Needs - Genesis 22

Did you ever have a plan in your head for how things are supposed to go - and then they don’t go that way? When I was in seminary, and I was getting close to graduation - my wife Sara and I had a dream of traveling and doing some mission work. I was still fighting with my call to be a pastor, and I thought “aha! I’ll be a missionary instead!” And a lot of people don’t know this - but Sara has a degree in teaching english to speakers of other languages - she’s worked with immigrants, refugees and even international college students. And so at the end of seminary - Sara and I were applying to all these mission organizations. We were looking at Vietnam, Turkey, and South Korea - among others. And my favorite option was Turkey. There was a church in Istanbul and they were hiring two positions. They needed a lead pastor and someone to teach English. And I looked up from the application and saw that on our couch was a lead pastor and an english teacher. It felt so perfect, it was like I could see God’s plan. Aw man, look at how the pieces all fit together so perfectly! So it was either mission work overseas or be a pastor up in Michigan. And so I told the denomination leaders - “No, don’t put me in a church this year - we’re going overseas. We don’t know where yet, but probably Turkey.” So they did not place me in a church in Michigan. Then we found out that the Vietnam organization wasn’t even a real organization - it was a scam to get money out of would-be missionaries. Yikes, but that’s okay - Turkey was the real prize. Then we found out the door closed on South Korea - there was some training that was going to happen in Colorado, but to go there you needed to be debt free, and we had student loan debt. But that’s okay - Turkey was the favorite choice. And then we got to just a few weeks before graduation when I got the news - they went in a different direction. I didn’t get the job. I was fresh out of seminary, no experience. They wanted a pastor with experience. So Sara and I graduated, two masters degrees and zero jobs. I called up Michigan and it was too late - all the churches were full for the next year. My first job as a seminary graduate was bagging groceries at Whole Foods. And no shade - it was actually a really great job and it provided for my wife and I, we could pay the bills. The job wasn’t the problem, the problem was that this was not the plan! And I remember being so frustrated! God - what happened to the plan? I thought my plan was a good plan - how can this not line up with your will for my life? Have you ever had that - where you thought you knew how life was going to go - and then God throws you a curve ball? Have you ever asked, God - what happened to the plan?

Today we are in part four of our series called Fear Over Faith. For the last month we have been examining the holiness of God and how that can help us develop and grow our faith. We’ve been all over the Old Testament - walking with Moses and Jeremiah, Isaiah - and today, we’re diving into Genesis chapter 22, the story of Abraham and Isaac. 

If you want to grab your bibles, or look it up on your phone - we’ll be in chapter 22 this morning. If you didn’t bring a bible, but would like one - please feel free to grab one off the back wall. One of our values as a church is that we want to be a BYOB church. A bring your own Bible church, and I promise if you bring it, we will open it. Couple weeks ago when Brian was preaching, I was looking it up on my phone - and man, I’ll tell you - it is so convenient to be able to click around the bible in the bible app. But whatever you are using - physical or digital - the story is the same, and we dive in with chapter 22, verse 1. [read v.1-2]. Fffwhaaa - I should not have started with verse 1. What on earth? And look at the way he says it - he piles on the adjectives. Take your son, you know - your ONLY son, you know - whom you LOVE - and go kill him in Mordor. I mean, Moriah. Not a great start to this story. 

And actually to understand it, we need a little bit of context. Some of you might know this already - but back in chapter 12, we meet this guy named Abram. And Abram and his wife had no children, but God comes to him and makes a promise with him. “I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will give this land to your offspring.” And if you don’t have kids but God is over here promising to give the land to your child - that means there’s a promise in there: “You’re going to have a kid.” And he changes Abram’s name to Abraham. Then we jump over to chapter 15, verse 3 and it says, [read v.3-6]. This is a pretty famous moment, probably you’ve heard something like that before - but I love to just dwell in it. Abraham is standing under the night sky looking at the stars - when my wife and I moved up to the UP it took us all day to drive up there and it was so late when we arrived… it was like 2 am when we finally arrived, and even though we were exhausted the first thing we noticed was the incredible painting across the sky. I might love city life - but you just don’t get the same stars as you do out away from things, you know? And God tells Abraham, your descendants will be more than these stars. This is the promise. And then we jump one more time up to chapter 18, and there’s one more little moment I want to show you. Abraham has some visitors come by, and they’re from God and they tell him, “I will return to you about this time next year, and your wife Sarah will have a son.” and then it says in verse 10, [read v.10-15]. And would you look at that - God was right, Sarah got pregnant, gave birth to a son and named him Isaac. And actually - it’s really cool, the name Isaac in Hebrew actually means “son of laughter.” It can also be translated as “the son whose birth produces joy and happiness, because it’s the joy and happiness of seeing God’s promise come true.” The messenger from God looks at Sarah and says, “why did you laugh? Is anything too hard for the lord?” So what I want you to see with all of this is that Isaac is extremely precious to Abraham. Isaac is the literal physical embodiment of God’s promise. God promised, “You will have descendants, lots of them” and they have exactly ONE baby. Isaac. 

And so you might have noticed - everything I just told you makes what’s going on over in chapter 22 even worse. Chapter 22, verse 2 [read v.2-3a]. Pause. What? No argument, no questions, no objections? Just the next morning he loads up the donkey?!? Wow. Let’s keep reading, [read v.3-6]. They make it to the mountain, they start hiking up with the wood, the fire and the knife. [read v.7]. So we’re hiking up this mountain and Isaac is starting to do the math. He’s looking at the sticks, he’s looking at the fire - there’s something missing here… And Abraham responds, [read v.8]. What do you think is going through Abraham’s mind in this moment? Number one there’s the horrific idea of losing someone who is so precious to you. But on top of that, Isaac IS the plan. Abraham is probably thinking, “wait a minute now God, I thought this kid was how you were going to fulfill your promise to me. I thought having Isaac was the plan to give me descendants.” What could be going through Abraham’s mind? Think about what he said to the servants - he told the servants, “wait here, we will go worship and then WE will come back.” Do you think he was lying to the servants? Deceiving them? OR.. maybe, do you think he was convinced - somehow, someway, I’m coming back with this kid. I can’t even imagine.

And in this incredible moment, the important thing for us to realize is that Abraham knows who God is. I mean, if God can GIVE Abraham a son, in a miraculous way, when his wife is practically a 100 years old - maybe he could bring him back to life, maybe he could give him another son. What story do you think Abraham telling himself in this moment? Now I know a lot of people cringe at this story - but this is SUCH an important teaching. Abraham’s fear of God, his belief in God’s power leads him to hold his gifts with an open hand. God has given, and maybe God will take away - but he promised to give and so I will trust. Thousands of years later they would write about Abraham in the book of Hebrews chapter 11, let’s put that on the screen, this is verse 11 and it’s not even really about Abraham, it’s about Sarah too. It says [read v.11]. Read that sentence again, “because she considered him faithful who made the promise” and so [read v.12]. The promise of God is tied to the power of God. The raw infinite and incredible presence that makes us shake in our boots is the same power that reassures us. If God makes you a promise - you can trust in that promise, because he is God. 

Sometimes I think I spend my entire Christian life learning to unclench my hand. To live with an open hand - every time something goes wrong, every time something unexpected happens, something that wasn’t “according to plan” - I want to close my fingers. I want to grab for control. But if God is God - and we remember his power and his promise we can unclench and live with an open hand. Do you trust God enough to hold his gifts with an open palm? Or are there things in your life that you want to hold back from God? Are there things you would not trust on the altar?

The story keeps going back in Genesis, verse 8 - Abraham says, “God will provide the offering.” Verse 9, [read v.9-12]. Fffffwhoa. I’ve heard this story like a thousand times, and every time I imagine it in my mind’s eye I tighten up in my gut a little bit. But there’s one piece I wanted to show you in case you didn’t catch it. The angel that calls out in verse 11 it says, “THE angel of the Lord.” Apparently, and this is something I learned recently, when it says “AN angel of the Lord” - that’s a regular ol’ angel. But when it says THE angel of the Lord - there’s quite bit of evidence that points to the fact that THAT was Jesus. Jesus - before he came in human form in Bethlehem. The fancy word is “pre-incarnate” Jesus. And you might notice a theme - Jesus was the voice coming from the fire that spoke to Moses, Jesus was on the throne in Isaiah’s vision of heaven - Jesus is all over the Old Testament teaching us about how fear of God is a good thing that helps us grow. 

To finish the story, [read v.13-14]. The Lord will provide. The good news that God has for us today in his word is that God provides what we need. And I don’t want you to miss what is happening here. Abraham is standing over the altar, holding a knife with his son Isaac on the table. Isaac who holds all his hope, all his earthly plans, all his designs for the future, for his legacy. Sarah doesn’t have any other sons. What’s really going on here is Abraham is saying “I trust you God more than any earthly plan.” He needs Isaac for his legacy to continue. For that plan that he had in his head to work out. I need this kid. And the scriptures tell us he loved his son, let there be no confusion - Abraham loves Isaac. But the altar is where he trades his lesser need, his finite, earthly plans, for the greatest and only need - which is God. When the angel of the Lord stops Abraham he says, “I know you fear God, because you have not withheld your son from me.” You have not held on to the plan in your head, you have not held on to your highest earthly hope. You have feared God, trusted God, loved God above all other things. And that need, that truth applies to every single one of us in this room - in all of our lives the altar is the place where we exchange lesser “needs” for our greatest and only need - which is Jesus.

Let me see if I can explain it like this - I heard this recently from another pastor and I thought it was so helpful. As some of you know, I have five children. The oldest is 8 years old and he’s in 3rd grade. Now all my children are incredibly bright. It has been such a joy in my life to watch my children struggle and overcome and be challenged and grow and just flourish in their schoolwork. I’m very proud of all my children. But my oldest is in 3rd grade. Now if I were to take the Advance Placement Calculus test and plop it down in front of my son, or any of my children - what would happen? They would fail the test. This is why I think we have to stop saying the church is a place of second chances. Follow me on this. Sometimes in church we say, “this is a place where you get a second chance.” But the third grader who failed the AP Calculus exam - what’s going to happen if I put that test in front of him a second time? He’s going to fail it again! And again and again - he doesn’t need a second chance, or a third chance or a hundredth chance - he needs someone else to take the test. When we face the test of life, of morality and mortality - there is a radical shift when we realize we can’t do it without God. 

When I say that God provides what you need - I don’t mean he will provide so that the plan in your head works - What I mean when I say that God provides is that HE is what you need. The angel of the Lord says to Abraham, “you have not withheld from me your son, your only son” - that phrase might tickle your memory. The reason for that is that you hear the same idea used in one other place in the bible. In Romans chapter 8 verse 32, except in that moment they are talking about God - who did not withhold his son, his only son whom he loved - Jesus. We need Jesus to take the exam for us. We need to take all of our lesser “needs” - the plans and purposes of our own design, the striving and seeking and churning - trying to get God to love us - take it all and put it on the altar. Take all of your sin, all of your brokenness, all of your shame, all of your doubts, all of your burdens - and put it on the altar. The altar is the place where we exchange everything we think we need, everything we have in this world, for the only thing we actually need - and that’s Jesus. 

So let me ask you the hard question that we get from Abraham. What do you need to put on the altar? What thing are you holding back from God? For some of us - we’re clinging to the bad things. There is sin and shame, and you are determined to never let it go. You hold on to your brokenness with an iron grip because somehow somewhere someone told you that you are not allowed to heal, you are not allowed to grow past it. You’re stuck. Put it on the altar. Trade it for the goodness of God. Or maybe it’s not shame or brokenness but unrepentant sin. Something you know you’re not supposed to be doing, something that goes against the way of Jesus, goes against the teachings of God - but you really like it. You’re holding on to that sin because you don’t want to let it go. Please, put it on the altar. Or maybe it’s a good thing in your life. Something you love and pour all your hope and happiness into - your job, your family, your home, or even just the plan you have in your head of how your life is supposed to go. With trust and fear and awe in the power and promise of the God who loves you - put it on the altar, hold nothing back from your God in heaven.

When I was in high school, I gave my life to Jesus. I told part of this story at Byron Days, so it might sound familiar - but basically I went to this big Christian Rock festival. Camping and music and speakers. And one of the nights there was this guy who talked about keys. Now at the time, I was already a church kid. I grew up in the church - my dad was a preacher, I had great friends in the church - it was so much fun. I sang the songs, I prayed the prayers, I knew all the answers in Sunday School - on paper, by all appearances, I was the perfect pastor’s kid Christian boy. But the truth is I was a phony. I wasn’t lying about loving the church - I DID love the church. But it was just something I did on the outside, that didn’t reflect anything on the inside. I wanted to pray to God, like they taught me, but I would go home and lie in my bed and to be honest - sometimes it just felt like I was talking to the ceiling. I didn’t have a sense that there was actually something more out there. And so I go to this thing - a church event, and I hear this guy talk about keys. I don’t remember the man’s name. I don’t remember the name of his ministry or even what church he was from. But he said, “you need to give ALL your keys to God” and then he just held up a set of keys, just like this. And he pulled them out one at a time. Some of us like to give God SOME of our keys. I’ll give God my Sunday morning key, my Wednesday night key - but Monday morning? Friday night? I don’t want to give God those keys. I’ll give God the keys to some things in my life. I won’t use swear words, I’ll volunteer twice a month at the soup kitchen - but the key to my sexual ethics? The key to my budget and my bank account, my calendar? No, no - I want to keep those keys.

And so that speaker on the stage - he challenged us to give everything to Jesus. To surrender completely with Jesus as our Lord and savior. To put it all on the altar. And so that’s what I decided to do. I sat on this blanket with my friend group and I closed my eyes and I prayed - I gave my life to Jesus, wholly and completely. All the keys, every piece. And here’s the crazy part - my life, from that moment on did not change very much on the outside. I had already been a church kid, but now I was a Jesus kid. I still sang the same songs - but now I was singing TOO someone. I still prayed those prayers they taught us - but now I was talking TO someone. It was as if I was talking to a wall, and then they raised up the blinds and I realized there’s actually someone listening. There is some THING that is out there. And I realized, not just that it exists - but that he cares about me, cares about me so much that he came into this world, as a human being, a baby in the manger - who lived, suffered and died for me on the cross. He took the exam for me - and my life had an authenticity to it suddenly. And since that moment - the plan in my head has been wrong over and over, good things have come and gone - but God has always been with me. He is the only thing I need and the same is true for you.

I know a lot of you have experienced this truth. You have understood the grace of God, and we put our entire life on the altar. You have been baptized, claimed Jesus’ name and washed everything else away. But some of you - even those who have been in the church for a long time, you’ve always trusted God - sort of. Some of us trust God as long as he follows the plan in my head. I trust God as long as things in my life go good. There are things we won’t put on the altar, keys that we want to keep for ourselves. After the second service we’re going to have an opportunity for baptism. If you feel that you are ready to put everything on the altar, to proclaim Jesus as your Lord - I hope you will step forward for baptism. But I also want to expand it a bit. For some of us - we have taken that step, we have given our life to Jesus, put everything on the altar - but we keep trying to take stuff off the altar, we keep trying to get our keys back from Jesus. For some of us it’s “Jesus take the wheel, but follow my GPS!” And so for those of us who have already been baptized - we need to remember our baptism. We need to take that step of faith, and put everything back on the altar. Like I said, so often it feels like trusting God is a constant process of unclenching my fingers. I keep wanting to grab control, to take my keys back, to take stuff off the altar. But Abraham teaches us that the power of God and the promise of God go together. He shows us in a dramatic way that God provides what we need. He is what we need.

When I graduated seminary the wheels fell off the plan for my life. I wasn’t prepared to get four rejections in a row - and it really sent me into a spiral. And I’m not going to get into it now - it’s a whole big story, but God used those extra months in Chicago in a huge way in my life. And one of the things God has done consistently is hold control of my life just out of reach. I keep grasping, trying to close my hand, and God keep returning with “not until you trust me”. So let me leave you with these two questions. 1.) have you ever had a plan in your head for how things should go - and then they didn’t go that way? And 2.) Are ready to trust God enough to hold his gifts with an open palm? To give God all the keys, to put it all back on the altar. Let’s pray.