It’s one thing to say you believe God. It is another to believe God for your children. Abraham’s wife, Sarah, was past the age of childbearing. Then, in a miraculous way, as a result of His promise, God gave them a son. Now God is going to test Abraham’s faith in the most severe way.
He said, “Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you” (Genesis 22:2)
I don’t know of anything that would require more faith. God had promised Abraham a nation through this son, Isaac. But now God was asking Abraham to sacrifice his son of promise. It is amazing that Abraham obeyed God to the point that he was in the very act of sacrificing his son Isaac when God stopped him. All of this was a test.
God does not ask for human sacrifices, but He does ask for faith. The Bible says that Abraham believed God. He evidently believed that God would raise Isaac from the dead after he was slain. His faith was evident when he told the men who had accompanied them, “We will worship and return to you” (Genesis 22:5) God did provide a substitute, an animal sacrifice—a prototype of God’s provision of the lamb of God, His son Jesus Christ, as a sacrifice for the sins of the world.
Abraham was human, he loved his son. But he loved God…more. You see his test was a matter of priorities. Jesus said that if we loved a family member more that Jesus, we are not worthy of Jesus.
“He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me” (Matthew 10:37).
Why do you think it is so hard to trust God for our children?