You may turn in your Bibles this morning to Genesis chapter 22. Genesis chapter 22, we'll be looking at Abraham's faith in God's promise. Genesis chapter 22, probably a familiar portion of scripture to each of us. We'll look at the teaching of the text and then notice specifically some of the lessons and the typology.
Typology refers to those figures or symbols that are lightened in the Old Testament that point to realities in the New Testament. And certainly, the bare reading of Genesis chapter 22 does suggest many of those to our minds as we consider the cross of our Lord Jesus. I'll just pick up reading in Genesis 22 at verse 1. It came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham and said to him, Abraham, And he said, Here I am.
Then he said, Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you. So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey and took two of his young men with him and Isaac his son. And he split the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day, Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.
And Abraham said to his young men, stay here with the donkey. The lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you. So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac, his son. And he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and the two of them went together.
But Isaac spoke to Abraham, his father, and said, my father. And he said, here I am, my son. Then he said, look, the fire and the wood. Where is the lamb for a burnt offering?
And Abraham said, my son, God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering. So the two of them went together. Then they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built an altar there and placed the wood in order.
And he bound Isaac, his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched out his son and took the knife his son. The angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham. So he said, Here I am.
And he said, Do not lay your hand on the lad or do anything to him. For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me. Then Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son.
And Abraham called the name of the place the Lord will provide. As it is said to this day, in the mount of the Lord it shall be provided. Then the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time out of heaven and said, By myself I have sworn, says the Lord, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son. blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which is on the seashore. And your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies.
In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice. So Abraham returned to his young men, and they rose and went together to Beersheba. And Abraham dwelt at Beersheba. Amen.
Introduction
We often think we have problems, and then we read about a man like Abraham, and I hope it puts it all into perspective for us. We need to make sure that we don't divorce this passage from the rest of the life of Abraham. In Genesis chapter 12, the initial call of Abram was for him to get out of his country, to leave his family, to leave his father's house, and to go to a land that God would show him. We see Abraham's immediate obedience, so Abraham departed as the Lord had spoken to him, and Lot went with him.
We remember that Abraham had a son by the bondwoman named Ishmael. And back in chapter 21, or just in chapter 21, prior to chapter 22, Sarah said that the bondwoman and the son had to leave. Well, Abraham had love for his son Ishmael. says, and the matter was very displeasing in Abraham's sight because of his son. He had to leave everything that he knew, everything that he loved, and obey God.
And then when he has a son called Ishmael, that son is cast out. And of course he is displeased and saddened by this. God, however, says, don't be displeased. Don't let it be distressing to you.
It will be. fact that the promise will be ratified and confirmed in Isaac. But nevertheless, there's a human element there where there was pain in Abraham's life. And certainly that pain came to a pinnacle here at Mount Moriah. And there are in this section, it breaks down to the three main parts.
The first is the presentation of the test in verses one and two. Secondly, the obedience of Abraham in verses three to ten. and then the approval by God in verses 11 to 19.
Presentation of the Test
Let's notice, first of all, the presentation of the test in verses 1 and 2. Moses, I believe, wrote the book of Genesis under the inspiration of the Spirit, announces to us, the reader, in verse 1, that this was, in fact, a test. He is not telling us that God now demands child sacrifice. Verse 1 makes it very clear what's in view here.
This test is designed to prove the quality of Abraham's faith. We are not to conclude at this point that God has become like Moloch, that God has become like the gods of the pagans, that he now desires child sacrifice. That is not what is in view here. But we do need to remember that Abraham didn't know it was a test.
We read it. We're in tune with what's going on. But as far as Abraham knew, he was to take his son to Mount Moriah and to cut his throat and offer him up as a sacrifice before the Lord God Most High. We have seen Abraham called to leave his land, his country, his family, his father's house.
We see his grief over having lost Ishmael. And as one commentator says that this scene, chapter 22, presents the radical nature of true faith. Tremendous demands and incredible blessings. He is told to go to the land of Moriah, which later revelation tells us is the place where Aaronah, the Jebusite, had a threshing floor, and David built an altar there to worship God.
It would be, according to 2 Chronicles 3 and verse 1, the site of Solomon's temple. So, this Mount Moriah would fare later in biblical revelation as a place of much sacrifice. And then notice specifically the object of sacrifice, verse 2. Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love.
It's interesting that Isaac was the son of promise. Isaac was Abraham's only son, not alone, but only in terms of the preeminent one, the favored one, just like Jesus Christ is the one and only Son of God, the Father Most High. Only Son is repeated in the narrative three times. Son is repeated about ten times.
And I think Walt, he's right. The emphasis is inescapable. Abraham faces a monumental task. It is set before the reader constantly that this is one of the most intimate of human relationships, a father and his son and their love for one another.
We don't know how old Isaac was in this particular event or in this account. Some speculate he was around 13. Others speculate that he was about 20. I would guess that he was in his later teens.
He was strong enough to bear up wood on his body and to take it up the hill to Moriah. So probably in his teenage years, certainly the bond between Abraham and Isaac was very strong.
Obedience of Abraham
Now, let us look secondly at the obedience of Abraham, where we'll spend a bit more time.
Preparation for the Sacrifice
The first thing to notice is the preparation. The preparation involved. You've got to realize Moses writes here to get us into it. I mentioned last Sunday, we're not supposed to just read our Bibles and not think.
We're not supposed to just kick off our day timer that we read today, or that we tell our parents, yeah, I read today, or we tell our husband or wife, yeah, I read today. The text, the narrative is laced with meaning and with power. It is to affect us as we read. There is to be anguish.
There is to be identification. There is to be a bit of holy imagination. What did they consider on that three-day journey to Moriah? I mean, these things are in here for us to consider.
But the first thing, with reference to the preparation, is there is a lack of discussion. We see in verse 3, So Abraham rose early in the morning. Remember back in the time of Ishmael, God had said, this is not the son of promise in Genesis 17. And Moses says, oh, that it could be Ishmael.
And I'm sorry, Abraham said, oh, that it could be Ishmael. God says, no, there will be another son, the son of promise. So Abraham, as it were, dialogued with God. Remember when God comes to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, what does Abraham do?
He dialogues with God. He finds righteous men in the city. Will you spare the city? There's no dialogue here.
Perhaps this is Moses' indicator that Abraham's faith has come to that place where he doesn't even ask questions anymore. He just early in the morning departs and does what he is told. Notice the specific preparation. This is interesting.
Abraham rose early in the morning, verse 3, saddled his donkey, took two of his young men with him and Isaac, his son. And he split the wood for the burnt offering and rose and went to the place of which God had told him. That's interesting. He saddled his donkey, got the servants, got Isaac, and then went and split the wood.
This would be the equivalent of us turning on our cars and then going into the garage to gather up the supplies that we were going to get. We wouldn't do that, would we? Why? Because gas is 85 cents a liter.
We're too cheap to part with any gas. But logistically, we usually gather up our supplies, put it in the car, start the car, and then go. It's kind of a backwards order here. He saddles up the donkey, gets the people ready, and then he goes to split the wood?
Why does he do the splitting of the wood at the end? I think there's two suggestions. One is that distress causes confusion. Distress causes confusion.
The general rule, if you're thinking about plunging a knife into the throat or the heart of your son, You're not thinking orderly. A second suggestion might be that he put off to the end the grim reminder of the task that was ahead of him. That's the last thing he wanted to take was the wood, because he knew what that wood meant. It meant the burnt offering.
It meant the binding of Isaac. It meant the driving of the knife into his son.
The Three-Day Journey
Notice the journey. And the Bible highlights the divine direction of God. This is not something that Abraham does in an attempt to appease God. We see that he arose and went to the place of which God had told him.
God is in divine control of this whole scenario. Notice that it is a three-day journey, verse 4. Then on the third day, Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off. John Calvin is perceptive.
He writes, for God does not require him to put his son immediately to death, but compels him to revolve this execution in his mind during three whole days. That in preparing himself to sacrifice his son, he may still more severely torture all his own senses. It's a three-day journey. Remember, they're not going camping.
They're not going to a sporting event. They're not driving to the Super Bowl. They're not going on holiday. They're going to Moriah, where Abraham is tasked with killing his son.
I think Calvin's absolutely right. That three day journey was a time of great torment for this godly man, Abraham.
Isolation on the Mountain
Notice the instruction to the servants that Abraham gives in verses five, And following, Abraham said to his young men, stay here with the donkey. Interesting, huh? He brings his servants to stay here. He brings his servants simply to stay there.
The servants are brought along to be left behind. This is their function, a very strange one in any narrative. Characters who are introduced solely in order to take no part in it. It compounds our sense of Abraham's isolation.
He's not taking his servants up Moriah. Abraham must leave everything behind. His lonely journey up that mountain symbolizes the lonely, lonely psychological journey of faith to the place of sacrifice. And notice how he refers to Isaac here.
It's not my son, it's the lad. What's Abraham doing? He's probably trying to detach himself a little bit. He knows what's going to happen.
He's not calling him my son in this instance. He says the lad. There's a bit of a distance now between the two of them. But notice his assertion of great faith.
He says the lad and I will return. We are going to worship. We will return to you. Notice, he says that at the end of verse five.
We will come back to you. This is true faith, brothers and sisters. The book of Hebrews displays this activity of Abraham as a model of faith for the believer. Hebrews 11, 19 tells us, by faith, Abraham did this, concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense.
So Abraham is convinced that he goes to Moriah, he will return with Isaac, even if it means the Lord God will raise Isaac from the dead after he has acted in faith to sacrifice him. And then notice the sacrifice itself in verses six to ten. The preparation. Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on his son Isaac.
Isaac wasn't a five-year-old. He was able to bear up under the weight of wood, enough for sacrifice. Abraham took the fire and the knife to carry out the sacrifice. What's going on in his mind here?
It's got to be one of the most distressing times in the life of one of God's people. So we often look at Abraham as the model of faith, but we don't look at the events and the instances and the record that puts him in that category. I'm here to tell you, brothers and sisters, you will never increase in faith when everything goes well. It's just not going to happen.
The only way you will increase in faith is by God turning up the heat. We want to just sail into heaven without any, any problem whatsoever. We want to say, oh, yea and amen for men like Abraham. But should God ever come to test us, why me, Lord?
No hint of that whatsoever in the account of Abraham. Not one bit of complaint. Not one word of challenge. Why are you doing this to me?
He doesn't. He's pressed. It's through many tribulations we'll enter the kingdom of God. I realize we don't like that.
I understand that doesn't feel good. I understand. I'm right there at the top of the list. I want everything to go well.
I'd be lying to you if I said I want problems, I want distress, I want difficulties. I really love it. I have sort of a sick fascination when everything just goes miserably. That's not the Christian life.
I think 21st century North Americans need to get back to the Bible. We've had it way too good for way too long, and at the very smallest suggestion that there may be a rumble in the road, oh my, we just agree. I can't even begin to enter in to laying wood on my son's back. taking a knife and taking fire so that I can ascend to Moriah and put a knife in him. I can't get there.
I mean, I'd like to have some meditation and some thought on all this. I'd like to roll it around in my head, wonder what went on, what was going on in the minds, but to identify with Abraham? I can't do it.
Isaac's Question and Abraham's Answer
Notice the question. Why is he spoke to Abram and his father and said, my father. And he said, here I am, my son. Father and son again to remind us of the gravity of the situation.
Isaac's a perceptive young man, isn't he? We've got the wood, father. We've got the fire. We've got the knife.
We have everything for the sacrifice, father. But where's the lamb? And this is time for theology. You wouldn't think, on the way up Moriah, Abraham would be interested in teaching theology, but that's what he's doing.
See, Abraham likes theology. All the people in the Bible like theology. All the good people. The sinners don't like theology.
Sinners, they hate. And when I say sinner, I mean the unredeemed sinner. They hate theology. But notice what Abraham does in verse 8.
Abraham said, My son, God will provide for himself. It's the only way it would ever happen. God will provide for himself. Man can't provide.
Man can't undertake. If there is peace between heaven and earth, it's because God provides. Because God is the God of initiative. God is the God of sovereignty.
God is the God of power. Don't miss the emphasis of the text. My son, God will provide for himself the land for a burnt offering. So the two of them went together.
Abraham's response from Isaac's perspective. What's Isaac do with this answer? Commentator says to Isaac, it must have sounded like evasion, but he said nothing and went up, went on up the mountain. The two of them went together.
We are forced to conclude that he was naive and totally trusted his father, or that he now realized what was planned, yet he continued on up the mountain with his father. Either way, he was a perfect, blameless, sacrificial victim. Either he just, whatever you say, father, I'm sure there'll be a lamb or a ram up in the thicket, or he knew what was going on. And the text seems to hint that he knew what was going on.
If he was big enough and strong enough to bear the wood for sacrifice on his back up Mount Moriah, certainly he could have withstood his aged father when he comes at him with the ropes to bind him. Isaac understands what's going on. And as the commentator says, either way, he presents himself as that blemish-free sacrifice that the Lord God requires. What about Abraham's response?
Verse 8, My son, God, will provide for himself the land for a burnt offering from Abraham's perspective. Commentator Sailhammer answers, and I just read these guys because they hit it right on the head. He says, Abraham's words cast a new light on his silence. Amid the anguish that the reader has read into Abraham's silence, there is now also a silent confidence in the Lord who will provide.
Abraham's words should not be understood as merely an attempt to calm the curious Isaac, but in light of the fact that they anticipate the actual outcome of the narrative, they are to be read as a confident expression of his trust in God. We come to verse 8 and we see that model of faith saying, I know that God will provide. God will undertake. Remember the whole context of the Abraham story in the Bible.
The very calling of Abraham in Genesis chapter 12 is God's divine solution to the mess of Genesis 1 to 11. We see God make man upright, pristine, beautiful, given dominion over the creatures. And he plunges himself and his posterity into the depths of depravity. You see, in Genesis chapter 4, the very first family committing murder, brother against brother.
You see, Genesis 5, the divine comment on God's promise that in the day you eat, you shall surely die. Genesis 5 is punctuated with those words, and he died, and he died, and he died, and he died. Genesis 6, God looks upon the earth and it looks similar to what it does today. It is exceedingly corrupt and filled with violence.
There is nothing new under the sun. God sends a flood to destroy the earth except for Noah and his family. The post-Diluvian peoples want to build a tower. They want to build a place.
They want to reach into heaven itself. to make a name for themselves. So God confounds their speech. What do we see? Genesis 3 to 11.
We see the depravity of man. Genesis 12 is marked by God's solution. The call of Abraham. Abraham knew theology.
Abraham taught Isaac theology on the way up Mount Moriah.
The Act of Obedience
And then the act itself, verses 9 and 10. Then they came to the place of which God had told them. And Abraham built an altar there and placed the wood in order. And he bound Isaac, his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood.
Abraham's not a machine, brethren. Abraham's not just doing this without any recourse, without any thought whatsoever. Especially if Isaac is in the know and he's going along with it. It must have been filled with tears.
This is what our God calls us to. This is what the judge of all the earth deems is right. We will submit. We will obey.
We will give him his due. And notice, Abraham built an altar there. He binds his son, puts him on the altar. Abraham stretches out his hand, takes the knife to slay his son.
He is going to carry out this sacrifice. He is going to drive the knife into the son, his only son, the son whom he loves.
Approval of God
And then we come to the response, or the approval rather, of God. The angel of the Lord announces in verses 11 and 12, calls to him from heaven and says, Abraham, Abraham. So he said, here I am. It's the only thing Abraham says in this entire narrative twice to God, here I am.
He says it when God initially comes in verse 1, to call him to go to Moriah, here I am. Now God or the angel of the Lord comes and addresses him and he says, here I am. Abraham sets a good precedence for godly men to follow. This is Samuel's response, here I am.
This is Isaiah's response, here I am. This is the Lord Jesus' response, here I am. This is Paul's response. Here I am.
This is the response of godly men when it comes to the Lord Most High. Here I am. Obedience. Service.
Submission. Subordination. Not take someone else. Not are you sure.
Here I am is the response that this godly man offers up. And then he responds. Now I know. He says, Do not lay your hand on the lad or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.
James 2, 21 to 24, in James's argument there, he is highlighting that whether you're a patriarch or you're a prostitute, genuine biblical faith will be demonstrable. James tells us it was not this act which earned Abraham's salvation. Abraham believed God according to Genesis 15, and it was declared unto him as righteousness. It is Genesis 22 that demonstrates, that actualizes, that gives breath to the reality that he had in fact believed God and had been accounted as righteous.
For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son from me." Verse 13, the sacrifice is provided. Abraham's theology lesson in verse 8 comes true in verse 13. Abraham lifted his eyes and looked and there behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by its thorns. So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son.
So the sacrifice is provided and the place is named Yahweh Yireh. Jehovah Jireh, the Lord will provide. Verse 14, Abraham called the name of the place. The Lord will provide, as it is said to this day in the mouth of the Lord, it shall be provided.
Again, we just read that Abraham, you know, solemnly says the Lord will provide. Abraham was probably doing a jig. He was back flipping. He was dancing.
He was singing. This is the place where the Lord will provide. He was going to bury a knife in his son, and the angel of the Lord says, don't. You don't respond by going, OK, the Lord will provide.
You say, yes, the Lord will provide. The Lord has provided. The Lord is good. The Lord is merciful.
The Lord is kind and gracious. And if sinners are ever to be saved, it must be by the Lord Himself. Yahweh Yireh is a statement, a testimony to the true and the living God that He does provide. And then the promise that God had given to Abraham in chapters 12 and 13 and 15 and 17 and 18 is reconfirmed here.
Essentially, that promise was threefold. Abraham would inherit a land. Abraham would inherit a seed. And Abraham would inherit blessing.
It would be through Abraham that both circumcised and uncircumcised would be blessed in Jesus Christ. And that promise is reconfirmed here. by the Lord God most high to his servant Abraham. And we can say the promise is fulfilled precisely because God would provide himself the lamb of his own choosing.
Concluding Thoughts
And that brings us to consider a couple of concluding thoughts. First, the faith of Abraham. This is the kind of faith that we need. This is the type of faith the church desperately needs.
The Faith of Abraham
This is the kind of faith that Paul wrote of in Romans chapter 4. He says, Therefore it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, and not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. As it is written, I have made you a father of many nations in the presence of him whom he believes. who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did. One of my favorite statements in all the scriptures, Romans 4, 18, as it describes Abraham, who, contrary to hope, in hope believes.
That's faith. It's easy to hope. It's easy to believe when everything's going right. You have a good job.
You're a nice wife. Great kids, great house, great car. Gas is 75 cents a liter. No threat of economic disaster on the horizon.
No threat of government encroachment in our lives. See, it's easier to have faith then. It's easier to have hope then. That's why it's been so important to study the mind of prophets in our Sunday evening services.
Let's have an eye at what it's like to have hope. Contrary We'll ask Habakkuk what it's like to have hope, contrary to hope. See, this is a man of faith. True, contrary to hope, in hope he lives.
Paul doesn't stop. Contrary to hope, in hope believes so that he became the father of many nations according to what was spoken, so shall your descendants be. and not being weak in faith, he did not consider his own body already dead, since he was about 100 years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb. He did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God. Abraham was not perfect.
You read the Genesis account, and you will see times where you go, come on, Abraham, you shouldn't do that. But the totality of his life is such that he is a model of biblical faith. Because in hope, or contrary to hope, in hope he believed. He believed God.
He didn't waver at the promise of God through unbelief. I was in my own study in preparation for Zephaniah tonight. One of the commentators that I'm reading, he says, we'll trust God in matters of salvation. We will trust God in the matter of the forgiveness of sin.
We trust God when it comes to Acts 16, 31. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. But when we're in a boat and the waves are knocking it and battering it and the tempest has come, we're crying out, Lord, will you help us? We'll trust him for eternal security.
We're not in a temple life. Especially when his son has said, look at the birds, look at the flowers. Aren't you more valuable than they? Don't you merit on the scale a little more than a sparrow, PETA notwithstanding?
Don't you merit more than those lilies in the field? Jesus didn't come to die for lilies and sparrows. He came to die for image bearers. He came to die for us.
Why are you anxious? Why are you worried? What's the matter with you? Paul's whole argument, which we'll see in just a moment in Romans 8, where he likens God to Abraham in a sense, says if He has done the greater, delivering Him up for us all, how will He not with Him also freely give us all things? believed God.
The Promise of God Reconfirmed
Secondly, the promise of God reconfirmed in this passage. I mentioned Genesis 12, 13, 15, 17, 18. You know what you get as a refrain, as a pattern, as an anthem? I will bless.
I will bless. I will bless. I will bless. I will bless.
That's our God. I will bless. Abraham, through you, I'm going to bless all the nations. Abraham, through your seed, which later is identified specifically as Jesus, through your seed, I will bless all the families of the earth.
Now remember, Abraham's a hunter. He already had a son, and he said, God, may it be Ishmael. God says, no, not Ishmael. It's going to be Isaac, the son you don't have yet.
Lord, the equipment doesn't work like it used to. Lord, you're expecting things out of us that physiologically are impossible. Believe God. We talk about being Calvinists and reformed and theology and predestination and decree of God, and yet we carry on like the most feminized, Arminian, liberal-minded Christians that have no God.
God has confirmed, according to Hebrews 6, 17, an oath to bless. See, when Jesus said, I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it, He's not just throwing out something for consideration. If you want to believe it, believe it. He is speaking in a theological context of a promising God.
Hebrews 6, 13, for when God made a promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no one greater, he swore by himself. That's who God swears by. Saying, surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you. And so after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise.
For men indeed swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation is for them, and end of all dispute. Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability or unchangeability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath that by two immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us. This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the presence behind the veil where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become high priest forever, according to the order of Melchizedek. We are to read Genesis 22.
We are to sympathize and empathize and enter in with Abraham and the testing of his faith, such that we'll probably never have to go through. But what we are to come out on the other side with is a praising God for the fact that he will provide. And we on this side of Calvary ought to praise God that Yahweh, Yireh, is fulfilled at Calvary.
Typology of Genesis 22
The event itself pointed to the exodus. This is the typology. The event itself pointed to the exodus. Remember, Israel was to travel three days and worship God upon a mountain.
The event pointed to the sacrificial system. When they left Egypt, they were to engage in tabernacle worship. They were to begin cutting up animals. They were to begin burning them in sacrifice and in offering to God.
So this event in Genesis 22 is a type of the exodus and the sacrificial system that would follow, which, of course, are fulfilled in hell. Abraham typifies God the Father. Both Abraham and God the Father are willing to part with their only son, son of their love. But this typification breaks down.
It only goes so far. Abraham is going to bury his wife, but he doesn't have to. God the Father buries the wife. This is the thrust of Isaiah 53.
Sometimes our delicate sensitivities cannot handle it, but it was easy for the Lord to crush the Son. That's what the text says. It pleased the Lord to bruise Him, putting Him to grief. Why?
For us. For you and I. God carried through with the sacrifice. As I mentioned before, Romans 8.32, he who did not spare his own son.
Abraham didn't spare Isaac, but he was stopped in the act of sacrifice. God delivered him up for us all. How shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Isaac typifies God the Son, doesn't he?
Can't miss it. Isaac is told to carry the wood up Mount Moriah to the place of sacrifice. Christ bears the cross to Golgotha, the place of sacrifice. Jesus Christ, however, is different than Isaac.
Jesus was actually sacrificed. You see, on that day at Calvary, there was no angel of the Lord who came and said, stop. On that day of Calvary, divine justice was satisfied. On that day at Calvary, the sword did pierce through the Son of God.
So much so that he cried out, Why hast thou forsaken me? There was no angelic interference. There was no help from the audience. There was simply the carrying out of divine vengeance on sin.
God made him who knew no sin. to be sin for us. And when He is sin for us, God executes Him. God fulfills the vengeance of the covenant in the Son of His love. And then His Son rises from the dead and His righteousness is given to us.
We don't earn it. We don't work for it. It's not because it's been infused and we do better. It is a legal transaction.
God takes perfect righteousness gives it to us by grace. And interestingly enough, the ram, that oft-unnoticed character of verse 13, typifies Jesus Christ. That ram caught in the thicket that was behind Abraham. In verse 8, Abraham states that God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering.
How could anybody neglect the Old Testament? I'm here to tell you, if you neglect the Old Testament, you're neglecting Jesus. You don't read your Old Testament, you're not reading about Jesus. You're getting half the story.
Sit at the feet of Abraham to learn Christology, please. Sit at the feet of Abraham to learn about your Savior. In verse 13, Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by its thorns. So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up for a burnt offering.
Note the language instead of. Don't we love substitutionary atonement in this church? Isn't this one of the things that make us happy? Substitutionary atonement.
The substitute taking our place. Genesis 22, 13 teaches substitutionary atonement. The ram and the thicket is taken by Abraham. It is sacrificed instead of his son.
This is the rich backdrop for that blessed day when John the Baptist cast a longing look upon Jesus and said, Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. That Lamb has been provided. That lamb is the one whom we remember. That lamb at Mount Moriah typified Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
Genesis 22 in Moriah itself is rich with biblical theology, rich with what it teaches and instructs us concerning Jesus Christ, concerning his love for his people, concerning his obedience to his Father, and concerning his Father's love. infection of sinners, because it was through the death of Christ, through his substitutionary atonement, he died instead of his people. Let us pray.
Closing Prayer
Our Father in heaven, we thank you so much for this account in Genesis 22. We thank you so much for the willingness of the Father and the Son to engage in this glorious covenant of redemption for sinners. We thank you for the spirit of the living God who takes these realities and applies them to our hearts, who gives us the graces of faith and repentance, causes us to see the beauty of Jesus Christ. And our Father, we just pray that you would increase our faith.
Help us to live more like Abraham. Forgive us, Lord God Almighty, that though we have these rich promises, though we have the abundance of Abraham's story and all of the rest of the Bible, Just so often we live as hopeless men and women. God, I pray that you would increase our faith. Give us that unwavering confidence in the God who has promised.
We ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.