Fear and Trembling

As a child my mom would read me Bible stories.

She read them out of a book with large pictures. I didn't know how to read the text, so I did what I could to read the faces in the pictures.

We always read from the Old Testament, and the pictures usually depicted weeping of some kind. The shepherd boy, David, at least seemed at peace playing his harp.

The story of Abraham and Isaac had a very unusual picture.


The first time I saw the picture it seemed as though there was an old man who had tied up a beautiful, young woman and was about to stab her with a knife.

The image terrified me.

I had no idea what a beautiful woman was 'supposed to' look like. The only one I had ever seen at the time (I was three or four) was probably my mom. The painting probably dated to the renaissance, which had a way of portraying men in womanly ways.

I remember thinking to myself something like, 'There's only a couple beautiful women in the world, and this old man is killing one of them! How terrible!'.

I asked my mom about the story because the image made me tremble. I thought she would have a ready explanation for what was happening -perhaps the old man was about to cut the woman loose, or he was going to fight a snake with the knife, or something.

The more I learned about the details, the more dredful the story seemed to me.

The old man, whose name was Abraham, was told by God to kill his own son, Isaac. Isaac was not a young woman Abraham had been attracted to. Isaac was the promised son Abraham had waited many, many years to receive.

...

When my wife and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary we stayed at a beautiful resort hotel -her choice. The next morning was Sunday and she asked me to pick a chapter in the Bible to read.

I turned to Genesis 22 and started reading.

The chapter starts off dramatically with God telling Abraham:

Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.

Which Isaac was God referring to? The Isaac whom Abraham loved. This was the only qualification God made in referring the sacrifice to Abraham. No further description was needed. One can almost imagine Abraham thinking to himself: 'That Isaac. I know exactly who you are referring to.'

At times God has been known to allow people to face difficulties. My wife's father, whom she loved, was killed in a terrible automobile accident. It was very sad for her and her family, although though no one had been instructed to kill her father.

Was Abraham tempted to disobey God?

The chapter opens saying that, "God tested Abraham". But I don't think Abraham was tempted in the same way we might have been tempted.

I don't think Abraham thought to himself, "Maybe I should just go to bed, forget the whole thing ever happened. It was probably just the spicey roast beef dinner anyway."

Abraham's temptation was probably more along the lines of:

'Is this the God I worship? Is this who He is? Is this what he considers good? To require me to kill my own son, who I have waited to behold for so long for?'

As unusual as the story maybe, I do not find bitterness against God to be very rare. I can think of a time -only a month ago- where I had a bitter attitude against God over breaking open the vinyl floor while pushing my new washing machine into its closet.

If my attitude was not truly bitterness against God, it was something a lot like it. On the other hand, tearing up the floor on accident is very different from intentionally drawing a knife on your own son.

Was Abraham bitter against God?

In the book of Hebrews we learn that Abraham was not only taking his son, his servants, and some supplies with him to the mountain in Moriah. He also brought something else with him.

Faith.

Like God, no one could really see Abraham's faith, except perhaps indirectly.

When Isaac asked his father, "Where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" Abraham answered in faith, "God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son."


How easily one comes to tremble in the details of this story.

After I read the story with my wife on our anniversary my wife told me that she became afraid as soon as I started reading the story, and that it was very difficult for her to listen to. I told her it was exactly that way for me as well.

How sad the way many people try to escape from this fear!

In junior high I asked my teacher about the story, about how one should respond if they hear God asking them to kill someone they loved.

And my teacher, who I consider to this day to be wise in many ways, told me that this story took place before God provided the ten commandments saying not to murder.

'So we don't have to be afraid because God would not ask this of any of us.'

Or so she seemed to suggest.

In a way it is like saying that at one time God was Someone to be feared. He laid armies to waste, killed the first-borns, and even destroyed the entire earth and all the people (Noah's family excepting) in a flood, but today? Today, He always behaves in a way that society can approve and accept immediately.

I tried to find consolation in her words, but I never could. Something seemed to linger in the story that terrified me, and it seemed like I was just overlooking it.

One time while discussing the story with a local pastor, he said to me, "But it's not like Abraham killed his son. God intervened at the last second."

He could have just as easily said, 'Look we're making spaghetti tonight, but, come on, it's not like we going to get it all over our white shirts. We can keep it in these bowls the whole time.'

And I feel like so much of my life has been a continual striving to do exactly this: to draw these imaginary lines and say, "God would never allow this to happen...".

But He does allow it to happen. And in this story He commands it of Abraham.

Abraham believed that God could bring Isaac back from the dead. He did not know God was going to do that. And he certainly didn't know God was going to intervene.

To consider only the end of the story and say, 'Well, that worked out pretty good,' Is to overlook the entirety of the obedience that God approved of.

Looking back on it, I suppose my pastor and my teacher were trying to do the same thing with their explanations: they were both trying to take all the fear out of the story.

According to the account, however, it was the fear which God commended Abraham for:

Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.

The strange thing about this story -and the many times I tried to grasp it- is that I probably understood it better when I was a child. Before I tried to explain the scary things away.

Faith can be scary, and because of it most refuse to have it. If you believe something good will happen to you, you can become very disappointed.

Faith says, 'I can accept disappointment. Yes, I can have it all taken from me, but I believe I know the One in charge, and I dare say that He has good things in store for me.'