Sermon Tone Analysis

Tests

Most of you here have long finished school and formal studies but I suspect many of you will still be able to recall that feeling that came around all too often - that is, exam time.

The biggest exam period for many of us would have been the exams at the end of High School, called the HSC (although I suspect some of you might have done the leavers certificate instead).

Now it is always interesting to watch how people approach this period.

Their approach usually fall between one of two extremes.

At one extreme is the “I don’t care” approach.

There will be no study and no revision.

They will just turn up, answer what they can and get what they’ll get.

After all, life’s too short to be stuck behind books.

Life should be enjoyed.

At the other extreme, you will find people who for the entire last year of their schooling, they will do little else then the study and revise.

They will have summaries made up, and summaries of their summaries.

All their notes will be carefully organised and categorised.

Usually their room will be filled with notes to remember.

These people will skip most (if not all) social engagements because there just isn’t enough time.

Most people however are somewhere between those extremes.

Now, I don’t think I would get too much argument if I suggested that there is a strong correlation between where people are on this spectrum and there final results.

Those who sacrifice time and relaxation to study, will generally get a better mark compared to the person who makes little effort.

On one level, this should come as no surprise.

Certainly we know this on a theoretical level.

But yet for some reason, we want quick easy results.

And this is not just for exams.

We pick up a guitar or sit down to the piano.

We get a few quick lessons and we want to sound like an accomplished musician.

But it doesn’t happen.

We say, I want a better job, as if we could wish it into existence, but we don’t want to go through all the hard work that is required to get it, and so it remains just a wish.

A test of faith

When it comes to our Christian walk and being close to God, we find something similar, although I’ll say that with a very important clarification.

You see, when we go on our journey of faith with God, just like the diligent student that cuts out anything that distracts from study, we too need to cut out those things that drive us away from God.

The clarification is that this analogy shouldn’t be taken too far as it isn’t hard work that will get us close to God, but rather a reliance on him to the exclusion of all other things.

This morning we are going to conclude our series on Abraham, and what we’ll see is the culmination of an amazing faith journey.

One where the promise of God is fulfilled, but also with a big test.

The test that Abraham finds himself with will be a difficult one for us to make sense of and I will spend a little time wrestling with it, but I really want to spend the time looking at the nature of how Abraham is tested.

As we explore this, we will be in a better position to consider our own faith journey.

You see, here is the question which can be difficult to answer.

Are we actually walking by faith or not?

We can easily say the right words.

But what about when we are put to the test.

Is it really faith, or is it some fake impression of it?

Abraham

So let’s dive in and explore what is going on...

But before I look at today’s passage, let me just briefly take you back to where it all started - the promise made to Abraham (or Abram as he was known at that point) in Genesis 12.

The initial component of the promise made to him was that he was to be made into a great nation.

This then started a long and unlikely journey as the promised is able to be fulfilled.

Of course, one of the most challenging aspects being that Abraham was 75 years old and didn’t have any children.

Which of course makes it very difficult to father a large nation.

Abraham battles with fears and doubts, and in the process, takes his wife’s slave, Hagar as his own wife and has a child called Ishmael.

This will provide a layer of complexity that we will look at very shortly.

But then, when Abraham is 100 years old, and his wife Sarah is 90, finally Sarah bears a son who they call Isaac.

This journey that has taken many twists and turns finally seems to be a point where we can see a clear trajectory to the final promise.

That’s not to say the promise is complete - certainly at this point there is a lot still to be fulfilled.

After all, one promised child is hardly a great nation, but at least we can see how it could potentially move forward.

Abraham’s tests

So Abraham has got this far, admittedly with a number of stumbles along the way.

But he’s here.

But it’s not quite over yet.

You see this journey of faith involves two aspects of faith.

Firstly, God’s faithfulness.

Hopefully as we’ve looked at this series this aspect of faith has been well and truly established.

God has always been faithful to his promise, even when Abraham wasn’t.

But the other aspect of the faith journey is Abraham’s own faith.

Does he have the faith to cling to God’s promise or not.

There have been some signs that he does, but when it comes to the crunch, will his faith hold strong or will it be shown wanting?

Test with Ishmael

Well, the biggest part of this test is going to come in chapter 22, however I want to come back to chapter 21, because here we see another aspect of the test, even if we might not normally think of it as such.

Now it is in chapter 21 that we actually read about the birth of Isaac, which given the lead up we’ve had to his birth, you might have thought the author would have made a bigger deal about it, but it all happens in just one verse, namely verse 2, where it states, Sarah fell pregnant, and then had the promised child.

There is a little more elaboration in the next few verses, particularly as considers the other aspect of the meaning of the name Isaac.

You see, the name, which means laughter, reflected doubt Abraham and Sarah had when they previously laughed at the idea of them having children.

But now the laughter is a positive thing as it flows from their joyfulness.

But in verse 8 we move forward to the time when Isaac has now been weaned which probably implies he is about 3 or 4.

We then see the problem that was caused when Abraham had a child with another woman.

You see, in verse 9 it tells us that “Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking”.

Now we loose a bit of the irony in this in the translation, because the word for ‘mocking’ that is used of Ishmael is actually a play on the name Isaac.

Remember, the name Isaac means laughter, and so we are seeing Ishmael act in a negative aspect of what Isaac is.

This act disturbed Sarah and so she approaches Abraham to tell him that he needs to get rid of Ishmael.

Now in some ways we lose the significance of what is going on here.

You see, we tend not to see Ishmael in a very positive light, except maybe to have a little sympathy for someone caught up in dramas not of his own making.

But it is evident that Abraham loved him very much.

Abraham had previously asked God that Ishmael might have the blessing of the promise, and in this passage, we’re told that Sarah’s request to see him gone caused him to be distressed greatly (that’s in verse 11).

But in verse 12, God tells him not to be distressed and to indeed listen to his wife, because the promise is to be with Isaac.

And so what we are seeing is actually a very difficult thing for Abraham, he has to cut off his first born son.

Now we are all perhaps very aware of dilemma Abraham faces with his son Isaac and chapter 22, but it is easy to gloss over this task without giving it much thought.

Certainly it doesn’t involve killing anyone, but it is clear that this was very distressing.

And of course it makes sense.

Abraham lived most of his life childless.

He then has a child and has to give it up.

Reframing

To help us make sense of this, it is perhaps worth reframing to see the bigger picture.

Hopefully in the process we can see why such a callous thing of rejecting a child is occuring.

What we need to recognise is the importance of the promise and nothing getting in the way of it.

You see, Ishmael was a result of Abraham not trusting in God but taking things into his own hands.

Even when it was made clear to him that this is not the child in which the promise lies, Abraham did not want to let go.

While it can almost seem callous of him to cut him off, but in the bigger view, keeping him close was going to cause problems.

What this doesn’t mean

So firstly, let me clarify what this doesn’t mean.

This story should not justify cutting people out of our lives because they don’t suit our needs.

The events in this account are part of a very specific plan of God’s that will ultimately lead to redemption for all man kind.

What this does mean

But an application that we can take from this is the need to cut things out of our lives that lead us astray from God’s promise.

And if you don’t know God’s promise on your lives, let me tell you because it is quite simple.