St. Gregory’s Church Woodstock

Sunday, 10 April, 2009, Good Friday

The Rev’d Susan Auchincloss

Genesis 22:1-18

For today’s reading go to:http://bible.oremus.org

What shall we make of the story of the command to sacrifice Isaac? Perhaps no other story in the Bible arouses such horror in us, or such pathos. We try not to ask what kind of God would set up such a test, because we do not want to hear the answer. We try not to put ourselves in Isaac's place, because we so need to trust our father, and yet, seen through Isaac's eyes, doesn't he turn out to lie to us and to betray us monstrously? We try not to put ourselves in Abraham's place, because he is setting out to put an end to everything in life that he holds dear – his son and his progeny. What is this story of horrors doing in the Bible?

I have said before that biblical stories are meant to be taken, not at face value, but as aids to the spiritual journey. Let's try looking at the command to sacrifice Isaac that way. If you are like me you began your life in faith uncritically. Possibly you grew up in a church or perhaps you converted as an adult. Either way you went along with the teachings and the norms of your congregation and your denominational culture. You did your best to conform your life to those teachings and norms, because they taught you who God is and what God wants. They were your pipeline to God, so to speak.

This probably describes Abraham's early life of faith. He lived surrounded by a culture that practiced child sacrifice. The practice was taught as pleasing to God. What reason would Abraham have to question what everyone accepted as necessary and normal?

Perhaps we draw back in horror, yet in our own day we can find ourselves exactly where Abraham was. We know of churches that teach racism. Others that teach the corporal punishment of infants. Some that teach anti-semitism, or condemn homosexuals. We carry on a more subtle form of violence, but it is still violence. There is even a subtle violence in the so-called Prosperity Gospel, insofar as it teaches that God favors the prosperous and the needy have no claim on us.

Abraham went along for years without questioning his faith. Then it became Abraham's turn to make the sacrifice. The story puts it this way: God decided to test Abraham. We can read this as a pass/fail test – in other words, a test with an outside judge, like a traffic court; either you win or you lose. On the other hand, we can read this as a test of development, of maturity – that is, an inward assessment. God would be asking: how much has Abraham grown? Abraham took it to be a pass/fail test. Given that understanding, who would be willing to fail with God?

Did God command the sacrifice, or did Abraham's religion command it? That is a question that Abraham did not ask himself. When Abraham started out in his life of faith, he took God and religion to be one and the same. It did not occur to him that there could be a difference. Perhaps it was during that long walk to Mount Moriah, and seeing little Isaac walking along under that load of wood, that started Abraham questioning. A process began to unfold in him, a process of moving from an other-centered faith to an inner-centered faith. Gradually he was becoming aware of the Spirit of God within him. Bit by bit he perceived that his religion might not be his God. Its teachings might not be God's teachings. The process had started, and yet a huge shift in understanding had to happen, and happen quickly.

As we know, it did. At the last minute enlightenment broke through within the soul of Abraham. The story puts it so simply: “Abraham lifted up his eyes.” Abraham lifted up his eyes from the things of this world. He lifted up his eyes from his religion. He lifted up his eyes from his reliance on himself and his own strategies for salvation. He moved outside of his frame of reference, outside of the world as he had known it, outside of what he had taken to be reality. Had the ram been there in the thicket all the time? He hadn't known to look. This story, far from being a horror story, holds a ground breaking teaching for us. It says, learn to go beyond your religion. Do not leave your religion behind, but make sure that your religion serves you truly.

The story of the command to sacrifice Isaac cannot be left there. We need to carry it over to the sacrifice of Jesus. Among so many parallels, one discrepancy between the two stories makes all the difference. Jesus was not sacrificed. For a sacrifice we need an unwilling victim, or at least one ignorant of its fate. Jesus participated willingly; and that turned the sacrifice into a sacrament; into a saving event. Jesus accepted the need for him to suffer and be killed. How else could the extent of God's love and forgiveness get through to us? Jesus' suffering and gruesome death would have been pointless, except for the Resurrection – except for the fact that he returned, every bit as real as he had been in life. He returned in person to make sure that the people who had betrayed him and put him to death knew they were still loved, loved without reserve and without conditions. In short, no matter what we do – even to the extent of making God suffer as Abraham suffered – we cannot kill or diminish or tarnish God's love for us. We are forgiven before we even begin. No wonder we call this Good Friday.