· 22:1,7,11: Three times Abraham says, Here I am, the words of someone who is available. 1) To God when He commands Abraham to take Isaac to Moriah. 2) To Isaac when he asks about a lamb. 3) To the Angel of the LORD who stops him from taking Isaac’s life. Availability to God and our children is a good trait. Abraham’s answer to Isaac was undoubtedly something the boy never forgot.
· 22:17: The issue in this test is Abraham’s faith. It is no surprise that the NT picks up on this story in important passages, and they are all about faith.
o James 2:21-24: The well known “faith without works” passage is built on this story. Paul, proving justification is by faith with no works, is based on Gen. 15:6: Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt (Rom. 4:1-4). Faith does not need additional works. Faith ceases to be faith when works are part of the equation. But remember: Gen. 22 is God testing Abraham. It is the proof of the faith, the value of the faith. So, James is also correct: works must accompany the faith or it is not faith.
o Heb. 11:17-19: We touched on this in the last post. One definition of faith is being fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform (Rom. 4:21). This is the faith of the righteous in Heb. 11, including Abraham. The proof of Abraham’s faith is when he passed God’s test.
o Heb. 6:13-20: Hebrews 6 is often considered to be a very difficult passage to interpret. In my view, it is made easier by this closing paragraph, which is built on Gen. 22. The promise that God made, swearing by Himself (Hb. 6:13-14) is the one given in 22:16-17. God had given this promise previously to Abraham in Gen. 17:1-8. Abraham passed the test; now God is assuring Abraham, “you can trust Me to be faithful to you as well.” As all these passages indicate: Abraham did not receive the promise while he was still living. There were to be many generations until the promised Seed would come.
· 22:17: One other thought from this. I credit my youngest son with reminding me of this yesterday. The NKJV “descendants” is actually the word “seed.” The term is used first in Gen. 1:11,12,29 of vegetation and “seed.” The first spiritual use is in Gen. 3:15, God’s promised redemption through the “Seed of the woman.” It makes sense. The vegetation produces after its kind; so do we. It is because our descendants are produced from our seed. Now here is the interesting thing: the Hebrew term “seed” (zera) appears 229 times and is always singular. Descendants (plural) are our “seed” (singular). The Apostle Paul noted this in Gal. 3:19-29. So much for us, for meditation, for worship, for our own obedience of faith.
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