"Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, 'Abraham!' 'Here I am', he replied. Then God said, 'Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering...' Early the next morning, Abraham got up and saddled his donkey."
Genesis 22:1-3
I wonder what it must have been like.
The night before, God tells Abraham to go sacrifice, aka kill, his precious son...and then Abraham has to go to bed.
What?
That had to be one crazy night!
I can imagine that night was a night of an epic battle between spirit and flesh...heart and head...seen and unseen....
Faith versus sight went head to head during the night.
Thats probably why it says he got up early the next morning....because he wasn't sleeping anyway!....
...or was he?...
Abraham was obviously a man of stellar faith, but he was also human.
Did he simply take God at His word, no questions asked, and sleep like a log that night?
Or did he plead through the wee hours of the night for God to choose, or to find another way?
But, here's the thing...in the end, no matter how he spent the night, it's what happened when the sun crept above the horizon that matters:
He loaded his donkey.
When it was time to move, he moved.
When it was time to step out in faith, he stepped.
He may have been bright eyed and bushy tailed, or he may have been baggy eyed and sleep deprived...but...in faith he began the journey.
Maybe it was in those wee hours that God, in His sovereignty, also began the journey of a certain ram up a specific mountain called Moriah.
Maybe it was in those wee hours that provision had already begun making its way to the exact place and time of need.
The night was that time in-between time where we wrestle with the choice to remain on the path of faith,
where we seek the face of God for a glimmer of understanding,
where we live through the discomfort of the necessary alignment of our flesh with His perfect unsearchable will...
where we see the near daybreak of the realty of what we must do, and we wonder......
Can I really load that donkey?
Because that, well that makes the trip real.
That puts feet to the command.
Early the next morning. Early the next morning. Early the next morning.
Abraham didn't know exactly what God would do or would not do.
But I am sure he rested in the fact that he knew God...and that was enough.
He had only to release his faith and he knew God would do what needed to be done because only God really knew what that need was anyway.
So Abraham did what he knew to do...he loaded the donkey.
How will I choose to emerge from the night in-between the call/the command and the step out in faith?
Will the doubt of the in-between time be victorious and cause me to sleep in?
Will I get distracted when my feet hit the floor?
Or
Will I prepare and load the donkey for the specific journey of faith to which He has called me?
Will I focus more on my lack of rest than on my position of being just outside the circle of obedience?
Or
Will I care enough to plunge into that obedience regardless of what my flesh may say or likely experience?
Who God is.
THAT is my strength, my focus, my drive.
"Here I am."
I have only to step out in faith.
To obey.
Time to wake up and load the donkey.
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Who God is.THAT is my strength,my focus, my drive.He is enough...enough for me to step out in faith n obey. #forhisglory
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