SERMON STRUCTURE: God Will Provide — But When?
Genesis 22:1-19
CIT (Central Idea of the Text): Because Abraham was willing to obey God, even by sacrificing his own son, God reaffirmed His promises to Abraham. (18 words).
SERMON FOCUS: God will provide a way for each of us to accomplish the tasks or calling that He gives to us.
MO: Consecrative
SO: Trust God’s faithfulness and God’s provision for your needs — even when God’s help comes at the last minute!
TITLE: God Will Provide — But When?
Then … the completed sermon should be evaluated in terms of how well it adheres to the CIT and SF, and accomplishes its SO.
INVOCATION
OUTLINE OF Genesis 22:1-19
God commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac (22:1-2).
Abraham responds in unquestioning preparation to obey (22:3).
Abraham and Isaac approach the place of sacrifice (22:4-6).
Isaac asks about the sacrifice, and Abraham responds (22:7-8).
Abraham binds up Isaac in preparation for the sacrifice (22:9-10).
The angel of God intervenes to stop the sacrifice (22:11-12).
God provides a ram to be sacrificed in Isaac’s place (22:13-14).
God reaffirms His promises to Abraham (22:15-18).
Abraham and Isaac return home (22:19).
SERMON DEVELOPMENT
God Will Provide — But When?
Genesis 22:1-19
This is the second in a series of sermons from Genesis that center on God’s provision for His people.
Last Sunday our Scripture we considered both God’s promises to Abram that he would become the ancestor of a people through whom all the earth would be blessed.
But we also took note of the ways in which Abram and his wife Sarai didn’t quite trust God’s initiative in keeping promises, and decided that they knew more about what was good for them than God knew.
And we saw the conflicts and family tensions that arose from their unilateral actions.
But at the end of the Scripture passage from last Sunday, all appeared to have turned out well:
Sarah had given birth to Abraham’s second son Isaac.
And even though he had been sent away from Abraham’s presence, God had promised that Ishmael, Abraham’s first son, would likewise become the father of a great nation.
But now, in today’s Scripture, a new challenge arises — a challenge that threatens to undo all that has transpired so far.
Our Scripture today is one of the most dramatic and well-known, but also one of the most puzzling, stories of the Old Testament.
There are perhaps only two or three other stories from the Old Testament that are as dramatic as this one.
One of them is the account in which Joseph, who has become a powerful ruler in Egypt, confronts his brothers who years ago had sold him into slavery (Genesis 45).
Another story is the prophet Nathan’s confrontation with David concerning his affair with Bathsheba (2 Samuel 12).
And a third and equally dramatic story is Elijah’s confrontation with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18:20-40).
In each of these stories we see God’s provision and protection for people who had to make difficult and potentially dangerous choices in being obedient to God.
Our Scripture for today comes from Genesis 22:1-19. I am reading from the New Revised Standard Version.
[Read here Genesis 22:1-19 (NRSV).]
The central point in this narrative is God’s reaffirmation of His promises to Abraham because Abraham was willing to obey God, even to the point of sacrificing his own son if necessary.
A significant theme in this passage is that God will provide a way for each of us to accomplish the tasks or calling that He gives to us.
Twice in this passage (22:8 and 22:14) Abraham said, “God will provide.”
It would be easy for us to reduce this Scripture passage to that simple observation.
But there is more to this passage than that.
Like many stories in the Bible, particularly in the Old Testament, a close reading of the text seems to raise more questions than answers.
We will explore some of those questions as we consider the narrative, which occurs in three scenes.
And each of the scenes is characterized by a distinct voice.
In the first scene Abraham is addressed by the voice of God, calling his name, “Abraham!”.
The voice of God is the voice of absolute sovereignty.
It is the voice of authority that commands immediate and unquestioning obedience.
And it is a voice that Abraham has perhaps not heard in this tone before.
It is a voice that calls Abraham to do the unthinkable: “2Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering ….” (22:2).
How can Abraham believe what he hears?
God tells Abraham to take his precious son, who is more dear to him than anyone else on earth, his own son, on whom rest all the promises that God has ever made to him, to take all of his own future, and surrender it to God’s control.
Were it not for the absolute sovereignty and authority of God, surely Abraham could not have believed it.
Have you heard the voice of God speaking to you in that way?
God does not call us to offer our children as burnt offerings for God’s pleasure!
That was a practice of other ancient religions in that part of the world.
But God does call us into relationship with Himself, and God does call us to specific ministries and areas of service in our families, in this church, in our community, and in our world.
What does God call you to do in service to God today?
Does God’s call seem to you to be as unthinkable as God’s call to Abraham here?
And how have you responded, or how will you now respond, to God’s absolutely sovereign call upon your life today?
We have no clue what Abraham was thinking.
But we do know how he responded.
Without hesitation he made immediate preparations to respond to God’s instructions.
In the second scene, Abraham approaches the place where God has commanded him to sacrifice his son Isaac.
It is here that Abraham hears the second voice: the voice of his own son.
The dialog follows a pattern similar to Abraham’s initial dialog with God.
Isaac addresses Abraham with only one word: “Father.”
And Abraham responds to Isaac in the same way he responded to God (22:7).
“Here I am,” he says.
And then he adds, “my son.”
Isaac’s voice is the voice of innocent pathos, a voice that asks a simple question, a question whose obvious answer conveys a great sadness and foreboding.
Isaac asks an obvious question, not comprehending that he himself is the proposed and intended answer.
Abraham’s answer was carefully measured.
And again, we have no clue what Abraham was actually thinking here.
Was he trying to deceive his son, not wanting to tell him the truth about what was about to happen?
Was his answer a deliberate lie?
Was his answer a carefully worded reference to what he fully thought God intended him to do?
Or was he fully confident that God would somehow provide a suitable sacrifice, a sacrifice other than his own dear son?
And the Scripture tells us that after this brief exchange, “the two walked on together.”
And yet as we read this, we cannot avoid asking ourselves, What sacrifice has God made on our behalf, so that we might live in relationship with God and with each other.
In the third scene, the awful sacrifice is about to be made.
Abraham has tied up his son Isaac and laid him on the altar.
And we don’t know how that took place.
And we don’t know when Isaac realized the awful truth about what was happening.
And we don’t know the feelings Abraham must have been experiencing at that moment.
But suddenly, incredibly, Abraham hears the third voice — the voice of stunning generosity and pardon. (22:11)
And the voice calls as before, “Abraham! Abraham!”
And again Abraham responds, “Here am I.”
Abraham answers the angel’s voice of generosity in the same way he answered God’s voice of absolute sovereignty and Isaac’s voice of pure innocence.
And the voice of the angel of God grants a reprieve — a ram, whose horns are entangled in a nearby bush.
It is the ram that will be sacrificed.
So the reprieve is first to Isaac himself — he will not be the sacrifice.
But the reprieve is also for Abraham — he will not be required to do what he thought God wanted him to do, and what he was ultimately ready to do.
God did indeed provide — but only at the last minute.
Examples of God’s provision at the last moment
When the Israelites finally crossed over the Jordan to enter into the promised land, they were led by the priests who carried the Ark of the Covenant.
[Read here Joshua 3:14-17 (NRSV)]
It was only when the priests who were carrying the Ark actually stepped into the rushing waters of the Jordan that the river itself stopped its flow.
In the same way, as the Israelites were departing from Egypt many years earlier, they found themselves trapped between the waters and the approaching Egyptian army.
But Moses said to them, “13Do not be afraid. Stand firm and see the deliverance that the Lord will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians whom you see today you shall never see again. 14The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to keep still.” (Exodus 14:13-14).
And so often those are also God’s words for us — “The Lord will fight for you, and you have only to keep still” — but we are unable, or unwilling, to listen!.
George Meuller was an evangelist and philanthropist in England in the nineteenth century. He founded a series of orphanages in Bristol, but then depended entirely on prayer for the support of those institutions. He refused to solicit any person or organization for support of these orphanages, but always received enough money to keep them operating — though some days he was often down to his last few cents. Over the course of his ministry, from about 1836 until his death in 1898, he received and distributed to the orphanages over $8 million in contributions. At his death, his personal worth was only about $800.
Late in his life, he wrote about his work in the following words:
I remember in all my Christian course, a period now [in March, 1895] of sixty-nine years and four months, that I ever SINCERELY and PATIENTLY sought to know the will of God by the teaching of the Holy Ghost, through the instrumentality of the Word of God, but I have ALWAYS been directed rightly. But if honesty of heart and uprightness before God were lacking, or if I did not patiently wait upon God for instruction, or if I preferred the counsel of my fellow men to the declarations of the Word of the living God, then I made great mistakes.
In these examples from Scripture, and in our own personal experience, God’s provision for our needs seems often to come at the last minute.
In these circumstances, I think God is trying to teach us to depend entirely upon Him, and not upon ourselves.
And while such experiences are often frightening as they happen, through them we come to realize that ultimately we are dependent upon God for everything that we need.
One of the hymns we often sing is “Take Time to Be Holy” (No. 441, The Hymnal for Worship and Celebration (Waco, TX: Word Music, 1986).
The third verse of that hymn says,
Take time to be holy, let Him be thy guide,
And run not before Him, whatever betide;
In joy or in sorrow, still follow thy Lord.
And, looking to Jesus, still trust in His Word.
Those words are a fitting admonition for us as we consider how God provides for us.
1 This exposition is adapted from James A. Newsome, “Genesis 22:1-14,” in Walter Bruggeman et al., Texts For Preaching A Lectionary Commentary Based on the NRSV –Year A (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), 381-82.