Genesis 22

This has always been one of the most jarring stories in the Bible for me. God asks Abraham to take his precious little son, and sacrifice him on a mountain. 

Holy Toledo. And I sometimes feel like God asks a lot of me. 

I don't know Abraham personally, but I like to imagine that this was not an easy decision for him. If he's anything like me at all, he looked up at the endless blue sky and had a fierce mental battle. Heck, I like to think that he cried a little at the concept that he was going to kill his little boy. 

I get what everyone says about this story. "God wanted to remind us that everything on earth is temporary, and that the first priority in our lives should be pleasing Him." 

That little rant always gets me really mad. I wish I could tell you why for sure - but I think the reason is that I feel like it's completely not what God is about. We are God's babies. He knows exactly how fond parents are of their children, and I really think He gets it even more than we do when parents accidentally put their kids before their Lord. 

The core theme that I take from this is that he will always always always, without fail, deliver us. Even when it's just about to look like He won't. 

Here's how I arrive there: Abraham is about to do this thing that would probably keep him in distress for the rest of his life. Yet, it's also the right thing to do, seeing as it is God's command. He had two options:

1. Kill Isaac and please God. 

2. Save Isaac and be separated from God. 

Neither of those look like solid options to me. How often in life do we look at our options and feel like both of them suck? I often find myself trying to discern the lesser of two evils. 

In Abe's situation, as well as in our own, God can give us a third, beautiful option - one we may not have even realized existed. And all we even have to do is trust God. Like Abraham, we can trust that He's going to give us a way out. 

Guys, I am so bad at this. For whatever humanly reason, I fail time and time again to trust God fully. It's a problem. I always wonder whether I'm really going to be taken care of in every situation. I find myself thinking awful things, like "does God care that I feel lonely right now?" and even simply negativity like "this school year is not that good so far." 

Abraham was about to murder his son, and he stayed calm and trusted God. God delivered him from this huge burden - He can do the same for me, and absolutely the same for you.