9.14.25 - Sermon written and preached by Leigh Rachal @ FPC Abbeville, LA

Introductory Warning (before the reading)

Friends, before we hear today’s scripture, I want to say this:

The passage we’re about to hear is one of the hardest in all of scripture.

I don’t think it should ever be included in children’s Bibles.

Though it often is. 

As we read it with, modern eyes, it can stir fear, confusion, even anger.

But this story was not written in our time

or for us as an audience.

It is a story that comes from a world very different from our own.

And in that world, the surprise of the story is NOT what we might first expect.

So I invite us to listen carefully,

to hold onto what we know of God from creation and from Christ,

and to trust that there is good news here.

to trust that even in stories that horrify us, there is a word of life, not death.

Read Genesis 21:1-3; 22:1–14 & John 1:29

Last week we spoke of “In the beginning…”

and we heard how God spoke, and it was so.

God saw the light, and it was good.

God separated and blessed, calling creation into life.

And God provided… seeds and fruit, water and sun,

so that life would not only begin, but also continue.

From the very first page of scripture, God is a God who sees.

And God’s seeing is never just noticing.

God beholds with delight.

God sees and offers blessing.

God sees the Good of creation

and provides what is needed for goodness to endure.

Between the story of Creation and the story we read today,

we learn that God called Abraham to leave behind his homeland. 

The Word that spoke light into being also called Abraham. 

At the time, Abraham was settled in Haran,

surrounded by family, rooted in a familiar land.

And yet he heard God’s voice: “Go. Leave your country, your people, your father’s house, and go to the land I will show you.”

It was a call into the unknown, into risk, into trust.

And Abraham stepped out not knowing where he was going,

trusting that God could make a home where there was no home,

a family where there was no child,

a future where there was only wandering.

The story unfolds and we see how God provides for Abraham and his wife Sarah.

And how a long-awaited child, for this barren couple is promised and then born. 

Isaac is the precious child on whom all the promises of God seem to hang.

God sees and calls Abraham and Sarah. 

And God blesses them. 

And God provides for the goodness of their life to continue. 

But now, years later, that same God speaks again.

And this time the call is even harder.

Abraham is asked not only to trust with his own life, not only with Sarah’s,

but with Isaa, his child, the fulfillment of all God’s promises. 

Every parent knows this is the hardest trust of all:

to place into God’s hands the child we love most.

To believe that God will see and provide not only for oneself, but for one’s child.

To believe that God’s blessing is bigger than any fear.

I remember the first day I walked Harper into his first preschool. 

He was so little, his backpack nearly bigger than he was.

He gripped my hand so tightly that my knuckles turned white.

And then the teacher came to the door and it was time.

I had to let go.

I smiled bravely, gave him a big hug and then handed him off to a woman that was all but a stranger to me.

And I cried all the way back to the car.

Because it felt like the hardest thing I had ever done was letting go of that hand,

trusting that God would watch over him when I could not.

And that was just school. 

But the ache Abraham must have felt in this story is like the ache every parent will feel at some point

as we realize we will have to entrust what is most precious to us into God’s safekeeping.

And yet, again and again, we discover in these stories of scripture, how God sees what is Good. 

And God blesses and provides for Life’s Goodness to continue. 

Now, just to be clear… This is not the promise of a life free of worry, but a promise of a life where we are not alone, and where God sees to it that Life and not Death continues. Even if that means Life after death.

This story of almost child-sacrifice may feel extreme to us. And it is!

And yet in Abraham’s world, it was not unthinkable.

The writer of Genesis sets it before us not as proof of Abraham’s devotion,

but as revelation of God’s character.

The true test is not whether Abraham will destroy what is precious to him “for God”,

but whether he will trust that God will provide what is life-giving for him and his family in the end.

Unfortunately, we still can still sometimes face this same struggle today.

We still sometimes imagine that faith means struggle,

that devotion must mean loss.

We still think we must prove our value by what we give up,

by how much we suffer,

by what we are willing to sacrifice for God.

The good news that shines through this story is that

the God of the new creation, to which we are being called,

is not glorified by our destruction or our own sacrifices,

but by God’s provision of what is needed for Goodness and Life to continue.

The God who saw light and called it good,

the God who saw Abraham and Isaac and provided life,

is the God who calls US… 

not to death, but to life.

Not to despair, but to joy.

Not to losing what is precious, but to receiving what is Good.

So Abraham walks up the mountain with Isaac beside him.

And as we read this story, the silence is heavy, until Isaac finally asks, “Where is the lamb?”

And Abraham, with trembling faith, replies:

“God will see to it. God will provide.”

And God does.

God provides not a lamb but a ram. 

And the child lives. 

The covenant continues.

The new creation is coming.

The author gives us a clue about what the story is supposed to teach us

when we are told that the mountain on which this happens

is named NOT for Abraham’s faith

but for God’s seeing and providing. 

If we take a step back, we will see that this story, and indeed the pattern of all of scripture, is the same story we heard in creation. 

God speaks or calls someone or something into action. 

God sees what is Good.

God provides what is needed to preserve Life

so that blessings and Goodness can continue.

Centuries later, John the Baptist will echo this

when he points to Jesus and says,

“Behold! See! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

When John calls Jesus the Lamb of God, he is pointing back to stories his hearers would have known by heart: 

The story of Abraham and Isaac, where God provides this ram in place of the child, preserving life and continuing the covenant.

But also. 

The story of the Passover, when the blood of the lamb marked the doors of Israel’s homes and death passed over, and the people were set free from slavery.

And the lambs that had been daily offerings in the temple. They were signs of forgiveness, a reminder that the people were still in covenant with God.

John’s declaration that Jesus is the Lamb of God even points to the time of the prophets, especially the prophet Isaiah, where we hear of the servant who suffered on behalf of the people.

And this servant is described as a lamb led to the slaughter, carrying the people’s grief and bringing healing.

All of those stories would have echoed at once in the ears of his audience when John cried out: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

It is John the Baptist reminding his followers that 

God provides. 

God rescues. 

God forgives. 

God heals.

And in Jesus, all those threads come together.

And that this blessing of provision and healing is not just for one person,

not even just for one family,

and not even just for one people group or nation,

but for the whole world.

Of course, now, as more modern humans, the ancient language of lamb and sacrifice may not resonate as deeply as it did then. 

But I think the underlying truth of these stories is still the best news we might ever hear:

God, the Word made flesh is still calling forth Goodness and life,

still separating the ways the Life from the ways of death. 

And in Jesus, God provides what is most needed for Goodness and Life to continue.

God rescues. God forgives. God heals. God shows up in love.

This is the story we live in:

God, at the dawn of creation, saw all that was made and called it Good.

This same God, even on the mountain with Abraham, saw the child and preserved his life.

And then God, seeing the whole world in all its brokenness,

still called it Beloved,

and still sent God’s own self in the form of His Son, Jesus,

to offer the path to Life for this broken world….

So that Goodness may continue eternally. 

This is the story of creation and re-creation.

Not destruction, but blessing.

Not despair, but hope.

Not death, but Life that continues, and continues in Goodness.

And the test is never whether we can offer up enough to earn any of it. 

But perhaps the test is whether we will dare to trust God to see us,

to provide for us,

And to bless us.

So that Life may continue,

and continue in Goodness.

Let us offer thanks for this Good News. 

Amen.