The Dividing Line between Christian and Jew - The Diety of Jesus Christ Part II
Genesis 22:1-2 And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham: and he said, Behold, here I am. 2 And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.
There is a lot of information in these verses. First, what about Ishmael, he was also Abraham's son? Ishmael was not the son of promise and he and his mother, Hagar, had been sent away. God had already made provisions and promises for Ishmael. The only son of promise to God was the son of Abraham and Sarah and no other.
Second, how was there going to be a great nation and how could the whole world be blessed if Isaac was about to be sacrificed? While it was a test, it was also the beginning of a pattern that God was establishing. The pattern is an only son as a sacrifice. The pattern is God will provide. The pattern is obedience unto death.
Genesis 22:6-13 And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife; and they went both of them together. 7 And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering? 8 And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering: so they went both of them together. 9 And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. 10 And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son. 11 And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I. 12 And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me. 13 And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.
Because of Abraham's obedience unto the death and sacrifice of his only son, the whole earth, whosoever would receive it, inherited a potential blessing from God. It should also be noted that Isaac carried the burden of the means of his own sacrifice up the mountain and also allowed his father to bind him and lay him on the wood. So, there is a double type of obedience demonstrated in this passage. A Father obeying God and a Son obeying his Father both even unto death.
Genesis 22:15-18 And the angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time, 16 And said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son: 17 That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore: and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies; 18 And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.
In part one of this post we discussed "the seed" and here again we are given another hint about that seed. First, the seed is going to be the seed of a woman. Now the trail is leading us to a particular man whose seed is going to possess the gate of "his" (notice the single pronoun here) enemies. And all of the nations of the earth are going to be blessed in Abraham's seed? What is that blessing going to be?
We are following a trail of four things
- A seed
- An only son for a sacrifice
- God's provision for that sacrifice
- Obedience unto death
In Genesis we are told that Isaac is the son of promise. He marries Rebekah and has twin sons, Esau and Jacob. The blessing goes to Jacob the second son. Jacob marries Leah and then Rachel, his beloved. Between Leah, Rachel and their two hand maidens, Jacob has twelve sons. We know from scripture that Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers and is taken down to Egypt. We then are told that eventually all of Joseph's family comes to him in Egypt and there the great nation of Israel is multiplied into a very large company of people.
This brings us to the Exodus and the institution of Passover. Chapter 12 of Genesis gives us the instructions for the Passover Lamb and procedures for Passover, so that while the first born in Egypt are being destroyed, the first born in Israel are being preserved. God orders them to keep this ritual forever and when their children ask them what it means, they are to respond thus,
Genesis 12:27 That ye shall say, It is the sacrifice of the Lord's passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt, when he smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses. And the people bowed the head and worshipped.
Here in the Passover we see that the purpose of the sacrifice is to deliver from death. The Passover is literally a training tool. It is to help the Jews to become so familiar with the ritual of the sacrifice, that when the real sacrifice that delivers forever comes, they would recognize and understand the sacrifice and it's purpose.
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