Temptations, Tests, and Blessings - Genesis 22:1-18

Grace, mercy, and peace to you…

Our readings today talk about temptations, tests, and blessings. Temptations and tests are something we have to go through, but don’t necessarily want to or enjoy. Blessings are something that we always need.

The Gospel reading for the 1^st Sunday in Lent always includes the temptation of Christ. Today’s Gospel from Mark includes just a brief mention of it, while the Gospels of Matthew and Luke go into it in detail.

Interestingly, John doesn’t mention the temptation of Jesus in His Gospel. That’s because John was written some years after the other Gospels, and it was meant to clarify and add certain details about the life and ministry Jesus, especially the last week of his life, and in the Upper Room. With the temptation of Jesus already detailed by Matthew and Luke, John didn’t see the need to include it.

The reason it’s just briefly mentioned in Mark, is because Mark is a summary Gospel – it summarizes the life and ministry of Jesus, and therefore is shorter than Matthew and Luke are.

According to all three, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, the first thing Jesus does after being baptized is to go into the wilderness to be confronted by the devil. To make himself as weak and vulnerable as possible, Jesus fasted for 40 days, just as Moses fasted for 40 days when receiving the 10 Commandments.

When finally the devil came to him in his weakened state, tempting him to misuse his divine power to end his suffering, Jesus resisted by quoting God’s Word. This reminded Jesus that he was in tune with His Father, and doing His will.

When the devil tempted Jesus to worship him, for which he promised to yield his evil influence on the world and bow out; and therefore Jesus wouldn’t have to die to save the world, the devil would just quit; Jesus again resisted Satan’s lies with the truth, quoting God’s Word, and doing God’s will, rather than succumbing to the devil’s will.

The story of the temptation of Jesus is included to assure us that Jesus has resisted and overcome the devil’s lies, and his seduction powers. Living a holy life, he could then die in our place, and rise for our forgiveness.

Jesus’ temptation also teaches us how to resist the devil’s lies -- not by our power, or wit, or wisdom, but with the power of God and the wisdom of His Word, which the devil can never disprove, although he tries. In the end truth and justice will prevail; all sin and evil will be judged, and all the devil’s lies will be disproved.

So rather than putting our trust in sin, death, and the devil, which is an amazingly foolish thing to do, yet we’re constantly tempted to do just that, let us put our trust in Christ, his forgiveness and his words of truth, which is the wise thing to do, and the thing that’s blessed, as we’re taught in today’s Old Testament.

Today’s Old Testament from Genesis is extraordinary story of being tested, and trusting in God’s benevolence, His good and gracious will.  

For many years Abraham and Sarah prayed for a son, and miraculously in their very old age, they were given one, Isaac, who they loved and adored.

As with every parent, the temptation for Abraham and Sarah, was to put their child before their God, which is the biggest mistake a parent can make.

First, because it’s not fair to their child or children to put that kind of pressure on them. Anyone one or anything that we put before God, and make into a sort of little god or idol to us, is going to end up disappointing us. Only God can handle the responsibilities of being God to someone.

So when we turn other people or things into our god, and they inevitably disappoint us; but it’s not their fault, it’s ours, our sin, our breaking the first and great commandment, You shall have no other gods before me.

All other commandments flow from the first commandment; break the first one and we can’t really keep the others. Break the others, and we’re breaking the first one.

To teach Abraham to keep this first and great commandment, God tested him with what he was most vulnerable, his love for his only son.

So God told him to take Issac to the Mountains of Moriah, near where Solomon  would later build the temple. So Abraham took Isaac and everything he needed to make a typical sacrifice, except the animal, and headed for Moriah. When Isaac asked him where the lamb was for the sacrifice was, Abraham said, “The Lord will provide one.”  

Some might think he was avoiding his son’s question; but as it turned out, Abraham was believing that God had a plan, and all he had to do was trust God, and He would work it all out for good.

Abraham believed that God would intervene and stop him, or, as we’re told in Hebrews 11, that if God let him go through with it, he would raise Isaac back to life. And as Isaac was bound and placed on the makeshift altar, he must have believed that, too.

Either way, Abraham trusted God’s word to him. He had raised the knife, and was about to do it, when an angel intervened, and stayed his hand, froze it so it couldn’t come down on Isaac. 

Even though he believed God could raise Isaac to life, how relieved Abraham must have been that God stopped him. Imagine how he must have embraced Isaac, both of them possibly sobbing.

And how thankful they were. God had provided, as Abraham believed he would. He believed that one way or another, God would save the life of his son, whether it was to stop Abraham or to raise Isaac.

What a test! Abraham passed that test in the only way possible, by trusting God to provide what was needed to take care of the situation.

This teaches us that no matter what we must sacrifice to follow Christ, or what cross we must bear, or what difficulty or hardship in life we must go through, God will always help us. As Abraham said, “God will provide.”

When the final test comes, and you face your death, God will provide the faith and strength you need at that time, and he will raise you up for life with Him.

After stopping Abraham, God provided a ram to serve as a substitute sacrifice. Over 2000 years later, Jesus would die near that very place, as a substitute for us, the Lamb of God to take away our sins and win eternal blessings for us.

As God had a plan to intervene on Isaac’s behalf, so he had a plan to intervene on behalf of the whole world. Therefore Abraham could trust him, Isaac could trust him, and every soul in this world can trust God, and He will provide and intervene on their behalf.

Our mission is to know this, and to make this known in the world. God will provide present help and eternal blessings for every soul who repents and trusts His Son.

In our Epistle, we’re taught even more about God testing our faith, and how important and valuable it is to be tested. As I’ve heard educators’ say about taking tests, “Think of it as a celebration of learning!”.

The tougher the test, the more we learn, and therefore the more we have to be thankful for. James says that the one who has withstood or passed the test is blessed, so much so that he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him.

James also addresses another really important issue for us humans, blaming God for our troubles. This is what he means when he says, “No one should say God is tempting me”, for God tempts no one; rather it’s one’s own sinful and evil desires doing it. It’s not because of God; it’s because the world left Him.

Blaming God is now human nature; sadly it’s what we sometimes do. When Adam fell into temptation, he blamed Eve, and he blamed God for making Eve.

That’s how ridiculous we can become when we try to deal with our sins on our own. In the end, Adam and Eve’s only hope was that God would make it right for them, which He did right away by promising them that their descendant, the Messiah, would crush and overcome the one who had deceived them. Our only hope is to look to him, Jesus, who has covered all our sins on the cross.

While God doesn’t try to get us to sin, He does allow us to be tempted, or tested, like Abraham was. This testing of our trust develops us to be more the way God created us to be.

As Peter says, it refines our faith like fire refines gold. Going through the fires of life’s troubles, with God’s help, with God providing, just makes us love God and our fellow man all the more, and trust in him even more the for the next trial.

Finally, as He brings us through all our troubles, He just blesses us all the more, with, as James says, every good and perfect gift from above, including the perfect gift of His peace, which passes understanding, and guards our hearts and minds, in every trial and temptation, keeping us steadfast in Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.