Preached at St Peter’s, Ovington and Holy Cross, Seend
Genesis 22. 1-18; Matthew 10. 40-42
“Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest … and offer him … for a burnt offering…”
Marc Chagall, The Sacrifice of Isaac (1960-6), hangs in the National Marc Chagall Gallery, Nice.
If God is merciful, why do men sacrifice their children to their gods? Today’s pairing of readings, seemingly so awkward and contradictory, is linked by the common theme of God’s mercy, and asks us how we should share God’s mercy with those around us.
The story of Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac is at once gripping and repulsive. The temptation is, as always with the more difficult Old Testament texts, to distance it from our own modern condition, because we would never do anything as crazy or barbaric as sacrificing our children for God, would we?
The conventional way to read the story of Abraham is that his faith is being put to the test, and that’s what the text itself pushes us towards. At the end of this passage, the angel of the Lord says explicitly that because of Abraham’s iron faith, God’s promise to him so long ago that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars has been confirmed.
But here’s the thing – the story was clearly strange and fearful also for people of its own time, as much as for us. Although Abraham is acting on a commandment of God, there is something furtive about his behaviour. At no point on their three-day trudge to the place of sacrifice does Abraham explain to his two young servants what is happening, and when they arrive, he leaves them behind, plainly lying to them about what he is about to do with Isaac.
He also lies directly to the boy about what is about to happen – when Isaac innocently asks where the sacrificial lamb is, Abraham replies that the Lord will provide one. But that’s not what Abraham thinks is about to happen – Abraham thinks he’s about to kill his own son, and won’t tell him the truth.
So there is a shadow of dissembling resting over this story. Abraham may have passed a test of faith set by God, but it’s as if he knows there’s something shameful about the way he’s done it. Shouldn’t Abraham have asked if God would really have demanded he embark on a course of action that he had to lie about to those closest to him? Was there a better way to be faithful? Surely, we should always ask hard questions if someone is asking us to sacrifice our children.
There’s another problem. Isaac is the son whom Abraham and Sarah have managed to produce at an impossibly old age, long after any reasonable hope had passed. Even more, he’s the son and heir who makes it possible for God to fulfil his first and grandest promise to Abraham, that in time his descendants will be as numerous as the stars. Abraham is, at least on a straight reading of the story, commanded by God to give up the greatest and most miraculous of his God-given gifts.
The problem goes well beyond God’s test being cruel and traumatising for Abraham and Isaac alike, even if both were offered a last-minute reprieve. The problem is this – was God’s initial promise to Abraham not reliable? Can God not be relied upon to keep His promises, or must all who seek to follow God also pass a series of bizarre tests to prove that our faith is blind and absolute?
The picture of God painted here isn’t a God I find possible to love – to fear, certainly – but to love, no. Jacob, who was Isaac’s son and Abraham’s grandson, was famous for his all-night wrestling bout with a mysterious stranger who turned out to be God – and far from displeasing God by doing so, actually received God’s blessing. This passage makes me wrestle with God. We should not be frightened of that.
Confident faith, secure faith, is a wonderful thing. Blind faith is not. A blind faith never pauses to consider whether what it perceives as the calling of God might actually be a self-generated projection. Men have often heard the voice of God calling them to sacrifice their children, most often in war, but not only then. Would that more of them pushed back where Abraham didn’t.
Just give a cup of cold water to someone who follows Jesus, and you will earn an imperishable reward from God. Notice how different the picture of God in our Gospel reading is from that of our first reading. A God not of bizarre and cruel tests, but a God of lavish generosity. This passage is from Jesus’ instructions to the twelve apostles when He sent them out to minister for Him on their own for the first time; in fact, it is the very last few sentences from those instructions. Up to now, Jesus has been warning them about the sort of dangers they are likely to face in a hostile land, and how to prepare themselves for that. But these final few sentences do something very different – they promise blessing and reward for those who do receive the apostles. The meaning of “little ones” in the final sentence is somewhat obscure, but the general thrust isn’t: even the smallest of acts of kindness and mercy done to Jesus’ followers because of who they are will be seen and rewarded by God, with a reward that cannot be lost. No other strings seem to be attached. The reward doesn’t seem to require people to be Jesus’ followers, merely to be willing to do small acts of kindness to those who are. The overall sense is of the sheer overflowing abundance of God’s mercy and kindness. Nobody is sacrificing their children here.
How do we reconcile these two pictures of God – the God who commands blind obedience of Abraham, and the God whom Jesus speaks of, who seeks to reward even the tiniest gesture abundantly?
Perhaps the answer lies in the nature of Jesus Christ Himself. Christians believe that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and was also God every bit as much as His Father; Christians also believe that there is a third person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit, who is, as well as many other things, the love that flows between the Father and the Son. God tested Abraham by asking him to sacrifice Isaac, but stopped short of allowing the sacrifice to go ahead. But the Father did not spare Himself the agony of sending His Son to die, for all that the love He held for Him was so fierce and great that it is itself God; but here’s the real difference – the Son was mature and fully aware and freely chose to offer Himself. And both Father and Son are God. God fulfilled the sacrifice that He stopped short of actually taking from Abraham for one reason – to forgive us our sins, to open the way to eternal life for us – ultimately, to show us mercy.
God desires mercy, not sacrifice. Now you, in your day-to-day life, go and do likewise. Show mercy in your life, and you will receive mercy in the world to come. Show mercy when all common sense would demand harshness or vengeance and you will touch the nature of God. Why do men sacrifice their children to their gods, when God would rather have a cup of cold water held out to a stranger? Mistaking our own voice for God’s can only be part of that terrible mystery of the human condition. But if you hear the voice of God telling you to sacrifice someone else for His sake, ask yourself if it’s really the voice of God at all.
And now to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, be ascribed all might, majesty, dominion, and power, as is most justly His due, now and for evermore. Amen.
