Music recording by Ann Emery and Lezlie Taguding. From Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken by John Newton, 1779. View the Lyrics. Narration by Aimee Riegert.

Devotional by Steve King.

Image: Old Testament Law specified two mandatory sacrifices, the sin offering and the tresspass offering. Rams were used exclusively for the trespass offering.

Our first-born son arrived a month early, shrunk to under five pounds, developed jaundice, and was in ICU. We begged God to spare him and were desperately looking for a way out. Would God provide?

The shocking story of God telling Abraham to go to Moriah, Mount Zion, and sacrifice Isaac took on new meaning. God’s aim was not the life of Isaac but the heart of Abraham who idolized the son for whom he waited 25 years.

Abraham filtered God’s hard command through God’s character and promise. He told his servants, “We will worship and return to you”¹, and he assured Isaac, “God will provide for himself the Lamb for the sacrifice, my son.” At the last moment,

God stopped Abraham and provided a Ram to sacrifice in Isaac’s place. Abraham named the place, “The Lord will provide.”

Where was the Lamb God promised? Two thousand years later, John the Baptist said of Jesus, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”² Jesus was the promised Lamb whom God provided for us all on Mount Zion.³ We knelt, entrusting our baby son to God, knowing that God is good because He freely gave us His Son (see Romans 8:32). God provided! Later, our son made us a sculpture of Abraham at the moment he was about to sacrifice Isaac with a note to us, “Thanks for trusting me to God.”

Notes

¹ Hebrews 11:19 indicates Abraham believed God would raise Isaac from the dead to keep His promise.
² John 1:29 indicates that the Lamb Abraham said God would provide was a son of Abraham, Jesus the Messiah, the Lamb of God.
³ Moriah is traditionally associated with Jerusalem, Mount Zion, the site where Abraham went to sacrifice Isaac and Solomon built the Temple (2 Chronicles 3:1).