Bibles to Hebrews chapter 11, and also we want to look at the book of Genesis chapter 22 here in just a little bit. What I'm doing on Wednesdays is teaching through Hebrews 11, one of the most famous chapters in the Word of God. It's called the Hero of Faith chapter. And what the writer of the book of Hebrews does is he goes back and he basically surveys the Old Testament. And we focused on different of the characters of the Old Testament in this study. We looked at Abel's offering. We looked at Enoch. We looked at him. I think that was the third message. We done a message on Noah. And now we're on the subject of Abraham. And we looked at him last week, but we have to look at him again this week too. Now, remember, the book of Hebrews was written to Hebrew Christians or Jews. And what was happening is some of them were going back. I mean, they started well, but they were going back under the Old Covenant to the sacrifice systems and things of that nature. So what the writer does in the book of Hebrews is he shows the superiority of the New Covenant or the New Testament over the Old Testament. And what he's doing in Hebrews 11, he's going back and showing how these old heroes of their faith, especially Abraham, who we're looking at now, were saved by faith. That's how the Lord saved them. They weren't saved a different way in the Old Testament than we are in the New. They were saved by the blood of Christ. They were washed clean by the blood of Christ, the same as we are. The only difference, we look back they look forward. That's the only difference between the two. So that's the case that he's drawing. Now tonight in Hebrews chapter 11 we're going to look at verses 17 through 19. I want to read those and then I want to read in Genesis 22. I want to start reading a little bit more. Now of course I read a lot of the Bible when I'm preaching. But I want you to look at it too as we're reading. So let's stand and show respect to the reading of the Word and we'll read what we're going to be covering tonight. I think you'll find it interesting. Hebrews chapter 11, and I want you to notice verse 17, 18, and 19. This is what we'll be covering. Then we'll go to Genesis 22 where you get a further more description of what he's talking about in Hebrews 11. Are you ready? Verse 17, By faith Abraham, when he was tried or tested, he offered up Isaac. He offered up Isaac. And he that hath received the promises offered up his only begotten Son, of whom it was said that in Isaac shall thy seed be called, accounting that God was able to raise him from the dead Accounting that God was able to raise him from the dead, even from the dead, from whence also he received him in a figure. Now let's go back to Genesis 22 and what I just read. You get to see in Genesis 22 the actual fulfillment of that. Chapter 22 and the verse 1. And it came to pass after these things that God did tempt Abraham. And he said unto Abraham, he said, Abraham, and he said, Behold, here I am. And he said, Take now your son. Now you think about what the Lord is asking him to do. Take now your son Isaac, whom you love, and you 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. That's a great trial, isn't it? Take your son, of course this was the promised son, and offer him as an offering. upon the mountain that I show you of." Verse 3, And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up. Verse 4, it says, Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said unto his young men, Abijah, hear the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder to 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. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we're thankful this evening that we have this honor to preach your word. Lord, we just can't do it on our own. And Father, we pray that you'd bless this congregation that's assembled this evening. And, Lord, grant Your Holy Spirit amongst us tonight that we be able to see what's being done and what's being said in our text. And, Lord, we pray that all that is said and done will be found pleasing unto You. In Jesus' name, Amen. You can be seated. Now, we're going to title this Abraham's Faith and Isaac. Abraham's Faith and Isaac. And we're going to look at Three main points, we'll look at Abraham's test, first of all. You talk about someone went through a great trial or a great test, Abraham did, and this is it. We'll look at Abraham's faith, secondly, because Hebrews 11 talks about his faith. We'll talk about Abraham's faith. And then last of all, we'll look at the pictures. Y'all like to look at pictures? I can see a whole lot by looking at a picture. And this offering up of Isaac, or this picture of offering up Isaac, this is a tremendous picture, and I think you'll enjoy it when we get to the end of that. Okay, so that's our three points. Abraham's test, Abraham's faith, and Abraham's pictures. We're going to see all the pictures that are in this text. Now, stay in Genesis 22, and we'll eventually go back to Hebrews chapter 11. And we'll see where this began. Now, look at verse 1. Now, put yourself in mind if you was Abraham, and this is what God tells him to do. He says in verse 1, it came to pass after these things that God had tempted Abraham. Now, the word tempt means to test. He put him to a test. Sometimes God does that. And sometimes the Lord will allow His people to be tested or tried. to face certain kinds of trials. Now, why does the Lord do that? Is it because He doesn't love us? No, it's because He wants to teach us something. Because He wants to teach us something. And trials are like exercise for yourself spiritually. Trials aren't designed to make you weaker. They are designed to make you stronger. And once they're said and done, the Lord accomplishes what he needs to, wants to accomplish with those, you indeed, when you look back at it, have been made stronger as a result of what the Lord has permitted or brought upon you in your life. Okay? So, he was going to put him through a test. And verse 2, he says, take now your son, your only son, Isaac. Now, of course, Abraham had another son by the name of Ishmael, didn't he? But that wasn't the promised son. And in the eyes of God, this was the son that God had promised him. And his name, of course, was Isaac. And he said, Whom do you love? And he said, Get you to the land of Moriah and offer him for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell thee of. Now, you know what a burnt offering was, don't you? They would, I mean, you look in the Old Testament, they offered a burnt offering every morning and evening in Israel. And they'd take a lamb and they would kill it with a knife and shed its blood. And then they would put it upon and they would offer it up. They'd put it on the altar and burn it completely up to the Lord. So when he told him to offer him for a burnt offering, that's what that consisted of. And, of course, we realize our Lord never had human sacrifices. He never required His people to offer human sacrifices. But this was a what again? It was a test. It was a test. Okay? And it was a tremendous picture too. And I can't wait to get down to the pictures and show you what all it pictured. So, this was a test of Him. Now, I want you to consider something. Back in Genesis 12, and you don't have to turn there, when Abraham was... Of course, he was called Abram in the beginning. God changed his name to Abraham. But in the book of Genesis chapter 12, when he was in Haran, God told him to leave his family, leave his father's house. And he said, I want you to go to the land that I send you. Didn't tell him where he was going. He just told him to leave. And he said, I want you to leave your house. I want you to leave your family. I want you to leave and take your wife and go to where I told you. Well, he took with him his father, Tira, and he took with him Lot. And he went to Haran. That's about halfway from where he left her. And that's about halfway from where he was supposed to be. He probably had another 400 miles once he got here. But while he was at Haran, his dad dies. He dies while he's there. And when he leaves Haran, the Bible records how old he was. He's 75. Seventy-five years old is how old he was. So, he wouldn't have Isaac. He wouldn't actually have this promised son until he was 100. So, God had promised him a seed. that through his seed would come one that would be the Messiah actually would come through Abraham and Isaac through that seed. And God would bless him. And God would make a great nation of him. And what was that great nation called? Israel. Israel the nation began with Abraham and then Isaac. But for that to continue on what did he have to have? He had to have a son. And that son's name was Isaac. And he waited, how many years? 25 years for him to be born. Now you don't have to turn there, but if you look at Genesis 11 verse 16, his dad Terah, or Terah, however you pronounce it, his dad had him when he was 70. So whenever Abraham was born, his dad Terah was 70 years old. When he left Haran, Abram was 75 years old. So he probably did the math and figured within a year or two, wouldn't you? If you were 75 and the Lord said, you know, I promise you a son, when you figure in a year or two you'd have it, it would be 25 years before it was born, before he was born. So he would have to wait 25 years. So those 25 years have passed. Abraham was 100. His wife was 90 Sarah was 90 and they have the promised son whose name was Isaac and now God comes on the scene and says now what I want you to do is I want you to go to Mount Moriah and I want you to offer him up as a burnt offering to me. That's what God says y'all think that was a test A tremendous test. Remember, you had waited 25 years for him to be born. And now once he's up, and I don't know how old Isaac is at this time, and there's no use guessing. Josephus says he was 26 or 27 years old, but there's really no way of knowing these kinds of things. Here's what I know. He was old enough to ride a horse or a donkey, and he was old enough to carry wood. So, he wasn't a baby or anything of that nature. He was probably in his teens or something along that line. And let's read on. Now, let's notice Abraham's faith. Now, are you still in Genesis 22? Did everybody see Abraham's test? I mean, this was the son that he had been waiting on for how many years? 25 years. This was the son he had through Sarah, his wife. Now, remember when he was 86, he got out of the will of the Lord there. And what happened? What happened is his wife sends her handmaiden into him when he was 86. Her name was Hagar, and he has a child through her. And God said, that's not the child. It's through Sarah. You and Sarah is the child. And of course, that child's name, remember what his name was? Ishmael. Ishmael. Scripture says he'd be a wild man. And his hand would be against every man, and every man's hand will be against him, and he will dwell amongst his brethren." Now, through Isaac came the nation of Israel. Through Ishmael came the Arab nations. And you look over there today, all the Arab nations is right there all together, just like the Bible says. Are they wild? No man can do anything with them either. Just like the book of Genesis said. God said that's how they'd be. They're like that all the way down to the day. But they're all descendants of who? Abraham. And all of them hate Israel. They all hate Israel. But really they're brothers in a sense. Because they traced their lineage back to the same father. Okay? So that was a test. That was a trial. All right, now let's go ahead and look at Abraham's faith. Now it says in verse 3, And he rose up in the morning, and he saddled his ass, and he took of his young men with him, two of his young men with him. I just wonder what they thought. I mean, can you imagine? He took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering. He split the wood for the burnt offering. He got the wood ready. If you're going to have a burnt offering, you have to have wood. So Abraham has to go out and get all the wood ready to take because not only is he going to sacrifice his son, but he was going to be burned up as an offering to the Lord. So Abraham's getting all of this ready. Everybody see it? That's why we entitled this point Abraham's faith. In other words, God said to do it. He starts moving. He starts doing it to bring it to pass, to do what God tells him to do. Verse 3, and Abraham rose up in the morning. Let's read on down. He claimed the wood for the burnt offering. He rose up and he went into the place which God had told him. He goes up to Moriah, Mount Moriah. Now, later in time, what would be built on Mount Moriah would be the temple. Isn't it interesting? It would be in that area. Verse 4, then on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and he saw the place afar off. Now, can you imagine? He had three days to think about what he had to do. You ever have to do anything rough? And I don't know if you've ever, there's been times when, back in the old days, when I used to be a boss up in a warehouse, sometimes someone had to be fired. And they would send it down and tell you, you need to fire this fellow today. And I was like, oh, you hated to do it. You hated to have to do such a thing. And you had to think about it. Sometimes they wanted it done on Friday. So they had all those days there that worked that week. And then on the last, when they got their payday, they wanted them fired. You'd have to think about that. All week long. That's why I never wanted to be in management ever, ever again. All week long, you'd have to think about that. Well, can you imagine Abraham? It took three days to get there. So he's got three days to think about offering his son as a burnt offering. That's three days to think about it. Can you imagine what was going through his mind? But you know what he did? He kept going. He kept going. If you look down in verse 5, then Abraham said unto his young men, abide ye here, and I am the lad who will go yonder and worship and come again to you. That's what Abraham said. How did Abraham handle this thing? You know there is no record here of him questioning God. Would you question? I would have said, what? I waited for him for 25 years. This is the promised son and you want me to offer him up? I mean for the seed to continue he is going to have to be married and have a child. And he's still a lad here. So none of this, none of this to Abraham would have done what? Somebody tell me. It just wouldn't have made sense to him. It would be hard to understand that. Do you not agree? I mean, here's God and this is the promised son. You waited 25 years for him. That great nation is going to come through that line. And now you're asking me to offer him for a burnt offering? I'm sure he didn't understand that. How do you deal with things you don't understand? I mean, is there anything ever going to happen in your life that you don't understand? I mean, has there never been anything in you? I tell you, if you live long enough, you'll find that there's things happen in your life that you just don't understand why the Lord done it. Or why the Lord allowed it, ever how you want to say it. You just don't understand. And I'll just be honest with you. I'm sure that Abraham didn't understand this either. But you know what he did? He trusted. That's what he did. He really had a couple promises to go on. And since you're in 22, look back at chapter 21 of the book of Genesis. Notice what it says in verse 12. Here's a promise that God had gave to Abraham. And Abraham knew the promises. And here's what Abraham did. Notice what it says in verse 12. And Abraham said to Abraham, and God said to Abraham, let it not be grievous in your sight because of the lad and because of the bondwoman. in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken unto her voice." Now notice what this said in verse 12. For in Isaac shall thy seed be called. So, like we said, was this a promise? Abraham knew. Abraham knew. God had told him he was going to make a great nation out of him. God had told him through him all nations was going to be blessed. Now how was that so? Through Abraham came the nation Israel. Through Israel came who? The Messiah, the Lord Jesus. We're blessed today because of Jesus. All nations is blessed. As a matter of fact, you'll find in the Scriptures that in heaven there will be people from every kindred, tribe, nation and people. How did everybody get there? Through who? Through Jesus. So through Abraham all nations are going to be blessed. And he said your seed will be through Isaac. Abraham knew that. And Abraham trusted that. He didn't know why God was doing what He was doing. He never understood what was going on. But he knew what God had promised. The seed would come to Isaac. Therefore, Isaac would have to somehow live, wouldn't he? He would have to produce an heir. All of that would have to happen. Genesis chapter 17. Genesis chapter 17. Interesting, isn't it? Genesis 17 and the verse 12. Notice what it says, And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised. Every man child in your generation is born in your house or bought with the money of a stranger which is not from thy seed. Look down in the text. Verse 21, But my covenant will I establish with Isaac. Who's the covenant going to go through? It's going to go through Isaac. which Sarah shall bear unto thee at this set time next year." So, he had two texts here that said through Isaac, his seed would be called. And I think Abraham trusted that. I think Abraham trusted that promise. So, when something happens that you can't explain, what's Chastity saying when you can't trace his hand, what do you do? You trust His heart. You trust His promises. So, there's a text that says that in the book of Proverbs chapter 3, isn't it? It says this, trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not to your own understanding. Leaning don't help you none. All leaning does is make you question and quarrel and sad. What gives you strength is when you do what? when you trust. There's times I talk to the king and I say, great king, I don't understand this thing. I can't explain this. This don't make, hey, this don't make no sense to me. Well, I don't got all the, hey, I don't got all the information yet. And sometimes all I know is that God has a purpose. And what I do is I trust the promises. I trust the promises. And when you trust the promises, what it does is, and that's what He wants you to do in a test. And that's what He wants you to do in a trial. And that's what He wants you to do in a hardship. He wants you to trust His promises. When you don't understand, and you can't figure it out, and you can't see why, and you can't pick out a reason. Man, I don't know how many times people ask me, and they say, Pastor, why? Well, I don't know. And if I give you a reason why, it might not be in any how. I'm not God and neither are you. And I must admit to you that there are some things that are going to happen in your life that you'll never understand why. Seriously. You can either quarrel with God and get angry at God and question God. What happens when people do that? Somebody tell me. What happens to them? They get bitter. Mean. Sad. But what happens when people trust the Lord? That's where their strength is at. And that's where their encouragement is at. And that's what gives them the ability to move on. That's what does it. That's what Abraham did. He didn't know how it was going to happen. He didn't know what was going to go on. But what he did is he trusted the promise. He knowed somehow, someway, Coy, it was going to come to Isaac. And he trusted that promise, and that's what carried him. All right, let's go to Hebrews 11. Hebrews chapter 11 now, let's go back here. The promise of the Lord is He's promised never to leave you nor forsake you. Y'all believe that? And if you're here tonight and saved, isn't that a great promise? Never. And if you feel like He has, He hadn't. How you feel is not necessarily what's true, is it? He's also promised that all things will work together for the good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose. Do you believe that one? Depends on how bad things are though, doesn't it? All things work together for the good according to them that love God. And then, without a doubt, somebody will come and they'll ask me. I've got to explain everything, you know, but I can't explain it. They'll say, how in the world could this be for the good? But, you see, I don't have all the information. Sometimes when time goes on, and I've seen it, and you probably have too, time went on, and then you look back and you could trace his hand, you could see. Other times you can't. So when you can't, and you don't understand, and you don't see, somebody in the house tell me what you do. You trust Him. He's good. He's got a plan. And He's got a purpose. And you trust Him. And you get on your donkey or whatever, and you keep riding where the Lord tells you to go. And you keep serving the Lord. You don't question Him. There ain't no strength in doing that. Now, Abraham had grew in faith. Abraham had grew in faith. I wanted to point this out to you, too. Oh, you all don't care if I turn you back there just for a moment. Let's go back to Genesis 17. I'm going to show you something you might not have knew. Does anybody know how your faith grows? How does your faith grow? I mean, if you want to grow physically, if you want to get bigger and stronger physically, you've got to eat good and you've got to lift a little bit. You know how your faith grows? It grows through exercise. It grows through exercise. Faith grows through exercise. How do you exercise your faith? You exercise your faith by trusting the Lord. See, and then trial always exercises your faith. In Genesis 17, I like this. Now, we all know that Sarah laughed you know, in the book of Genesis, and we're going to look at that too. I mean, she was like 89 years old, and she was told she was going to have a child. I would have laughed too. I mean, that just wasn't something that was normal. But Abraham also laughed. Genesis 17, notice what happens. Verse 16, And I will bless her, talking about Sarah, and I will give thee a son also of her, And I will bless her, and she shall be the mother of nations, kings of people shall be of her." Now watch what Abraham does. And Abraham fell upon his face and laughed. Did he believe God here? No. He was old. He was 99 here. He was 99 here. Sarah was 89. So when he told him that she was going to bear a son, how did he respond? He didn't believe what God said. He did what? He laughed. He laughed. You look over chapter 18 and verse 12. God appears to Abraham and she's in the tent. And the Lord told him about, he's going to have a son. And it says in verse, let's go ahead and begin in verse 9. And they said unto him, where is Sarah your wife? And he said, she's in the tent. You know, she's going in that tent, don't you? Like a good woman would do, she's listening. She was listening, yeah. She wanted to hear what was going on. Well, she was. Let me show you the text. Alright, now let's read on. Now, Abraham, verse 10, and he said, I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life. And lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son, and Sarah heard it at the tent door. She did what? She heard it at the tent door. Told you she's listening. Now, Abraham and Sarah were stricken in age. And it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. It wasn't possible for her to have a child. So, everything was going against the promise. It would be 100 and then she'd be 90. So, physically impossible to have a child. In verse 12, it says, Sarah laughed within herself. Sarah laughed, where at? Within herself. Of course, the Lord hears your heart, don't He? It knows what happens. It says, After I am waxed old, have pleasure, my Lord also being old. And the Lord said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I surely bear a child which am old? And look at verse 14, is anything too hard for the Lord? You want to answer it? Nothing's too hard for the Lord. Here you see that before this time their faith wasn't much. It wasn't very much faith. But you see here at this time he grew in his faith. And you do. As you grow as a Christian, you are to grow in faith. Abraham laughed at that promise before, but now they're riding up and they're going to Mount Moriah and he's going to offer Isaac. And he's strong in his faith. He never questions. He never laughs. He never complains. His faith had grown. Does anybody know what Isaac's name means? Laughter. He laughs. So every time she would go out there and holler, Isaac, she'd be thinking about the day she laughed, and so would Abraham. God told him, and his name means laughter, or he laughs. Would Abraham have offered him up? Would he have offered him up? Now we're going to go back and look at the text, but I want you to look here at Hebrews chapter 11. And I want you to notice what this says. Verse 18, Of whom it was said that in Isaac shall your seed be called, accounting that God was able to raise him up. What does that mean, Coy? He would have offered him up. But he believed, Larry, that God would raise him from the dead because of those promises. That's faith. Why did he trust it? He knowed what God said he would do. This was the promise done. Through Isaac your seed will be called. Through them will come a great nation. So if God's telling me to offer him up, then God will raise him back again from the dead. Does everybody see the faith? He had great faith in God's Word. Okay, let's go back to Genesis. I'm having fun, y'all. I was talking about a year or two ago. I was talking to this guy again on the phone the other day. And he lives in California. And he was talking to me. And he stopped for a minute. He said, boy, he said your accent. And I thought, well, I think you talk funny, too. I mean, but yeah, he said your accent. I didn't think I had an accent. Did y'all? Let's go back to our text. Now, I want you to get a grip on this now. Let's go ahead and look down here at Genesis 22, and let's notice verse 6. And Abraham took wood of the burnt offering, and he laid it upon his son Azzi. And he took fire in his hand, and a knife. He took a knife, because what did you do with a burnt offering? You slit his throat. He would have slit his son's throat. And then laid him on a Set him on an altar of wood. That's why he's carrying the wood. That was wood for the fire. And a burnt offering, you burn it up. That's what God asked him to do. And Isaac's speaking to Abraham and said, now watch this, folks. He said, Father? And he said, my father? And he said, here am I. Isaac knows something's up because something's missing. Do you all know what's missing? There's no lamb. There's nothing to offer. Now watch this question. Now remember, you're Abraham. You had to ride three days thinking about what you had to do. You leave your servants here. You lay the wood on your son who's carrying it up Mount Moriah. And you've got a knife and there's fire and you're going to offer him up. You getting this in your mind? You see Abraham's faith? Verse 7, And Isaac said to Abraham, his father, My father, and he said, here am I. He said, behold, the fire and the wood. Where's the lamb for the burnt offering? He'd seen his dad offer burnt offerings before, and he knows there's an animal missing. Listen to Abraham. He said, my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went, both of them, together. They came to the place which God had told them. And Abraham built an altar there. And he laid the wood in order and he bound his son. That means he tied him up. And he laid him on the altar upon the wood like you would a lamb or a ram or whatever. And Abraham stretched forth his hand and he took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of the Lord called to him out of heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham. He said, here am I. And he said, lay not your hand upon the lad. God stopped him. Neither do thou anything to him, for I know now that thou fearest God. Of course, he always knew that. Sin that thou hast not withheld thy son, thy only son from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and he looked, and behold, behind him a ram was caught in the thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered up for a burnt offering instead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-Jireh. Which means what? The Lord will provide. God provided a substitute. I haven't really gone preaching yet. I just laid everything up for you. But let me show you some pictures real fast. I realize I've been long. Let me show you some pictures. The picture of a father offering up his son. Do you see the picture? This is a picture of a father offering up his son. And that's exactly what God did for us. Can you get a grip on that now? God so loved. That he gave his only begotten son. Romans 8, 31 and 32 says he that spared not his own son. But delivered him up for us. I'm going to be honest with you. For me to be saved, I'm a sinner. I broke God's law. If I got what I deserved, the earth would open up and I'd slide right into hell if I got what I deserved. But God loved me. I can't explain why He did that. Can you? He said His affection and He loved me. He loves you. But to save us from sin and to save us from hell and to save us from condemnation, it required the sacrifice of one that was innocent and one that was perfect. And the only one that ever walked this planet that was perfect was Jesus. And that's why he came. He came to be born under the law and live a perfect life. And when he went to Calvary, to be the substitute for our sin. Can you explain that kind of love? Now, I'm not going to go into this because I've got to deal with this Sunday morning. God dropped down all of His wrath on His Son when He was on the cross. Jesus was the propitiation for our sin. So, we focus on the physical suffering of Jesus, that that was nothing compared to having God's wrath drop down upon Him. Why did God do that? Because He loved me. Y'all got a grip on that? Because He loved me, because He loved you, that's why He did it. To save me from hell, that's the price that He had to pay. spared not His own Son to save you. And He was perfect, and He was innocent, and He was righteous. Yet He was made sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him." Everybody see it? Everybody see it? Number two. The statement of Abraham, I want to point out too, the statement of Abraham was, son, God will provide himself a land. Did he? He sure did. That land was the Lord Jesus. Most generally, when people say Jehovah-Jireh, they're talking about money. You're wanting to, you know, you're wanting to maybe build a building or you're wanting to do something, you'll say, well, Jehovah-Jireh, God will provide. It's always money related. But when Jehovah Jireh was said back there, it's talking about Jesus. God provided us a lamb. I just thought that was funny. You never really hear Jehovah Jireh in that kind of context. God provided a lamb to save this old hell-bound, rotten, no-good-for-nothing sinner. Perfect lamb who was his own son. Isaac's a good picture of Jesus, isn't he? He carried his own wood up to the place of sacrifice. Did Jesus do that? I mean, remember his dad put the wood on him and then they took the wood up the mountain and then he would have laid it out and laid it out and then laid him on it. It's a picture of bearing your own cross, isn't it? That's exactly what Jesus did 2,000 years ago. After his scourging, he went through Jerusalem bearing his own cross and he went, carried his own wood to the place of sacrifice. He was binded. Was Jesus binded? We've seen that this past Sunday. And whenever he was arrested, he was binded. Isaac was binded. And you know what? Isaac went here willingly. He could have run. But he went willingly. He allowed his dad to tie him up. And he did it willingly. Picture number four, the rams, the picture of Jesus. See all the pictures of Jesus in this? You see, instead of Isaac dying, instead of Isaac being sacrificed, there is a ram provided to be sacrificed. Everybody see it? Instead of me spending eternity in hell, instead of me, Jesus paid my debt 2,000 years ago. Romans 8 said there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. The whole Old Testament sacrifice, when they offered lambs, when they offered rams, when they had the burnt offerings and all these offerings, he said, what did it do? It pictured what Jesus was going to do. And this is a picture of what Jesus was going to do. The ram was a substitute. Instead of Isaac dying, the ram died. Instead of me spending the eternity in hell, Jesus was substituted for me. How about you? How about you? If you don't have a substitute, you'll die in your sin. That's a big deal. That's the worst thing that could happen to anybody. You'll die in your sin. There's been a substitute provided. Jesus told the unbelieving Jews in His day that unless you believe that I'm He, you'll die in your sin. So he told them. That's the same thing that's true today. It's more believing there's a God. I mean, most people believe that there's a God or believe that God exists. To be saved, you've got to trust Jesus as your substitute. You've got to trust that he died for you and rose again the third day. Trust it. Because that's the power of God, the salvation. Everybody trusts it. Ram's a picture of him too as a substitute, last of all. See a beautiful picture of the gospel, really. They're going up. Isaac carries his wood up there. And then instead of Isaac being killed, the Ram's provided. So you see a picture of what? Somebody tell me. Death. You see a picture of death. But then you have Isaac coming down off the mountain, how? Alive. What's that a picture of? The death and the resurrection, which is called what? The gospel. You see a beautiful picture of the gospel. The ram was substituted for Isaac, so you have a picture of the death. Isaac coming down off the mountain, alive, is a picture of the resurrection. Death, resurrection, that's the gospel message. Pretty picture, isn't it? John, isn't that a pretty picture? And that's what the Lord, just in this picture, you see what he did. You have a father who sacrifices his own son. And that's what God did 2,000 years ago for us. And that's why I love him so. Don't you? Let's all stand. Thank you.