Genesis: Binding of Isaac

Merry Christmas. I'm the probably ten thousandth person that said

that to you. I'm going to totally date myself here.

If you know what I'm talking about, I'm dating you

who remembers when we're kids, we'd be watching a TV

show or a movie, and it seemed like it always happened.

At the climax, the screen would go black and then

this image would appear. You know this is old because

it's not culturally appropriate, but this would be followed by

a loud, obnoxious beep, and then you would hear these words,

this is only a test. I remember as a kid,

every time that would pop up, I'd hear, this is

only a test. I remember thinking, this is a bad

time for a test. We have been looking at the

story of Genesis. The first eleven chapters of Genesis is

what scholars refer to as prehistory. But now we've started

on Genesis twelve and it's focused around this guy by

the name of Abraham. And I shared with you a

principle that I want to bring home today. So I

want you to understand the way that God will work

with you, the way that God speaks to us. Here's

the way it works. God will give you a command.

With it, he will attach a promise. He will await

your response, but then he will all always put it

to the test. I want to ask everyone to buy

your heads, close your eyes. I want you to repeat

this prayer after me. Everyone say, Dear Jesus, speak to

my heart, change my life in Jesus' name. Amen. So

we've been looking at this guy, Abraham. We were introduced

to him in Genesis twelve. He was a seventy five

year old man without a child. He was married to

a gal by the name of Sarah who was sixty five,

and Sarah was barren. What we know about Abraham and

Sarah is that they were pagans who worshiped idols. But

they had this encounter with God that changed everything. In

Genesis twelve, God speaks to Abraham and he says, go

from your country, your people, your father's.

Household, to the land I will show you.

God gives him a clear command, but with it God

attached a promise. In scripture, these are famous. These are

referred to as the three I Wills. God says Abraham,

if you go, I will make you a great nation.

I will bless you, I will make your name great

so these promises came with enormous implication. For Abraham and Sarah,

this was an assumption that even though she was barren,

God was going to give them children. They knew that

at some point God was going to do a miracle,

we were going to have kids. So for the last

two weeks we focused on Abraham's response. So again God

gives a command. With it, he attaches the pro he

awaits our response. Well, Abraham, he went kind of he

had some detours along the way. He's kind of like

you and I like, he obeys reluctantly, kind of the

way that he's supposed to. But the whole time, though

he's not perfect along the way, it seems like day

after day is a constant test of will he trust

God or not. It's the test of whether or not

he will trust that God has a plan or he'll

try to figure it out himself. You see, God always

has a way he wants us to go, and then

there's a way that seems right to us. You see,

there's God's way and then there's what makes sense to Brandon.

In Genesis fifteen, which is where we're going to start today,

he's ten years into this journey and he still doesn't

have any kids.

Church.

This journey with Jesus that you and I are on together,

this is a school of faith that every single day, every.

Single week, we are going through.

This test of whether or not we will trust the

promises of God or if we'll take matters into our

own hand. You see, this journey with Jesus is this

constant journey of trusting. We are about to, at the

end of this service take this miracle offering. So we

did this years ago. We did a three year capital

campaign pledge. Over those three years, we raised eight million

dollars and that's how we.

Built this building.

Now, I will be honest that I struggled with doubt

the entire time, Like doubt was deeply in my heart

that first time. But my doubt came from that the

resources were actually in the people. Like I did not

think it was possible that our church could give over

and above their tithe eight million dollars over those three years.

That was what I struggled with. Well, you're in a building,

so you know what happened. You know, once again I doubted,

and God was trying to teach me trust. As we've

geared up for this miracle offering trying to raise a

million and a half dollars by the end of the year.

My doubt is on a whole other level.

I fully believe that the resources for us to pull

this off are here. Totally believe it. I mean, I've

seen eight million dollars come in the church, is three

times the size it was with the people that raised this.

So I believe we can do this. But here's my struggle.

My struggle really simply is, Uh, Die and I were

gearing up. I shared with you a couple of weeks

ago that we're about to give the largest single gift

that we've ever given in our lives. And as I'm

moving money around to prepare for this gift because uh,

you know, I want to give it on my last

Airlines card because I at least got to get the

miles come on. So I got a clear space, pay this,

do this. And so I'm moving all this around, and

I'm watching this money that was in a savings account

that brought a lot of security to Die and I

and I said this to Die. I said, Die, I'm

really anxious about this. I didn't realize how this money

and this savings account brought me security. And I've always

joked that there's God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit than Die.

So sometimes God doesn't want to like speak him sell

or through the Holy Spirit, so he just says, I'll

prompt Die to say something to him. And so Die says,

God has been so generous us to Brandon's He's been

so generous to us. It'll be fine. But just like you,

I struggle with doubt. Every day. God is gonna ask

you how much you trust him. Abraham is struggling to

believe the promises of God. It had been ten years.

He's in his late eighties, and he still doesn't have

a son. So God gives him this vision ten years later.

You're gonna notice over and over again in Abraham's journey

that there are these moments he has an encounter with God.

Sometimes they're ten years apart, sometimes they're twenty five years apart.

But he has these spiritual mile marker moments where.

God speaks to him.

So he has this vision and again in the midst

of his doubt, and he responds to God by saying, Lord, what.

Can you give me?

Since I remain childless? You've given me no children. So

a servant in my household will be my heir. We

are reminded again that Abraham, like us, struggles with doubts.

Here's the deal with doubt. Doubt is normal. Doubt does

not make you an unbeliever. All doubt does is make

you a believer who happens to have some doubts. And

God again reminds Abraham of his promise Genesis fifteen, verse five.

He took him outside, and he said, I want you

to look up and count the stars. He says, If

indeed you can count them, so shall your offspring be.

He says, Abraham, all of these countless stars, that is

gonna be the amount of children, grandchildren, great grandchildren you

are gonna have. I'm gonna make you a great nation.

Well remember it wasn't just Abraham. There was also Sarah.

So Sarah was struggling with this too.

I always wondered what was it like to be Sarah.

You're in irv Caldi's, You've made this home, You're around

all of your extended family, and your husband has this

encounter with God. You're sixty five, you're barn and he

has just gotten a word from God that not only

are they gonna have children, but they're gonna have so

many kids and grandkids. It's gonna make them a great nation.

And now here you are ten years later, and you're

still barren. She had struggled with infertility for seventy years.

Genesis sixteen, verse one to two. You guys still with me? Now, Sarah,

Abraham's wife, had borne him no children, but she had

an Egyptian slave named Hagar. So she said to Abraham,

the Lord has kept me from having children, Go sleep

with my slave. Perhaps I can build a family through her.

Now we read this and we think this is a

terrible idea. This is not a good idea.

But believe it or not. Back then, this was the

cultural norm.

If you were unable to have children of your own,

you could have them through your maid servant. Now God

had given them a command, and with it he.

Attached to promise.

But God's plan and trusting him didn't make any sense.

This made sense to them.

This seemed like a reasonable, culturally appropriate solution to them.

But this was not God's plan. But Abraham slept with Hagar.

So Hagar bore Abraham a son, and Abraham gave him

the name Ishmael, to the son she'd borne him there's

a proverb that you should memorize. It's Proverbs fourteen to two.

It says, there is a way that seems right to

a person, but its end is the way of death.

Well, this is what makes sense to.

Me, Brandon, This is the way I think things should

be done. This is this is what seems reasonable to me.

But God said do this.

There's a way that seems right to a person, but

in the end it leads to death. Did you know

as a result of this decision, Abraham Sarah had so

many issues arise. Eventually, Sarah gets incredibly jealous of her

maid servant, Hagar. She strongly dislikes Ishmael. As Sarah eventually

has the son, Ishmael mocks and doesn't get along with

his son. This eventually leaves to Hagar and Ishmael being

banished from the family. They were forced to leave and

sent out. Now I don't have time to go into that.

I have a podcast this week on our Pastor's Unfiltered Podcast.

We're gonna do a deep dive on Genesis. We're gonna

hit a couple areas that I can't cover here. We're

gonna talk about the ramifications of Ishmael and Isaac. We're

also gonna talk about the Melchizedek priesthood, and we're gonna

talk about the Abra Covenant. Encourage you to listen to

that podcast for a deeper dive.

But this was what seemed reasonable to them.

Well, let's just have a kid through our maid servant

Genesis seventeen, verse one. So now Abraham's ninety nine. This

is twenty five years after God sent him from er.

It says when Abraham was ninety nine years old, the

Lord appeared to him and said, I am God Almighty.

Walk before me faithfully and be blameless. Then I will

make my covenant between me and you and will greatly

increase your numbers. So Abraham again gets this reminder from

God that God's promises to him are true, that God

is going to come through, but his reality is far

from this promise. How many of you have stepped out

in faith doing something that you believe God has for

you to promise to it and now your present reality

is far from what you thought God promised you. If

that's you, you relate to Abraham a lot. So in

the middle of all of this, he's now almost a hundred.

God is still promising him a son. In verse fifteen,

God said to Abraham, as far as Sarah your wife,

I'll bless her and will surely give you a son

by her. I will bless her so that she will

be the mother of nations. Kings of people will come

from her. Remember, the people are one hundred, Sarah is ninety.

This is ridiculous, And that is exactly the way that

Abraham felt about it.

So the Bible says.

That Abraham fell face down, and he started laughing to himself.

He's like, will a son be born to a man

who's a hundred? Will Sarah bear a child at the

age of ninety? Why do you think Sarah philt about this?

Genesis eighteen, verse eleven. Abraham and Sarah were already very old,

and Sarah was past the age of child Bary. So

Sarah laughed to herself, and she thought this or her words,

not mine. She said, after I am worn out and

my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?

So Abraham thinks this is ridiculous. He's laughing about it,

just like you think it's ridiculous. Sarah thinks it's ridiculous.

She's laughing about it, just like you think it's ridiculous.

And then God tells them this, your wife, Sarah will

bear you a son, and you were to call him Isaac.

This is kind of interesting.

We know the name Isaac now very popular church name.

It's probably a bunch of Isaac's in here. It's probably

a bunch of you. They're gonna have kids in the

next year. You're gonna have an Isaac. Back then, Isaac

was not a common name. God told them to name

him Isaac. They never would have picked that because of

what the name Isaac means. Isaac means one who laughs,

like is literally God saying, oh yeah, I know this

is a joke. I know this is absurd. We're just

gonna name this guy. He's a joke. So we're all kidding,

we're all laughing. So Isaac, when he's bored, his name

means laugh. So in Genesis twenty one, finally happens. Sarah

becomes pregnant bore a son to Abraham in his old age,

at the very time God promised him. God will give

you a command. With it, he will attach a promise.

He will await your response, and then he'll put it

to test over and over and over again, and at

just the right moment, God will fulfill his promise. We

ask you, guys, We challenged you with this offering, figure

out what you can plan to do. And some of

you looked at your finances and said, I could afford this.

I'll give this. But then we said, have a vision. Okay,

if a few other things fell into place, I could

probably give this.

And then I said, but have a dream.

Put God to the test, say all right, Lord, here's

what I would love to give. But this seems ridiculous,

This is unreasonable. This is you saying, Lord, take some

of what's in your hands, place it in mine, and

I will be obedient.

With what happens.

And just see what happened. And the most fun thing

for the staff over the last month has been those

stories from you guys. I mean, we have heard one

miracle provision story after another of God placing in someone's

hand what their dream was. At just the right moment,

God will fulfill his promise. So now Isaac is born,

and my introduction is over.

So now let's get to what I want to talk about.

Genesis twenty two. Thirty years have passed, so we now

jumped forward thirty years. Abraham Isaac and Sarah have planted

their roots in the area of Bearsheba, Ishmael, and Hagar

have long been sent away. And then Genesis twenty two,

Verse one happens some time later God tested Abraham. Abraham

was seventy five when God told him to go. He

was a hundred when he finally saw the beginning of

the fulfillment of the promise of God. It's now thirty

years later and God decides to test him again. Why

does God test us seriously? Why do we go through stuff?

Why does God make us face one test after another?

Why do we struggle with our kids? Why do we

struggle in our marriages? Why do we struggle with our finances?

Why do we struggle with our health? Why do we

face tests? Will tests measure our achievement, tests measure our proficiency,

But tests also identify areas where you and I need

to grow. Did you know that You're never too old

to grow? You're never too old to change. You're never

too old to face new challenges, to fight new battles,

to learn new truths. When you and I stop learning,

we stop growing. When we stop growing, we stop living.

I really want you to hear this, all eyes on me.

Our faith.

Is truly not tested until God asks us to bear

what seems unbearable, to do what seems unreasonable, and to

expect what seems impossible. So now Abraham is getting tested again.

God comes to him and says, Abraham, here I am.

Abraham replied, God said, take your son, your only son,

whom you love, Isaac, and go to the region of Mariah.

This word go is the same word go that Abraham

heard in Genesis twelve when God told him to go

from the air of the Caldis into a country he'd

never been, And now he's hearing that word go again.

There is this document called the mid Rash. It's a

volume of rabbi's teachings around for centuries. This has been

accumulated around the Torah. Rabbis describe this interaction between God

and Abraham this way. They say God comes to Abraham

and says, Abraham wants you to get your son, and

I want you to go take him to Mariah.

And Abraham says.

Well, which son I have two sons? Don't forget he

also had Ishmail, and the rabbi say. God responded by

saying the one you love well, I love both.

Of my sons.

And then God says, no, your favorite son, Isaac. You

know what's fascinating about this passage of scripture. You ready

says take the son you love, the one you love.

Did you know that that is the first time the

word love is used in the Bible, the very first instance.

The first time love is used.

It's in reference to how much Abraham loved Isaac. I

told you that every page of the Bible you can

find Jesus over and over again. In the Book of

Genesis there is hints to the person of Jesus. You

should see the hint about Jesus here. What is John

three sixteen remind us? It reminds us about God's love

for his only son, but that he loved you and

I so much that he was willing to sacrifice his

son for you and I. Then he says, your son,

the one you love, Isaac, sacrifice him there as a

burnt offering on a mountain. I will show you our

faith is not really tested until God asks us to

bear what seems unbearable, to do what seems unreasonable.

And expect what seems impossible.

This is unreasonable, I mean, consider how unreasonable this request was.

Isaac is Abraham and Sarah's only son. The future promised

rests on him.

His birth alone was a miracle.

He was literally a gift from God to Abraham and Sarah.

This is unreasonable. You and I know this is only

a test.

We know we've read it.

We know we know the end of this.

We know this is a test.

Abraham didn't know that. To Abraham, this was just life.

Verse three. Early the next day, Abraham got up, loaded

his donkey, took with him two of his servants, his

son Isaac. Here's the key. It's gonna refer to Isaac

as a boy. It's gonna refer to Isaac as a son.

Scholars debate how old he was. I agree with the

scholars that say he was likely in his thirties. He

was still really young back then when their ages lasted

so long. But this was a man, So think the

age of many of you. This is happening to him,

his son Isaac. Then he had cut enough wood for

the burn to offering, and he set out for the

place God had told him about.

Verse four.

On the third day, Abraham looked up and he saw

the place in the distance. He said to his servants,

stay here with the donkey, will I and the boy

go over there, we will worship, and then we will

come back to you. Let me show you a map. Okay,

so this is the region where they were Bearsheba. They

traveled north three days to that region up there, Mariah.

Back then there was a small town there. It was

called Salem. That town would eventually become one of the

most significant cities in history, Jerusalem.

But they went up to Mariah.

When they looked up at the mountain, Abraham looks up,

looks at his servants, say I want you to stay here.

Stay here, and then what does he say? He says,

the boy and I will go, We will worship, and

then we will come.

Back to you.

Did you notice the keyword at the end of the

verse says we.

We'll come back to you.

We will worship, We Isaac and I will come back

to you. Abraham didn't know how, He just knew Isaac

would come back.

Now, I'll tell you church.

Abraham obeyed because he knew God would never contradict his

promise that if God said it, it has to be true.

God promised children would come from Isaac. If God says something,

it must happen.

It has to happen.

God cannot lie. Now, I will tell you this made

no sense to Abraham at this moment. Abraham couldn't depend

on his feelings. I know, we're like a feelings are

such a big deal today. Well this is how I feel,

you know. I hear that from people all the time

when they come in and they're fighting with their spouse. Well,

this is the way I feel. Well, Abraham couldn't trust

his feelings. How do you think he felt when he

loved his son? His feeling was pain. This feeling was anngst.

The other thing that Abraham couldn't do is he couldn't

depend on other people.

No one would get this. Most scholars believe he didn't even.

Talk to his wife about it because she'd have never

let her son go, So he couldn't depend on anyone else.

Abraham could only depend on the promises of God. This

makes no sense, but God, says.

Verse six.

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering. He placed

it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the

fire and the knife. As the two of them went

on together, Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham,

this is the only time in all of scripture. We

see Isaac and Abraham interact with each other the only

time we see them talk outside of God, the Father

and Jesus. This is the most important father son relationship

and all of scripture, and this is the only time

we see them talk. Isaac's father, Yes, my son, Abraham replied,

the fire in the water are here, but where is

the lamb for the burnt offering? Abraham answered, God himself

will provide the lamb for the burnt offering my son.

And the two of them went on together.

That those two words went on together. It's used twice,

those two words. It's used twice in this passage. Here's

what it means in Hebrew. They were totally united. They

were in absolute agreement. In other words, they were one.

So they went on this journey. None of this makes sense,

but they are in absolute agreement. They were one, And

Abraham says, God will provide the lamb for the burnt offering.

And they went on together in total agreement. Then verse nine,

when they reached the place that God had told him about,

Abraham built an altar there and he arranged the wood

on it. He bound his son Isaac, and he laid

him on the altar on top of the wood. Could

you imagine what was happening in that moment? Talk about

something that doesn't make sense. First off, Isaac was a man.

He could have easily overpowered Abraham, but we see him

totally yield to his father. Could you imagine the spiritual

battle going on in Abraham's mind.

On the one hand, I.

Totally trust the promises of God. On the other hand,

this is insane, this is crazy. Scholars believe that at

this moment Abraham didn't know how God was gonna do it,

but they believed that Abraham believed that God was gonna

raise Isaac from the grave, that it was gonna actually

have to go through with it, but that God was

gonna raise him up from the grave. So he grabs

a knife and he's going to go through with this,

And the whole time Abraham is thinking, God promised me,

Isaac is gonna have a child. This is God's problem now.

Then he reached out his hand and he took the

knife to slay his son, but the aide of the

Lord called out to him from heaven, Abraham, Abraham.

Here, I am, do not lay a hand.

On the boy. Do not do anything now, I know

that you fear God because you have not withheld me, your.

Son, your only son. Clarity.

God abores human sacrifice. He hates it. God never intended

a human sacrifice to happen here.

That is one of the reasons that if you talk

to someone.

Who is Hebrew or you use a Hebrew Bible, that

portion of scripture is referred to as the Binding of Isaac,

where some English translations call it the sacrificing of Isaac.

Here's what God was doing. God was testing Abraham. He

was testing him to say, Abraham, do you.

Will you do.

For me, for the One True God, the only God,

as other people will for their man made gods. Every

ancient society back then practiced human sacri to appease their gods.

Abraham was familiar with the practice.

God was challenging.

Him, Abraham, are you willing to do for me what

other societies would do for their false gods? Will you

be as committed to me, the One True God, as

everyone else around you is to all their false idols?

Did you know that that is.

The test that you and I get to take almost daily.

Are we gonna be as committed.

To the Jesus that we believe is the one true God,

as all these other people that are lost around us

are to all.

Their false idols.

So at just the moment he's about to plunge the

knife into his son Isaac, a voice from heaven shout, Abraham,

this is only a test.

This is so cool.

When I'm about to share with you, I hope you

catch it, says the Angel of the Lord, shouted from heaven.

What is the Angel of the Lord. The Angel of

the Lord is a theophony.

It is the.

Physical manifestation of Jesus in the Old Testament. This was

the pre incarnate Jesus speaking to him. You and I

we are about to celebrate the incarnation. What is the

incarnation where God becomes man. That's what Christmas is all about.

It's that Jesus became man, a baby in a manger.

This is the pre incarnate Jesus on Mount Mariah telling Abraham,

this is only a test. For those of you who

know your Bible's really well. It was about two thousand

years later. That's near the area where Jesus himself would

be sacrificed for mine and your sin. That is the

place near where Jesus came to our rescue Jesus is

on every page of the Bible. All of a sudden

they looked up and there's a ram in the thorns.

They grabbed the ram and they sacrifice it to God,

and Abraham names that place Jehovah Jirah, which means God

provides in just a moment. Where are going to receive

a miracle? Offering for a miracle.

Doesn't make sense.

It seems like I should do this over a year

that seems totally doable, totally reasonable. But instead we're gonna

try to do this today and the end of the year.

So I'm gonna ask you in just a moment, I'm

gonna pray for you. First, I'm gonna ask you to

come forward and lay your promise at the altar. So

there's gonna be in fact, I'll invite the ushers to come.

They're gonna or the trustees, boards, pastors, they're gonna come,

and they're gonna stand up front with a basket.

So this is for those of.

You that came prepared to give, like cash, maybe in

an offering envelope.

You're gonna give a check, whatever it may be.

For those of you that came prepared to give online

or this is the way you give You can scan

that QR code. But this is us believing that God

is gonna prove for us, So calm, bring your offering.

And then we gave you that little promise card. And

this is what you're saying. All right, Lord, you gave

a command. This is the promise that I'm believing. I'm

believing that as I release this, you were gonna do this.

One of my mentors used to always say, he said,

every dream needs the seed for a miracle. So if

I have a dream something that i'm believing for evidence,

here I give God a seed to work with. And

then what we're believing that in the weeks, months, years,

to calm, these miracles are gonna happen. And when they do,

you're gonna tell us about it. And I've written one down.

I'm believing that I'm gonna see a miracle too. So

I want you to stand up. I'm gonna pray for you.

In just a moment, we are believing for radical provision

for our church. You're going to bring your hope filled

request to Jesus with your offering. And I want to

explain the way that God provides. Where does God provide

our needs the place of his assignment. When does God

meet our needs when we have the need and not

a minute before?

How does God provide.

For us in ways that are usually quite natural.

God gives you a bonus, you.

Get a sale you weren't expecting, but they're kind of

normal things. To whom does God give us provision those

who trust him obey his commands?

Why does God meet.

Each and every one of our needs? Why does God

do this? God does this so we can make his

name famous. God does this so that we will give

him all the glory, all the praise, all the honor.

So I want you to hold that little promise.

Card in your hand.

I'm gonna grab.

Mine, Lord Jesus. In the next several moments, as people

take a step of faith, as they obediently give what

they felt compelled upon their hearts to give, Lord, I

pray that you would bless them, that you would give

them the courage and Now, Lord, as they lay this

request at your feet, God, I want to pray that

these requests, these miracles, that we would see these over

and over and over again come to pass in the weeks, months,

years to come. You want to be people that are

generous because you have been so generous with us, and

now Lord, I pray that you would bless every person here.

May this be a spiritual mile marker moment in all

of our lives. In Jesus' name, Amen,