St. Mary's Episcopal Church

Good Friday 2007 - Genesis 22

Lord open our hearts, and free us to love as you love.

I always hated the story of Abraham and Isaac. It made me afraid and angry - Somehow it seemed Abraham should have put up a fight - should have worked to preserve this child - should have acted like a FATHER. I worked hard to deny the story of a father, who even at GOD'S demand, set out to kill his own son.

So I worked to make it a different story - Maybe this was really Abraham testing GOD - to see what this God would do. But no, the text was undeniable… God brought a trial to Abraham. I trust this text - I know it is important to our very identity - SO I continued to look at this story.

First, there was Abraham's response to God - It was immediate. This relationship with God was not new - Abraham had lots of experience with God's goodness and God's power.

When God called, Abraham had one answer - "Here I am!"

God's requests were absolutely clear - "Take your ONLY son." "Bring him to the land of Moriah." "Offer him as a burnt offering."

Abraham understood. Burnt offerings and sacrifice were among the norms required of deities of the day. Abraham indicated no surprise - He knew the voice - The voice that had announced the birth of this surprise child - This was the voice he'd come to trust completely.

So here was Abraham - God's choice to be the father of a nation. Yet here was Abraham - with his only son and only hope for that nation - headed for sacrifice - And Abraham obeyed.

Let's look further at the story:

A man and his son walk with others. Abraham and Isaac leave the others, but interestingly enough Abraham says to them, "We'll be back."

After 3 days, Abraham looks up and sees his goal - Mount Moriah.

Moriah - the mountain range in Jerusalem - Moriah is likely the site of the Temple Mount - - Recent archaeology indicates this ridge may also contain Golgotha - the place of the skull - the site of Jesus' crucifixion.

To its south and west lays the Hinnom Valley, foul garbage dump of Jerusalem where fires burned, children were sacrificed to other gods, and the remains of executed criminals and dead animals rotted. The place Jesus referred to as Gehenna - Hell.

Abraham and young Isaac begin to climb the hill beyond this wretched valley. In their time, people sought God in the high places.

Abraham carries the fire; Isaac heads up the hill with wood tied to his back.

As the pair reaches the altar, Isaac voices his concern - "Where is the sacrifice?" "Don't worry, son - God will provide," replies his father.

The pair continues on their mission, following God's command until Isaac is bound and laid on the altar - a lamb awaiting sacrifice in the shadow of the knife raised by his father's hand. Isaac does not struggle - He too is obedient to his father - he too chose to trust the father who had given him life.

And at the last instant, the familiar voice of the Lord's angel intervenes, replacing the son on the altar with a ram. Abraham, ever attentive to that voice, heard and stopped his hand.

God will provide.

In his obedience, Abraham offered to God all he had wanted, what he loved most - this son - the great gift given him in his old age - his future itself. For this God had never betrayed him -

Abraham proved his trust of God - and God responded in kind… Promising blessings to all of Abraham's family who would come after

God promises and God provides.

And Abraham has learned something else about this God - our God - Something that clearly distinguishes him from the other gods of the time. The god of Abraham does not want the sacrifice of our children. As later books of the Bible will reiterate, from Isaac's time, there is no longer human sacrifice to God.

For the past six months, I've spent many days and nights as a chaplain at the Seton Medical Center in Austin. I am assigned to the Intensive Care Unit - a place of great healing and a place that knows death. The patients and families in the ICU almost always find themselves in times of struggle, in times when the miniscule thread on which human life hangs becomes apparent in its fragility. There are usually many decisions to be made. Most alien and frightening can be those involving life support, when a patient or their loved ones must decide whether or not to give away the very ability to breathe on one's own. The irony is that when such a decision is called for, it is almost always because the patient must give up autonomy for a time in order to heal - in order to live. We may not be so far from Abraham when we put a life in God's hands.

Our God - the God of Abraham - in the death-defying submission of his Son - shows us that he is a god of life. All he asks is that we sacrifice our life - our LIVING - to Him.

And today we hear that story - On this Good Friday, we are with another son who walked up a hill. It may well be the same high hill on that ridge in Jerusalem that Abraham and Isaac climbed.

On Good Friday, another son carried wood on his back as he climbed. This son too could have fought his fate. This son was human but this son is also God himself. But unlike the binding of Isaac by his father, this son was bound at the hands of the people around him - Our hands.

They bound Him to silence Him for he said NO to the behaviors of his day with its values of power and money and status - the abuses - the injustices - the violence needed to get and keep ahead of each other --

They bound Him as his way is clearly not the way of the powers of man.

And so he walked up that hill, wood on his back, sacrificing himself rather than tacitly approve of the despair of the world. Could he have stopped it? Absolutely. Yet he chose the way of obedience - the way of a life that will not stoop to beating each other senseless in the dirt - the freedom in love that is our God.

We have a passionate God - A God who feels human pain - a God in pain at the pain of the world. A God whom Luke tells us will die to be "raised him from the dead, and (freed) from the agony of death" (acts 2:24) A God who shows himself and receives the worst of human betrayal, physical pain, and death of a body so that he can fly in the face of death and show us the joy that is our life in his model. A God who calls us to celebrate freedom with him and dance in that life and celebrate our coming together with each other.

The first time my son, Indy, came to St. Mary's, he came back to the pew after communion and whispered to me "Mom - that bread is really good. Can you buy it?" I leaned back over to him and thanked God for the chance to whisper back, "No Honey, you can't buy it. It's FREE! All you have to give is your whole life."

Tonight we do not get to come to this table together. We are not fed this bread of life. The body is broken - The light of the world is out. Tonight we can taste only the darkness and realize the loss. But unlike the folks who came heart-broken down that black and rocky hill 2000 years ago, we know the rest of the story.

Like Abraham we trust that "We'll be back."

Through this cross, we remember to trust in the life Jesus showed us. Though this cross, we see the love that would not compromise on our lives. And through this love, we find our direction for living - - - In return, we are to be faithful and hand over our lives to our creator for he has modeled eternal life.

Abraham with Isaac, Jesus ---- they lived when they gave up their life to God.

In giving up the fight - in giving our perception of control clearly to God, we find life.

On this darkest of nights, when you look to the cross, look to this man, Jesus, and Look at what he has done - Can you hear almost him whispering - - Look how much I love you!

This is the God we can trust. This is the God for whom we can live.

For only in dying to the fears of this world are we free to live in the miracle of His love for us.

And in response to that ever-more familiar voice, we echo Abraham as we turn to the source of life itself and answer "Here I am!" Amen.