God will stretch our faith - Genesis 20-23

In this section we have one of the great stories of the Bible that gives all who read it pause. Abraham is asked to sacrifice his son, Isaac. We shutter to think of doing that, however, before focusing on what that teaches us about faith and God, remember: God sacrificed His son for us. We may feel conflicted over this but God's sacrifice of His son is no less of a conflict. You may ask, how could Abraham even consider offering his son. It should be noted that the companion passage to look at this is found in Hebrews 11:17-19. In Hebrews we read that Abraham had "reasoned" that if he killed Isaac, God would raise him from the dead. Abraham's faith was a working faith. It was an active faith, not a passive-I-will-just-trust-God-and-pray faith. Abraham could do this because God had just promised in the preceding chapter that Isaac would be the son who would produce children for Abraham (21:12). But, there is more. In chapter twenty-one Hagar and Ishmael are sent away. How could Abraham do that? He sent them into the wilderness, alone? He could do that because God had just told him that Ishmael would be a great nation as well.. So, when he sent them away he believed in God's promise and he believed that God would do something to protect them. Here again is an active and computing faith, not a passive and dormant faith. God stretched his faith in chapter 22 but Abraham was excercising his faith in chapter 21. God strecthes our faith. That is why in 22:1 we read God "tested" him. The little things we believe in (chapter 21 and Ishmael) give us the abiltiy to stretch our faith in the great things (chapter 22 and Isaac). Beleive God's promises and "compute" that when you do He will do something really big. Here he protected Ishmael and he provided a sacrifice in place of Isaac.