MATURE FAITH SEEN IN THE OFFERING UP OF ISSAC
by C H SpurgeonFROM SWORD & TROWEL 2000 No 2
Abridged and adapted by the Editor from an address given by C H Spurgeon
And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get
thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains
which I will tell thee of (Genesis 22.2).
I do not intend to enter into this narrative in its bearing upon our Lord, although
we have here one of the most famous types of the Only-begotten, Whom the Father offered up
for the sins of His people. We shall dwell now upon the triumph of Abraham’s faith when his
spiritual life had come to the highest point of maturity.
After he had passed through nine great trials, each of them most searching and
remarkable, and had through the process been strengthened and sanctified, he was called to
endure a still sterner test. It is good to learn that God does not put heavy burdens on weak
shoulders. He educates our faith, testing it by trials which increase little by little in proportion to
our faith. He only expects us to endure adult afflictions when we have passed through the
childhood state and arrived at mature stature in Christ Jesus.
Do not think that as you grow in grace the path will become smoother beneath
your feet, and the heavens serener above your heads. On the contrary, reckon that as God gives
you greater skill as a soldier, He will send you upon more arduous enterprises. As He more fully
fits your vessel to brave the tempest and the storm, so will He send you out upon more boisterous
seas and longer voyages, that you may honour Him more.
You would have thought that Abraham, in his old age, after the birth of Isaac,
would have had a time of perfect rest. Let this warn us that we are never to reckon upon rest from
tribulation this side of the grave. No, the trumpet still sounds the note of war.
We shall now look at the trial itself; we shall next see
Abraham’s behaviour under it; and shall, in conclusion, spend a little time in noting
the reward which came to him as the result of his endurance.
I. And first, the trial itself. There is scarcely a single syllable of God’s address to Abraham in the opening of
this trial, which does not seem intended to pierce the patriarch to the quick.
‘Take now thy son.’ What! a father slay his son! Was there nothing in
Abraham’s tent that God would have but his son? He would cheerfully have given Him his herds.
All the silver and gold he possessed he would have readily surrendered. Will nothing content the
Lord but Abraham’s son?
If one must be offered of human kind, why not Eliezer of Damascus, the steward
of his house? Must it be his son? How this tugs at the father’s heart-strings!
The word only is particularly emphasised by the fact that Ishmael had
been exiled at the command of God. If Isaac shall die, there is no other descendant left, and no
probability of anyone else to succeed him; the light of Abraham will be quenched, and his name
forgotten.
Nor is that all: ‘Thine only son Isaac.’ What a multitude of memories
that name ‘Isaac’ awoke in Abraham’s mind. This was the child of a promise graciously given,
the fulfilment of which had been long and anxiously expected. Isaac, the child of the covenant,
the child in whom the father’s hopes all centred, was the gift of God who was to be retracted.
Surely this was a trial of trials!
Yet was it added, ‘whom thou lovest’. Must Abraham be reminded of
his love to his heir at the very time when he is to lose him? The phrase seems to have no bowels
of compassion in it. Was it not enough to take away Isaac, without at the same moment
awakening the affections which were so crushed?
Isaac was very rightly beloved of his father, for in addition to the ties of nature,
and his being the gift of God’s grace, his character was most lovely. His behaviour at the time of
his sacrifice proves that in his spirit there was an abundance of humility, obedience, and
resignation, and such a character was quite sure to have won the admiration of his father.
But note, not only was this tender father to lose the best of sons, but this son must
be sacrificed by the father himself. If the Lord had said, ‘Speak thou with Eliezer,
and charge him to offer up thy son,’ it would have softened the trial, but Abraham must grasp the
sacrificial knife and drive it into the breast of his son, and then see him consumed to ashes upon
the altar. Everything was designed to make the trial severe. The friend of God was tried in such a
way as probably never fell to anyone before or since.
In addition to the sacrifice, Abraham was commanded to go to a mountain which
God would show him. It would have been agony to obey at once while under the fresh influence
of sacred impulse, but to have three days to chew this bitter pill would have been a triple agony.
He must journey on with that dear son before his eyes each day.
Only faith, mighty faith, could have assisted Abraham to look in the face the grim
trial which now assailed him. He might have said, ‘I am called upon to perform an act which
violates every instinct of my nature. I am to offer up my child! Horrible! Murderous! I am to burn
my slaughtered child as a religious act - terrible, barbarous, detestable! I am myself to offer him
upon the altar deliberately. How can I do it? How can God ask me to do that which tears up by
the roots every one of the affections which He Himself has implanted, which runs counter to the
whole of my humanity?’
We too may be called by the Word of God to acts of obedience which seem to us
to violate all our natural affections. Christians are sometimes commanded to come out from the
world by decided acts, which provoke the hatred of those who are nearest and dearest. Now, if
they love God, they will not prefer father nor mother, nor husband, nor brother, nor sister, in
comparison with Him; and though Christians will ever be among the most tender-hearted of
people, they will be ready to give up all for His sake. They will deny every natural affection
sooner than violate the divine law.
Perhaps, today you are suffering under an affliction which is grieving all the
powers of your nature. The Lord has been pleased to take away from you one dearer than life, for
whom you could have been well content to die. O, learn with Abraham - let not Isaac stand
higher than the Lord. Let Isaac be dear, but let Isaac go sooner than God be distrusted. Bow your
head and say, ‘Take what Thou wilt, my God; slay me, or take all I have, but I will still bless Thy
holy name.’ This was how Abraham’s love for God was demonstrated.
It may have occurred to Abraham that he would, by the slaughter of his son, be
rendering all the promises of God futile. There are times with us also when we are called to a
course of action which looks as though it will jeopardise our highest hopes. A Christian is
sometimes bound by duty to perform an action which, to all appearance, will destroy his future
usefulness.
I have often heard men advance as an argument for staying in a corrupt church,
that they have obtained an influence there, which they would lose if they followed their
conscience and left. True Christians, however, must be ready to forfeit all their supposed
influence, and renounce their apparent advantages, rather than sin against their conscience just as
much as Abraham was bound to offer up Isaac, in whom all the promises of God were centred.
It is neither your business nor mine to fulfil God’s promise, nor to do wrong to
produce the greatest good. To do evil that good may come is false morality, and wicked policy.
Our duty is to obey God, and He will take responsibility for the fulfilment of His promises, and
the preservation of our usefulness. Though He dash my reputation into shivers, and cast my
usefulness to the four winds, yet if duty calls me, I must not hesitate a single second. At the
command of God, then, Isaac must be offered because obedience can never endanger blessings,
and God’s commands are never in real conflict with His promises, because God can raise up
Isaac and fulfil His own decree.
Abraham must have been subject to the thought that the death of
Isaac was the destruction of all his comfort. The tent would be darkened for Sarah, and the plain
of Mamre barren as a wilderness for her lamenting heart. He must have felt thus, but it did not
make him hesitate. Sometimes the course of duty may lead through the death of our dearest
comfort and our brightest hope. But we must do right, come what may.
It must also have occurred to Abraham that from that time forth he would make
himself many enemies. Many would distrust his character, count him a wretched person, and
shun him as a murderer of his own son. How could he bear to meet Sarah again? ‘Where is my
son?’ How could he meet his servants again? How could he bear their looks, saying, ‘You have
slain your son’? How could he face Abimelech and the Philistines? The wandering tribes which
roamed about his tent would all hear of the awful massacre and shudder at the thought of the
monster who defiled the earth on which he trod.
And yet observe the holy detachment of the godly man to what might be thought
or said of him. Let them count him a devil. Let a universal hiss consign him to the lowest hell of
hatred and contempt, he takes no account of it, for God’s will must be done. God will take care
of His servant’s character. He must obey, for no second course is open to him, and he will not
consider disobedience.
This is one of the grandest points about the faith of the father of the faithful; and
if you and I shall be called to exhibit it, may we never be found wanting. May we be ready to
brave calumny and reproach with cheerfulness, through the power of the Holy Ghost. How
Luther’s lips must at first have trembled when he ventured to say that the Pope was Antichrist.
The millions bowed down before the ‘vicar of God on earth’. ‘No,’ said Luther, ‘he is Antichrist,
and a very devil.’
When he found himself shunned by the ecclesiastics who once had courted his
company, and heard the common howl that went up, that the monk was a drunkard, and (when he
married a nun) was filled with lust, he said, ‘They may call me what they will, but I know that
God has spoken into my soul the great truth of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. I will not hold
my tongue.’
II. We shall now observe the patriarch under the trial. In Abraham’s bearing during this test everything is delightful. His obedience is a
picture of all virtues in one, blended in marvellous harmony. First notice the
submission of Abraham under this temptation. There is no record of any answer given by
Abraham. It had been a startling command, ‘Take thine only son, and offer him for a burnt
offering!’ But Abraham does not argue the point.
It is natural to expect that he should have said, ‘But, Lord, do You really intend it?
Can a human sacrifice ever be acceptable to Thee? Thou art love and kindness. It cannot be.’ But
there is not a word of argument; nor a solitary question that even looks like hesitation. ‘God is
God,’ he seems to say, ‘and it is not for me to ask Him why, or seek a reason for His bidding. He
has said it: I will do it.’
Prayer against so dreadful a trial might not have been sinful. He could have
prayed, ‘My Lord, for Sarah’s sake, and for Thy promise’s sake, test me not so.’ But from this
grand soul there is no such prayer. He does notA ask to escape; he does not pray to be delivered
once he knows God’s will. Much less is there the semblance of murmuring.
Abraham goes about this business as if he had been only ordered to sacrifice a
lamb ordinarily taken from the flock. There is a coolness of deliberation about it which does not
make him a Stoic, but does prove that he was gigantic in his faith. ‘He staggered not,’ says Paul,
and that is just the word. You and I, if we had done right, might have done it in a staggering,
hesitating manner; but not he. He knows that God commands him, and with awful sternness, and
yet with childlike simplicity, he sets about the sacrifice.
The lesson I gather from this is: when you know a duty, never pray to be excused,
but go and do it in God’s name in the power of faith. If ever you clearly see your Master’s will,
do not wait for better opportunities: do it at once. It is a very terrible thing to delay or disobey,
and to let conscience grow hard. It is like the freezing of a pond. The first film of ice is scarcely
perceptible. Keep the waters stirring, and you will prevent the ice from hardening, but once let it
film over, and it will thicken over the surface, until it is so solid that a waggon might be drawn
over it. So with conscience, it films over gradually, and at last it becomes hard, unfeeling, and it
can bear a weight of iniquity.
This world has come to a sad pass because of the tricks men play with their
consciences. This is the cause of all those unnatural senses that people give to texts and creeds.
This is the secret reason why the religion of this land, which claims to be Protestant, is becoming
popish to its very core, because evangelical men have sworn allegiance to a popish catechism,
and given it another sense. Instead of coming out of a corrupt church, they have dallied with their
consciences, and by their practice have nullified their preaching and taught men to lie.
But we must move on to notice next Abraham’s prudence. Prudence
may be a great virtue, but often becomes one of the meanest of vices. Prudence rightly
considered is a notable handmaid to faith; and the prudence of Abraham was seen in this, that he
did not consult Sarah as to what he was about to do.
Naturally, prudence would have said that it was Sarah’s due to give her judgement
in the case, and that Eliezer, who had often helped and guided Abraham, should be consulted.
‘Yes,’ Abraham probably thought, ‘but these beloved ones may weaken me.’ And, therefore, like
Paul, he did not consult with flesh and blood. After all, what is the good of consulting when we
know the Lord’s mind?
If I go to the Bible and see very plainly there that something is my duty, for me to
consult with others as to whether I shall obey God or not is treason against the Majesty of
Heaven. Imagine an inferior officer in an army, when ordered in the hour of battle to lead an
attack, turning round to a fellow soldier to ask his opinion of the orders he has received from the
commander-in-chief! Let the man be tried by court martial, he is utterly disloyal.
Notice, further, Abraham’s alacrity. He rose up early in the morning.
O, but most of us would have taken a long sleep, or if we could not have slept, we would have
lain till dinner time at least, tossing restlessly. The command does not specify the hour; there is
no peremptory word as to the time of starting upon the awful journey. At least let us postpone it
as long as we may, for the dear young man’s sake; let him live as long as possible.
But no, delay was not in the patriarch’s mind. The holy man rises early. He will
let his God see that he can be trusted, and that he will do His bidding without reluctance. O
believers, always be prompt in doing what God commands you. Hesitate not. The very pith of
your obedience will lie in your making haste and delaying not to keep the Lord’s commandment.
Further, I must ask you to notice Abraham’s forethought. He did not
desire to break down in his deeds. Having cleft the wood, he took with him the fire, and
everything else necessary to consummate the work. Some people take no forethought about
serving God, and then if a little hitch occurs, they cry out that it is a providential circumstance,
and use it as an excuse to escape the unpleasant task.
O, how easy it is when you do not want to involve yourselves in trouble, to think
that you see some reason for not doing so! Says one, ‘We must live. Why should I throw myself
out of a job merely because of a small point of conscience?’ Says another, ‘I know the Bible says
I ought to act differently, but we must take circumstances into consideration, and compel the
postponing of obedience.’
Abraham takes care as far as possible to forestall all difficulties that might prevent
his doing right. ‘No,’ he says, ‘there is no compromise for me, my duty is clear. Does God
command it? I will provide all that is needful for the fulfilment of His will. I want no excuse for
drawing back.’
Observe, further, Abraham’s perseverance. He continues three days
in his journey, journeying towards the place where he was to sacrifice his son. He bids his
servants remain where they were, fearful perhaps lest they might be moved by pity to prevent the
sacrifice. Now, you and I would have liked to provide ourselves with some friend who might
have stepped in to prevent the deed, and to take the responsibility off our shoulders. But, no, the
good man puts everything aside that may prevent him going all the way.
Then he puts the wood on Isaac. O, what a load he placed on his own heart as he
lay that burden on his dear son! He bare the fire himself in the censer at his side, but what a fire
consumed his heart! How sharp was the trial when the son said artlessly, ‘My father, behold the
fire and the wood: but where is the lamb?’ He made but a short reply.
We have every reason to believe that other replies followed, which are not
recorded, in which Abraham explained how the case stood, for it is hard to suppose that Isaac
would have blindly yielded unless first an explanation had been given that such a command had
come from the highest authority, and must be obeyed.
At last, Abraham unsheaths the knife, and the deed is about to be done, but God is
content. Abraham has truly sacrificed his son in his heart and the command is
fulfilled. Notice the obedience of this friend of God. It was not a matter of talking about what he
would do, but his faith was practical and heroic. I call upon all believers to note this. We must
not only love God so as to hope that we should be ready to give up all for Him, but we must be
literally and actually ready to do it. We must ask for more faith, so that when the trial comes, we
shall not be revealed as mere wind-bag pretenders, but true to God in deed.
How many professors love God until it comes to losing their pence and their
pounds, and involves penury and poverty. Many will be faithful to God until it comes to scoffing
and shame, and then they are offended, and thereby prove who is really their God. So many serve
their God up to a certain point, but no further, and so show that they love not God at all.
I have but feebly brought into the light the obedience of Abraham, but I must not
leave the scene until I have mentioned what lay at the bottom of it all. The eleventh chapter
of Hebrews tells us that by faith Abraham offered up Isaac. What was
the faith that enabled Abraham to do this? I believe that Abraham was sure in his own mind that
God could not lie, and God’s Word could not fail, and therefore hoped to see Isaac
raised from the dead. He said to himself, ‘I have had an express promise that in Isaac shall be my
seed, and if I be called to put him to death, that promise must still be kept. God will raise him
from the dead.’ We are told in the New Testament that he believed in God that He could raise
him from the dead, from which he also received him ‘in a figure’.
Some may say, ‘But this lessened the trial.’ Granted, but it did not lessen the faith,
and it is the faith which is most to be admired. He was sustained under the trial by the conviction
that it was possible for God to raise his son from the dead, and so to fulfil His promise.
But beneath this, there was in Abraham’s heart the conviction that by some
means, if not by that means, God would justify him in doing what he had to do; for it could never
be wrong to do what God commanded him.
Brethren, believe that all things work together for your good, and that if you are
commanded by conscience and God’s Word to do that which would impoverish you or throw you
into disrepute, it cannot be a real hurt to you, and it must be right. I have seen men cast out of
work owing to their keeping the Lord’s Day, or they have been for a time out of a job because
they would not fall into the tricks of trade.
O for the faith which never will, under any persuasion or compulsion, fly from the
field. If only people had strength enough to say, ‘If I die and rot I will not sin, or do what God
commands me not to do, or fail to do what God commands me to perform!’ This is the faith of
Abraham. Would God we had it! We should have a glorious race of Christians if such were the
case.
III. I have left myself only a few minutes for the last point, which was, let us
observe the blessing which came to Abraham through the trial of his faith.
First, the trial was withdrawn: Isaac was unharmed. The speediest
way to get to the end of tribulation is to be resigned to it. God will not try us when we can fully
bear the trial. Give up all, and we shall keep all. Give up your Isaac, and Isaac shall not need to
be given up. But if you will save your life, you shall lose it.
Secondly, Abraham had the express approval of God: ‘Now I know
that thou fearest God.’ The man whose conscience bears witness with the Holy Ghost enjoys
great peace, and that peace comes to him because under that trial he has proved himself a true
and faithful servant. O brethren and sisters, if we cannot stand the trials of this life, what shall we
do in the day of judgement? If we are afraid of a little loss and a little scorn, what would we have
done in the martyr days, when men counted not their lives dear to them, that they might win
Christ?
Abraham next had a clearer view of Christ than ever he had before -
no small reward. ‘Abraham rejoiced to see my day,’ said Christ: ‘He saw it, and was glad.’ In
himself ready to sacrifice his son, he had a representation of Jehovah, Who spared not His own
Son. In the ram slaughtered instead of Isaac, he had a representation of the great Substitute Who
died that men might live.
More than that, to Abraham God’s name was more fully revealed that
day. He called Him Jehovah-Jireh, a step in advance of anything that he had known
before. ‘If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine.’ The more you can stand the
test of trial, the better instructed shall you be in the things of God. There is light beyond, if you
have grace to press through the difficulty.
To Abraham that day the covenant was confirmed by oath. The Lord
swore by Himself. Brethren, you will never get the grace of God so confirmed to you as when
you have proved your fidelity to God by obeying Him at all risks. Then you will find how true
are the promises, and how faithful is God. The quickest road to full assurance is perfect
obedience. While assurance will help you to obey, obedience will help you to be assured: ‘If ye
keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s
commandments, and abide in his love.’
Last of all, God pronounced over Abraham’s head a blessing,
the like of which had never been given to man before. First in trial, he is also first in blessing.
First in faithfulness to his God, he becomes first in the sweet rewards which faithfulness is sure
to obtain.
Brethren and sisters, let us ask God to make us like Abraham, his true children,
that we may gain such rewards as he obtained. May He help us to make a surrender this morning
in our hearts of all that we have of the dearest objects of our affections. May we by faith take all
to the altar today in our willingness to give all up, if the Lord wills.
May we never pause to ask whether any act of obedience shall make us rich or
poor, honourable or despised, or whether it will bring us peace or anguish, but may we go right
onward, as though God had shot us from the eternal bow, in the firm conviction that if there be
temporary darkness, it must end in everlasting light. Let us set our seal upon the fact that God is
true, that rewards are to the righteous, and true peace to the obedient, and that in the end it will
be our highest gain to serve God. O that there may be trained in this house a race of much
enduring believers, who can endure hardness, but cannot endure sin.
May you, my brethren, obey your convictions as constantly as matter obeys the
laws of gravitation, and never may you sell your birthright for the world’s wretched pottage.
Could this house be filled with such men and women, London would shake beneath the tramp of
our army, and this whole land would perceive that a new power had arisen up in its midst. The
Lord make us true men like Abraham, true because believing, and may He help us to sacrifice
our all, if need be, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
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