20 Sermon Illustrations on Abraham

Jacob's life ending in serenity and blessing, shows God's power to transform character. Trace steps in his experience. His first faith (Gen. 25:28-34). His vision (Gen. 28). His wandering (Gen. 29-31). His transforming experience (Gen. 32). Return to Bethel (Gen. 35). His final walk of faith.

Abraham is an example of an old person who lived dangerously for God. His wife did not believe him, but he did it for the Lord.

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Sermon in Old Testament Heroes series. Abraham.

Genesis 11:27-12:4

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ABRAHAM, FRIEND OF GOD

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I. Abraham was one of greatest individuals of all time.

A. A pivotal figure in Judaism, Islam and Christianity.

B. Greatest designation is given him: "The friend of God." Jam 2:23

C. Simple reason: God called him, and Abraham obeyed.

II. God's call required Abraham to leave his old home.

A. Leave country, people, household. Gen 12:1

B. Christian faith requires "leaving." (separation)

C. Abraham's left, but not right away.

III. God's call required Abraham to go to a new home.

IV. Abraham's faith can be our faith.

A. More than a great man - all peoples blessed through him. Gen 12:3

B. To follow Abraham's example, we must obey God as he did.

Imagine a world where the calendar marks months, but not years. There could be seasons -- spring, summer, harvest, and winter -- but no sense of past, present, or future, just an endless succession of days.

And that's exactly what the world was like until God spoke to Abraham, a Sumerian living 4,000 years ago in what is now Iraq. In his book, The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels, historian Thomas Cahill writes that when God called Abraham out of Sumeria, He also called the whole world into time and history.

According to Cahill, many things we take for granted -- our concept of time, progress, history, and even our notion of what it means to be human -- we owe to the Jews and to the God of the Bible. "From Genesis onward," he writes, "the Bible presents us with a new way of thinking about and experiencing reality."

Before Abraham, the world had no concept of history as we think of it. Everything was just part of the great circle of the seasons, never changing or progressing. The idea of progress from past to future did not exist.

Cahill writes that "thumbnail sketches of each [king's] reign are arranged ... without the least regard for what may in fact have occurred in Sumerian history." Some kings were said to have ruled for hundreds of years. Others for thousands!

This concept of history also affected story-telling. Sumerian stories lacked the beginning-middle-ending structure that the modern world associates with narrative. Instead, they began and ended in the middle.

When Moses wrote Genesis, it was the first time anyone had written a history that included a true sense of time, and accurate dates. The Old Testament writings represent the first attempt to get facts, genealogies, and chronologies right -- in short, history as we know it today. And the more archeological discoveries there are, the more these facts prove to be accurate.

Similarly, the story of Abraham's journey, being called from Sumeria to the Promised Land, represented a pronounced break with the familiar, cyclical mindset. Abraham was called by God to leave his home and go to a strange place. God told him that He would raise from Abraham's seed a great nation. Cahill says the concept of a distant, unseen future, and a personal or national destiny, was unheard of prior to this time.

For Christians, the idea of history and time is especially important. God's promises to Abraham articulate our great Hope in the anticipation of "the fullness of time."

Now, this author's particular theology is muddled, to put it mildly. He denies many miracles and doesn't believe the Bible to be the Word of God. But the central tenet of his work is right on track, and it's especially useful for challenging skeptics.

Secularists constantly berate Christians for being "backward" or "unenlightened." But if they would read "The Gifts of the Jews," they would gain a much better understanding of the truth and importance of Scripture. They would see that much of what we take for granted today actually began when the God of the Bible spoke to a wandering Jew named Abraham.

Judeo-Christian revelation is not the negative influence secularists proclaim it to be. Rather, it is the taproot of our civilization.

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Copyright (c) 2000 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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Mrs. Pomroy was counted a member of President Lincoln's household. One day when he had grown weary with the affairs of state he suggested to her that she should occupy with him that night the President's box at Ford's theater. She courteously declined. He gave her a subsequent invitation which was again not accepted, and finally, with some degree of irritation, he said to her, “Mrs. Pomroy, it is counted an honor to sit in the President's box; I should like to ask you why you have refused.” Hesitating a moment as if she were afraid that she might hurt the feelings of the President, she said: “Mr. President, I am a Christian, and when I became such I promised my Lord that I would go no place where I could not take him with me or ask his blessing. I could hardly do this at the theater, and for that reason I do not go.” It is said that Abraham Lincoln never again asked her to accompany him to such a place, but it is known that again and again when they were driving together on some mission of mercy in the various hospitals, me would say to his coachman, “Drive a little slower,” and then say to Mrs. Pomroy, “Tell me more of this Christ whom you serve.”

Such a life always has power, and this is simply being consistent, not in any sense fanatical.

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J. Wilbur Chapan, “Present Day Parables.”

When we look at what the Bible has to say about Lot in the OT, we would say he was never saved. But 2 Peter 2:6-8 declares plainly that he had a righteous soul. Therefore, he was saved. This brings us to the question, when and where was Lot saved?

We cannot go to a definite scripture that says when or where he was saved, but we can apply some Bible principles concerning salvation and come up with a proximity of when and where he was saved.

First, we have to conclude that Lot did not have as much light (truth; understanding) as Abraham; therefore, he could not have been saved until after Abraham. With this principle being true, we must establish when and where Abraham was saved before we can begin to pinpoint Lot’s salvation.

It is not hard to establish when and where Abraham was saved if we would just look at scripture. Paul said in Rom. 4:3, “For what saith the scriptures? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.” Paul stated this same basic verse in Gal. 3:6 and James quoted it in James 2:23. The scripture they quoted is Genesis 15:6 which clearly reveals the time, because Genesis 15:1 says, “After these things.”

After what things? AFTER God appeared unto him in Mesopotamia and said, “Get thee out of thy country, and from they kindred, and go into the land which I shall shew thee (shew thee as you go).” (Acts 7:2-3) AFTER he had dwelt in Haran for a number of years (unable to establish the exact number of years; may have been from 5 to 32 years). AFTER God spoke to him at Haran when he was 75 years of age in Gen. 12:1-4. AFTER he had entered Canaan and God had spoke to him again. (Gen. 12:5-7) AFTER he had built altars and worshipped. (Gen. 12:8, 13:4) AFTER he had gone to Egypt due to famine in Canaan. (Gen. 12:10-20) AFTER he had separated from Lot. (Gen. 13:5-13) AFTER God spoke to him the fourth time (recorded) in Gen. 13:14-18. AFTER he had defeated Chedorlaomer and his league of kings with 318 trained servants. (Gen. 14:1-16) AFTER he paid tithes to Melchizedek. (Gen. 14:17-24)

Gen. 15:1 then says, “After these things,” God spoke to Abram, for his name had not been changed to Abraham yet. At this time and place, approximately nine years after Abram entered Canaan when he was 84 years old, he believed God and was saved. (Gen. 15:1-6) The Bible tells us WHEN and WHERE Abraham was saved.

Since Lot did not have the light and understanding that Abraham had, this means that Lot was not a saved man when he “pitched his tent toward Sodom” in Genesis 13:12. It is hard to tell exactly how much time elapsed after Lot left Abraham until Abraham was saved. Six or seven years may have elapsed. During these years Lot, being a lost man, was controlled by the course of this world (anti-God and rebellion) and the prince of the power of the air (the devil and his demons) as shown in Eph. 2:2. As a result of this control he as well as his family, became entangled with the affairs of Sodom.

When Abraham was saved, he no doubt became concerned for his nephew Lot, and made several trips down to Sodom to speak to him so that he might believe God exists and desire Him as his God. You may say, “That is not in the Bible.” I know it is not, but the principle of a human instrument is a MUST for one to be saved. (Acts 8:31; Rom. 10:13-15; 1 Cor. 3:5; John 17:20) This took some time and probably several trips due to Lot being caught up in materialism, and the sins of Sodom. One MUST come to the end of self before he is saved. Man’s nature is to fight against God. He does not want to submit to the Lord; therefore, God is good to forbear (hold off) the wrath that abides on every lost person thus giving him a space of repentance. (Rom. 2:4; John 3:36) Salvation occurs in an instant but coming to the end of self usually takes some time especially in Lot’s case, because he was so entangled in the affairs of Sodom.

It was approximately 15 years from the time that Abraham was saved till God destroyed Sodom. He was about 84 years of age when saved and 99 when Sodom was destroyed. Therefore, it was sometime during these 15 years that Lot was saved. More than likely he was saved when Abraham was about 97 or about 2 years before God destroyed Sodom.

You may ask, “How did you determine that since the Bible does not say distinctly?” Again I go to a Bible principle to declare my position. 1 John 3:9 declares plainly, if one will rightly divide the Word of truth, that a saved person cannot practice sin naturally. If one claims to be saved yet lives in the sin of the world for a period of time without the chastisement of God, he is not saved. (Heb. 12:8) You may ask, “How long a period of time?” We cannot say exactly, but I do not believe one can go five or more years in sin and live if he is saved. In saying five years I am giving the benefit of doubt.

Any earthly father who desires to do right will not go five years without correcting a son who is wrong. The heavenly Father, who always does right, will not let His children get by without correction. First, He will speak, then rebuke, and if one will not repent He will scourge. Then if one refuses to repent, he commits a sin unto death. (1 John 5:16) God takes that individual home, because he is embarrassing his Father. He will suffer loss, but be saved so as by fire (sin unto death for one saved). (1 Cor. 3:15) This whole process will not take five years to be completed!!

Tradition has taught us one can be backslidden for years then get right with God. If you are one of those whose testimony is that you were saved early in life and lived like the devil for years and then got right with God, you had better check your experience closely where you say you got right with God to see if that is salvation. And if it is not salvation, you need to get honest with God and let Him show you that you have never been saved. This is a Bible principle. I had rather stand on a Bible principle than man’s tradition.

Many want to excuse their years in sin by referring to Lot. You need to quit that, because Lot may not have been saved over two years before God took him out of Sodom, then destroyed the city. The moment Lot was saved, he became a new creature (2 Cor. 5:17) and his righteous soul began to be vexed (annoyed; disturbed; tortured) at that instant. (2 Peter 2:8) He could not have stood the pressure of this vexing had it went on for the approximate 22 years he was in Sodom. This is Bible principles applied.

Therefore, I believe that Lot was saved in Sodom about 20 years after he went there and 13 years after Abraham was saved. You may agree or disagree, but one thing you had better not do -- use Lot’s life for an excuse for your years in sin after you said you were saved. That is foreign to the Word of God.

“He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #20842]

The contested interpretation of Old Testament passages rarely makes the pages of the nation’s leading newspapers, but THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE recently looked at the interpretation of Genesis 22 -- the passage about Abraham offering up Isaac.

Religion reporter Manya A. Brachear suggests that the story of Abraham obeying God by offering up his son Isaac as a sacrifice is troubling and “a hard sell.” It seems that some people find the account to be morally suspect.

The immediate context of the article is the fact that this account is a featured part of the Jewish New Year observance. Brachear asked several rabbis how they interpret the passage and teach it to their congregations.

As she reports:

On Rosh Hashanah, many rabbis struggle to inspire their audiences

with one of the Bible’s more chilling tales: Abraham, father of

the Jewish people, bound his beloved son Isaac to an altar,

raised a knife and prepared to kill him simply because God told

him to do it. Although an angel stopped the slaying and pointed

out a ram to take Isaac’s place, Abraham is hailed as a hero for

yielding to God’s heartbreaking demand. The biblical story is a

centerpiece of the Jewish New Year celebration, serving to remind

Jews that God blesses those who submit to a divine calling

without question.

Some find in the account evidence that Abraham was, at base, a religious fanatic. Rabbi Ellen Dreyfus of B’nai Yehuda Beth Sholom said: “In a way it’s kind of a horror story.... In our state of mind, if somebody hears a voice and goes out to sacrifice his son this man has to be put in a mental asylum.”

So Rabbi Dreyfus sees the story as evidence that Abraham was delusional -- a candidate for a mental asylum. Another synagogue held a mock trial of Abraham for attempted manslaughter. He was found not guilty by a narrow margin.

Brachear reported that several rabbis felt that the story, if read in the service, would offend about half of their congregations.

Others found the story to be about religious extremism, child abuse, or fanaticism. Rabbi Eitan Weiner-Kaplow of Shir Hadash Reconstructionist Synagogue explained: “In reading this story we recognize the critical lesson is that God does not want the death of human beings as a sign of faith and a sign of doing God’s will. Therefore the lesson for this time has got to be, we all have to come together to end war and stop the violence and stop the sacrifice and stop the killing.”

At least some included in THE CHICAGO TIMES article got closer to the truth:

As Rabbi Michael Sternfield of Chicago Sinai Congregation read

the Scripture from the Torah scrolls Thursday, Sara Beugen passed

her mother, Joan, a note. “What would you do if you were

Abraham?” Sara scrawled in pencil. “If you devoted your whole

life to conceptualizing and understanding a singular God, and God

called you to do something, no matter how reprehensible, would

you not do it?” her mother said later. “You’d believe in your

heart of hearts he would make it right and would not let it

happen.”

For Christians, the authoritative interpretation of the passage comes in Hebrews 11, where we are told that the entire episode was intended to test Abraham’s faith and to demonstrate God’s faithfulness.

As Hebrews 11:17-19 reveals:

By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he

who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his

only son, of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your

offspring be named.” He considered that God was able even to

raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he

did receive him back.

The book of Hebrews teaches that Abraham was being tested, and that his own faith in God was evident in his binding of Isaac. At the same time, we are also told that Abraham trusted God. The same God who has promised Abraham that he would be the father of a great nation would also be able to protect Abraham’s son -- or even raise him from the dead.

Abraham was also confident that God would make a provision for him and even for the necessary sacrifice. Of course, God provided a ram. Christians know that this ram represents Christ.

The controversy should remind Christians to study the Old Testament with dedication -- and it should also remind us that Christians are also dependent on the New Testament’s interpretation of the Old Testament.

You’re part of the story of this dysfunctional family. And that’s a good thing!

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My wife’s college roommate would sometimes tell people, “I’m a descendant of George Washington!” It was an interesting way to start a conversation at a party, but more than that, I think, she was claiming a connection to the founding father as a way of writing herself into the history of America. Her story was America’s story, through this somewhat dubious lineage.

We do something similar when we read Genesis. The best way to read the first book of the Bible, with its sprawling story of a dysfunctional family, is to read ourselves into the text. We need to find ways to find ourselves as part of the narrative.

It is natural for most of us to feel a strangeness, reading Genesis, because we come to this story as outsiders who have been invited in. We are, as the apostle Paul said, grafted in through Jesus (Rom. 11:17–24). We have been adopted into this narrative about God’s family, and become children of Abraham, so that “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen. 12:3, ESV).

If you’re reading it for the first time, or the first time in a while, you’ll see pretty quickly that the story of Abraham is a story of profound family dysfunction. We find our place in the narrative easily, because that family is so fractured. But then it is also the story about a promise of restoration — a story where we can be re-storied, re-narrated, restored. That’s the power and promise of Genesis.

But as we read, we really have to prepare for the dysfunction. Consider perhaps the most upsetting bit of parenting in Genesis: when Abraham attempts to sacrifice his son Isaac. If the parent of one of your child’s friends confided in you, “God is telling me to kill my child,” you would hopefully dial 911. So what then are we to make of God’s command that Abraham sacrifice his son? What kind of God would make this request? What kind of parent would agree? The text offers only a meager explanation: “After these things God tested Abraham” (Gen. 22:1, ESV, emphasis added). What things?

Decades earlier, immediately following the Lord’s calling, Abraham had found himself sojourning in Egypt. Fearing that the Egyptians would kill him to take his beautiful wife, Abraham passes off Sarah as his sister.

Pharaoh, who is known for taking what he likes, predictably takes Sarah into his house. Abraham is showered with gifts, but then Pharaoh is afflicted with plagues. So much for God’s promise to make Abraham a blessing to all the families of the earth.

We might hope this early episode is a teachable moment for Abraham. He could learn to trust God and not make up weird lies about his wife being his sister. But then, several chapters later, he’s just as fecklessly trying to deceive another authority in the same way. He tells King Abimelech of Gerar that Sarah is his sister.

And lest we think this is just an Abraham problem, Genesis informs us that Abraham’s son Isaac does the same thing. This weird bit of familial dysfunction happens three times in two marriages in the first book of the Bible!

This threefold repetition is an invitation to pause and ponder. Can we find ourselves in this odd repetition in the text? How do we repeatedly take matters into our own hands when fear leads us to doubt God’s promise?

The whole she’s my sister business isn’t the only thing that might prompt God to test Abraham. Another one of “these things” may have been the episode when Abraham consented to Sarah’s plan to speed the promise along and get a child by impregnating a woman they have enslaved, Hagar. The text leaves little room to doubt that this was a terrible idea that leads to conflict and turmoil instead of the promised blessing.

Eventually, God must spell things out, informing the elderly couple that the promise will be fulfilled by the child they will have together. Both respond with incredulous laughter. They are now in their 90s! It’s one thing to believe God’s promises when they lie within the realm of possibility. But it’s another when the promises are simply ridiculous. And in this family, whether the promises are believable or not, they like to have a plan B ready just in case, an alternative way to take things into their own hands.

The question for us, reading this story, is whether we can relate. Disbelief. Cowardice. Plotting. Does this sound like us? Does this dysfunction sound familiar?

If it does, then we are prepared to see that God’s redemption of Abraham and Sarah can be our redemption too. Like them, we can see that we’ve had some “these things,” where we turned to our plan B instead of trusting God.

But the God of Genesis, importantly, is the kind of God who doesn’t just give up on the dysfunctional human family. Instead, there is this test of Abraham’s loyalty on Mount Moriah. Will Abraham trust in God’s promise even if the only tangible proof of its fulfillment — his only son Isaac — should die? Or will he resort once again to plan B?

The story of Abraham and Sarah invites us to see ourselves and connect ourselves to the hope of a promise beyond the wreckage of our bad decisions, our failures to trust God, and the families that we’ve messed up. We get to be children of Abraham.

Of course, the story of the immediate children of Abraham, and those children’s children, alerts us to the fact that our dysfunction is still an issue. By the time Abraham’s great-grandson Joseph is a teenager, the relational dynamic within this family has — if possible — gotten worse.

Joseph’s older brothers conspire to murder him but settle instead upon a hasty plan to sell him into slavery in Egypt. The fallout from this betrayal shapes the final narrative arc of Genesis. After nearly 15 years, Joseph and his brothers are reunited. By this point, Joseph has risen to prominence as Pharaoh’s viceroy, before whom his brothers appear in a desperate attempt to buy grain during a famine. Joseph recognizes his brothers instantly, but plays the stranger. For the next several chapters, Joseph engineers an elaborate game of cat-and-mouse, accusing his brothers of spying, twice planting stolen goods in their packs, imprisoning his brother Simeon, and threatening to imprison his younger brother Benjamin.

In the end, Joseph reveals himself, embracing his traitorous brothers in tears. Why all this subterfuge? Did Joseph intend to confront his brothers with their guilt to prepare the way for reconciliation? Or was the goal of his drama all along simply revenge? When reconciliation bounds onto the stage at the climax of the narrative, is Joseph just as surprised as his brothers?

We are not told, but one thing is clear: Forgiveness in the face of such crushing betrayal does not come easily. Joseph has been betrayed by those who should have loved and protected him. But we as readers can see that the crippling reality of this betrayal takes its place within the more capacious reality of God’s gracious provision.

As Joseph explains to his brothers in the final pages: “Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good, in order to preserve a numerous people, as he is doing today” (50:20). Joseph’s individual story, in this way, is renarrated as the larger story of God’s good work.

The question for us, then, is how to invite God to renarrate the stories of our own family dysfunction. The beginning chapters of Genesis offer us two practical truths to assist us in this task.

While we may feel, as Leo Tolstoy once observed, that our family dysfunction makes us unique, Genesis invites us to see how the pain and brokenness of the story we ‘ve been born into can be part of a larger narrative of fulfilled promises.

We may be convinced that we are damaged goods, part of a damaged family, broken beyond restoration, but Genesis 1 reminds us that our story does not begin with our birth. Rather, we have been written into a story that begins this way: “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good” (1:31, NIV) God speaks goodness into being, and you and I are part of that goodness.

The first practical truth is this: We are not defined by our dysfunction. We bear the image of the God of boundless power and love. Our story begins not in sin but in goodness. It is not enough simply to know this truth; we must daily remember it. This daily act of remembering will be helped if we begin our day in stillness and quiet, in prayer and worship, and in gratitude.

When we turn to Genesis 2, we see that the God who speaks creation into being is also the God who kneels down and gets his hands dirty. We are creatures fashioned by God’s own hands, humans made from humus (in Hebrew, adam from adamah). Having breathed his own breath into this mud creature, God proceeds to work with the human to solve — together — one of the most basic of human problems: loneliness.

We observe that the first try doesn’t quite get it right: Having named all the animals as God has instructed, the man still has not found a partner. No matter; God tries a new strategy, bringing forth from the man himself a “corresponding strength” (in Hebrew, ezer kenegdo). “At last,” the man cries, “bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh ... Woman” (2:23).

The second practical truth, then, is this: No matter the problem we find ourselves in, God is prepared to get down on his knees beside us. No matter how messy our families are (or how profoundly they have messed us up), God is prepared to get his hands dirty in the mess and muck of our lives. We must hold these truths together. God is the one who speaks goodness into being. And God is the one, when we fail or when life fails us, who is right there beside us, working with us to make us whole.

And God’s way of making us whole, of restoring us, is to re-story us, to renarrate our stories by enfolding them in his own story, a strange and wonderful story stretching from the goodness of creation to the resplendent glory of the new creation.

Strange as it is, Genesis is our story, for it addresses questions of fundamental human importance. In it we learn that we are creatures made in God’s image, filled with God’s breath, called to faithfully represent God’s loving rule on earth. We learn of our fateful choice to listen to the cunning serpent, becoming cunning as a result and hiding from God in our shame. We learn of the disastrous results of our choice that persist even still: death, chaos, and confusion. But above all we learn of God’s plan to set things right, a plan to turn curse into blessing, a plan that we also have been called to join.

ABRAHAM is not only one of the greatest names in history, he is one of the greatest of the great. No man ever marked a greater turning-point in history. No man ever became father to a greater posterity. No man ever received greater promises from God. What is more, besides being great as an historical figure, he is great in his personal character. Became of certain distinguishing qualities he is distinctively called “the friend of God.” Isaiah 41:8.

But it is with the spiritual significance of Abraham that we are concerned just now. He moves before us in a typical and representative way as the man of faith. Whatever else he may or may not be, Abraham is outstandingly and representatively the man who “believed God.” Romans 4:3. Some of the most precious and vital lessons of the faith-life are to be learned by studying his personal history.

For the moment, we turn only to the twelfth and thirteenth chapters of Genesis, where we have the call of Abraham (or “Abram” as he then was) and his first stepping forth into the walk of faith. There are three key verses in the narrative:

12:5 — “Abram went forth”;

12:10 — “Abram went down”;

13:1 — Abram went up.”

In the first of these we see that Abram “went forth” into Canaan. In the second we are told that “Abram went down into Egypt. In the third we are told that Abram “went up” back to Canaan.

Why was it that “Abram went forth into Canaan?” He went in response to a divine call. Why was it that Abram went down into Egypt?” He went at the suggestion of his own mind. Why was it that “Abram went up out of Egypt”, back to Canaan? He went back because he had learned that faith in God is better than trust in human reason.

Thus we here have three lessons in one. In the first movement, where we see that “Abram went forth into Canaan” we have faith responding.

In the second movement, where we learn that “Abram went down into Egypt” (because of famine) we see faith receding. In the third movement, where we learn that “Abram went up out of Egypt” back to “the place of the altar which he had made there (in Canaan) at the first”, we find faith returning.

Let us think for a moment about the first of these, i.e. FAITH RESPONDING. Chapter 12:4, reads, “So Abram departed, as Jehovah had spoken.” Faith is always a response to the word of God. Therefore, faith is not presumption, a believing without reason. Nor is it ever against reason, though it is

above reason. Suppose someone now reading these lines has been aroused to a sense of sin and the need of salvation. The first thing for that someone to ask is, “Has God spoken any word for me?” Then if convinced that the Bible is by clear credentials the Word of God, there is neither prescription nor risk if that someone accepts passages like Hebrews 1:1-3, John 5:24, and says, “I therefore believe that I am now saved. “It is not presumption for me to accept the assurances of God’s Word that through union with Christ I am now “a child of God.” Nor is it presumption for me to accept and act upon the promises of God’s Word, for that Word itself tells me that they are all “yea and amen” to me, in Christ.

My wife and I were returning home on an evening in October. As we drove, we were both concerned about the five-year-old son of our dear friends. Over a 24-hour period, Noah had become quite sick. Even as we were praying silently, we received word that the doctor had ordered a brain scan. In that one moment our hearts swung from concern to anxiety. Yes, we have been told by the Lord we cannot add a single hour to our lives by worrying. But that evening the Lord Jesus graciously bore with our limitations for he knew in his heart that we were indeed very worried.

What would your prayer be at such a moment? What if you were in the place of these parents? How would you get through this long night?

When Abraham left Haran he was 75 years old. At this point, God had already promised to make him into a great nation. But his son Isaac would not arrive until after a quarter century of waiting! Years later, Genesis 22 depicts the Lord asking Abraham for that very son as a sacrifice. In verse two the Lord makes his asking known. Verse three begins by stating, “Early the next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac.” What is it that transpired between verse two and verse three? The answer is short and simple: a night. But the agony was neither short nor simple. If King Darius could neither eat nor sleep on the night when Daniel was put into the lion’s den, how much more was the agony of Abraham? This was arguably Abraham’s longest night ever. The night has its unique way of amplifying fears and anxieties. There in the long night, the shadows seem longer, the lights seem dimmer, and the enemy seems bigger. The psalmist spoke of one such night when he wrote, “I am worn out from groaning; all night long I flood my bed with weeping and drench my couch with tears” (Psalm 6:6).

If you are facing your long night it may help to remember that you are not alone. Abraham went through his. Many of the prophets went through theirs. Most importantly, the Lord Jesus went through his at Gethsemane. In such moments we do well to remember that the night may be long, but it cannot be forever and that long nights have a unique way of unraveling treasures from the heart of God. As the psalmist wrote, “At night his song is with me” (42:8). Jeremiah, too, wrote in his Lamentations, “Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” (3:22-23). By the ordinance of a loving God even the longest night of agony must make way for a new morning of hope. Weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning (cf. Psalm 30:5).

Sadly, for our friends, their long night had only begun. Noah’s scan would reveal a mass near his brainstem and he would be scheduled for neurosurgery. Like Abraham their burden was both unexpected and unimaginable. As Abraham saddled his donkey that next morning a heavy burden was saddled to his heart. If only he could have snapped the cords that held this burden to him! Yet paradoxically, for him relief would come only after he allowed himself to be bound to this burden, for the cords were tied by the very hands of God.

Interestingly, in Genesis 22:5 Abraham says to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.” Was he speaking the truth when he turned a singular into a plural? Should he not have said, “We will worship and then I will come back to you.”? Had not God asked him to sacrifice Isaac as a burnt offering on one of those mountains? Had he worked out some other human plan to save his son or was he deliberately creating a false impression in the minds of his servants? Was this only a father’s way of hiding from his beloved son the treacherous intent of his heart? Was Abraham a victim of his own wishful thinking as he found himself without hope on the dead-end road of his commitment? Or was there perhaps something more going on?

On the morning of Noah’s surgery, we prayed with him before the doctors would attempt to remove the mass. Our friends were given a new courage that morning, reflecting a special peace from God. After eight hours of successful surgery and a biopsy report that read “benign,” little Noah was brought out of the operating theatre. To everyone’s joy, he came out with his “hi-beam smile” and broke the silence when he whispered, “Daddy, let us go back home!” The long night had indeed given way to a new day of promise.

When Abraham said “we will return,” I believe he was not making a grammatical mistake. On the contrary, he was making a statement of faith -- faith in the God who had given him Isaac and into whose hands he had placed him back. In the long night, our only legitimate way of escape comes from God who is faithful and who will not let us be tempted with more than we can bear (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:13). And God is indeed faithful! We never truly lose what we place in God’s hands.

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Arun Andrews is associate apologist with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Bangalore, India. Copyright © 2008 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.