The Gospel in Genesis - Part 3

The Gospel in Genesis – Part 3
Redemption Acted Out


This is the third message in the occasional series highlighting the Gospel in the book of Genesis. I’ve been slow to tackle the account of Abraham because there is so much shown to us by his life that a series of messages could be delivered on truths found in the account of his life. Condensing this into a single message is really not possible, and I’ve found it challenging to select any particular subset of the information even as a starting point. So today I am going to do that, but even in this message I will take a detour or two to point out details that I find too important and encouraging to leave out. I hope you’ll bear with me and grant me that indulgence.

Let’s read the main text I’ll be using:

Genesis 22:1-18 (NASB)
1  Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."
2  He said, "Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will 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 wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him.
4  On the third day Abraham raised his eyes and saw the place from a distance.
5  Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and return to you."
6  Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together.
7  Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, "My father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." And he said, "Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"
8  Abraham said, "God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son." So the two of them walked on together.
9  Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood, and bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.
10  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!" And he said, "Here I am."
12  He said, "Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing 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 raised his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in the thicket by his horns; and Abraham went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the place of his son.
14  Abraham called the name of that place The LORD Will Provide, as it is said to this day, "In the mount of the LORD it will be provided."
15  Then the angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven,
16  and said, "By Myself I have sworn, declares the LORD, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son,
17  indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of their enemies.
18  "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice."

Prior to this seminal event God had made promises to Abraham. Let’s review a few of them.
Genesis 12:2-3 (NASB)
2  And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing;
3  And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed."

Genesis 13:16 (NASB)
16  "I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth, so that if anyone can number the dust of the earth, then your descendants can also be numbered.

Genesis 15:3-4 (NASB)
3  And Abram said, "Since You have given no offspring to me, one born in my house is my heir."
4  Then behold, the word of the LORD came to him, saying, "This man will not be your heir; but one who will come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir."

This promise had to do with the fact that at this point Abraham had no offspring whatsoever. This meant that Abraham’s estate would accrue to a servant rather than any family member.

When it later appeared that the Lord might fail to deliver on this promise (Abraham was 85 years old by then) Abraham and Sarah decided they’d better take matters into their own hands. The result of this human effort was a son, born of a servant girl, named Ishmael, of whom God said, “Genesis 16:12 (NASB) "He will be a wild donkey of a man, His hand will be against everyone, And everyone's hand will be against him; And he will live to the east of all his brothers."”

This son, brought about by human effort did not fulfill the promise of God. Neither did it nullify the promise. God did not fail to deliver on His promise simply because Abraham did something outside God’s plan. I encourage you to remember this when the enemy whispers in your ear that you’ve blown it and God can’t bless you or use you. Here is the way it played out.



Genesis 17:15-21 (NASB)
15  Then God said to Abraham, "As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name.
16  "I will bless her, and indeed I will give you a son by her. Then I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her."
17  Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, "Will a child be born to a man one hundred years old? And will Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?"
18  And Abraham said to God, "Oh that Ishmael might live before You!"
19  But God said, "No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.
20  "As for Ishmael, I have heard you; behold, I will bless him, and will make him fruitful and will multiply him exceedingly. He shall become the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation.
21  "But My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this season next year."

God’s covenant is with the child of His promise, not with the child that came from human effort. Abraham and Sarah had taken things into their own hands in an attempt to fulfill God’s promise to them, but while God blessed Ishmael and made him the father of many nations, His covenant was established only with the fruit of His promise.

Genesis 21:1-7 (NASB)
1  Then the LORD took note of Sarah as He had said, and the LORD did for Sarah as He had promised.
2  So Sarah conceived and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the appointed time of which God had spoken to him.
3  Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac.
4  Then Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him.
5  Now Abraham was one hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.
6  Sarah said, "God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me."
7  And she said, "Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age."

Let me just take a brief detour here. I want us to make a short stopover in Genesis 14 and notice a couple of details in the account of Abraham’s encounter with Melchizedek.

Genesis 14:18-20 (NASB)
18  And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High.
19  He blessed him and said, "Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth;
20  And blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand." He gave him a tenth of all.

It’s very interesting that Melchizedek brought bread and wine. We see this theme repeated in several places in the New Testament. Probably the most obvious one is at the last supper, which we reenact as we remember Christ through bread and wine every time we celebrate Communion. Other times include Jesus’ first miracle, turning water into wine; His teaching on putting new wine into old wineskins; His statement that He is the bread of life and the true bread that comes down from heaven; and His shocking claim to the Jewish religious leaders that unless they eat His flesh and drink His Blood they have no life.


Notice also that Melchizedek was a priest of God Most High. This is interesting since the Mosaic Law and the Levitical Priesthood would not be established for hundreds of years. We learn important information about Melchizedek in Psalms 110 and Chapters five through seven in the book of Hebrews. One day we’ll discuss that in detail, but one thing we learn there is that Mechizedek had no lineage and that he was a priest forever. Melchizedek is a “type” of Christ. He was not a Levite, and Jesus was likewise not a Levite. Melchizedek was “King of Salem”—Salem means peace--, and Jesus is the Prince of Peace.

OK, now that we’ve refreshed our memories with regard to God’s promises to Abraham, let’s return from our detour and get into our text in Genesis 22.

1  Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am."
2  He said, "Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you."

Since Ishmael is certainly a son of Abraham, I wondered for a very long time why the Bible says that Isaac is Abraham’s only son. Here is the conclusion I’ve reached. It’s because Isaac is the child promised by God. In a very real sense, Isaac is the only son of Abraham who matters, and there is a very important reason for this.

Romans 9:6-9 (NASB)
6  But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel;
7  nor are they all children because they are Abraham's descendants, but: "THROUGH ISAAC YOUR DESCENDANTS WILL BE NAMED."
8  That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants.
9  For this is the word of promise: "AT THIS TIME I WILL COME, AND SARAH SHALL HAVE A SON."

Ishmael was the result of human effort and therefore not acceptable to God as a model of His plan. Remember in the first installment of this series we discussed the difference between Abel’s animal sacrifice (something created by God) and Cain’s sacrifice of something he had grown. This is the same.

So the next question that’s raised here is the question of a good and loving God requiring human sacrifice.

God’s standard is perfection. Mankind sinned when Adam and Eve rejected God and chose to trust in their own ability to judge what was righteous rather than trusting in His word. There was no way mankind could ever reconcile themselves to God.

Fortunately, God had a plan right from the start. He began to reveal this plan and part of it was the requirement of blood—the wages of sin is death. As a pattern, example, figure, or type, pointing to His plan to provide salvation He instituted an animal sacrifice system. This system provided a covering for sins until the time when God’s plan and promise would be fulfilled.

Even so, animal sacrifices could never take away sin. They could only cover it because, even though only the best animals were used, the sacrifices themselves were imperfect.

Hebrews 10:3-4 (NASB)
3  But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins year by year.
4  For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

Hebrews 10:8-10 (NASB)
8  After saying above, "SACRIFICES AND OFFERINGS AND WHOLE BURNT OFFERINGS AND sacrifices FOR SIN YOU HAVE NOT DESIRED, NOR HAVE YOU TAKEN PLEASURE in them" (which are offered according to the Law),
9  then He said, "BEHOLD, I HAVE COME TO DO YOUR WILL." He takes away the first in order to establish the second.
10  By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

God asked Abraham to do this in order to show what He had planned for the reconciliation of all of mankind.

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 wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him.
4  On the third day Abraham raised his eyes and saw the place from a distance.
5  Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and return to you."

Notice what Abraham tells his men. We’re going over there to worship and we will return to you. He and God had been through a great deal by this point in his life. Time and again Abraham had seen God deliver him, bless him, and finally keep His promise to give Abraham an heir. Abraham had faith in God, as we see in Hebrews 11:17-19.

17  By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was offering up his only begotten son;
18  it was he to whom it was said, "IN ISAAC YOUR DESCENDANTS SHALL BE CALLED."
19  He considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead, from which he also received him back as a type.

6  Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on together.
7  Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, "My father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." And he said, "Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"

Matthew 26:39 (NASB)
39  And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, "My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will."

Can you imagine how heartbreaking this had to be for Jesus and for the Father? This is the length to which God went to be in relationship with you and me. This is how much He loves us!

2 Corinthians 5:17-20 (NASB)
17  Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
18  Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation,
19  namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation.
20  Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.

8  Abraham said, "God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son." So the two of them walked on together.

What an amazing picture this is of God’s promise plan of salvation for fallen and helpless mankind. “God will provide for Himself the lamb…”.

John 1:29-34 (NASB)
29  The next day he *saw Jesus coming to him and *said, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!
30  "This is He on behalf of whom I said, 'After me comes a Man who has a higher rank than I, for He existed before me.'
31  "I did not recognize Him, but so that He might be manifested to Israel, I came baptizing in water."
32  John testified saying, "I have seen the Spirit descending as a dove out of heaven, and He remained upon Him.
33  "I did not recognize Him, but He who sent me to baptize in water said to me, 'He upon whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining upon Him, this is the One who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.'
34  "I myself have seen, and have testified that this is the Son of God."

9  Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood, and bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.
10  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!" And he said, "Here I am."
12  He said, "Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me."

Let me just talk about the use of the word fear here—and as it relates to “the fear of the Lord” generally. God is not manipulative. He does not use fear to motivate us. In fact Scripture tells us that God is love, and that perfect love casts out fear because fear has to do with punishment.

The translators notes in the New English Translation say, “In this context fear refers to obedience that grows from faith.”

13  Then Abraham raised his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in the thicket by his horns; and Abraham went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the place of his son.

God did indeed provide the sacrifice, just as Abraham trusted Him to do. Abraham’s faith resulted in a beautiful pictorial representation of God’s plan for redeeming humanity.

14  Abraham called the name of that place The LORD Will Provide, as it is said to this day, "In the mount of the LORD it will be provided."

Matthew 27:45-46 (NASB)
45  Now from the sixth hour darkness fell upon all the land until the ninth hour.
46  About the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, "ELI, ELI, LAMA SABACHTHANI?" that is, "MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?"

John 19:28-30 (NASB)
28  After this, Jesus, knowing that all things had already been accomplished, to fulfill the Scripture, *said, "I am thirsty."
29  A jar full of sour wine was standing there; so they put a sponge full of the sour wine upon a branch of hyssop and brought it up to His mouth.
30  Therefore when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, "It is finished!" And He bowed His head and gave up His spirit.

15  Then the angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven,
16  and said, "By Myself I have sworn, declares the LORD, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son,
17  indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of their enemies.
18  "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice."

Philippians 2:8-11 (NASB)
8  Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
9  For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name,
10  so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11  and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

What a beautiful picture this is of Father’s ancient plan for our reconciliation. What a great God we have. How He loves us! 

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