Genesis Abraham's Fight of Faith - Part 2

You are listening to the podcast of Recast Church in Matawan, Michigan. So I got a bad tooth.

Before COVID came along, by the way, Don and family are doing great.

I checked in with them this week. Symptoms have been very minor, manageable. By God's grace, the whole thing happened outside of church.

Nobody in here was at risk. It was very cool to see, given how many people Don interacts with, right?

How that was contained in a really kind of neat, sovereign way. So that's a good thing. But keep praying for the

Filsex. Lord willing, they'll be back with us next week. So I got this tooth and a piece of it fell off just before COVID hit.

And when I eat, I get pretty large pieces of food in there. You know what

I'm saying? All right. COVID happens. Three things are working against me. Well, maybe two.

One, I'm Dutch and I don't want to pay the money to go have it fixed. Two, I'm Dutch and I don't want to have to spend the money to have it fixed, right?

And third, I'm just, I don't take initiative on these things very, very quickly. And I found that in my work, which is a lot of travel and meeting with people.

Often I have to grab some food in the car. Large pieces get in there, right? So I found a half a cheeseburger once in that spot.

What I do before every appointment, though, is I take a business card and I just shove it in there to knock all the food out.

Is this sick? Right? All right. It's true. And because I'm a coffee drinker and haven't made the work to have my teeth checked up on, my teeth are yellowing again.

And it's gotten to the point where in my own family, right? The people who love me, right?

Say, you're a yuck mouth, right? I love that. You're a yuck mouth. And so what's happened here?

Deterioration. Lack of attention. All right. Hard shift to what we're talking about. Last week we introduced a discussion on faith.

I asked you to consider over this last week, after the message last time, to consider your faith.

Are you giving it proper attention? Are there things that need to be addressed in it? Are there some holes, right?

Have things gone a little yellow, so to speak, in your faith journey? Are you walking closely with God?

These are hard questions. And we talked about last week that God wants us to ask them, right?

He says to us in the New Testament, we're to examine our faith, to make sure we are in the faith, right?

This really matters to the Lord because we know that without faith, we don't please

God. And so we discussed Abraham and we looked at his life through some scenes in the Old Testament, in the book of Genesis, where he is introduced as the father of the nation of Israel.

This is where this is all going. But we know from the New Testament that the church, us, people of faith, wherever you are on your faith journey, even if you're not there yet, you're here this morning, you wouldn't be a part of that family, but maybe one day you will be.

The church is a family of faith. Abraham is our father, right? So last week, we looked at different scenes and we talked about things that can move us towards deepening our faith, maintaining contact with God.

This is important, maintaining humility. And we talked about things that can detract our faith journey, fear, hurry.

So this past week, how did it go for you? What shape are you as you walk in here this morning?

Today, we're going to look at a few more scenes from the life of Abraham. So I'm going to have you start. We're going to intro our talk just by looking at one short little snippet of a verse, okay?

So if you've got your Bible, I want to invite you to turn it open to Genesis chapter 17.

And I want to just look at the first verse by way of intro, and then we'll do some more after our announcements.

Genesis chapter 17, verse 1. I think this verse is kind of cool because we learn a lot of stuff here just in this one verse about where things are at.

You ready? Here we go. When Abram was 99 years old, stop.

All right, this is 24 years after God appeared to him the first time.

He's not the same man as he was at the beginning, wise in the ways of the world, but not so wise in the ways of faith.

He's learned a lot, gone through a lot, is not yet perfected. He's on a journey, and so are you and I, right?

But he's not the same person he was when he started. This is going to be evidenced here just in a couple verses we'll look at here in just a bit.

Abram was 99 years old. When he was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him,

I am God Almighty, walk before me and be blameless. All right, two last things by way of intro. God appears to Abram.

Can you believe it? This should never stop to wonder us, that the

God of the universe, right, who made heaven and earth and you, appears. He appears through scripture.

We talked about this last week. He appears through our friends sometimes. Nature, prayer, circumstance, impression.

Scripture, I said before, but it's worth saying again because it's the primary way God speaks to us. He appears to us and he's not hard to find.

New Testament says if you seek God with all your heart, Old Testament says that, Jeremiah says that, you'll find him.

How is your seeking this week? Because I guarantee you, God did his part to appear to you through these different means.

Are you staying connected, right? This is the challenge that all of us have to fight in our fight of faith.

There's so much we can learn from the life of Abraham. What does the fight of faith look like? These three things in this verse.

Abraham, God appears to Abraham and said, I am God almighty, else should

I, right? I am God almighty. And so faith starts here.

Do you believe there is a God who is almighty? Meaning he has all power, can handle anything in your life.

He is God almighty. Do you believe this? Do you need to re -believe it or get back to that place?

We're going to talk about some things this morning as it relates to that. Second, walk before me. This is the journey and God is so kind, isn't he?

He comes back over and over and over to Abraham, appearing to him all through his lifetime.

And many times in the verses we looked at last time, today again, he appears right here in this verse and he's going to show up in some verses later.

God is faithful to say the same things over to us. Why? Because we need the reminding. We need the reminding, right?

And that's why we come to church on Sunday and weekly. And I hope you don't miss. Why? We need the reminding. There's stuff that gets taken away in the course of the week and we can get off track and we come here and we're reminded and God appears and he shows up.

And again, he says, walk before me. It's a beautiful picture. Picture it, right? Before him,

God back here, you walking this way, him guiding, whispering, directing.

This is the life of faith. Believing God's right here with me and I'm walking before him. To what end?

The third phrase, to be blameless. Tough. We blameless this week?

Not me. But God wants blamelessness. It's only possible because of Christ.

But we are agreeing that in our faith journey, we are walking in a way as to continue to pursue purity, blamelessness.

And when we fail in faith, right? Romans 14, I think 23 says, anything that does not come from faith is sin.

But this is the picture and Abraham's learning it. Trusting God Almighty, walking before him, striving to be blameless.

And I'm going to ask you again, along with me, to examine, is this the trajectory of your life this morning?

God, we're going to need your help. We want to take these passages. They're intended for us. Yeah, you meant them for Abraham.

But the next level is for us to look at this father of our faith and go, Lord, where am I in this journey?

And so we don't want to waste our time this morning. We want to work. We want to invite you into our journey with you and ask ourselves hard questions.

And God, that you would encourage us today. That you would draw us back to yourself if there's been wandering.

And God, that you would help us in the week to come to honor you, to walk with you, to be blameless before you because of the power of Jesus in us.

In Jesus name. Everybody said. Recast.

We're so happy. Wait, who's on cams? Oh, no.

Hey, Recast. We're so happy you're here. I'm Jason. And I'm David, the youth director. We've got a couple announcements for you before we continue with our worship service.

The worship folder has announcements and upcoming events. Inside the worship folder, you'll find a connection card.

And if you're new or newer to Recast, we'd love for you to fill this out if you'd like to get connected. Feel free to drop that off on your way out at the welcome table out front.

Also, there is an offering envelope. Thank you. If you feel led to give, feel free to drop this off at the welcoming table as well.

Our youth ministries, Recast 180 and Gravity are going to be heading to Camp Barachel January 15th to the 17th.

So be sure to mark your calendars and be looking out for more info about that soon. We should hope to get more info out to you about those for the next couple weeks.

Also, we have our annual Thanksgiving service, November 29th. It's going to be awesome. If you're there in person, feel free to share what you're thankful for, what

God's been doing in your life on the open mic there. And if you're online and you want to do the same thing, you can take a video and send it to Hope Klein and she'll do that too.

Finally, last announcement. This week is the last week to pick up a box and fill it for Operation Christmas Child because we're going to be picking those up.

Those should be dropped off next Sunday, November 15th. Again, whether it's online or in person, we are so glad that you've joined us today.

If you're watching on YouTube, feel free to hit the notification bell and subscribe.

Take it away, Spencer. Well, thank you guys. I don't think I've ever seen anybody so thirsty.

I don't know what it is about doing announcements that makes you thirsty, but those guys, they need some more refreshment,

I guess. I'm so excited to see so many people here this morning. Recast is a local expression of the body of Christ, and it's so encouraging to see everybody gather together to worship and give praise to the

Lord. I am going to pray now for Dan as he comes to bring the word to us over the next couple of minutes.

Let's bow our heads. Oh, Lord Jesus, we love you. And we are so thankful that you have chosen us to be a part of your body.

We're thankful that you have placed us here in this local expression of your body here on Earth.

Lord, I pray for us this morning, that as your word is opened up and explained to us, that your

Holy Spirit will work in our hearts and our lives. Lord, we are so thankful that your spirit does a variety of things in our life.

He convicts us and he encourages us and he causes us to be more like you. And so,

Lord, I pray that our hearts will be open, that we'll have ears that hear, not ears that want to be tickled,

Lord, but ears that are attentive to how you want to work in our hearts and in our minds. Lord, I pray for Dan this morning as he opens your word.

We're thankful for faithful elders in this church who can open your word and explain it to us.

Lord, I pray that you work through him to deliver the message to us this morning. We're thankful for him.

We pray that the meditations of his heart and his mind are pleasing to you, oh

Lord, our rock and our redeemer. We're thankful for Christ who died on the cross so that we might have hope and eternal life.

And Lord, we are thankful for the spirit that indwells us and helps us to be more like Jesus. I pray that that end is accomplished through the preaching of your word this morning.

Amen. You got your

Bibles. I want to encourage you to open them to Genesis chapter 17 again. Side screens will have some of these verses.

They're kind of small, a little hard to read. That's my fault. But I do hope you'll follow along and choose to engage as best you can with God's word this morning.

Now, God appears to Abraham. He's 99 years old. We read that in verse 1. And let's move on now to verse 16.

As for your wife, Sarah, I will bless her. And moreover, I will give you a son by her.

I will bless her and she shall become nations. Kings of peoples shall come from her.

Now, Abraham most likely is thinking Ishmael's the guy.

Remember last week he went into Hagar and this was an example of his hurried non -counseling life with God and made a huge mistake.

But Ishmael comes along as a result of that. And now here God appears 13 years later and says, have

I got news for you? Have I got news? Look at this.

You're going to have a son. Sarah is going to have a baby. And Abraham fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, shall a child be born to a man who is 100 years old?

By the way, what's the answer to that question? No way, Jose, right? No, not normally, right?

And how about the next one? Shall Sarah, who is 90 years old, bear a child? Right? And Abraham said to the

Lord, oh, that Ishmael might live before you. God said, no, but Sarah, your wife, shall bear you a son and you shall call his name.

All right, I just told you Abraham is not the same man he used to be, that he's been growing in his faith now for quite a long time.

And this is one of the incredible evidences that Abraham is indeed grown huge.

Because this falling on his face, I'm going to suggest a couple of things here. This is an incredible example of faith.

This isn't Abraham doubting. He's falling on his face realizing I can't believe it.

I'm going to have a kid at age 100 and my wife at 90. That's like a shaking of the knees, dropping to the ground, falling on your face realization that God's going to do a miracle through me.

And we know he believes that it's going to happen because he asks this question about Ishmael.

He already has gotten a hold of, if that's true, and I believe it's true, I believe Abraham would say, right?

What does that mean for Ishmael? I love that boy. And God says, no, it's not going to come through him.

The promise is going to come through Isaac. I'll take care of him, but it's not coming through him.

So Abraham evidences deep belief here that even at age 100, he can have a kid and Sarah too.

He believes it. This is also backed up, if you look in the New Testament, into Romans chapter 4.

Romans chapter 4 talks about this incident, and it says that Abraham never wavered in his faith here.

By faith, he believed this was going to happen. That's incredible faith. That's a faith that's growing, right?

It's pretty exciting. And Abraham is just falling on his face, weak with joy, right?

As he realizes, a kid's going to, I got another kid coming. Oh, what a beautiful thing. And yet, it doesn't quite go that way with Sarah.

Let's take a look at this next scene from Genesis chapter 18. All right. Not much time has passed since God shows up to Abraham and says, you're going to have a new, you're going to have another kid, right?

Not much time has passed. Baby's not here yet. And I want you to understand, again, because we're not reading all the verses here.

We're kind of having just to kind of pick and choose to sort of make the points that we're after. But God shows up himself.

Many people think of pre -incarnate appearance of Jesus with two other angels, and they're going to talk to Abraham.

And the whole Sodom and Gomorrah story is going to happen right after this. So you can read that on your own. We're not focusing there today.

But I want to focus on this meeting, God, angels, and Abraham with Sarah, probably just a few feet away, listening in behind the tent.

This isn't sneaky. This isn't inappropriate. God knew she was there. It's evident in the text.

It's perfectly fine, right? She was doing the stuff she needed to do in the kitchen, the tent, and that's fine.

But she's hearing everything. God intended for her to hear this. Look what happens.

Now, Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in years. The way of women had ceased to be with Sarah.

All right, you get this. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, after I am worn out and my

Lord is old, shall I have pleasure? All right, stop. She laughed.

Abraham laughed. Dan, you just said you're commending Abraham for his laughter because it was a laughter of faith.

He fell weak to the ground, couldn't believe it, but believed it. Isn't this the same thing? And the answer is no, it's not, based on context.

Sadly, but understandably from a human perspective, Sarah is doubting.

Okay, this is our next faith detractor. Doubt destroys the life of faith.

And every one of us have been there. And are you there today? Right? Because when

Sarah hears this, she goes, no. I don't believe it's going to happen.

It's not been easy for her. Yes, she's had a front row seat to what's gone on in Abraham these last 25 years.

But it's not easy for her. She's gone through all these ups and downs as well. Now, I personally, and my wife and I have not struggled with having children.

We've had a front row seat to people who have. Sarah has waited all this time, lost hope, gave

Abraham a Hagar, was not God's plan. She's lost hope. She's doubting.

And if you have ever struggled with that, or you've had a front row seat to someone who's struggled with childlessness, how hard for women, for men, but for women this is.

When you believe, right? God wants you to be a mom, and you want to be a mom, and the kid's not coming, right?

And if that's not you, what is that thing that's brought doubt for you, okay? And so often doubt shows up in our lives because of a loss, right?

The loss of hope to have that kid, the loss of hope because I lost a kid, the loss of a ministry, the loss of a job, the loss of a spouse, the loss of a parent or a mom, some kind of loss, right?

These are the things that cause us to doubt. How about you? For me, one of the ones, and I've shared,

I don't know if I've shared this with you before, but it was my dad passing. When my dad, he was a big tall guy like me, 6 '5", and never sick a day of his life.

Shortly after he retired at 62, colon cancer. And we prayed, oh

God, please, right? Um, three years, mostly bad news, usually around every

Christmas. And at age 65, after a number of days on hospice care in my home, he breathed his last.

And what it seemed like to me was that every prayer was unanswered.

I'm pastoring at this time, and this is just really hard. I thought

God that dot, dot, dot. You fill it in because it's you.

You've had the stuff that you've gone, God, I thought that, and then it doesn't turn out to be that way.

But you answered prayer, didn't seem to answer prayer. I thought you did, it doesn't seem to do this. And this is Sarah.

For 24 years, she's heard about nations and so forth, and it's just not happening, and she's losing heart.

And doubt is a huge detractor in our faith journey. Where are you doubting today?

That's a question for you. Individually, right now, because God wants you to answer it.

So take the time to do so. God doesn't want you to doubt, but he comes alongside us.

And look at the promise that he tells Abraham here. Here's the answer. Is anything too hard for the

Lord? Is anything too hard for the Lord? I heard that, what? Is anything too hard for the

Lord? Genesis 18, 14, I hope you're writing it down. Because this is a verse you need to memorize.

When you lose hope, is anything too hard for the Lord? When you're struggling, is anything too hard for the Lord? When it looks like all is well, is anything too hard for the

Lord? You've got to pound this one in your brain, friends. And so do I. Why? Because I'm so prone to doubt.

Is anything too hard for the Lord? Incidentally, this is a theme that comes through a lot of scripture.

Why? Because a lot of people have faced loss in their life, including the people in this room. And so there are multiple stories in the

Old Testament and New where this theme comes through. Sarah's not believing.

His doubt taken hold. Oh, that she would have been able to read Job 42, 2, where Job, after everything that happened to him, says this.

I know that you can do all things, God, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.

Job 42, 2. Do you believe that? Jeremiah puts it this way in 32, 17.

Ah, Lord God, it is you who have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and by your outstretched arm.

Nothing is too hard for you. Jeremiah came to believe it.

Jeremiah got thrown in a pit. 50 days or something crazy like that.

He was thrown in a pit for his ministry for a super long time and was misunderstood, known as the weeping prophet.

Very difficult. Nobody listened to him. But he believes this. Nothing is too hard for the

Lord. Jesus himself, when discussing faith and how difficult it is to enter heaven, in fact, impossible with man, says this in Matthew 19, 26.

Jesus says, for nothing is impossible with God. Now, disciples heard this.

They heard it. They heard it right from the mouth of Jesus. And guess what happened just a little while later? They doubted. And they lost faith and they ran.

And then they saw the resurrected Jesus later and their faith came back in powerful ways.

So where are you on this continuum? What do you need to hear today that's going to cause you to walk out of here and believe a little more and reestablish your faith?

And pay attention to the parts that have turned yellow and the holes that need to be addressed. This is the challenge.

What a beautiful, beautiful challenge. Is anything too hard for the Lord? And of course, the answer to that question is a resounding no.

Because Abraham is going to father this child and Sarah is going to have this baby. And it's going to be the baby of promise.

And it's Isaac, right? Laughter. That's what that name means. Now, unfortunately, we're going to move forward here to Genesis chapter 21 through 3.

Because Abraham... And by the way, this scene also takes place a very short time after the last one because the baby's not here yet.

From there, Abraham journeyed toward the territory of the Negev and lived between Kadesh and Shur. And he sojourned in Gerar.

And Abraham said of Sarah, his wife, she is my sister. Sound familiar? If you remember from last week, we had a scene where this is the lie that he told

Pharaoh and the Egyptians and everybody got in big trouble. She's my sister.

And Abimelech, king of Gerar, sent and took Sarah. How about this?

But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said to him, Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman you have taken for she is a man's wife.

And on goes a long story about the restoration of Sarah. And God had put all kinds of trouble on Abimelech and his people.

And the wombs of all the women were shut tight and no one could have babies. And even in their loss of faith,

Abraham, after seeing all these promises and believing them, even at this point, bumps into another struggle.

Can you relate to this? Some of you have been walking with God like Abraham for 20, 30, 40 years.

And all of a sudden, it hits you. And you go back to believing the thing you believed before you even knew

Jesus. That when things emotionally aren't going well or I get scared in my life, I run to these things or I do this bad habit when

I'm not feeling, you know, safe or understood. That when things seem to not be going my way,

I solve the problem by doing the wrong thing, the wrong way, the wrong time. And you know what those things are.

You know your thing that you tend to go back to when things aren't going your way. 1

John 2, 15 through 17, and talks about how there are really three things that we really struggle with.

Lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and pride of life. And one of them is our trip up. And some of us run to the lust of the flesh problems when we're scared and uncertain and lose hope.

And we struggle continually with the same thing. Even Abraham struggled with the lie to protect himself. Did it 20 some years ago, just did it again.

After all of this stuff comes from God who says, trust me, believe me, I'm here. I'm repeating my promises.

Do you trust me? Yes, I trust you. I believe you. We're going to have this. Boom, Abraham's treachery.

He lies again. Sometimes these are like just kicks in the gut, right?

For us as a Christ follower, because we want to be faithful. But then here we see ourselves again, going back to the same routines as if God wasn't even there.

And we lose faith. And we have the promises like, is anything too hard for the

Lord? And you go, yes, I believe that. But then why did I act this way this week? And that was some of my week.

And you beat yourself up and you go, why did I do that this week? I think

God has mercy and he has grace. And he doesn't treat us like our sins deserve, the scripture says, right?

And he is there and he wants to walk with us. And he really will complete the good work that he started, Philippians 1.

He will complete it. I don't want you to lose heart. But I don't want you to leave this morning with a bunch of doubt in your life either.

Because God wants you to hear, is anything too hard for him? And he wants to hear you say back, no, no, I believe, but God help my unbelief.

Right, that's the prayer. Because the struggles don't go away just because God reminds you that he'll be there for you, right?

Is anything hard? No, but that doesn't mean your trial's over. I don't know how long it's gonna go on.

I don't know if your unanswered prayer will be answered in the time you want it to be answered. I don't know how that looks, but what we've learned and I hope what you're learning and what we're seeing here and what

Abraham is gonna evidence in just a moment is that our faith can grow. It grows through these times, it can.

But you gotta do your part, right? James talks about how faith without works is dead.

Dead faith means, God, you gotta do it all. Don't expect me to fight. No, you gotta fight through.

And God enables you to do it with his strength, but he wants you to keep on your faith journey, even when it's hard, right?

What's the old Proverbs says? Like a righteous man or woman falls seven times, but gets back up again, see?

And that's what I want for you this week and for me. We're gonna finish with this last scene that's gonna lead us into communion.

We're gonna call it Abraham's triumph. It's a long passage. I'm just gonna give brief commentary along the way.

After these things, God tested Abraham and said to him, Abraham. And he said, here

I am. I mean, like, really, God? Even after all of this that he's gone through, 25, 30, 25 years of all of this stuff and God's not done testing.

And he tests us. And God tested Abraham and said to him, if you can believe it,

Abraham. And he said, here I am. He said, take your son. By the way,

Isaac is now probably 13, 14, 15, right?

In other words, Abraham's journey now has moving into 30 to 40 years of walking with God. Take your son.

Which son? Is it Ishmael, Isaac, right? Let's just take this right back. Take your son. Your only son,

Isaac, that son. The one the promise is coming through. The one through whom nations will come, right?

I don't imagine he told Sarah about what he was up to as a result of this challenge. But take your son, your only son,

Isaac, whom you love and go to the land of Moriah. It's probably about 50 miles away. And offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which

I shall show you. So Abraham rose early in the morning. Didn't delay.

Faith has grown to the point where I'm just, God says I do. No questions asked.

Even to this degree. Take your son, your only son, the one you love,

Isaac. Sacrifice him. You need to let the weight of this sink in, friends.

I'm going to show you where, but let's get going. And first thing in the morning, off he goes.

Don't linger. I had a pastor friend who always would teach us, he would say, you know, when

God prompts, act. Don't wait. When God prompts, go. Right then, don't give your flesh time to double think it.

God prompts, just go. And Abraham evidences his growing faith. He rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, took two of his young men with him and his son,

Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering.

You're going to notice if you pay attention, the word offering is many, many times in this passage.

This is a passage about laying it down. And he arose and went to the place of which

God had told him. On the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes, saw the place from afar. Then Abraham said to his young men, stay here with the donkey.

I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you.

Some commentators think that he's just continuing his hiding of what's really happening to his friends here, his servants, and also hiding what's about to happen for Isaac's sake, right?

Others think that this, we're going to come back to you as an indication of how deep Abraham's faith has grown.

Believing that if he goes and sacrifices his son, Hebrews tells us he believed that God would raise him from the dead.

This has never happened before. But Hebrews tells us by faith, Abraham offered up Isaac, believing

God would raise him from the dead if he had to slay him. Slay him by slitting his throat.

Because this is what you did to sheep on the altar. You slit the throat, you let it die.

It's a burnt offering. And God just asked Abraham to go give that treatment to Isaac.

And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, here's our wood, and he lays that on Isaac.

Now, I just want to tell you, Scripture's beautiful.

It's just beautiful. If you slow down enough to read it and study, you'll learn that there are multiple things going on at one time.

When God appears, it's probably Jesus pre -incarnate. There's something there, right?

This story, it predicts what's going to happen in the

New Testament when Jesus comes and lays on that altar and gives his life up for us for crucifixion and the blood.

This is a foreshadowing of what's going on. And can you see it? I just told you,

Isaac's 13, 14, 15. You think he could run away from Abraham if he wanted to? Do you think he could?

Do you think Isaac could run away from Abraham? Yeah, of course he could. I can't keep up with my boys.

The indication here is that Isaac is willing. He has come to so love his father and so trust

God that he is willing, ultimately, to be the sacrifice. Now, we haven't gotten there yet. We'll see this in a second, but he's willing.

And Abraham has come to the point in his life where his faith is so strong that he trusts God that even in the sacrifice of his own son, he'll either raise him up for the dead or I don't know what he's going to do, but he's going to do something.

Why? Because God said he would. And I believe it, no questions asked. That's amazing faith.

And so the wood is laid on Isaac like the wood of the cross is laid on Jesus. And Isaac carries that burden to the place of sacrifice like Jesus carried that cross up to that hill.

That's what's going on here. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, laid it on Isaac's son, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife.

How'd you like to carry that for three days? Knowing what you're about to do to the son you love, the son of promise.

How'd you like to carry that out? And so they went, both of them together.

And Isaac said to his father, Abraham, my father, he said, here I am, my son,

Abraham answers. He said, behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering? And Abraham said,

God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son. And so they went, both of them together.

See, Isaac's been through burnt offerings before. He knows they need an animal. His question is accurate.

He knows something's not adding up just yet. And when they came to the place at which God had told him,

Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac, his son, because sacrifices were to be bound.

And again, you don't see complaining. You don't see hesitation. You don't see Isaac running away. He simply binds him, lays him on the altar on top of the wood.

And then Abraham reaches out his hand and he took the knife to slaughter his son. Okay, you need to wrestle with this.

Can you imagine? And does the thing we love get in the way of our faith?

Sometimes, right? This is the ultimate test. Even this promise from God, can

I sacrifice it? Do I trust him so much that even the good things and the things that I love so much will not become an idol in my life?

Imagine, I just... And when they came to the place, read that,

Abraham built the altar there, laid the wood, bound his son, put him on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand, took the knife to slaughter his son.

But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham. What a beautiful, timely intervention.

And he said, here I am. And he said, do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him.

For now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son from me.

And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked and behold, behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by his horns.

Yeah, because this happens every day, right? Rams running around in the mountain, getting caught by their horns in the thicket.

Probably the only time in eternity it's happened, but God saw to it. Why? Because God's gonna provide a sacrifice and he's gonna do it miraculously and he's gonna do it his way.

And here's the sacrifice. It's gonna be this lamb. And so Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering.

Listen, instead of his son. And so Abraham called the place the

Lord will provide, as it is said to this day on the Mount of the Lord, it shall be provided.

And this is a picture of the cross. And as we go to communion, this is what

I want you to understand. Isaac was to be sacrificed and so were you and I.

Our sin deserves the wrath of God, deserves our spiritual and physical death. But God provides the ram to be a substitute.

And this is the first picture in the scriptures of substitutionary atonement, right? The big theological word that simply means this.

Our faithlessness, our mistakes this past week, and our mistakes next week, our sin deserve death.

And we can't be the perfect sacrifice. And so you see a substitution.

And this is what's happening at the cross, right? Jesus taking your place and my place, except the difference is

Abraham mercifully heard stop. But God would not do that to himself, right?

And Jesus was slain on that wood. And God did that slain.

And he did it for you. And Jesus substituted, paid our price, willingly went to that cross.

Why? So by faith, you could receive him, have your sins paid for, and walk with him knowing how much

God loves you. How much does he love you?

Don't doubt this week, trust him. Let's go to communion together.

Father, as we contemplate now, what you did on the cross for us, that you would not hold back your love, that you would punish your own son as a substitute in our place, that we might know you by faith, that the blood that was shed on the altar of the cross, the body that was broken, the bread and the juice that remind us of these things,

God, they remind us that it was our death that should have happened, but you chose your own son to die in our place.

May the memory of it encourage us our whole life to trust you and to walk with you and to understand that the difficulties in this life are going to pale in the beauty and the comparison of what's to come.

And so help us worship you now, trust in you. You will help us through our doubts, our struggles, our repeated failures.

And may we throw ourselves in faith and in trust on a merciful God who paid our penalty.

God, encourage us this week. Help us to share this good news and to live it, trusting that you are our savior and you are a