. And he said, behold, here I am. And he said, take now thy son, thine only son, Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell thee of. And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up and went into the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place of far off. And Abraham said unto his young men, abide ye here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it upon Isaac, his son. And he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went both of them together. And Isaac spake unto Abraham, his father, and said, My father. And he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood. Where is the lamb for a burnt offering? And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went both of them together. And they came to the place which God had told him of. And Abraham built an altar there. and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched forth his hand and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him. For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me.' And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-Jireh, As it is said to this day in the mount of the Lord, it shall be seen. Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, death, physical death is something obviously that we all face. And unless the Lord returns in glory before we die, all of us must face the last enemy, as Scripture calls it. And immediately after, we enter eternity. That's a very solemn thought. Is there anything that can overcome death? We know, of course, that the Lord Jesus Christ has done so. But what about our lives? We all face death. How can we face death without fear? We can't prevent it, but can it be overcome? Really only one way, and that is by faith. Why by faith, you may ask? Because faith brings to life, faith brings to our minds the reality of that which lives beyond the grave. Faith brings into focus, as it were, the city that has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Faith lets us rest in the hope of a better life, a life just beyond death. And so it was that the faith that God had given to Abraham Though it would be again sorely tried, tested, that faith would rest in God, even though what he would see, what he would hear, what he would experience would seem completely contrary to what God called him to do. The chapter we're going to be considering with God's help this morning is full of death. And yet, it's perhaps for us a timely subject, something we need to pause and to think about, because so many things in our lives really deflect our thoughts away from eternal matters. But as we continue our studies through Genesis, we will see once again that the grace of God, evidenced in the faith of believer, overcomes even the greatest obstacles that come in our way. And so this morning we're going to focus solely on Genesis chapter 22. As we have been doing, let's just look at maybe three verses. to sort of orient ourselves in this chapter. Verse 3, And he that is God said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell thee of. And then verse 8, the first part, And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. And then verses 12, And he again, God said, Lay not thy hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him. For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me. This morning we simply have another installment of Lessons from Abraham, our fifth in that particular category, and we're simply going to see one thing in this chapter. And so, not two points or five points, but one point, Abraham's faith tested in the offering of Isaac. Boys and girls, we have been following the life of Abraham in the book of Genesis for a while now. We have seen that this father of the faithful, as he is called in Romans chapter 4, did not have an easy life. If you remember, he left Ur of the Chaldees, his homeland, and he entered into Canaan at 75 years of age. He had to leave everything behind except his wife and his nephew. his father having died in the interim town of Haran. And yet Abraham, despite those difficulties and others, he was a very privileged man. We've also seen that too, haven't we? He had several appearances of God to him. coming to Him in different ways and giving Him great and precious promises that not only were for Him personally, but for His seed and for the world even. In Thee shall all the families, shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. But then you also recall the years of childlessness. the years involving the strife between Sarah and Hagar, the trouble he endured on account of his lying concerning Sarah twice, the battle he fought against Catalamer to free Lot, his witnessing of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, not knowing as yet that God had freed Lot from the overthrow. Even after he prayed for its preservation, And then more recently in our studies, we have seen him having to send away not only Hagar, but also Ishmael. And we can tell that Ishmael meant a great deal, being his firstborn son. We can hardly imagine seeing how much he cared for Ishmael, how much he cared for Isaac. This was a son of his old age, the son of Sarah, his wife. And it's hard to say how old Isaac was when the events of this chapter, 22, take place. But certainly he was old enough to make a three days journey with his father to carry the wood, at least for a part of that journey. And so yes, Abraham had difficult moments in his life, but I'm sure we do too. And so this chapter is not just a historical curiosity, it's not just a cameo shot of a great saint with remarkable God-given faith, but it's a path we can travel along. It's a book of lessons we can learn from. It's an encouragement for the weary. And it's a way forward for those who face the impossible. So let's consider his faith tested. In verse one of the chapter we read, God did tempt Abraham. And right away our mind perhaps goes to the book of James where the apostle James says, let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God. For God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man. How do we put those two together? Well, thankfully, in the Hebrew language, the word that is translated for us, tempted, has a much broader sphere of meaning than just temptation. It also has a sense of proving, testing, trying, as in trying out something or testing to make sure something is sound, and so on. And in fact, in the five verses that we find this word in the Old Testament, The other four make reference to tempting God, which means, again, in light of what James says, not tempting him to sin, for he cannot be, but trying God, testing God. And so, in those instances, those tests or trials were through unbelief, or defiance of sin. And so we would probably understand this command as a test, as a trial of Abraham's faith. But what a trial it was. What a test it was. God simply begins by calling Abraham's name. Did you notice that? And in servant-like reverence, Abraham answers, Behold, here am I. If you look at the chapter, you know that the italicized words are not found in the original, but are added to make English sense of it. So it says, Behold, I. A very simple indication, Lord, I am ready to hear what Thou hast to say. And when answering a summons, this is the way that a Jewish person, one speaking Hebrew, would be emphatic. In other words, it's the same expression, actually, that Isaiah used in Isaiah chapter 6 when he said, Here am I, send me. So there's a certain readiness and attentiveness. Now that already tells us a few things. First of all, Abraham knows the voice of God. He didn't have to ask, like Saul on the way to Tarsus, Lord, who art thou? He knew right away this was the Lord addressing him. Do we know the voice of the Lord? It's not that we expect to hear God audibly with our ears, an actual voice speaking to us. But do you know what it is to have the Word of God powerfully brought to you? So that you no longer hear or see words on a page or somebody in a pulpit, but the Lord is addressing you and you know it because it has you, it's connecting with you, it is changing you, the voice of the Lord. Secondly, notice his readiness to answer God's call. as well as his reverential humility toward God. Abraham is such a beautiful picture, and not just because of that statement, but in other instances we've seen, he is ready to serve. As eminent as a man as he was, and he was in those, he was a very wealthy man, he had at least 300 servants, he was well respected by all the neighbors, but when it came to the things of God, he was a servant, and he was ready to answer the call. Little did he know the call he was about to receive. And God comes directly to the point, and his word must have seemed like a dagger in Abraham's heart. Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah and offer him there. for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of." What a staggering command, and that for a number of reasons. First of all, God didn't say to Abraham to offer himself. As difficult as that might have seemed, But how much more don't we feel we would rather be ill, we would rather have died, than to see a beloved son or daughter suffer or die. Now, he says, he is to be offered. And secondly, he knew God did. How much Isaac meant to Abraham. He says so. I know that in your mind this is your well-beloved son. And so he had to offer his beloved son. Thirdly, and we've seen this before in his life, he has to take a three-day journey. If you notice, he was told the region to go to, the land of Moriah. But then God inserts those words, to a place that I will show thee. We've seen that before, haven't we, children? When he left his home, God said, go into the land of Canaan to a place that I will show thee. And so he has to travel, not by a map, no GPS, it's by faith. But then, Ishmael being gone, now he needs to sacrifice his son, and if that all wasn't enough, Finally, and most importantly, obviously, this was the son of promise. This was the son through whom the families of the earth would be blessed. This is a son through whom the nations would be saved. This is the son whose lineage would lead directly to the Messiah in whom Abraham himself was trusting. So the death of this son meant the death of everything valuable to Abraham. What would become of the promises of God? What would become of the Messiah to come? Now, we might ask ourselves, and children, maybe you've heard this story, read this story, you've asked, how could God ask such a thing? Human sacrifice was an abomination to Him, and He says so. Later on in Israel's history, when Israel became so debauched, much like the neighbors around the Baltham, and they were actually sacrificing their own children to Moloch and to other idols, He said, it never came into my mind. In other words, I would never have dreamed to ask my people to do such an abomination. And here he is saying to Abraham to do that very thing. This had to be the most painful experience to Abraham's flesh possible. This was a son for whom he waited so long, around whom the promises centered. Offer Him for a burnt offering? An atonement? Appeasement of God's wrath? How could the Son of Promise, representing the Messiah, how could He be a sacrifice? This chapter has always been a very significant one, a very moving one for the Church of God throughout the ages. And not just because it's a fascinating and gripping history, but because it strikes so near to our experience as believers. Now, does that mean God asks us to do things like this? Well, not this, precisely. But in a certain sense, all believers have passed this way before. Maybe you have besought the Lord time and again for a wayward son or daughter. Maybe you have done what you could to rear this child, to bring this child up in the fear of the Lord, in God's ways. Maybe you've even received encouragements from the Word of God, from the people of God. Maybe a promise of the Lord through His Word applicable to that child. the bottom falls out. That child went further and further into the world, left behind the last vestiges of religion or concern. Maybe the same child for whom you had such hope trampled upon your heart over and over again. Maybe trampled upon the ways of the Lord, perhaps came to the point of utter contempt for God's ways. Maybe this child even was visited with judgments. sore sicknesses, deep ways in their own lives. Maybe married someone ungodly. Maybe drugs or alcohol or other addictions plagued their life. And you couldn't see it anymore. How could your prayers have been real with this going on? How could those promises have been real and these are the fruits of them? How could God at all be involved with a child like that for whom you so prayed, for whom you so labored, and in secret so wept? You know, sometimes we fall into the habit of using cliches. I, for one, don't much care for clichés, but there certainly is one that applies both to this history and to such situations. God often leads us in ways of impossibility, in ways where we honestly don't know anymore. Consider another scenario. Maybe you cried out to God against a sin in yourself that is so besetting or to deliver you. from an oppressive situation or a very difficult relationship. You've asked for grace, you've wrestled with God, you've tried all that is within you to cast yourself upon the Lord, clinging to his word, clinging to his mercy, clinging to his son. You've begged him, you've sought him, you maybe even made promises to him, maybe even an oath to him. Maybe you've tried looking to him to make significant changes in your life, to break with that sin. You've used means to free yourself from that oppressive situation or that relationship. You've prayed that things may change so that it doesn't go on and on and drag you through the most difficult things. And yet, how many times doesn't God allow things to go from bad to worse until, like it says in that one psalm, you are at your wit's end. Offer him there, said God, for a burnt offering. Well, what are we to do? when we come into such situations. What are we to do when we are, as Paul would say, pressed out of measure, beyond our strength, past what we thought we could possibly handle? What do we do then? Well, boys and girls, what could have Abraham done? Well, he could have complained. Now, we don't think that Abraham maybe would complain out loud. maybe wouldn't dare, maybe we wouldn't either, but inside, there can be such bitterness, there can be such weariness, there can be such a sense of frustration, maybe even despair, and it's all welling up against the Lord. We feel that rebellion, we are fighting it, but it's there, His way with us, we are not one with. Abraham could have questioned God. He could have prayed to Him. What was God doing? Why are you commanding me to do something that you are vehemently opposed to? How could you command me to do what is against thy commandment? And again, we might be also tempted to think such things. We might be questioning God's way with us. We might be questioning God's timing with us. We might be questioning God's love for us. His word, even there's people even question the reality of God, because it becomes so oppressive and so difficult. Why would God have allowed this marriage to take place? Why, if he knew all the problems? Why did I ever start working in this place and all the grief and misery that's come out of that? Or God, I should say, Abraham could have disobeyed. He could have just flatly refused. I'm not willing to do this. Besides, it's a horrible deed. How many times when we are pressed out of measure, we've got all the excuses lined up why we can't do this, why we have to turn aside to other gods, to other means, to something else, why we have to lose it, why we have to go off the deep end. We could do that. We could say that. He had reasons, too. First of all, the command itself. What would Cyrus say if she found out? What would the servants say? And what would the Canaanites say if they found out that this man of God sacrificed his son at the behest of the living God? What would they say? Well, what he could have done, he did not do. He didn't complain. He didn't question. He didn't disobey. In fact, he didn't even doubt God. What he did do was very simple. But the reason he did it is very profound. You see, beloved, if anyone thinks that God is putting you in a difficult and impossible situation, I would highly encourage you to take out your scriptures, to turn to this chapter, and to read it. You see, God is, and I say this with care and reverence, but just think about it a minute. God is not primarily interested, concerned about outcomes. We are so focused on outcomes. How does this turn out? How does that child I was referring to, or that workplace oppression, or that relationship, we want to see the end of it all. We want to see the result. We want to know how this ends. We want to see deliverance. God is not focused. His scripture is clear as day. He's not focused on that. He's focused on how we live in the process. He is focused on turning us, conforming us, shaping us to the image of His Son. That's not accomplished by the outcome normally. It's accomplished by the impossible ways. It's accomplished by the difficult journey. It's accomplished by the chiseling away of the flesh. And that He is keenly interested in. And for us to be able to do what Abraham did, we do need to understand this. And not only understand it, but embrace it as what is best. We want to know the outcome. We want to see the happy ending. We want the resolution. God wants a God-fearing person bearing under affliction. He is the most glorified and we are the most godly, not when the weight is lifted, but when the pressure is on. That's when our weakness comes out, that's when our strength dries up, and that's when Paul says, I glory rather in the strength of God in the midst of my weakness. It's the motives, it's the intents of our heart, it's the way we are responding to the things that are happening that has God's attention. This is the point of Abraham's trial, this is the point of every test he sends us. How do we react to his commands? How do we react to when he crushes our earthly dreams? How do we respond to temptations? How do we deal with the sins of others against us that so trouble us? These are important matters to God. What did he do? He obeyed. And he did so promptly. Verse 3, Abraham rose up early in the morning, saddled his ass, took two of his young men with him and Isaac his son, claimed the wood for the burnt offering, rose up and went into the place which God had told him. How could he do that? How could Abraham just do that? How could any father do that? Obey so promptly, be so quiet, no asking questions. We're given the answer. Not in this chapter. In Hebrews 11 verse 17. By faith, Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac. And he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said that in Isaac shall thy seed be called. That verse goes on to say, accounting that God was able to raise him up even from the dead. What is that saying? Maybe you had a promise from the Word of God for that wayward son. God does not want you ultimately resting in that promise. He wants you ultimately resting in Him. Resting in the very solid, steadfast, immovable, immensely good character of God. He wants every means to fall away so that those means bring us to the heart of our strength, and that is God himself. Abraham accounted God faithful. and able, even if he had to kill his son, that God could raise that child from the dead, even though, to this point in scripture history, it had never happened before. How did he do that? By faith. Faith, beloved, goes places. where reason and where feelings can't go. Faith is able to do things that human strength and ingenuity cannot do. Faith sees things that the natural man never even knew existed, can imagine, weighs out, weighs through, God was more real to Abraham in these moments than anything else in the world. More trustworthy than flesh and blood and feelings and sentiment. If God said it, I must do it. If God commanded it, it must be done. And would to God that I and that you would live our lives that way. God said it, that is the end of the discussion. because of who he is. Abraham rose up early in the morning. Now I know, dear friends, there are times, sometimes many times, that prayer and even faith seem not to work. times when the circumstances seem so oppressively real, temptations so incredibly sore, the failure so crushing and so ongoing, the pain so severe, the depression so deep, the anxiety so paralyzing and earth-shaking, that God and prayer and faith can seem like distant theories. God does lead. through ways of impossibility. Ways in which we die to ourselves over and over and over again until we think there is nothing left to die. Until there's nothing left in us. And if you don't believe that, open to the Book of Psalms. Open to Romans 7 and Paul's lament. There you have the inspired Word of God opening the hearts of people who couldn't see it anymore, who were so emptied of themselves and yet found a place in God. If Jesus says to us that, if needs be, we have to pluck out our eye and cut off a hand Rather than enter into hellfire with each, you know that things are serious. You know that he means business. You know there are sins, there are issues, there are situations in our life that take absolutely everything out of us. But that's not the time to quit the battle. That's not the time to lay down in despair. That's not the time to say, well, this religion thing doesn't work. That is exactly not the thing to do. God doesn't empty us and take the light in us being prostate on the ground, lifeless and hopeless. That is not the point. He empties in order to fill. He breaks down in order to build well. He drains the swamp of our heart to fill our heart with Himself. And so, what's going on with Abraham here is nothing strange to any of you who are truly exercised with spiritual matters. We might wonder, was Abraham something like a stoic Like a stone, was he fatalistic? No, he was a man of like passions as we are. And so we see them traveling together in silence. We can't begin to imagine the thoughts that were multiplying in Abraham's mind, and you know the feeling. You're on the way to the hospital, you get the phone call. The person just said their relationship is over, whatever it might be, you know the feeling. Thoughts multiplying. What can possibly imagine, who can imagine the heavy heart as he went along this three-day journey, three days, with this weighing on his mind. Verse 4 tells us, on the third day, Abraham finally sees the place. The servants, they had to stay behind. How could they understand anyway? Only Abraham and his son walked the last kilometers to Mount Moriah. Was it already faith and exercise that prompted Abraham to say to the servants, I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again to you? Did faith already believe that somehow Isaac was going to return? What must have been to walk along and then, silence broken, And Isaac saying to his father, what about the sacrifice? Where was the lamb? And even in this very brief exchange, you see something, something that's easy to miss. Did you notice how the conversation went? Brief as it was. Isaac asked, my father, and then he waits. He waits for his father to answer. To say for him, to him, it's okay now to speak on. Isaac doesn't just go plowing in to a conversation, uninvited. And notice how Abram answers. Here am I, ready to hear and to answer. You know, I thought about that. In the fast-paced world we're living in today, people talk past each other all the time. without even listening to each other. Children talk back to their parents as if they were equals, speaking their mind uninvited, many times without respect or reverence. Parents, half-listening, too preoccupied with our own thoughts and things. Children, some advice from the Word of God. Next time you want to address your parents, you want to talk to them, why not say something like, Mom? And then wait. Before you just go along and say everything that's on your mind, just wait a second. Wait till they say, yes, my son. Yes, my daughter. And parents, when they ask for our attention, how about we give them our attention? Our whole attention for those moments. Was verse 8 the language of faith again? Did God really believe? I'm sorry, did Abraham really believe that God would provide himself a sacrifice? Or was that a way to kind of put off telling Isaac what soon must be? from the text in Hebrews, faith was working at this time, this amazing obedience. And whether that applied to their entire journey or the last part, we don't know. But here is a beautiful thing, another thing. Did you notice that Isaac doesn't ask any more questions? He didn't ask, how is God going to provide a sacrifice? What kind of sacrifice is God going to provide? He doesn't say, Father, don't we have to hunt for one? Where may it be found? His father words were sufficient. Few as they were. And that makes me think, you know, fathers and mothers of faith, of godliness, they are counted trustworthy. Boys and girls, you don't need a big long explanation for everything. Sometimes you can just, well, all the time, just trust that your parents know what they're doing, are doing it for your good, and even if they're wrong, you can always look to the Lord to make it right for you, to use whatever it is for your good. Your parents don't have to be geniuses. They don't have to be right every time. We talk about Abraham's faith. How deep a trust was Isaac's. In verse nine, he allows himself to be bound upon the altar. He was ready to die at the hand of his father, who surely by this time told him what God had said. Isaac was ready to die. Boys and girls, Isaac could have run away. His father was very old. Isaac could have overpowered his father, you know, just broke through and left. He could have struggled against death. He could have argued. with good reasonings. You know, Father, how can this be? God would never do it. It must have been Satan. He could have pled for mercy to be spared. He could have pleaded the unreasonableness of it all. He lies down. He allows himself to be bound. He's ready to be sacrificed merely because God said it. You know, the best reason to obey your parents is because God said it. Not because they're right, not because they're wise, but because God said it. He obeyed simply because God told his father to do this. This is honoring to the Lord how we ought to be toward God, not hesitating to cut off whatever, everything and anything in our lives that is not good for our souls, that is not pleasing to God. Maybe that means letting go of a friend who's really not a good friend, a companion who's maybe leading you in the wrong direction. Maybe that means uninstalling programs from your computer or maybe pulling the plug on the Internet completely. Something that tempts you or to waste your time. Maybe that means to get a cheaper, plainer truck or car because the one you've got makes you too full of pride. Maybe it means selling that grandiose home that you are filled with delight about because it's not good for you on your journey to heaven. You might think, well, that's so extreme. Is that more extreme than plucking out eyes and cutting off hands? Do you want to go to hell with the things that make you proud? Or the things that cause you or tempt you to lust? Or those friendships that you and them are all going to go down the broad way? Is it worth it? Is that extreme? Do you think it's extreme if somebody's in a burning building and are unconscious to run in there and drag them out maybe against their will? Or a drowning person, and you hear how they, in a state of delirium, fight against the very people that are rescuing them. Is that unreasonable? Cruel, maybe, that you dared to rescue them? It's not extreme. What's extreme is allowing things so relatively trivial to sink us to the bottomless pit. That's extreme. Not the other. Abraham went ahead with it. Knife in his hand. Knife in his hand. And then the voice. Abraham. Abraham. And in that moment of extreme anguish, his answer is stunning. Here am I. Still, at that moment, of all moments, ready to hear the voice of the Lord. Still his servant, still his child, lay not thy hand upon the land, neither do thou anything unto him. For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing that was not withheld thy son, thy only son from me. But boys and girls, we don't want to mistake what God is saying here. It's not like God needed to go through with all this to know that Abraham loved Him, feared Him. He knew that already. When He puts it this way, it's for Abraham to know. And could you imagine the impression made on Isaac? My father was willing to do this and God Himself intervened. He spoke and stopped the whole thing and commended the faith of my father. I know that thou fearest God because you've not withheld thy son, thy only son, from me. May I ask you and myself, what would you be willing to give up for the Lord? Not in a way of merit, earning something. What would you be willing to part with if God required it? Easy to answer in words, not so easy to live such a way. What would we give up cheerfully in order to have His favor? I think maybe a lot of us would be willing to give up things that maybe we don't really have our heart set on anyway. Maybe some of our desires for a little while. But when God calls us to the impossible ways, do we realize But that's exactly what he's doing. He's parting things from us that we can't hardly bear to lose in order to gain Him. To gain Him. We know that anything that is held dearer and tighter to our heart than God We are by nature not willing to give up. And that's where the grace of God and sometimes the afflictions of God breaks that hold on those things so that there is room for Him. I made a list of things. Could be something as simple as lusting after food. Scripture calls it gluttony. It's a sin. Maybe you smoke or excessively drink. We know at this point in medical developments that that's harming your body. It's a slow death. And I say that having watched my father slowly suffocate from emphysema, smoke his whole life, could not seem to overcome that addiction. That's a sin to harm ourselves purposely, driving recklessly, to show off, Taking risks with our health to impress people, that's a sin. Are we consumed with worry, anxiety? That may seem like a virtue. Jesus says we ought not to do that. Are we a workaholic? Go, go, go, two, three, four jobs, hour upon hour, not because we're serving, but because we are wanting. What's the treasure that we are expending so much time and energy? And what are we avoiding? You know, sometimes workaholics are hiding. Hiding from family responsibilities, hiding from relationship failures, hiding from their relationship with God. That's a sin. Do we crave ease and comfort? That's called sloth and that's a sin. Abraham went to the mat. He was about to lose the most precious thing in his life for the Lord. Will we ever resemble this man of God? I know, God says, that thou fearest God. Abraham looks up, a ram and a thicket. God did provide, exactly as he said, a sacrifice. Abraham, likely, with the help of his son, offered up this animal together. How deeply impressed that father and son must have been in those moments. How deeply impressed are we? Not about this history. but about a far greater and more amazing substitution. You know, it had to be really difficult from the time that God told Abraham to the time they stood on Mount Moriah with a knife in his hand. Those hours must have seemed like years contemplating what was about to happen. But beloved, did it ever cross our minds that the covenant between God the Father and God the Son was not struck was not made during the 33 years that Jesus was upon earth. He is the Lamb slain, Scripture says, before the foundation of the world. In other words, it was ever eternally on God's mind, if I may so say, that in the fullness of time, the Son of God made man, would not come close to death, but would die. Instead of three years or three days, it was an eternity. He knew it would be until the end. And besides, there you see Isaac carrying the wood. There we see the Lord Jesus carrying a cross of wood, the wood that he himself created at the beginning, until he could carry it no more and another had to take it along with him. But the most amazing thing is, this sacrifice of his son, Abraham, was for God. to sacrifice his son for God. God sacrificed his son for sinners, for enemies, for rebels. God sacrificed his eternal, only begotten, ever with him, son. As intimate a relationship as Abraham and Isaac might have had, as long as they lived together to this point in history, is nothing to be compared. Because there are two sinners living a normal lifetime, so their level of connectedness could only be so much. Not so with God, the Father and the Son, eternally perfect, infinitely blissful, never being separated from one another. And Isaac was threatened with a knife that never came in. The Lord Jesus was a man of sorrows his entire life. There was the mocking, there was the condemnation, there was the scourging, there was the cross, the nails, the agony of thirst, and as if all of that wasn't enough, the torments of hell, the pains of hell got hold of him. There was no voice. on Mount Moriah that day, saying, Enough, my son, now I know that thou lovest sinners. He even cried out, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Where art thou, Father? No answer. Why? Because in those moments he had to endure what we will endure if we go lost. Never to know the favor of God again. He tasted that. There was no substitute. The divine knife, as it were, went right in Jesus died. And yet, Who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? How is it that with all of this foreshadowing that, that's what Hebrews means when it said he received Isaac in a figure, that was a type of foreshadowing of that same mount, Mount Moriah, which would be the place where the sacrifices would be made in the temple, would be the place where Jesus would be crucified. How is it that so many of us are still not amazed, still not relinquishing our grip on the world in light of this astounding sacrifice? In verses 15 to 18, we see God's good pleasure regarding the exercise of faith. Why is that? Because faith honors the Lord Jesus, God's only begotten Son, and honoring Jesus Christ honors God the Father and is well-pleasing to him. Do you honor the Lord by faith in his Son? This amazing chapter ends on a seemingly mundane note. Abraham's told that his brother and his wife had children too. Why is that mentioned? After such, you would think, surely, the chapter should have ended right there. We know the chapter divisions were not in the original scriptures. They were added sometime later in history. But I'm thankful this is what it is. Because as you read that little genealogy at the end of the chapter, did you notice a name in there? Rebecca. Rebecca, verse 23, would be, boys and girls, right, the wife of this very same Isaac. And why is that important? Because through the two of them, that unbroken line right to the Lord Jesus continued until the Lamb of God himself. appeared. We can see a little clearer maybe this morning why Abraham is called the father of the faithful. He didn't just trust God on some starry night when he was told that his seed would be as the stars of heaven. It was a lifetime of trusting. Faith is not an event. Faith is a life. It was Abraham's life. Is it your life too? How we answer that question is how we will spend eternity. Amen.