Offering of Obedience and faith

And Abraham said, “My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.” So the two of them went together.
Genesis 22:8

We have been reading through Genesis this week as a family and tonight approached this chapter which is my favorite in the book. It is an amazing picture of a Father and Son who both walk together in obedience to a command and it ends with a sacrifice provided by God Himself. It is written as a foreshadowing of what would happen on the cross when the Son of God would be offered as a living sacrifice for the sins of the world.

My oldest was questioning why the Bible keeps saying, “offer your son, your only son.” When it occurs more than once it usually means it’s important enough to stop and ponder. I explained to her how Isaac was the child of the promise God made to Abraham, through Isaac would come generations of people and the Nation of Israel. Israel is there today as a testament to God’s faithfulness of keeping that promise. Along with that promise is the realization Abraham had when God told him to sacrifice his own son. Abraham still believed God would have to restore Isaac to him in order to keep his word. So it was an act of obedience showing his faith.

The cross was not a cosmic mistake or accident, nor was it a great human tragedy of unjust murder. No it is far greater than we imagine possible. Before the creation of the world itself God knew once mankind was created they would fall and need a savior. His plan of redemption went into effect before Adam even breathed his first molecule of oxygen. The work of the cross was an act of a righteous Son and Father working together on behalf of you because God is crazy about you. His desire is for your peace and life and salvation. So long before you were even born, He knew you. Long before any of us created sin debt, He paid the price in full. 

Genesis 21:32-34: Trees and Altars

Thus they made a covenant at Beersheba. So Abimelech rose with Phichol, the commander of his army, and they returned to the land of the Philistines. Then Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there called on the name of the Lord, the Everlasting God. And Abraham stayed in the land of the Philistines many days.
Genesis 21:32-34

Abraham understood the importance of setting up altars to the Lord at significant moments in his journey. At this point in the road Sodom has been destroyed, Isaac the promised son has been born, and he has again moved around the wilderness. It is during key moments though, Abraham sets up for himself reminders of what the Lord has been doing in his life.

It is important for us also to set up memorials in our journey with the Lord, reminders of who He is and what He has done. Abraham did not have the social media websites or the ability to take pictures of life events. There is no scrap book of baby Isaac photos. But I know he wanted to remember all these important things. So we see him plant trees, built piles of rocks, making places to remember what God is doing in Him. Because God is an everlasting God, who walks us through life and continues to move in us every moment.

Everyone has a different way of communicating with God and remembering the things He has done. Artists might paint or draw events of significance. Writers will write stories or journal. Engineers might launch rockets. No matter what way you do it, pause and celebrate His work in your life. As you go through the rocky times you can look back at those moments, those trees planted in the past and remember the goodness of the everlasting Father! 

A God who sees us

Now the Angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. And He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from, and where are you going?”………………..
Then she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, “Have I also here seen Him who sees me?”
Genesis 16:7-8,13

He already knows your name. One amazing thing I learn from this first appearance of the Angel of the Lord, is what hope it gives to all of us. The Angel of the Lord is an Old Testament appearance of Jesus Christ and this event is very similar to the time Jesus meets the Samaritan woman at well. In both cases He shows His full knowledge of where the woman has come from and what is going on in her life.

Hagar had run away and was hiding in the wilderness when the Lord found her. He already knew what she was dealing with but asks her so that she would be in conversation with Him. He is a God who seeks to be known by His own people. This story is an example for us, that He wants to meet us where we are at in our lives. He does not just leave us there though, he helps us to walk ahead and directs us to move forward. He is the God who sees us, just as Hagar says in verse 13. He sees us.

It is not always going to seem like He cares about what is going on in your life. Often He is going to feel like a million miles away. But even in the darkest hours of life, He is there with you and knows where you are. When Jesus met with the woman at the well, He called Himself the water of life. Both Hagar and the Samaritan woman were searching and needing this life desperately. Neither would have guessed He was the eternal life that would give them rest. 

Cost of the sacrifice

Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord. Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering, but He did not respect Cain and his offering. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.
Genesis 4:2-5

Where is your heart when you give to the Lord? Have you examined yourself to see if what you are giving is something you could live without, of it’s really something of great value of which you are giving. The issue between Cain and Abel’s sacrifice had more to do with the issue of those two brothers than it did with what they were giving. The cost is what matters.

Later in Scripture during the days of King David we see the aged King seeking land to build a sacrifice on to the Lord. When someone offers to just give David some land, the king responds that he cannot give to the Lord something which cost him nothing. This is the key to our understanding of sacrifice, it is a matter of the heart.

Abel brought the firstborn of his flock which is typically the promise of more animals and more livelihood ahead. He gave to the Lord knowing He could trust the Lord to provide for him again with more animals. Cain brought something from his produce which cost him nothing because there was more from where it came. Again it was about the heart and the cost. What is of greatest of value to you is the very thing we should be willing to give away first. 

In the Garden of our life

Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
Genesis 2:15-17

Man’s first job was agricultural management. From the beginning of his own creation the Lord God placed him in a garden to work and maintain the plants, trees, and animal life. He was given simple instructions to be followed and handled with care. One tree from which he was not allowed to eat. Life and death was held in the balance in the Garden of Eden. Man was faced with a choice to obey God or follow his own desires.

How often do we stop and pause for a moment look around us, at the garden of life God has placed us? Each person has been given their own personal spot in this world, to live, to work, too thrive. We are also given a choice to spend our time productively tending our garden, cultivating it to produce life, or to follow our own desires. The challenge is for us to make those two options the same. Seek what you want to be the very thing He wants for your life.

Life is a garden and you my friend are the agricultural manager. The Lord God has given a task to accomplish in this moment in which you will be carrying out through the power of the Spirit who dwells within. After that task will be another as He sees fit to give. Follow His instructions for life and seek His face in the garden. He is already there with you ready to get started today.