"Where is the Lamb, Father?"

Good morning,

7 Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father?” “What is it, my son?” he replied. “Here is the fire and the wood,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” 8 “God will provide for himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son,” Abraham replied. The two of them continued on together.

9 When they came to the place God had told him about, Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood on it. Next he tied up his son Isaac and placed him on the altar on top of the wood. 10 Then Abraham reached out his hand, took the knife, and prepared to slaughter his son. 11 But the Lord’s angel called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am!” he answered. 12 “Do not harm the boy!” the angel said. “Do not do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God because you did not withhold your son, your only son, from me.”

13 Abraham looked up and saw behind him a ram caught in the bushes by its horns. So he went over and got the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 And Abraham called the name of that place “The Lord provides.” It is said to this day, “In the mountain of the Lord provision will be made.”

This time of year always feel dark to me.  When I think of December, in general, I think of words like "dark", "waiting", "resting", "preparing".  When I rise in the morning, it is dark.  When I am cooking the evening meal, it is dark.  I've even gone to do my routine walking by the lights of Christmas decorations.  Dark.

In the midst of this, we light the candles of Advent.  How appropriate that we celebrate the birth of the Lord at the darkest time of our calendar year (here in the Northern Hemisphere)!  He was and is the beauteous, heavenly Light who broke through the darkness of this sin-crippled world to be its salvation.  Lighting the Advent candles reminds me that Spring and longer days are coming, that though all around me appears dead, new life is on the way.

The names of God, written in the Bible, are so beautiful.  Some of them are Adonai, El Shaddai, Elohim, Jehovah-Nissi, Jehovah-Rapha, Jehovah-Jireh.  That last one means, "The God Who Provides".  Yes, He always does.  But, in going to research other occurrences of the Hebrew word, yir·’eh, in the Old Testament, it is more often translated "looks" or "sees".

Yesterday the Hubster asked that I give him some gift suggestions.  There's this one thing that I want and that I truly would use, but when I went to look at its price on the internet, I thought it was egregiously, flagrantly expensive.  In truly seeing, regarding this item, I relegated the item to the category of "want", not "need".  There are just better uses for our money.  So often, we think that there are things we need, when God does not see it that way.

He saw mankind, hopelessly trapped in sin, and provided a Lamb, our Savior.  In so doing, He met our greatest need.  The story of Abraham and Isaac on Mt. Moriah is a prefigurement of how God would provide the perfect Lamb hundreds of years later.

When all seems dark around us, He calls us to light a candle of faith, to trust that He is our Source and our Provider.  The greatest of all our needs is for more of Him, more of Jesus.  When we make Him and His will our first priority it becomes possible to push worry about life's challenges aside. Worry is simply not taking God at His word when He promises that He "will supply your every need according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 4:19).  Worry is thinking that God does not know what He is doing, that He will somehow "mess things up".  It often looks that way to us because we do not see as He sees.  We ask, "Where is the lamb, Father?"

Do we truly believe that God sees us in our neediness and that He will meet all of our needs?  If we do believe that, then why do we worry and fret over things which are "out of our control"? (It's all ultimately out of our control, by the way.) Abraham did not do this.  Even when faced with the command from God to slay his son on an altar and then to burn his body with fire, Abraham did not waver.  He trusted God.  I am just "slain" by this.  I would have been freaking.out.  It is little wonder that, when we think of Abraham, we think of stalwart faith.

God provided a ram for Abraham and Isaac, that day on Mount Moriah.  I wonder if the animal was there for some time, even as they were building the altar, stacking the wood, sharpening the knife.  It was not until just the right moment that they saw it.  God opened their eyes ... aligned their will with His.  And, Abraham named the place "The Lord Provides".

Lord Jesus, you are the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29).  You are all-sufficient and have the answers to all my questions.  You meet all my needs, showering on me glorious spiritual riches.  Thank you for seeing me in my poverty, and in making me yours, making me rich.  Help me to remember this, when the darkness threatens to close in...that You are my light, and my salvation!  In Jesus' name, amen.