The Testing of Faith

Introduction

Read Genesis 22:1-19

Genesis 22:1–19 ESV

After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and 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.” And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together. When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” 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. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called the name of that place, “The Lord will provide”; as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.” And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven and said, “By myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.” So Abraham returned to his young men, and they arose and went together to Beersheba. And Abraham lived at Beersheba.

So here God is testing Abraham’s faith. It is not a test for God to learn about Abraham’s faith. God already knew where Abraham was in his faith. This testing is an act of growing and purifying Abraham’s faith. It is the kind of testing that gold goes through when it is put through the fire, to bring the other minerals and the dross so the gold can become pure and beautiful.

This is not the first time Abraham has been tested.

He has been tested over and again. But this is the culmination of all the other times of testing.

All his other times of testing has prepared him for this greatest of tests.

God’s Testing Invites Us to Trust Him

Abraham Responded in Obedience

God’s Shocking Call

God gives a command that is unlike anything He has given before or since.

He commands Abraham to take his son, Isaac, and to offer him as a burnt offering to God.

What’s even more shocking is that God knows how difficult and hard this command is going to be for He says, take your son, your only son Isaac.

Of course, we know Abraham has one other son.

But God is reminding Abraham of the fact that this is the son of promise, the only son through whom God is going to work to bless all the nations of the earth.

Just as God called Abraham to leave his past behind in Ur, now He is calling Abraham to forsake his future in Isaac.

And what is most shocking is that God has never commanded human sacrifice before.

God even condemns the other cultures for the practice of child sacrifice.

God abhors the practice of killing children in the name of any god or reason.

And God has very severe consequences for the killing of children.

This is a shocking call that should sit very uneasy for us and we are not simply to gloss over this account.

God is getting us to open our eyes to what He is doing in Abraham’s life, because this is not a normal kind of command that He would make.

Abraham’s Even More Shocking Response

But what’s even more shocking than God’s call to Abraham is Abraham’s response.

Notice what Abraham does when God comes to him with this command. Abraham rose early in the morning and got everything ready to go.

There is an unhesitating obedience that takes place.

This is not to say that Abraham was without emotion.

As one commentator pointed out, he gets everything ready to go and then realizes that he needs to cut the wood for the offering. There seems to be a disorientation to Abraham’s thought process. He may be emotionally out of sorts with this command.

But Abraham chooses to obey, even when this command is so shocking and even does not seem to make sense.

How do we respond when we hear God’s Word? When we hear or receive an explicit command from God, do we follow Him in obedience or do we give reasons why we can’t obey.

Abraham could have justified his disobedience to God.

He could have said, I can’t do this because it doesn’t make sense.

I can’t do this because he is the child of promise.

I can’t do this because what would Sarah say?

I can’t do this because it would hurt me emotionally.

I can’t do this because I’ve done my time in serving You and waiting on You.

I don’t need to do this because I’m saved by grace and not by works.

Abraham could have justified his disobedience in many ways, just as we so often do in our own lives. Yet, he chose to obey God’s Word.

Abraham Obeyed Because He Trusted God

Why did Abraham Obey? How could Abraham obey?

Abraham obeyed because he trusted God. He did not obey to earn God’s love. He obeyed because he trusted and believed in the love that God has already demonstrated for him and the goodness of God that he has come to experience first hand.

True faith will lead to obedience, however imperfect. But true faith will produce the fruit of obedience.

Often, when we speak of faith or belief, we talk about an intellectual assent to certain facts.

Of course, faith has to begin with certain acknowledgments of what is true. We cannot put our faith in something we do not know anything about.

Romans 10:14 ESV

How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?

If we are to believe in God, we do need to hear about Him and know certain truths about Him.

But faith does not stop with the knowledge of these facts.

James 2:19 ESV

You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!

Faith is the active placing of one’s trust in this God that we know and are learning about.

James 2:20–23 ESV

Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a friend of God.

Of course, the way James seems to word his teaching seems to be somewhat confusing. Even the great protestant reformed, Martin Luther, wanted to remove the book of James because of its apparent contradiction to the message of grace that Paul preached. But there is no contradiction here.

James is acknowledging that we are saved by grace through faith alone, but that this faith that saves does not stand alone.

The true faith that saves and justifies is a faith that is active and produces the fruit of obedience.

Why? Because when we truly trust and believe in God, we know that God is always faithful to accomplish all that He has promised, so we are freed to obey knowing that God will do all He has said, even when we aren’t sure what is happening.

We see Abraham’s faith playing out when they arrive at the mountain and he tells his men to stay with the donkey and that he and Isaac would go up the mountain.

Genesis 22:5 ESV

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.”

He tells them that he and Isaac will go to worship and then will return to them.

He obeyed because he honestly believed that whatever happens, he and Isaac would both return. Even though inwardly he might be struggling with the emotions and confusion of this command, he knows God has promised to bless the whole world through Isaac so God is not going to let this be the end of the story for Isaac.

Hebrews 11:17–19 ESV

By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.

You see, Abraham’s faith led him to obey because he believed that God would accomplish his plan even in spite of this very difficult and soul disturbing command. He knew that God was powerful enough to accomplish His plan. Just as God had brought his and Sarah’s body back to life in order to give birth to Isaac, he believed God was able to bring Isaac back from the dead. Faith is the assurance that God will do exactly what He has said even when we can’t see how He will do it.

Our failure to obey stems from the fact that we do not trust that God is who He says He is.

If we truly believe that God is who He says He is and He will do what He has promised, then we are freed to obey because we know that regardless of the circumstances we are facing, God is worthy of our trust.

This means we obey when the way is hard and dark and the wait seems long. We can obey because we trust that God is good even when life often is not.

God’s Testing Invites Us to Die to Self

So true faith produces the fruit of obedience, however imperfect. We know that Abraham did not have perfect obedience, but as his faith grew when he experienced the goodness of God, so his obedience grew as a result.

Here’s the thing about obedience though. Obedience is not the same as legalism.

Legalism says I am going to be good enough to earn my own way before God. Obedience says I am going to die to myself as I trust the only One who can save me.

True faith which produces the fruit of obedience will lead us to die to ourselves. If we are going to live by faith, we must learn how to die.

Isaac Had to Die by Willingly Lay Down His Life

As we see how Abraham followed God by faith which led to obedience, Abraham was not the only one who was being obedient to God’s call on his life.

Just as Abraham had to trust and obey, so Isaac also had to trust by willingly laying down his life to the will of God. We do not know exactly how old Isaac is by this time, but most likely he is between a teenager and a young adult. Anywhere from 13 to 30 or so.

We see he is strong enough to carry the wood for the sacrifice, the wood he would be placed upon. He has to carry his own sacrificial altar, just as we will see many years later when another Only Begotten Son will have to carry His own cross.

And we see that he is no dummy. They have everything they need for a sacrifice, except one thing… the sacrifice. He asks his father, where is the lamb for the burnt offering. He knows something is off.

And of course, Abraham’s response is that God will provide all the while knowing that Isaac is the sacrificial lamb, unless God revealed another way as they progressed up the mountain.

But when they get to the place of the sacrifice, they prepare the altar. And then what happens? Abraham begins to bind up Isaac as the sacrifice.

Keep in mind that Abraham was 100 when Isaac was born. Abraham is also 13-30 years older than that now.

Isaac is in a position to fight and say no. It is one thing for God to command Abraham to sacrifice his only son. But Isaac is in a position to fight and there’s not much that aged Abraham could do to stop him.

And yet, Isaac, trusting in both his father and in the God of his father, willingly submits himself to this plan and dies to himself.

And of course, Abraham had to die to himself as he is sacrificing the blessing and the future that has been promised to him. Both father and son are dying to themselves as they are giving up the life they have for so long waited for.

True faith leads to dying to yourself.

Like Abraham and Isaac, we too are called to die to ourselves.

If we are going to follow Christ, we must die to ourselves. There is not true discipleship without death, no true salvation without sacrifice.

Luke 9:23–24 ESV

And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.

Jesus told His disciples that if they are to follow Him they must take up their cross daily. This means they must die to themselves. They must die to their desires, to their pride and boasting, to their self-reliance, to their philosophies, to their own personal lordship.

We must learn that death is necessary if we want to live.

Gospel-Driven Ministry: An Introduction to the Calling and Work of a Pastor 10. Dying

Milton Vincent writes:

When my flesh yearns for some prohibited thing, I must die.

When called to do something I don’t want to do, I must die.

When I wish to be selfish and serve no one, I must die.

When shattered by hardships that I despise, I must die.

When wanting to cling to wrongs done against me, I must die.

When enticed by allurements of the world, I must die.

When wishing to keep besetting sins secret, I must die.

When wants that are borderline needs are left unmet, I must die.

When dreams that are good seem shoved aside, I must die.2

Do you trust God with your life? Are you willing to die to yourself and to your desires to follow Christ?

God’s Testing Invites Us to Receive True Life

Here’s the good news, though. When we choose to die to ourselves, God actually gives us life.

It is when we try to hang on to life that we actually lose our lives.

God Provides a Ram

Abraham and Isaac both chose to die to self and to live by faith in obedience to God’s command.

Isaac, willingly got up on the altar and was willing to be sacrificed. Abraham lifted the knife upon the son he waited 100 years to have.

And what happened next? God stopped Abraham!

God having tested Abraham has revealed the fruit of Abraham’s faith that God declared to be credited for his righteousness.

And because Abraham and Isaac both trusted the Lord, God provides salvation to Isaac by providing a substitute to die in his place.

God lifted up his eyes and saw that a ram was caught in a thicket. This Ram will take the place of Isaac. And so Abraham’s trust allowed him to receive the gift of life that God was graciously offering the whole time.

God Provides the Lamb

Like Isaac, we all belong on the sacrificial altar.

Going back to the beginning of Genesis, we are told that death would come when they sinned against God and partook of the fruit that God commanded them not to eat from.

The wages of sin is death. And yet, God provided a way for us to live.

Just as God called Abraham to take His Son, His only Son and offer Him as a burnt offering, so God, in His grace, did not merely make the offer of His only Son, but actually did sacrifice His only Son as the Lamb of God who takes a way the sins of the world!

Jesus is the True and Better Isaac who carried His own cross up the hill of Calvary. He willingly allowed Himself to be nailed to the cross. At any moment He could have called down angels to free Him from those crucifying Him, and yet, He chose not to because in the end, it wasn’t the nails holding Him there, it was His love and grace for us and His perfect obedience to the Father.

And now this Lamb of God is offered to all those who by faith will receive God’s grace offered at Calvary. This is not merely an intellectual faith, but a faith that changes everything. A faith that trusts in the finished work of Christ, that produces the fruit of obedience and is willing to die to ourselves because we have tasted and seen that the Lord is good.

Yes, the testing and purifying of our faith can be trying and filled with hardship and suffering. But The testing and purifying of Faith is God’s invitation to receive life and to receive it abundantly because of what the Lamb has done for us. When Christ bids a man to follow Him, He bids him to come and die. But when that man dies to follow Christ, He will receive a better life than the one he left behind.

So the choice is now ours. Will we strive to hold on to life until we die? Or as C.S. Lewis wrote, Will you “Die before you die. There is no chance after.” We can only find life when we choose to die to ourselves and receive the life that can only come from the Lamb of God offered for us.

The Lord’s Supper

As we come to the Lord’s Table, let us take a moment to reflect upon the mercy and grace that God has shown to us through His amazing gift of His Son. We stand here redeemed and freed from the penalty of sin because of the finished work of the Lamb upon the cross.

Let us listen to the words of John the Baptist in John 1:29

John 1:29 ESV

The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!

It is only as we behold and fix our eyes upon this lamb that we find life. Let us as God’s people turn our eyes away from the things of this world and the life we attempt to build and let us fix our eyes upon Jesus who alone gives us the abundant and eternal life we so desperately need.

The Lord’s Supper is a chance for us to remember and remind ourselves of who Christ is and the joy and life that is in Him.

Let us spend a few moments in prayer and repentance for how we have turned away from Him. Confess to the Lord your sins and struggles, and ask Him to help you to daily die to yourself as you seek to trust and obey Him.

The Pastor’s Book: A Comprehensive and Practical Guide to Pastoral Ministry Sample Prayers for Communion

Almighty God, we come to you this morning admitting our unworthiness to partake of this holy meal. And yet, with confidence, sincerity, truth, and joy, we come to this Supper through the sacred blood of Jesus, our Lord and Savior. We praise you for your mercy and grace, and ask you through this bread and cup to commune with us now as we commune with you and one another. Amen.

The Bread

As we pass the bread, let us Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the World.

Prayer

The Pastor’s Book: A Comprehensive and Practical Guide to Pastoral Ministry Sample Prayers for the Bread

Our dear Lord, the bread that we are about to partake of is symbolic of the human body in which you dwelt incarnate among us, sinless, for thirty-three years. And when you were crucified, you bore our sins in your body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. And by your wounds we were healed (see

Directive

The Pastor’s Book: A Comprehensive and Practical Guide to Pastoral Ministry Classic Directives > Sample Directives for Partaking of the Bread

The body of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was given for you, preserve your body and soul to everlasting life. Take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for you, and feed on him in your hearts by faith with thanksgiving.

The Cup

As we pass the cup, let us focus on the Almighty power of God who has by the blood of the Lamb taken away our sin and given us abundant and eternal life with Him.

Prayer

The Pastor’s Book: A Comprehensive and Practical Guide to Pastoral Ministry Sample Prayers for the Cup

Our gracious and merciful God, we know from your Word that we cannot claim to be righteous apart from your righteousness, the righteousness that has been given to us through faith in Christ. We praise and honor you for this new covenant, the covenant sealed through the death of your Son and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And we drink this cup in remembrance of Christ’s sacrifice for our sins, asking him even now, through the Spirit, to commune with us as we commune with each other. With grateful hearts and sober minds, we pray this in Chri

Directive

The Pastor’s Book: A Comprehensive and Practical Guide to Pastoral Ministry Classic Directives > Sample Directives for Partaking of the Cup

The blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for you, preserve your body and soul to everlasting life. Drink this in remembrance that Christ’s blood was shed for you, and be thankful.