As just the two of them walked up the mountain, Isaac broke the silence. His question must have cut Abraham like a knife. Yet, Abraham’s answer is overflowing with faith, “God will provide.” The LORD provides the test, and the LORD provides the faith to pass it. Abraham passed the test with flying colors and as the knife was coming down the Angel of the LORD reached out and caught him.
The Angel of the LORD said, "Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him." Abraham made the sacrifice in his heart and that’s what mattered to God. He had surrendered his will and his wisdom — yes, and his son — in obedience to the word of his Lord. Here on Mount Moriah, the future site of Jerusalem, Abraham’s Son is spared when God’s Son, the Angel of the LORD, steps in and stops it. Years later the Angel of the LORD would sacrifice himself and no one would stop it.
We know from Hebrews 11 that Isaac is portrayed as a type of Christ. Isaac carried the wood on his back to his own sacrifice much like Jesus carried the wood of His cross on His own back on the way to His own sacrifice for the sins of mankind. As Abraham was tasked to sacrifice his one and only son, so God the Father went through with the blood sacrifice of His one and only Son.
But perhaps the best picture of Christ in this account isn’t to be found in Isaac at all. Because with Jesus, of course, God didn’t stop the knife in midair. He let if fall. Verse 13: “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.”
The LORD did provide. He provided a ram stuck in the sharp thorns of a thicket. He provided a substitute. Jesus served as a substitute for us on the altar of God, just like the ram was a substitute for Isaac. The head of our beloved Jesus stuck with the sharp thorns of the mocker’s crown. God’s greatest gift was provided on the cross of Calvary! To what lengths God’s love for you drove Him! To what an agonizing, humiliating death He sacrificed His Son! All this in order to buy us back from sin, to bring us away from the brink of hell, and open to us the gates of eternal life. What a Substitute! What a Savior!
Merciful God, I praise you for substituting Your Son for me. Help me to always remember the great lengths to which You in love went for my salvation. Amen. |
