Good morning, my brothers! My time with the Lord this week forced me to ask a question I wasn't expecting - and I didn't like my answer. Maybe God wants to ask both of us the very same question today. Let’s go! 5-min, 2-sec read.
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I've read Genesis 22 dozens of times. I’m sure you have, too. Abraham, Isaac, Mt. Moriah, the sacrifice…the trust.
Before I became a father, I admired Abraham's faith. After becoming a dad - and now a grandfather - I don't read it the same way.
I linger over the beginning of the chapter instead of rushing to the ending. I can almost hear Abraham loading the donkey before sunrise and the quiet crunch of sandals on the rocky trail as father and son begin their three-day walk.
Scripture never tells us what Abraham was thinking. It leaves the silence intact. I know what I would be thinking:
“Why God?” through a tear-stained face.
“You didn’t mean it literally, did You, Father?”
“We’re turning around. Now”
Every time I read the passage, one question always comes to the forefront of my mind: Could I do the same? If God would ask, would I immediately obey (“The next morning”) and take the three-day journey with my son, knowing what I am called to do?
I don’t think I could. Just being honest.
Closed Fists
Which has challenged me deeply this week. I’ve asked myself an important question, one you probably have as well: What else am I holding on to so tightly that if God asked, I’m not sure I could release? The “closed fists” test, let’s call it.
My guess is, we all hold something a little too tightly, unwilling to immediately obey and surrender.
They could be a child, a spouse, our health, our finances, our time, our reputation, our future. These are good gifts. Tough to surrender.
Or they could be “not so good gifts” – an addiction, an affair, a secret sin.
This week, I’ve come to call these things “Isaacs”, those things or people in our lives which we’d have to think about before we could truly lay them down at the feet of the Father, if we could at all.
But as I’ve prayed through Genesis 22 this week to uncover my “Isaacs”, I think it asks you and me an even deeper question:
Do we trust the Giver more than the gift? That’s the real question. Do I trust the Father?
The Three-Day Walk
The journey to Moriah wasn't one dramatic moment. It was three ordinary days of quiet obedience. Every sunrise gave Abraham another opportunity to turn back. Each day, he chose obedience over comfort. He chose to trust the Father, moment by moment.
Could not have been easy.
But I believe that this is how our trust is formed. Most of us don't surrender ourselves or our Isaacs in a single decision. We learn to trust God one small step of obedience, one conversation, one disappointment, one answered prayer, one difficult moment at a time.
Perhaps your Isaac isn't something God intends to remove. Perhaps He's simply loosening your grip so your confidence rests more in Him than in His gifts.
But maybe your Isaac needs to be killed. Maybe it’s an idol, taking the place only the Lord should inhabit.
Regardless, fundamental questions remain: Do I trust the Father? Do I believe His ways, His timing are always for my eternal best? Or don’t I?
The Father Revealed
Before they arrive at Mt. Moriah, Isaac asks, 'Where is the lamb?' Abraham answers, 'God Himself will provide the lamb.' He answers before seeing any reason to respond as he does.
At last, they arrive. Abraham builds the altar. He stacks the wood on it. And as a dad, does the unthinkable. He ties his son up, places him on the wood, and he raises his knife to sacrifice him.
Heaven breaks the silence.
"Do not lay a hand on the boy."
Every father exhales. Abraham unties Isaac. He looks up, and there is the ram, in the thicket. The perfect sacrifice, provided by the Father Himself.
Together they walk down the mountain because a ram dies in the son's place.
Moriah, however, was never the destination. It was a shadow stretching toward another hill.
On Moriah, the father heard, 'Stop.'
On Calvary, the Father didn’t.
No angel intervened. No ram appeared. The beloved Son was not spared.
Before God ever asked us to trust Him, He proved Himself trust-worthy.
He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all - how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?
When I finally saw Genesis 22 through the lens of Calvary, everything changed. The greatest hero of the story was never Abraham. It was always the Father.
Abraham is a harbinger of the love, mercy, and grace of the Father, who willingly gave His Son to take our place, to take your sins and mine. So we could live as His sons, here on earth empowered by the Holy Spirit, and for eternity with Him, face-to-face.
Show Me My Isaacs
Here's what I'm discovering. The longer I walk with Jesus, the easier it becomes to release my Isaacs. Not easy, but easier. There are still those I hold too tightly, but slowly, the hands are opening.
Not because I've become stronger. Because I've come to know the Father better.
Every answered prayer. Every unexpected provision. Every trial He carried me through. Every expression of undeserved grace has revealed more of His heart.
As we know Him, we trust Him. As we trust Him, our grip begins to loosen. And as our grip loosens, laying our Isaacs on the altar becomes less about loss and more about love.
One day at a time, we discover that placing our Isaacs into the Father's hands no longer means giving something up. It frees us to entrust it to the only One who has ever loved it more than you do.
And loves us so much that He willingly gave His Son in our stead.
So today, don't simply ask God to show you your Isaac.
Ask Him to show you His heart.
The rest will follow.
And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power...to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
-Will
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