Abraham and Isaac

An old man, a young son, and a long climb. The son carries the wood. The father carries the fire and the knife. And the son asks a question his father can hardly bear to answer.

Abraham had waited a lifetime for this son. God had promised him that his family would become a great nation, as many as the stars in the sky. But for years, he and his wife Sarah had no children at all. Then, when Abraham was a hundred years old and Sarah was ninety, Isaac was born. His name means laughter. Every promise God had made to Abraham now rested on this one boy. The family was living near Beersheba, on the edge of the southern desert in the land of Canaan. And it was there, Genesis tells us, that God tested Abraham.

God called to him. “Abraham.” And Abraham answered, “Here I am.” Then came words that must have stopped his breath. “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Offer him there as a burnt offering, on a mountain I will show you.” Genesis does not tell us what Abraham said that night, or what he felt. It only tells us what he did. Early the next morning, he got up. He saddled his donkey. He split the wood for the offering. And he set out with Isaac and two of his servants.

They walked for three days. On the third day, Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. He said to the servants, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there. We will worship, and then we will come back to you.” We will come back. Abraham laid the wood on Isaac’s shoulders, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. And the two of them went on together. Then Isaac spoke. “Father?” “Here I am, my son.” “The fire and the wood are here,” Isaac said. “But where is the lamb for the offering?” Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb, my son.” And the two of them went on together.

When they reached the place God had shown him, Abraham built an altar and set the wood on it. He bound Isaac and laid him on the altar. He reached out his hand. And then, a voice from heaven. The angel of the Lord called out, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am.” “Do not lay a hand on the boy. Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not held back from me your son, your only son.” Abraham looked up. There, caught by its horns in a thicket, was a ram. He went and took the ram, and offered it instead of his son. And Abraham gave that place a name. The Lord Will Provide.

The angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time, and God renewed his promise. Because Abraham had trusted him and held nothing back, his descendants would be as many as the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. And through his offspring, all the nations of the earth would be blessed. Then Abraham went back down the mountain, to the servants who were waiting. And together they set off home to Beersheba.

Where was Moriah? Genesis only calls it a mountain in the region of Moriah, about three days’ walk from Beersheba. But much later, the Bible gives a clue. Second Chronicles, chapter three, says that King Solomon built the temple in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah. So Jewish and Christian readers have long connected this hilltop with the place where, for centuries afterwards, Israel would gather to worship God. And it is worth saying clearly: elsewhere the Bible firmly condemns child sacrifice, which some nations around Israel practised. In this story, the boy is spared, and God provides.

This story is found in Genesis, chapter twenty-two, verses one to nineteen. It is a hard story, and it is meant to be. But it ends with a ram in a thicket, a promise renewed, and a name on a mountain: The Lord Will Provide. So here is a question to carry with you. When you cannot see how things will work out, what helps you trust that God will provide?