This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Love of the Father” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, August 23, 1992.

We will be looking first at Genesis chapter twenty-two this morning and then turning to Hebrews chapter eleven. Genesis chapter twenty-two. We are reading the first fourteen verses. Let’s hear the word of God. And it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham and said unto him, Abraham, and he said, Behold, here I am.

And He said, Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah. Offer him there as a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell you of. And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and he took the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up and went to the place of which God had told him. Then, on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar off. And Abraham said to his young men, Stay here with the donkey, and I and the boy will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son, and he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went both of them together. And Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, My father. And he said, Here I am, my son. And he said, Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering? And Abraham said, My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went, both of them, together.

And they came to the place which God had told him of, and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched forth his hand and took the knife to slay his son.

And the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham. And he said, Here I am. And he said, Do not lay your hand on the boy, and do nothing to him. For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket by its horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering instead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place The Lord Will Provide. And it is said to this day, On the mount of the Lord it shall be provided.

Then turning to Hebrews chapter 11, beginning at verse 1: Now faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen. For by it the elders obtained a good report through faith. We understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. By faith Abel offered to God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain. By which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts, and by it he, being dead, yet speaks. By faith Enoch was translated so that he did not see death. He was not found, because God had translated him. For before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God. But without faith, it is impossible to please him, for he who comes to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him.

Father, we glory in all of your good gifts. We glory in how you have prospered us for reasons known to you, for reasons that are part of your plan. May we, our Father, be submissive to you. As we come before you in worship, we thank you that you sustain us in difficult times as well as in good times. And may our praise be constant, even through those difficult days. But we thank you, our God, that you have given us your word, so that we might have a light for our path. Let us then, Lord, your people, receive from you your blessed word for the benefit of our souls and for your glory in Christ. Amen.

We come to our third message on this remarkable story about Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac. Actually, our fourth, if we also count the wonderful and unexpected bonus to which we were treated last week when Don Duff preached on Hebrews 11, specifically that section that dealt with Abraham’s offering of Isaac. But as far as my messages have gone, we are to number three, and thus far my point has been this: The story of Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac is intended to startle us.

It is intended to stop us in our tracks. With this story, we are to pause and reflect, reflect deeply. Now, we have already established the broad and sweeping biblical and theological aspects of this story. And we have seen that these aspects in themselves are arresting in their own right. In fact, were all we were going to consider, we have reason enough to stop completely.

With respect to these matters, we have seen the captivating, riveting beauty of Isaac’s Christlikeness, and we have also seen the marvels of Abraham’s godliness. Isaac appears in this passage as the passive, obedient sacrifice who is given over to death in the confident hope of a resurrection from the dead. And in this, we are told later in Hebrews 11, he is most definitely a type of the one who is to come.

Abraham appears as a light to the Eternal Father, just as the Eternal Father will, in the fullness of time, willingly offer His Son for the sake of another whom He judges to be of infinite value. Thus, Father Abraham’s offering of his only begotten son, Isaac, for the sake of God, anticipates God the Father’s offering of His only begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, for the sake of all the true children of Abraham. This is so striking, so startling. We observe the parallel between the actions of Abraham and Isaac and the actions of God the Father and God the Son. We observe the mutuality and reciprocity between them. In the end, we see Abraham’s love for and faith in God measured by God’s love for and faithfulness to Abraham. Abraham, in the bond of God’s sovereignly initiated covenant, was dear to God and also became more like God Himself.

Most specifically, in the context of this story in Genesis 22, Abraham, in his faith that God will provide, draws near to God and also becomes more like the God who, in His faithfulness, knows absolutely what He will do to provide. I present this to you once more: Abraham, in his faith that God will provide, draws near to God and also becomes more like the God who, in His faithfulness, knows absolutely what He will do to provide. You are beginning to see now the origins of the certainty of faith. You are beginning to see the origins of the certainty of faith.

Now it is true that standing where we presently are, we are standing short of the most striking feature of this story. A feature that I intend to address, yes, I do, a feature that lies in what we call, for convenience, the ethical sphere. That feature is the fact that God here explicitly commands what He elsewhere forbids. Although this is the most striking feature of the story, it still can be said that we are at an especially critical point in our analysis, a point that demands further examination, a point that is striking in its own right. Are you not struck when it comes to this wonder of space?

The sermon text provided above is derived from the sermon audio recording making use of generative tools. It has not been manually edited. While transcription tools have a high degree of accuracy, the output may include generative textual, punctuation, and/or formatting errors.