Bishop Erik Gronberg
The story of Abraham and Isaac is one of the classic narratives of the Hebrew Bible. The test of faith, the willingness to sacrifice the physical sign of the promise, to kill and be killed, elicits dramatic emotion and strong feelings. Within this story there are many opportunities to feel the lure of temptation. Temptation to disobey God’s command. Temptation to despair at God’s cruel demand.
We cannot possibly understand all the emotions in the minds of Abraham and Isaac. What a father and son might be feeling in this moment. Was Abraham tempted to walk another way? The younger Isaac to overpower his aged Father? To flee God’s cruelty and refuse to commit not just human sacrifice but sacrifice of all he knew of God’s promise.
We don’t know what they thought. But we know their actions. In the face of the temptation to walk away. Abraham and Isaac move forward. Trusting that God’s promise is indeed true and that God would provide. Isaac is the pawn in the narrative, he has little agency. But Abraham had been tempted and had chosen to take matters into his own hands before. Choosing not to be patient and await the child promised to he and Sarah. So now he moves forward taking Isaac with him. Trusting God would provide.
Lent is a discipline that reminds us of the temptation to believe we know better than God. That the things of this world are real and that God’s promise is not. That the cross was real and that death gets the final say. To that this story reminds us that God will provide. God’s abundance is greater than our temptation to believe we know all the answers. Or that we can truly, fully, understand the mind of God.
This Lent I pray we can let go of the temptation to think we can understand it all. To wonder at the power and mystery of a story of faith millennia long. To have the perspective that while our days seem long in the vast history of humanity we are but a part. And that God fulfills God’s promises. God provides.
Abundant God, throughout history your people have struggled to understand your commands. We have been tempted to distrust, to walk away. Yet you prove over and over your faithfulness. Turn our hearts from the temptation to believe we know best and to trust your presence and your faithfulness. Amen.
