Grace Blogs

This week’s graceTALK featured the following question…

Here is one I hear all the time…”If God told you to sacrifice your son, would you?”

How would you respond?

I am going to assume that the question here is in reference to Abraham and Isaac in Genesis 22 where Abraham is called by God to sacrifice his son.

In order to put Genesis 22 into proper perspective, we need to look at Abraham’s complete relationship with God leading up to that incident.

Genesis 12, God tells Abram to move and promises offspring and land.

Genesis 13, God repeats the promise.

Genesis 15, Abram is told to gather and split animals, which he does. He then sees a vision of fire going between the animals as a sign of God’s covenant to Abram.

In Genesis 17, God changes Abram’s and Sarai’s names. God explains that Sarah will bear a son and that his name will be Isaac. God instructs Abraham to be circumcised, and Abraham complies.

In Genesis 18, angels appear to both Abraham and Sarah. God repeats the promise that Sarah will bear a child at 99 years old. Sarah hears it, too. Abraham has a back and forth with God over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

In Genesis 19, God makes good on His promise to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah.

In Genesis 21, Sarah, barren for 99 year, bears the promised son.

This brings us to Genesis 22 where God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. God had established a relationship and pattern of direct, specific, supernatural communication with Abraham. Abraham was chosen, specifically, to father the child of promise. The nation of Israel would flow from this child and be the conduit through which the promised Messiah would come to the world. Abraham believed this promise so the writer of Hebrews can say of Abraham “He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead” (Hebrews 11:19).

Compare this to my relationship with God…

At the very end of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus commissions the church to go and make disciples of all nations. Just before Jesus ascended in Acts 1:8, He told his followers to expect the Holy Spirit to come and empower us to be His witnesses to the world.

The book of Hebrews opens with this statement: “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:1-3) Jesus, Himself, is the ultimate revelation of God’s glory and plan for human history.

The revelation of Scripture doesn’t teach me to expect anything like what Abraham experienced in his relationship with God. God dealt specifically with Abraham in creating a nation. I, on the other hand, am a beneficiary of the culmination of that nation in the person and work of Christ. I don’t need to be tested the way Abraham did (even if the test was actually for Abraham’s sake, but that’s another topic). I am sealed with and indwelt by God’s Spirit.

So, if God truly instructed me to sacrifice my son, I would have to and would because He is God and the sovereign over all He has created. However, I would have good reason to be very skeptical that what I think I’m hearing is actually from God because nothing in my personal history with God or in God’s revealed plan for mankind leads me to believe that this is something God would ask of me. Indeed, I have much that indicates just the opposite in the sufficiency of Christ.

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5 Comments

1. Jeffrey J. Stables : July 7th, 2008 at 9:45 pm

   I think also that how to answer this question depends largely upon the context in which it is asked. It seems to carry the connotations of a challenge in the questioner’s words. If that is the case, then it’s often not best to answer such a question at all, because it’s an attempt to derail the conversation (in our case, to direct it away from the gospel). Answering the question will do nothing to remove obstacles against the gospel, it’s just a smoke screen thrown up in a little game of “stump the Christian.” (Could God make a rock…?)

   Then, of course, it could be a genuine question from an inquiring nonbeliever. Your answer is perfect in this case.

   Finally, it could be just food for thought thrown about among Christians. In that case, they don’t need to be told again Abraham’s unique history with God or the reasons why God wouldn’t ask us this—they’re attempting to use it to better understand what the Godhead went through at the cross, or what Abraham and Isaac went through back then. Answering the question is not the point among Christians, the point is contemplation and, ultimately, worship.

2. Hugh Williams : July 8th, 2008 at 9:38 am

   Good point, Jeffrey — I imagine Jesus would have answered this question with a question. A great book I’m reading, Questioning Evangelism, offers a possible approach for answering a question like that… something like this:

   Mr. Lost: If God told you to sacrifice your son, would you?
   Evangelist: Wait a minute, do you believe God even exists?
   Mr. Lost: No, I think it’s ridiculous to believe in God.
   Evangelist: Then why are you asking me such a ridiculous question?

   And while I agree the ultimate point of considering the question among Christians is worshipful contemplation, it is also important for maturity’s sake: we need to think critically about what we believe God has commanded us to do so that we 1) do everything he commands and 2) don’t get duped into thinking God has commanded something he hasn’t.

3. Larry : July 8th, 2008 at 3:50 pm

   This was a very good answer Eric. In this morning’s Tabletalk devotion, the transfiguration was covered. One of the points R.C. Sproul made was that appearances from God were usually granted only to what he calls “central figures in the Almighty’s redemptive plan.” So as you say, given that God’s redemptive plan has been fulfilled in Christ and His revelation in Scripture is complete, I shouldn’t expect God to give me instructions like this.

4. Vicki Miller : July 9th, 2008 at 11:27 am

   Would it be wrong to say to an unbeliever that I believe God has called me already to sacrifice my son…from a spiritual perspective. After all, what is a sacrifice? Isn’t it giving unto God in an act of worship? It is saying to the Lord that He is worthy of all of our adoration and that nothing comes between that.
   For example; If our child said they wanted to become a missionary to Iran. Then they asked us to please pay for some missionary training for them. We have a choice as a parent; this is very dangerous and I can somehow control the outcome a bit or do I trust that God is moving through me to use our child. Does that make sense? Sort of like saying that God’s will is priority, even over parental fears or control? Lots of question marks because I’m thinking about it as I write.

5. Larry : July 9th, 2008 at 11:58 am

   I think that’s a good point Vicki. While God does not ask us to sacrifice our children in the way Abraham was asked, He may indeed ask us to support them (both financially and otherwise) in carrying the Gospel to a place where the possibility of their being killed is much greater than it would be had they stayed here.

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