1.
Grace, mercy, and peace to you from
God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The
message for this 4th Sunday in Advent is taken from Genesis 22:1-18,
which says (READ TEXT). The message is
entitled, “The Lord Comes Through,” dear
brothers and sisters in Christ.
2.
The story has been told of a man who
was crossing a desert in the days of the pioneers. He ran into trouble and was
dying of thirst when he spotted a pump near an abandoned shack. He had no water
to prime the pump, but he noticed a jug of water near the pump with a note
attached. It read: “There is just enough
water in this jug to prime the pump, but not if you drink some first. This well
has never gone dry, even in the worst of times. Pour the water in the top of
the pump and pump the handle quickly. After you have had a drink, refill this
jug for the next man who comes along.”
3.
What would the man dying of thirst
do? What would you do—follow the
instructions on the note, or stick with the “bird in the hand,” as it were?
You know the proverb don’t you, “a
bird in the hand is worth two in the bush?”
It means that having something, even if it’s a lesser quantity is
better than taking the chance of losing it in order to attain something else
that seems more desirable. In this text
Abraham had a bird in the hand, his
son Isaac. We don’t know exactly how old Isaac was at this time, but he was
Abraham’s pride and joy. Still, God had told Abraham to sacrifice the bird in the hand. Abraham was to pour
out Isaac’s life. He was supposed to take Isaac to the land of Moriah, kill
him, and make him a burnt offering.
4.
These words of the Lord fell upon
Abraham with a tremendous weight. We might have a sense of how chilling a thing
it is to kill another human being. (It
should be noted that throughout the Old Testament the worship of the Lord God
didn’t involve human sacrifice, unlike the worship of many, many false gods.
This text is the only place in the Bible where God commanded anyone to kill and
sacrifice a human being.) Any parent would be disgusted at the thought of
killing his or her own son or daughter.
5.
In this case, much more was at
stake. As mentioned in the last sermon, the Lord had called Abraham and given
him magnificent promise. Essentially, these promises fell into three categories:
land, seed, and blessing. In each
case the promise entailed a premise, that Abraham would have descendants. The
childless Abraham and his wife Sarah had to have a son. The Lord had made it
clear that only their own son could be the child of promise, even though they
had tried doing things differently. Finally, when Abraham was a 100 years old
and his wife 90—some 25 years after the Lord first called him—their son Isaac
was born. They had waited so long for this son! Everything God had promised was
riding on Isaac. And now God said: kill him!? It looked like the Lord was going
back on his word.
6.
So Abraham was tempted to think that
the Lord’s promise was worthless and his own situation hopeless. The promise proclaimed that the Lord loved
Abraham and had singled him out as a conduit of blessings for the nations. The
world Abraham saw all around him said that he was just one of many, many people
on the face of the earth, not particularly special. Why should he listen to the
promise? The promise said that from this
boy Isaac a multitude of descendants would be born. But now it seemed Isaac
would not have any descendants. Why listen to the promise? The promise said the promised Seed would come
from Isaac. But how could this be so if on that day the promise died with
Isaac? Why listen to it?
7.
Our faith doesn’t face exactly the
same test that God gave Abraham, but it is tested in this world. The world we
see all around us says you and I are also very small parts of a huge world
population, mere specks in the universe. What interest would God have in us?
Moreover, let’s admit that we are selfish, quite slow to sacrifice our
convenience—let alone any of our possessions—and certainly not anything or
anyone we really care about. Abraham puts us to shame in our sin. Surely, we
prefer to bank on what we can see rather than place stock in things we can’t
see. So the question comes to us, too: why listen to the promise?
8.
What would you have done if you had
stood in Abraham’s shoes? Would you have determined to stick with the “bird in the hand,” Isaac? Would you have
refused to pour out his life because you wouldn’t want to see this son on whom
so much depended go down the drain? Would you have disobeyed the divine
instructions to kill your son, then taken your chances with God?
9.
Here is what Abraham did: He made
all the preparations and set out for the land of Moriah. While he and Isaac
were walking, Isaac carrying the wood for the burnt offering and Abraham
himself with the fire and knife, Isaac said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt
offering?” Abraham replied, “God will provide from himself the lamb for a burnt
offering, my son” (Genesis 22:7–8).
10.
Isaac would find out the rest of the
story soon enough. At length, he lay bound on the altar. Abraham had his knife
at the ready, all set to kill the son of promise. At the last moment, the Angel
of the Lord stopped him. If there ever
was a close call, this was it. Once, when Martin Luther read this Bible story
to his family, his wife Katie couldn’t contain herself. She burst out, “I don’t believe it.” She couldn’t
believe that God could do something like that, ordering a man to kill his own
son! Even though it turned out that Isaac didn’t die at Moriah, Katie thought
this whole episode seemed pretty cruel on the Lord’s part. She said, “God wouldn’t have treated his son like that.”
Luther simply told her, “But, Katie, he
did.”
11.
God did. He killed his own Son. At
Calvary, 2000 years later, there was no one to shout “stop!” when Jesus was hung on the cross. The Lord wasn’t going to
call off this sacrifice. He was going to keep his promise, even at the cost of
his own Son. The Lord comes through on
his promise when things seem hopeless. Jesus
for his part was willing, just as Isaac had been. At Gethsemane, Jesus had
prayed, “My Father, if it be possible,
let this cup pass from me,” but he immediately added, “nevertheless, not as I
will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:39). In all his work, Christ was
speaking the words of Psalm 40, “Behold,
I have come to do your will, O God.” (See Hebrews 10:5–10, especially 7–9.)
Jesus became the willing sacrifice for all human sin. What love, what
dedication, what a rescuer and Savior and friend we have in Jesus!
12.
The Angel of the Lord prevented Abraham from killing Isaac. Then
Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. This ram
became the burnt offering in place of Isaac. The Lord had provided. At the cross there was no one to take
Christ’s place. He was taking our place. There’s no ram in the thicket for this
world, but instead God’s own Son! Jesus died, taking your place. The Lord was
providing. He was keeping his promise.
13.
All those years before, Abraham knew
that God would keep his promise. He made all the preparations and took the trip
to Moriah in faith that kept clinging to what God had promised. I hope you
noticed how Abraham told the servants that he and Isaac would go to worship,
then come back (Genesis 22:5), both of them. Abraham was not giving the
servants an excuse for what was about to happen. He could speak these words in
complete seriousness because he knew that the Lord was totally serious about
his promise. God was going to come through. Even in this situation, where it
seemed that God’s command to kill Isaac cancelled out his promise, Abraham knew
that God would come through anyway. Abraham “considered that God was able even to raise [Isaac] from the dead, from
which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back” (Hebrews 11:19).
14.
Isaac was “received back” by not having been killed in sacrifice at Moriah. Christ
was killed on the cross as THE great sacrifice. God the Father raised him from
the dead, showing that his sacrifice was indeed acceptable and accepted. God’s
commands and laws didn’t cancel out his grace, for the Christ who had been held
to account for all human lawlessness and sin now lives to tell the tale of good
news. Again, the Lord has provided. He comes through on his promise when things
seem hopeless.
15.
The promise ends up being the most
important thing in this text, not Abraham’s agony of soul or even his obedience
of faith. At the end of the passage the Angel
of the Lord reiterated the promise that God had already made at the call of
Abraham: in Abraham, specifically in Abraham’s Offspring, all the families of
the earth would be blessed. This was the promise of Christ, the promise that
Jesus was keeping by his life, death, and resurrection. With Christmas now so
near you can virtually taste it, rejoice that the Lord has come through on his
promise.
16.
Live by his promise. Cling to it in
faith, like Abraham did. You don’t have to hoard the “birds in the hand” that you have immediately before you and try to
keep them all for yourself. Instead, live every day knowing and believing that
God can even raise the dead. He raised Christ, and he will raise you when
Christ comes again. Do you remember the jug of water and the well from the
beginning of the sermon? By faith, you can pour yourself out for others in
love. God’s well of life-giving water never runs dry. In his Word, he always
has more to give you. You can count on it, especially when things seem
hopeless.
17.
The Lord comes through on his
promise when things seem hopeless. You can take it from Abraham, or take it
from Joseph or Mary. For you can really take it from the Christ who came, who
comes, and who is coming. And now the peace of God that passes all
understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus until life
everlasting. Amen.
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