3, the sacrifice of Isaac.

 Chapter 4: 3 

Three, the sacrifice of Isaac. 

Many people believe the hardest story in the Bible is about a father who was about to sacrifice his own son, but they're mistaken. 

You probably know the account. 

It is without question one of the most wrenching in all of Scripture. 

God spoke to Abraham and the command was terrible. 

"Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you  love, and offer him there as a burnt offering."

 Abraham in an act of faith that defies our understanding, obeyed. 

The next morning he set out with his son for Mount Moriah. 

For three days they walked in silence. 

Imagine that journey. 

Each step a hammer striking a father's heart. 

And notice a detail we often overlook. 

Abraham carries the fire and the knife, the instruments of death. 

But he takes the wood for the sacrifice and lays it on Isaac's back. 

The father does not bear the weight of the instrument that will consume the offering. 

It is the son who must climb the mountain with the wood on his shoulders. 

But there's something else few consider. 

Isaac wasn't a small, frightened child. 

According to many scholars, he was about 33 years old, the same age Jesus was when he died.

 He was a man in the fullness of his strength. He could have resisted. 

He could have run, but he didn't. 

He let himself be bound in silence. 

Then in the midst of that unbearable tension, Isaac breaks the silence with the most logical and at the same time most painful question in the story. 

"My father, here are the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the sacrifice? "

Abraham's answer is one of the most astonishing statements of faith ever spoken. 

A prophecy he himself did not fully understand.

"God will provide the lamb, my son. "

They reach the summit. 

The altar is ready. 

Isaac is bound. 

Abraham raises the knife. 

His hand trembles. 

The whole world holds its breath in that instant. 

He is a heartbeat away from seeing his promise and his future go up in ashes. 

And just then, the angel of the Lord steps in.

 "Abraham, stop. Do not lay your hand on the boy. "

Abraham looks up and sees a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. 

A perfect substitute. 

God had provided everything. 

Isaac is spared. 

The ram dies in his place. 

A happy ending, right? Not so fast. 

This isn't where the story ends. 

In fact, it's only beginning. 

That ram caught by its head in a thicket of thorns is the key to everything. 

This scene unfolded on Mount Moriah and is in truth a prophetic foreshadowing. 

Fast forward nearly 2,000 years. 

The setting is the same, the Moriah Range, where Jerusalem would one day rise. 

And again, a father walks with his son, his only one, the son he loves. 

The story repeats with divine precision, but the ending will be radically different. 

Consider the parallels. 

A father, his beloved only son, a command to sacrifice him on a mountain. 

Isaac went up Mount Moriah carrying the wood. 

Almost 2,000 years later, another son, the one and only beloved Son of God, would climb another hill in that same mountain range, a place called Golgotha, also carrying the wood for his own sacrifice, the cross. 

And just like that substitute ram, this son wore a crown of thorns upon his head. 

And here comes the twist that changes everything. 

When Abraham raised the knife over Isaac, 

God stopped him. 

There was a substitute. 

The father received his son back. 

But when the judgment of God fell on Jesus at the cross, the knife did not stop. 

Heaven did not cry. Stop! 

The father kept silent. 

This time there was no angel shouting enough. 

There was no ram caught in a thicket because he was the lamb God had provided. 

The story of Abraham and Isaac is no longer merely a test of obedience. 

It becomes a revelation of the heart of God. 

God was not asking Abraham to do anything. he himself was unwilling to do. Isaac came down the mountain alive because a ram died. 

We can have life because the true Son went to the cross and died there. 

Isaac's question, where is the lamb? 

Found its ultimate answer centuries later on the lips of John the Baptist. 

"Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. "

And this isn't just an interpretation. 

Jesus himself confirmed it when he said, "Your father Abraham rejoiced that he would see my day."

 He saw it and was glad. 

When did Abraham see it? 

He saw it there on Mount Moriah when he understood for a moment that God himself would provide the true and final lamb. 

Chapter 5: 4 

Four, Babel, but in reverse. ( Click here to continue)

It's a story you probably know. 

In the beginning, all humanity spoke a single language and shared one goal, greatness. 

They said to one another, "Let's build a city with a tower that reaches to the heavens. Then we'll make a name for ourselves, and we won't be scattered   across the face of the earth." 

Then God came down. 

He saw their pride, their perfectly unified rebellion, and his judgment was almost poetic. 

He did something both subtle and devastating. 

"Let us confuse their language there, so no one understands what their neighbor is saying."

Picture the scene. 

People were shouting, but ...