Today’s reading is all about Isaac, the miracle child, who brought laughter to Abraham and Sarah’s life and fulfilled their hopes. In Isaac God demonstrated that he keeps his promises and nothing is too hard for him.

When Isaac was weaned, around three years of age, Abraham threw a party for him. The boy had survived infancy and babyhood and was now the walking, talking heir to Abraham’s great wealth. There was a lot for everyone to celebrate . . . everyone except Ishmael.

Who could blame Ishmael for resenting Isaac who had displaced him as primary heir in the family? He made mocking remarks about his little half brother and his step-mother Sarah heard about it. It was the last straw in this long, tense relationship between the two mothers of Abraham’s sons, and  Sarah demanded that Hagar and Ishmael be sent away.

God is a Father to the Fatherless

Abraham was distressed, Hagar was shocked and Ishmael’s heart was broken as mother and son plunged into the desert with only as much food and water as Hagar could carry on her shoulders. Ishmael was probably a strapping seventeen year old by now, but I can imagine Hagar swatted his hands away if he tried to help his mother. She would carry the load and provide for him as long as she was able.

As he did before, God met Hagar in her despair.

The first time she was sent into the desert, a frightened pregnant woman, the Lord told her he saw her. This time God calls to her from heaven and says, “What is the matter, Hagar? Do not be afraid; God has heard the boy crying as he lies there.” Genesis 21:17

God who saw the mother now heard the son, and provided for both of them.  God stayed with Ismael as he grew up and developed his archery skills. Ishmael became a hunter and defender . . . a real man . . . and eventually Hagar is able to get him a wife from Egypt, her home country.

Ishmael was the only son of Abraham who didn’t inherit anything from him. Abraham sent Ishmael and his mother away penniless. If God had not been with him, Ishmael might have died in the desert. God became the father to this fatherless boy, finished raising him and provided for his needs so that he eventually became a great nation.

Quiet Isaac

Isaac is a quiet participant in these stories of his life.  He is the focus of so much drama, from seeing his brother Ishmael sent away, through being designated a burnt offering, to being married to Rebekah. He only speaks once in these passages, when he asks, “Father?…The fire and the wood are here…but where is the lamb for the sacrifice?” Genesis 22:7

Isaac didn’t even protest when his father bound him, laid him on the altar and prepared to slay him. He said nothing when he was released from his bonds and climbed down from the altar. Even when his beautiful bride was presented to him, the Bible records no words from Isaac. He was a quiet man who simply lived within God’s will for him.

Hard Worship

When Abraham took his beloved son to sacrifice him, he regarded it as an act of worship. “He said to his servants, ‘Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.’ “ Genesis 22:5

Worship was not about Abraham’s thoughts and feelings, it was about God’s thoughts and his will in the situation.

Do you find it hard to worship when you don’t understand what’s going on in your life? So did Abraham.

But Abraham knew whom he was dealing with, the great, mysterious God; the God of wrath against sin; hidden in darkness and revealed in fire; the keeper of impossible promises.

Abraham had long ago given up resisting or disobeying God. When God said, “Take your son, your only son whom you love, Isaac . . .Sacrifice him as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you,” Abraham saw only one course of action. He took Isaac to worship God on the mountain.

Great Faith

In Hebrews 11:17-19 we read this about Abraham:

“ By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” 

Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.”

Perhaps the greatest test of faith for anyone is to worship God and believe his promises in the face of costly personal sacrifice. God created Isaac out of two bodies as good as dead and this led Abraham to believe two things:

1. That Isaac was going to grow up and have a family

2. That he should kill Isaac as an act of worship before that could happen

Abraham steadfastly obeyed God despite these impossible contradictions.

When you face the unthinkable in your life, is your first impulse to turn it into an opportunity to worship God? Do you walk into trouble, pain, fear and sorrow and say to those around you, “Wait here while I go over there and worship?” that’s what Abraham’s example encourages us to do.

A Mother Dies and a Bride Arrives

Abraham and Sarah grew old together and eventually Sarah died. Abraham negotiated the purchase of a field with a cave in it for the family burial plot. This was the first land Abraham’s family owned in Canaan, and it established the place where they could be laid to rest with their ancestors. Canaan became their homeland with the purchase of Ephron’s field. Abraham, Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob and Leah were all buried there.

Abraham didn’t seek a wife for Isaac until after Sarah’s death, but when he sent his servant in search of the right girl, God supplied Rebekah. Perhaps Isaac needed a great story about how God provided his wife so he would open his heart to her. He seems to have remained attached to Sarah after her death, he even moved into Sarah’s tent when he got married, but his was soon comforted by his wife’s love, as Genesis 2:24 says. “That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.”

These first chapters of Genesis show us that while God’s will is steady and immutable, from the human perspective, it may seem very slow and hard to understand. Sometimes decades go by and very little seems to happen. Thank God for these biblical people who show the fruit of enduring faith.