Reflections off a radio sermon: We are the Isaac, not the Abraham

Below is a lightly-edited version of a dump draft note I wrote in my phone a few weeks ago, shortly after hearing a message on the radio while commuting. I say “lightly edited” because two things happened: 1.) I felt a sense of urgency, prompted by the Lord, to capture the major talking points from this sermon when I heard it, 2.) the Lord interrupted my note-taking to speak something directly to me. It was a message directly to me, but I also felt it was a message directly to all who have turned astray. I will say more once I get to that point.

First, the Bible passage to offer background:

1 Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!”

And he said, “Here I am.”

2 Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”

3 So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. 4 Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off. 5 And Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.”

6 So 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 the two of them went together. 7 But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!”

And he said, “Here I am, my son.”

Then he said, “Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”

8 And Abraham said, “My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.” So the two of them went together.

9 Then they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built an altar there and placed the wood in order; and he bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, upon the wood. 10 And Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.

11 But the Angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!”

So he said, “Here I am.”

12 And He said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”

13 Then Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram, and offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 And Abraham called the name of the place, The-Lord-Will-Provide; as it is said to this day, “In the Mount of the Lord it shall be provided.”

Genesis 22:1-14, NKJV

We are the Isaac, not the Abraham

I heard a sermon on the radio the other day, concerning the story of how Abraham, in his great faith, was obedience to God to the point that he was willing to kill his one and only son Isaac, only for God to stop him at the last minute and reveal to him a substitute to sacrifice instead. The clear parallel is God sacrificing His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, on the cross as a blood sacrifice for our sins, in our place. Much is and has been made ado of Abraham’s great faith (he is called the father of faith) and how we as modern-day Christians in the 21st century need to develop and have faith like that. After all, “without faith, it is impossible to please God.” (Hebrews 11:6, NKJV) The preacher however also argued that we are not so much the Abraham in this case; rather, we are the Isaac.

But to back up a bit: this preacher asked his congregation (and by extension all who tuned in to the radio program) if we as believers were truly “all in” in terms of not withholding any areas of our hearts and any areas of our lives from God, to do with us as He wishes, no matter what. Even my pastor at my church regularly preaches about the importance of having faith and not doubting. However, what I’ve noticed is that oftentimes people associate this kind of message with thinking that they have to muster up faith to the level that Abraham had. (To be honest, this kind of thinking turns me off.) The pastor whose message was broadcast on the radio, however, directly addressed this, including the comparison between Abraham being willing to sacrifice his one and only son, and God Himself actually sacrificing His one and only Son, to indicate how this applies to us as true believers: in fact, we are not Abraham, but rather we are Isaac.

How does this work, you might ask? First, in a sense, God is in the same role that Abraham was. Second, Jesus is not in the role that Issac was but rather the ram that was ultimately sacrificed. Third, we are in fact in the Isaac role. How this is works is that, because of our sinful nature, no matter what it is that we do, we are abominable to God and therefore deserve the ultimate punishment of an eternity away from God and instead in hell to experience constant torment day in and day out forever and ever. And with Abraham, God wasn’t kidding around when He asked him to sacrifice not just his one and only son Isaac, but the same son that he and his wife Sarah conceived in their old age, the one that they waited decades for God to fulfill a long-ago promise. This wasn’t a small-stakes ask, a small-stakes sacrifice that God was asking of him to make.

This would kind of explain the line of thinking that says we need to have the kind of faith Abraham did. Because in truth, we do need to have that kind of faith. How many of you reading this blog post would immediately and without question give up to God the most important thing to you? If I’m honest, I’ve already failed this test many times, and I still am failing it today. I can think of a few precious things and/or people in my life that I would seriously struggle to be willing to give up for any reason, and that’s my own personal growth edge. Nonetheless, God’s command still stands. The first and great commandment is to love Him with all of ourselves, withholding absolutely nothing. Abraham obeyed. Isaac obeyed (he trusted both God and his earthly father all the way to being strapped down on the altar of sacrifice and seeing the knife about to be driven into his body). That’s the kind of faith and trust that God calls me to, that He calls You to, and that He has called every person who has ever lived and who will ever live. There is no compromise.

But the other reason we are in the Isaac role and not the Abraham role (and most certainly not in the role of the sacrificial ram (not to be confused with the sacrificial lamb)!) is because Jesus is the embodiment of God’s love and mercy for us. He doesn’t want us to end up in hell when we die. He doesn’t! But if we don’t surrender literally everything to Him, every aspect of our hearts and every aspect of our lives by the time we reach out dying breath and exit our human bodies… He’s a holy God; He has no choice. God and sin cannot and will not coexist. When we pass away, any remaining unforgiveness, bitterness, hatred, malice, lust, or any other manner of sin — that sticks to us, post-death. Similarly, if when we die we still lack faith, love, and hope, among other things — that too sticks with us. What will be our legacy is not how good we looked or how great our minds worked, nor how much monetary wealth (or other physical wealth for that matter) we acquired, nor (for me) how many pieces I composed or how many compositions got published or performed… nor whether you got married and had children or not… no, the only thing that will matter is whether you had Jesus in your heart, and what you did with that while you were alive during your earthly lifetime.

I'm going to interrupt myself here. As I continue reading this next session - in my spirit I'm realizing why God interrupted this. This next paragraph does not please Him. So I will go ahead and issue my statement of repentance, all the while still releasing the original statement. The sin of my heart is ever before me. I ask for the Lord's forgiveness, because in truth I do want (and choose) to trust Him completely and live a totally surrendered life, for Him and Him alone. I preach all this boldly knowing that surrendering my life to Him and living for Him is not only good and right, but also deep down I realize that this is what I want to do. However, in my note-taking I stated the opposite, which reveals another part of me that I have yet to crucify and am commanded to do (and am choosing to do):

I’m preaching this boldly knowing full well that I don’t want to surrender absolutely everything to God. I don’t trust what will happen if I were to do so, and I have justified that with all the unresolved pains that I still carry, arguing that because He allowed those things to happen I cannot trust Him. (facepalm - I disagree with and stand against this statement in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ! Forgive me, Father God!)

But guess what? My flesh will not win, and if I keep sowing to the flesh, I will most certainly lose. And if I don’t surrender the above arguments, I will be found in rebellion and cast out.

The truth is, everything is loss compared to really knowing Jesus Christ as my Savior and especially as my Lord, King, Master, and Emperor. That means, every piece I’ve ever written, every note I’ve ever played, every dollar I’ve ever earned (and borrowed, and saved, and spent), every friendship I’ve ever had, every relationship I’ve ever had, every wrong thing that I’ve ever done and every wrong thing I’ve ever incurred, as well as every right thing I’ve ever done or incurred… even my relationships with my parents and even with my fiancée, my sweetie pie, and everything that has ever happened… these things are losses compared with knowing Jesus Christ as my Savior, Redeemer, Healer, Restorer, and especially my King, Lord, Emperor, and Master.

Below is where the Lord finally interrupted and spoke directly to me:

WHO ARE YOU TO DETERMINE WHAT IS RIGHT?

IF JESUS ISN’T YOUR KING, YOU CANNOT BE IN THE KINGDOM. The kingdom is only for those who truly recognize Jesus Christ as their King.

As I shift back to proper lower and upper-case spelling and grammar, more words flowed out of me as I reflected on what I had just heard God say:

Heaven is a kingdom.

It’s not a republic.

It’s most certainly not a democracy.

And it is absolutely not an anarchy.

It’s a kingdom, a sort of dictatorship—a benevolent dictatorship.

Either you’re with the King (that is, Jesus Christ), or you’re not. That’s what determines whether you’re in or out.

Earth was meant to be like heaven, and it was, once. 

8 The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed. 9 And out of the ground the Lord God made every tree grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. 10 Now a river went out of Eden to water the garden, and from there it parted and became four riverheads. 11 The name of the first is Pishon; it is the one which skirts the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. 12 And the gold of that land is good. Bdellium and the onyx stone are there. 13 The name of the second river is Gihon; it is the one which goes around the whole land of Cush. 14 The name of the third river is Hiddekel; it is the one which goes toward the east of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates. 15 Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of , it you shall surely die.” Genesis 2:8-17, NKJV

1 And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb. 2 In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. 3 And there shall be no more curse, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and His servants shall serve Him. 4 They shall see His face, and His name shall be on their foreheads. 5 There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever. Revelation 22:1-5, NKJV

But there was no death. And in heaven there will be no death.

There was no separation between God and humanity, spiritual or otherwise, and one day it will be like that again.

But because of Adam and Eve’s rebellion, they brought immediate death into this world—spiritual death. The body does not die immediately, but it does gradually over time. Adam and Eve’s sin also brought separation between them (and all of humanity) and God.

Sin, death, and separation from God was not His desire. It was not His design. It was not His plan, ever. But it happened. And because it happened, earth is not heaven. One day it will be, once again. But sin and rebellion will still not be allowed in. For this reason it is imperative to let it all go, to surrender it all, to lay it all down.

Because of the intentional lag with my posting, the timeline has been thrown off a bit. Tomorrow's post will speak more to my response and posture of repentance from the above. I'm feeling prompted to share one more thing, to illustrate a component of the gap between where I am vs. what is acceptable to God (especially in terms of obedience). Specifically, I felt God challenge me regarding my obedience to interruptibility. I was running errands involving multiple stores, and as I was pulling out from one store to go to another, I faintly heard in my spirit: “STOP AND PRAY.” I did, briefly, but I was confused as to what felt like randomness, and I pulled out of the parking lot shortly after, still while praying. Toward the end of my time at the next store, it finally dawned on me what it was. There was a young woman at that store who appeared to be shopping at the same pace I was, and we even ended up checking out in adjacent lanes. The moral: if I had stopped even just five minutes longer to pray while still in the parking lot of the previous store, I would have missed her entirely and avoided any risk of temptation. With God's help (and perhaps because I did spend time praying even though I didn't wait before driving off), I was able to withstand temptation. I really don't want to give in to it. But the point of me sharing this story is that I have a lot of work to do regarding obedience, particularly in interruptibility.

I know it's Christmas. This is a joyous time of year - we are celebrating Jesus's birth! But how many people are celebrating Christmas (even those who don't get involved in the "Santa Claus" version, let alone other cultural facsimiles) who don't do the most important thing of all -- receive the Birthday Boy's free gift of salvation and make Him their Savior and the Lord, King, and Master of their lives? Shouldn't that be THE thing we should be doing at Christmas?