Historic Sacrifice

The sacrifice of Isaac, Genesis 22

The parallels of the near-sacrifice of Isaac and the actual sacrifice of Christ are too obvious to miss. The actions of God, Abraham and Isaac in this story in Genesis chapter 22 are clearly pointing to the future gift of the savior.

In this story, Abraham is called upon by God to make a sacrifice of his only son, Isaac. For the previous several chapters, we learned of Abraham's desire to have a son and the eventual gift of a son, despite Abraham's old age. It seems almost inconceivable that Abraham would then be willing to sacrifice his son, even though it is according to God's plan. Likewise, it is almost inconceivable that God would allow His only Son to be made a sacrifice, but Abraham tells us in verse 8 that is exactly what will happen: "God himself will provide the lamb for the offering."

By the time of this story, Isaac is most likely a young man who could easily have staved off any aggressive act by his father. Instead, Isaac submits to the will of the father. Jesus does the same thing, praying feverishly in the Garden of Gethsemane that God would "take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will." (Mark 15:36) Note, too, that Isaac is innocent in this story - he has done no wrong. Jesus was the ultimate innocent sacrifice. He was innocent, yet sacrificed to atone for the sins of people.

What does this passage tell us about God?

This passage tells us that even from the time of Abraham, God had a plan to offer salvation to His people. The Christ would be given to us a sacrifice that we - just like Isaac - would be saved.

This sacrifice clearly predicted a time when God would make a new covenant with the people and would send Jesus to the world to walk among us as flesh and to serve as an atoning sacrifice. It is impossible to overstress the importance of this ultimate gift or the hope that it gave the people of Abraham's time (and those that followed him) that God would indeed provide this gift.

In Gen. 22:14, Abraham names the place of the sacrifice "The Lord Will Provide." We could easily refer to the entire world in that way: The Lord Will Provide. God provided Jesus to take away the sins of the world.