The gospel of Mount Moriah, that's
the name of the mount or the land that Abraham was called
to go to with his son Isaac. Look at verse one, it says, and
it came to pass. And anytime I see those words,
I think about God's sovereign, predestinating providence. It
came to pass. It's not in the sense in the
Bible that whatever's going to be talked about here, it just
happened. as if it was just some random
event. But it's in the fullness of the time, just like when God
sent his son, in the fullness of the time, God sent forth his
son. So when it came to pass, means
this is in God's appointed time. This is what God intended to
do all along from eternity past. And it says after these things,
after all the events that Abraham had gone through in his own conversion,
in his marriage to Sarah, and they're having their son Isaac,
he said, after these things, that God did tempt Abraham. God tempting, what does that
mean? Well, you know, whenever we think
about temptation, we always pretty much think of tempting, you know,
we're tempted to do evil. We know Satan tempts us, the
world tempts us, and our own flesh. We have a battle within
and so we're tempted. I'll never forget one time I
had heard a man say that, make this statement. He said, it's
not a sin for us to be tempted. It's just a sin if we give in.
Well, that's not true for us. Because the temptation to do
evil has to do with the desire within to do it. And we have
to fight the desire. And Christ told us the desire
is sinful, isn't that right? when he talked about murder and
lust and all of that in Matthew chapter 5. So yeah, see the problem
that we have is that Satan has an ally within us, it's called
the flesh. And thank God for the Spirit
of God who's given us of his spirit that we can fight the
warfare of the flesh and the spirit. But when we're tempted
we sin. Now we may not give in to do
the act physically, but we still sin. But when God tempts someone,
it's not to sin. And let's look over at James
chapter one. James deals with this. Any temptations to evil do not
come from God directly, but from our own fleshly desires. And
over here in James chapter one, look at verse 13, he says, James
1, 13, let no man say when he's tempted, I'm tempted of God,
for God cannot be tempted with evil. So he's talking about being
tempted with evil or evils plurals, your concordance might say. Neither
tempteth he any man. You can't tempt God to do evil.
God is nothing but good. And God doesn't tempt any man
to do evil. But verse 14, but every man is
tempted when he's drawn away of his own lusts and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived,
it bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth
forth death. So when it talks about God tempting
Abraham here, it's not talking about tempting to do evil. What
it's talking about is God testing Abraham, testing or trying him.
That's what this word tempt means back here in Genesis 22. It's
a test, it's a trial. God does test His children. Many times we see that in the
form of chastisements as Hebrews chapter 12 tells us, but God
tests the gift of faith in His children for His glory and our
own good. And this test here took place
on Mount Moriah. Look at verse one again. It came
to pass after these things that God did tempt Abraham and said
unto him, Abraham, and Abraham responded, behold I, behold here
I am, behold I. I believe that's Abraham in submission
to the Lord saying, I'm at your service, Lord. Here I am. And God knew where he was, but
he's calling him out. And so what we see here, this
is the test that God is going to put him
through. Verse two, he says, take now thy son, thine only
son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of
Moriah. So we talk, most commentators
and most scholars say this happened on what is called Mount Moriah,
or in that area known as Moriah. And some scholars believe that
this is where later that the Temple of Solomon was built and
that may be so. And that certainly would be appropriate
because what God is going to command Abraham to do is sacrifice
his son and the temple was the place of sacrifice. And then
other scholars believe that this is what later came to be called
Mount Calvary. That could be so too. And obviously
there's a connection there, isn't there? Because that's where our
Lord suffered on the cross. on Calvary. But all of this,
as we see, is going to portray in type and picture and in prophecy
the sacrifice of God's dear son, the sacrifice of Christ as the
surety and the substitute and the redeemer of God's elect,
a multitude of sinners that God chose before the foundation of
the world. And that's what this is all about. So God commands
Abraham, he says, go to the land of Moriah and verse two, he says,
offer him there for a burnt offering. Now this is a sacrifice to the
Lord. This is not just the death of
Isaac that God's commanding here. And he says, offer him for a
burnt offering up on one of the mountains, which I will tell
thee of. So God's command. And I put in your lesson, you
know, that may seem so strange and it may even seem to us to
be cruel. How could God do something like
that? But it's not strange and it's not cruel once you see what
God is doing. And we only know what God is
doing after he does it, unless he tells us so beforehand. But
God brought this trial on Abraham for three reasons. And I've got
these listed in your lesson. Number one, to test and prove
Abraham as his child whom he loves. Every chastisement, every
trial that we go through as a child of God is a proof of God's love
for us. It's a proof that we are truly
his children. Over in Hebrews 12 that I've
got cited here, read that whole passage sometimes. He said, every
son or every child of God suffers chastisement from the Lord and
that's a proof of his love. And he said, those who do not
suffer chastisement They're bastards and not sons. Now, there is a
suffering that is common to all people as a consequence of sin. For example, this COVID virus. There are believers who get sick
just like unbelievers. There are believers who suffer
in a lot of ways just like unbelievers. But to the believer, we have
a different perspective from the word of God on those sufferings.
They are not manifestations of God's condemnation against our
sin because we're not condemned. In Christ, there is no condemnation. We're sinners saved by grace.
So how are we to look at any of the sufferings that we go
through, any of the trials that we go through? These are the
chastisements of a loving father. and he's gonna bring us through.
And that doesn't mean that they're pleasant. Now that doesn't mean
that I'm to act like I'm happy when I'm not. I'm not gonna be
fake about it. And I thought about Abraham here.
We're gonna look here in just a moment about Abraham taking
his son. up on that mountain and I don't
know what was going through Abraham's mind and I don't really want
to speculate too much about it. I know preachers who've gone
30 minutes on talking about Abraham's journey to the mountain and all
what he was thinking. Well, I don't know what he was
thinking other than what the scripture tells me. But I know
this, the prospect of his son being hurt and suffering, even
being killed, I'm sure that wasn't a pleasant thing to him. So it's
not that when we go through these trials that we're happy, but
it says this in Hebrews 12, that afterward, it yields the fruit
of righteousness. You know what that is? I sincerely
believe if you look at the whole context of Hebrews 12, what that's
showing us is that when God puts us through a trial, just like
he's doing Abraham here, and he brings us through it by his
power and his grace, we come out on the other side loving
Christ, following Christ, valuing Christ even more. His righteousness. When you go through a trial,
are you proud of how you act? I've never been through a trial
that I come out onto the side and say, boy, I'm just proud
of how I did during that time. No. But when I come out, when
God brings me out, I say, thank God even more that Christ is
my hope, that his grace kept me, brought me through, that
his righteousness is my only ground of salvation. So that's
why God put Abraham through this, to test and prove that Abraham
is his child whom he loves. And when the trial was over,
Abraham knew himself better than he did before, and he knew Christ
better than he did before. I believe that. And then the
second reason that God put Abraham through this trial is to provide
a great testimony and picture of his glory and the salvation
of sinners based on the blood of Christ. I believe this is
one of the pointed meanings of this, that God's doing this to
provide in the Old Testament a picture and a prophecy of what's
to come in the slaying of the Lamb of God. Because all of this
is about Christ. And then thirdly, God put Abraham
through this to prove once again God's faithfulness and power
to do all that he promised to do. He promised Abraham and Sarah
a son, Isaac, and they had a son. And he told Abraham that in you
all nations are gonna be blessed, and in Isaac shall the seed be
called. Is God faithful to his promise?
He's faithful to every promise he's ever made. God has never
broken a promise. And all the promises of God in
Christ are yea and amen. And so we have to remember that
God had promised Abraham that it was through Isaac that the
Messiah was to come. for the salvation of his people.
And Abraham believed God's word. So look at verse three. He says,
and Abraham rose up early in the morning, saddled his ass,
and then took two of his young men with him, his servants, and
Isaac, his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering,
and rose up and went into the place of which God had told him.
And then on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the
place far off. Now, as I said, we could speculate
about what all was going through Abraham's mind and all of this,
but I suggest that we just leave it with the scripture. And like
I said, I'm not going to try to make Abraham some type of
superhuman being who didn't struggle, because we all struggle. Even
with God's commands, we struggle, don't we? That's the warfare,
the flesh and the spirit. I'm sure Abraham had his struggles,
And then, I don't want to make Abraham anything less than what
he was, a sinner saved by grace who believed God. Abraham believed
God, the scripture says. And he's talking about here a
burnt offering. And Abraham knew that the burnt
offering was for the Lord, and I believe he knew that it was
a picture of what God was going to do in the salvation of his
people through Christ. I believe that, for the sins
of his people. But what does the Bible say about
Abraham's thoughts? Well, we have an explanation
in the book of Hebrews chapter 11, and it's in verse 17. I've got it written out in your
lesson here. If you want to turn to it, that's fine. But it says
this, this is the hall of faith in Hebrews 11. It says in Hebrews
11, beginning at verse 17, by faith, Abraham, now what does
that mean by faith? Based upon God's word, that's
what that means. Abraham believed God's word.
God's word, we're talking about that Frank, God's word settled
the issue, didn't it? God spoke, that settles it. And
by faith, Abraham moved upon God's word and command. When
he was tried, when Abraham was tested, he offered up Isaac,
and he that had received the promises offered up his only
begotten son, of whom it was said, of whom God said, that
in Isaac shall thy seed be called, accounting. Now Abraham accounting. Now what does that mean? This
has to do with Abraham's thoughts. You know the New Testament word
impute or account or reckon sometimes is translated think. In other
words, and this is why I've often said about justification, justification
basically involves how God thinks. All right, who shall lay anything
to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. God
is the judge. And somebody told me one time,
said, well, it's more than just how God thinks. Well, let me
tell you something, folks. How God thinks is how it is. However he thinks, that's how
it is. Now how I think sometimes is not how it is. I didn't think
it was gonna rain today. But that's not how it is, all
right? Now God, his thoughts, remember
his thoughts are not my thoughts, your thoughts are not my thoughts,
your ways, you see, until he brings us into submission to
his thoughts. So what I believe this is talking
about in Hebrews 11 verse 19 is how Abraham was thinking.
And it says, accounting that God was able to raise him up,
even from the dead, from whence also he received him in a figure. What that means, that word figures,
it's the word we would translate or say means type. Abraham apparently,
according to the Holy Spirit's testimony in Hebrews 11, was
looking at this whole thing as a type. a figure, a picture,
realizing, thinking in his mind that God's able to raise this
boy up because God had said in Isaac, shall thy seed be called.
So I'm not saying that because that Abraham didn't struggle.
I'm not saying that at all. But I think a lot of people go
too far when they talk about Abraham, you know, being almost
in the throes of depression over this. But at the same time, I'm
sure he did struggle. But in all this, we can see so
many parallels of God the Father giving his only begotten son
to save us from our sins. Abraham had the wood for the
burnt offering. Isaac was going to be the burnt
offering. And in that, Isaac, you could
say Abraham was a type of the father and Isaac is a type of
the son to be the burnt offering, our sin offering. That's what
Christ is. He was made sin, our sin bearer, our sin offering,
our surety, our sacrifice, our substitute. And it was by the
will of the father. You know how many times Christ
said, I come to do not mine own will, but the will of him that
sent me. That's what he was portraying here. He wasn't denying his own
deity. He was simply saying that he
became submissive as the son of God, co-equal with the father
and the spirit and every attribute of deity, he became submissive
for the salvation of his people. A servant, he took upon him the
form of a servant. And that's what he did. Our sins
were imputed to him as our surety before the foundation of the
world, and he had to submit to the punishment to do the work,
to pay the debt. And it was the father who sent
him in the fullness of the time. God sent forth his son made of
a woman, made under the law. It was the father who was pleased
to bruise him, Isaiah 53. You remember he said, a body
hast thou prepared me, that human nature, that human body and soul
that he took into union with his deity was prepared for him
by the Father through the Holy Spirit, conceived in the womb
of Mary without the aid of man. And in all of this, God shows
that there is no salvation, there is no love, there's no grace,
no mercy apart from justice satisfied. That's why Christ had to die.
Righteousness must be established because without that there is
no salvation. And so as the Bible says in Romans
8.32, God spared not his own son. Here's Abraham, he's not
gonna spare his son. That's a type, that's a figure.
God spared not his own son. Well, look at verse five. He
says, and Abraham said unto his young men, abide ye here with
the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder and what? You notice
the word there? He said, we're going to worship.
Now, Abraham wasn't lying. He wasn't trying to throw them
off base. He wasn't covering up what he
was doing. He was telling the truth. They're
going to worship. Obeying the Lord. going through all the test
of faith. It's worship, it's attributing
unto God everything that honors Him and everything that He says
of Himself. That's what worship is, that's
what we're doing this morning, we're worshiping. We're attributing
unto God, we're recognizing the greatness of our God and our
Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he says, we're gonna go yonder
and worship and come again to you. Now, I believe he meant
he and Isaac were gonna come again. Some people say, well,
Abraham just thought he was coming back. Well, not according to
Hebrews 11. He said, we're coming again to
you. And he says in verse six, and
Abraham, well, first of all, Abraham and Isaac did this alone.
And that's a good picture of our salvation. It's between the
father and the son alone. It's not with our cooperation. It's not conditioned on us. It
was between the father and the son. Remember when he said, my
God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? That awesome statement that
just boggles our minds, but we know there was a legal separation
between the father and the son because our sins were upon him. And he satisfied justice, but
it was the work of God and salvations of the Lord. And so he and Isaac
went up there alone. That picture is the father and
the son who worked out the salvation of God's elect by themselves.
And it says in verse six, and Abraham took the wood of the
burnt offering and laid it upon Isaac, his son, and he took the
fire in his hand and a knife. And they went both together,
both of them together alone. Redemption. the work of the Father
and the Son. And this is why in the gospel
we have to make it clear. You know, where Paul said in
Romans 1, 16, 17, he said, I'm not ashamed of the gospel, the
gospel of Christ, for it's the power of God unto salvation to
everyone that believe it, to the Jew first and the Greek also,
for therein is the righteousness of God revealed, not the righteousness
of man. not the cooperation of man, it's
totally what God worked out through his son, the merits of the obedience
of Christ, from faith to faith, as it is written, the just shall
live by faith. So we look to Christ in the glory of his person
and in the power of his finished work. And he is our whole salvation. We don't look to ourselves. Not
after God brings us to faith in Christ. We do by nature, don't
we? That's why we were talking about that earlier, how man says
there's so many ways to God. That's because man wants his
own way to God. And it always involves something
that he does to make the difference. But that's not the way it is.
Look at verse seven. This is precious. He says, Isaac
spoke unto Abraham his father and said, my father. And he said,
here am I, my son. And he said, behold the fire
and the wood, but where's the lamb for a burnt offering? Isaac knew that if you're gonna
worship God, you have to have a lamb, a spotless lamb for a
burnt offering. You can't just come to God on
your own. You can't appear before God based on your own work. You
got to have a perfect, sinless, God-appointed sacrifice. And of course, this is a picture
of Christ. This is what it's all about. And listen to what
Abraham said, verse eight. Abraham said, my son, God will
provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went both of
them together. Now again, I don't think Abraham
was lying here. I don't think he was just expressing
wishful thinking. Abraham knew that God was gonna
provide a lamb, an animal. that would picture the Savior.
And so, this prophecy says many things. I've got three things
here. Number one, it says the Lord will provide Himself as
the Lamb, that's Christ, God the Son incarnate. For our Lord
Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God and He is God. Secondly, it shows
us the Lord will provide for Himself a Lamb, for the Lord
God is the offended party. to whom and for whom the blood
was shed that he might be both just and justifier. This is an
offering unto the Lord. You know, I've actually heard
people who call themselves Christians say that Christ was offered to
Satan. You ever heard that? Read, don't read this. You know
the Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis wrote? I really haven't
read those books, but I was watching the movie one time and it had
the one who they say pictured Christ going to Satan to offer
himself. He wasn't offered to Satan. He
was not offered to us. Christ was offered unto the father.
It was the father who had to be both a just God and a savior. And so God will provide for himself
a lamb. And then third, the Lord will
provide or see to the redemption for all his sheep, the satisfaction
of his just. God is going to save his chosen
people. And he's gonna do it in a way
that honors himself. It's all gonna be finished. Nothing's
gonna be left done. It's finished. That's what Christ
cries. Righteousness established, sins put away, all of that. Now
look at verse nine. It said, now listen to this.
It says, and they came to the place which God had told him
of, and Abraham built an altar there and laid the wood in order
and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar upon the wood. Isn't that amazing? But what you notice about this
is that Isaac was willing. They didn't have a wrestling.
Isaac was a grown man at this point. He wasn't just a toddler
or anything like that. He knew what it was to worship
God. He didn't fight. They didn't
have a wrestling match. Abraham didn't have to hold the
knife to his neck and say, now get down so I can tie you up.
No. Isaac was cooperative. And I think of our Lord there.
What the Lord Jesus Christ did, he did willingly. And I've got this referenced
in your lesson here, how he became obedient unto death, even the
death of the cross. Remember he said, no man takes
my life from me, I lay it down of myself. And I think about
that episode in the Garden of Gethsemane when Judas and the
soldiers came to get him. And he asked him, who are you
looking for? And they said, we're looking for Jesus of Nazareth. And he
said, I am. And what happened? They fell
back. That's amazing. He was willing. I think about
this. In order for God to bring about
the salvation of his people, there were three things required
of the sacrifice, of the substitute. Number one, he had to be appointed
of God. had to be God's choice. And of course, that certainly
describes Christ, the Son of God. Number two, he had to be
able to do the work that he was given to do. He is able to save
to the uttermost them that come unto the Father by him. I know
whom I have believed and am persuaded that he is able to keep that
which I have committed. His ability in his person, God
manifest in the flesh without sin, his ability to go through
the suffering unto death, he is able. And number three, he
had to be willing. And he willingly gave himself
for the glory of his father and for the good of his people, for
the salvation of his people. And we see that in Isaac here. We'll look at verse 10, we'll
read the rest of the verses here. And Abraham, verse 10, stretched
forth his hand and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel
of the Lord called unto him out of heaven and said, Abraham,
Abraham. And he said, here I, here am
I. And he said, lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do
thou anything unto him, for now I know that thou fearest God.
Seeing thou has not withheld thy son, thine only son from
me. What a lesson. And then go on verse 13. And
Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked and behold behind him
a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and
took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the
stead of his son. Now here the lesson switches
in the type. Whereas Isaac was a type of Christ,
now the ram is a type of Christ. Isaac is the type of people for
whom Christ died. And that's an amazing thing,
this ram caught in a fish. Isaac was spared and this was
God's plan from the beginning. How do you know that? Well, because
what he told Abraham. First of all, we know nothing
takes God by surprise. Nothing's happenstance. We don't
believe in luck. Sometimes we'll mess up and talk
about being lucky and stuff like that, but we don't believe in
luck. And then what God said about Isaac, you're going to
have a son and in him, the promise is going to be fulfilled. And
he said, the angel said here, for now I know that thou fearest
God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son. It wasn't as though
God learned something he didn't know before, but he's speaking
as old John Gill said, in the manner of men, because we know
that God had already determined to do this. Abraham knew it,
really. And to bestow his grace upon
him, work it in him, And it would be the result, the results would
be to glorify God and to show the validity of the faith that
God gave Abraham, that it was real and that it was genuine.
But God knew full well beforehand what was gonna happen. He knew
from eternity past what was gonna happen here. And James, if you
wanna look at, look over at the book of James in chapter two. Let me, I'll wind this up here
in just a moment. You need to show you this because
people, a lot of people don't understand the book of James. But in James chapter two and
verse 20, what James is writing here is that this act of Abraham
doing what he did under the testing that God put him through proved
evidenced that Abraham was a justified person. He was justified before
God based on the righteousness of Christ, freely imputed and
received by faith. And it justified him before men
to show that Abraham's faith was real and genuine. And so
look at verse 20, he says, but wilt thou know, O vain man, that
faith without works is dead. Now the works here is not works
that save us or works that make us righteous. but it's works
that prove the genuineness of our faith. Do we really believe
what we claim to believe? That's what it's saying. Verse
21, was not Abraham our father justified by works when he had
offered Isaac his own son upon the altar? It proved that Abraham
was already justified as sinner saved by grace. And it proved
the genuineness of his faith before men. Abraham, do you really
believe that in Isaac, all nations will be blessed? Do you really
believe that in Isaac that the Messiah will come? And this is
proof of it, Abraham believed that. And so he says in verse
22 of James 1, he says, see as thou how faith wrought with his
works and by works was faith made perfect, means it was completed. In other words, it reached its
goal. That's what that means. And the scripture was fulfilled
which saith, Abraham believed God. What did he believe? He
believed God's promise to send Christ and it was imputed to
him for righteousness. What was imputed to him? What
God promised him, that Christ would come, die for his sins
and work out a perfect righteousness by which he would be declared
righteous in God's sight. And he says, and he was called
the friend of God. So that's what it's talking about.
And then this last verse here, let me just show you this. Genesis
22, verse 14. I'm in numbers, that's what I meant.
Let me get over here to Genesis. Genesis 22, 14. And Abraham called
the name of that place Jehovah-Jireh, as it is said to this day in
the Mount of the Lord, it shall be seen. Jehovah Jireh means
the Lord will provide. And the thought is stated in
that last line. When it says in the mount of the Lord it shall
be seen, it means literally in the mount of the Lord it shall
be provided. And boy, we can certainly see
a picture of Christ there. In the mount of the Lord, it'll
be provided. On Mount Calvary, Christ was
provided, presented. Christ did his great work of
salvation for God's people. All right.