Abraham, Isaac, and Today's Church

Good morning, everyone. My name is Jeremy, and I’m really excited to share a word with you this morning. I’m currently a fourth-year Avondale student studying theology, and I’m graduating at the end of this year, which I’m looking forward to. I’m also leading a church plant here in Melbourne called Avenue. That’s a little bit about me. I’m excited to share a message that I hope will inspire and challenge you to see things differently and see Jesus in a new light. Before I do, I’d like to say a word of prayer.

Father in heaven, I invite you here and I pray for your presence and for the Holy Spirit. I know my words are empty and meaningless on their own, but through your Holy Spirit you can touch people’s hearts and change people’s lives. So I pray that you would come now, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

The blood bank

Today I’m going to be sharing on gathering to worship, but I want to start with a story. About two years ago I gave blood for the first time. If you haven’t, there’s a place in Ringwood called Lifeblood where you make an appointment and give blood. I went with a group of friends, because one of them was really passionate about giving blood, so for his birthday we all decided to go together.

When you make an appointment you get a text message that says, remember your appointment is tomorrow, and please drink lots of water, at least two litres, eight glasses, so you’re well hydrated before you come. I read that and thought, sounds good, and I completely forgot about it. I was playing sport, so I was a bit dehydrated. The next morning my friend rocked up and I realised I hadn’t drunk much water. I didn’t have much time to cram it in, but I tried to drink as much as I could. When you drink a lot of water, obviously you need to go to the toilet a lot, so as I filled in the form I was running off every five minutes, because I’d realised I hadn’t followed the instructions.

If you’ve been to a blood bank, it’s really cool, because there’s lots of free food. You can get a kombucha, an iced honeycomb, chips, pies. I walked in and it was like Disneyland. I grabbed all the food and all the drinks I could and just enjoyed it, taking everything I could from this blood bank.

After I’d filled in my form, they sat me down and asked, “Have you drunk enough water?” “Yeah, I’ve drunk enough.” They asked to see my vein, and as the needle went in the nurse said, “There’s something wrong. Your veins seem a little dehydrated.” I said, “Try the other arm.” “No, you can only do one arm per day.” “Just keep it in there, let me drink a bit more water and we’ll be all good.” “Sorry, it doesn’t work like that. You’ll have to book another appointment.” So I left that place with nothing but a sticker on my shirt that said “First-time blood donor” and tons of food in my stomach.

The reason I tell this story is that sometimes I think we treat church and coming to worship the way I treated the blood bank. We go to a place where we’re supposed to gather to worship, a place where we’re supposed to give, and all we do is take. We consume without contributing and without serving. What I want to share is that worship looks totally different from that. The true essence of worship is sacrifice. It’s about pouring out, not taking for yourself.

The first mention of worship

To unpack that, I want to look at the first mention of worship in Scripture, in Genesis 22. For context, God has promised Abraham that his descendants will outnumber the stars in the sky. But Abraham gets older and realises he has no kids, so he tries to manufacture the promise of God by sleeping with his servant to have a child. God says no, this is not the promised one, you’re going to have a miracle child. And the miracle child comes, in Sarah’s old age and Abraham’s old age, after 25 years of waiting. Then God asks Abraham to do the unthinkable with this child.

Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”

So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.”

— Genesis 22:1–5

Notice that in this first mention of worship there’s no music. There’s nothing but a bleak desert and an atmosphere of discomfort. When we think about worship, we often think only of song. We treat worship almost like an adjective, the “worship song.” But worship is far more than that. Worship is sacrifice. It’s obedience. It’s saying to God, “Here I am. Whatever you’re calling me to do, I will follow you.”

Consumers in a consumer culture

I think worship has become almost consumeristic because culture shapes the way we view it. In the Western culture we live in, everything is consumeristic, and I’m consumeristic myself sometimes. I’m always looking for the best deals. I have a food app called Liven, a rewards thing where every time you spend money at one restaurant you get credit to spend at another. I’m really into it, because I’m trying to consume the most while paying the least. I’m always trying to get people on it. I know my referral code off by heart, which is really sad.

Sometimes I forget that when I go to church I’m not supposed to be a consumer. I’m supposed to contribute, to serve, to sacrifice. I think we’ve missed the point in many ways, and we need to get out of what has become ingrained in us for so long. In Scripture, pure worship is costly. David says:

I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.

— 2 Samuel 24:24

Throughout Scripture and history, worship is directly connected to sacrifice. If you want to find what you worship, look at what you sacrifice. Is it your job? Your finances? Even ministry, church and service? Are you worshipping the things of God or God himself? What you’re willing to give up the most is what you worship the most.

True worship is an act of obedience. God calls Abraham, and Abraham says, “Here I am.” Worship says, “I don’t understand everything, God, but I trust that you are God and I am not. Even when what’s going on in my life doesn’t make sense, I’m going to trust you. I’m sick of trying to manufacture things in my own hands. I’m going to submit to you and yield to you.” Abraham has complete faith in God. He knows that in giving his son Isaac, God will either resurrect Isaac or stop him and provide another way out. He has faith in God’s character.

Worship together

Worship also has a together element. Notice verse 5: “the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.” Let’s keep reading.

So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife, and the two of them went together. But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” Then he said, “Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” And Abraham said, “My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.” So the two of them went together.

Then they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built an altar there and placed the wood in order; and he bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, upon the wood. And Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.

— Genesis 22:6–10

Worship has a personal element, and it has a “we” element. There’s worship apart, but there’s also great power when we come together. In Exodus, God commands the Israelites how to build an altar:

If you make an altar of stones for me, do not build it with dressed stones, for you will defile it if you use a tool on it.

— Exodus 20:25

In other words, don’t use a stone you’ve manufactured or cut with your own hands. Use natural stones, imperfect ones. When you put them together, those imperfections create something perfect and beautiful. I think that’s an image for church: imperfect people coming together with their broken edges and rough places, creating a beautiful altar, a gift of worship to the Lord.

God cares about your worship, and he’s moved by it. Many of us have gone through the motions of church without truly engaging in worship. I know the culture among young Adventists. There’s a ministry buffet. There’s always something on, and you can go from place to place, ministry to ministry, event to event, just consuming and taking. I think God is calling you to give your life to something more. Maybe that’s your time. Maybe God is calling you to give more time in service to him. Maybe he’s calling you to give your finances as an act of worship. Worship isn’t just a song. It’s a holistic way of being, a posture of sacrifice.

It’s not about you. When we come together to worship, one thing I’ve had to challenge myself on is that it doesn’t matter whether people are singing the songs I like or worshipping the way I normally worship. What matters is that I’m willing to lay my preferences aside. That’s the beauty of church: we lay our preferences aside and worship God in unity, in one spirit.

I look at Abraham and Isaac’s worship, and it’s so powerful because they were totally locked into God. That was all they cared about. Isaac laid himself down so selflessly, and Abraham laid down the son he loved. It was this shared worship that made it so powerful. There’s even an image here of priests offering a sacrifice to God, before there were priests and Levites. And what do priests do? They minister to the Lord, and they minister to others. These days, after Jesus, we are called to be priests:

You also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

— 1 Peter 2:5

We’re called to minister to God and to others. The tension is that everywhere else in society we’re consumers, trying to minister to ourselves, taking for ourselves. God calls us to shift our perspective out of ourselves, to him and to others. When you do, you find the most meaning in your life. A life serving just yourself feels good in the moment, but the feeling is only temporary. A life of service to others and to God is so satisfying and fulfilling. As I’ve dedicated my life to serving God and doing what he’s called me to do, it’s been the most meaningful experience. I’ve found so much passion and value in adding value to people’s lives, serving them, humbling myself, and lifting them up. When you see people thrive, see Jesus, get healed and be transformed by the grace and love they find in him, you feel so fuelled. I want to encourage you to see worship through that holistic lens: laying your own agenda down and giving your life to the service of God and other people.

The mountain where God provides

Let’s continue.

But the Angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” So he said, “Here I am.” And He said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.” Then Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram, and offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son. And Abraham called the name of the place, The-Lord-Will-Provide; as it is said to this day, “In the Mount of the Lord it shall be provided.”

— Genesis 22:11–14 (selected)

The mountain God asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac on is called Mount Moriah, and it’s very significant. Later David makes a sacrifice for the nation at Moriah, Solomon builds the temple at Moriah, and Jesus makes his sacrifice around the same place. God is a great storyteller. Three significant figures in Israel offer different sacrifices in this place, and all of it points to a greater sacrifice, the sacrifice of Jesus, who didn’t give just any sacrifice but gave himself, his entire life, for everyone.

It’s called the mountain where God provides, because God seems to care more about providing a sacrifice than requiring one. He knew we could never provide a sacrifice that would be enough, so he said, “Let me do it.” And scholars suggest rams didn’t normally exist at high altitudes like Moriah. But God will do whatever it takes to make a sacrifice available.

Two sons of promise, two miracle children. Isaac is willing to be sacrificed in obedience to his father, carrying the wood up the hill with full confidence in the promise of resurrection. For Isaac, the knife was stopped. For Jesus, the knife kept going through, and his life was given up as the perfect sacrifice. God says to Abraham, “Now I know that you love and fear the Lord, since you were willing to give your only son.” We can say the same about God: now I know that you love me, God, because you were willing to give your only Son as a sacrifice for me.

That’s how we know God loves us. He provided the perfect sacrifice, and we simply return a sacrifice to him. We’re not trying to earn his love and affection. We see his love, we feel it, and we respond to it. As Christians, we don’t sacrifice for God’s approval. We sacrifice from God’s approval. We return to Jesus what he gave to us.

I want to read one more Scripture. David wrote this beautiful psalm of repentance after the prophet Nathan rebuked him over his adultery with Bathsheba:

Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare your praise. You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.

— Psalm 51:15–17

Imagine, if you close your eyes, a picture of heaven. Thousands of angels singing perfect songs, not a note out of place, perfect melodies and harmonies. I picture that and think, why would God want our worship if he has angels singing a perfect song? The truth is that God delights in our brokenness. We can make a sound the angels can’t make, the sound of people who have been redeemed. The angels don’t know what it’s like to be redeemed. We do, because Jesus gave his life as the perfect sacrifice, and we respond by worshipping from a place of being redeemed. Our altar isn’t perfect. Our song might not be perfect. Our worship might not be perfect. But his sacrifice is, and he delights in ours.

God wants a song, but what he wants more is what’s behind the song. He wants your broken heart given to him. He wants your life given to him in total sacrifice and complete worship. Worship isn’t God meeting us in our comfort. Worship is us stepping out in discomfort and laying our lives and hearts and everything down at the feet of Jesus, and saying, “God, all that I have is yours.”

We’re going to worship together with this final song. As we sing, let’s remember what it is to truly worship, and that is to be a living sacrifice. Why don’t you stand and sing with us.

We stood and sang “What a Day That Will Be.”

Prayer

Father in heaven, we thank you for the sacrifice of Jesus. We know that you love us and care for us and have so much grace towards us, because you did not withhold your Son, your only Son. You gave him for us. Now we want to respond to you with a life of worship, a life of sacrifice, a life of selflessness, where we don’t live for ourselves, and the thoughts we have are not for our own sake but for those around us and for you. May we live a life that isn’t consumeristic but is about contributing and adding value to the lives of those around us, loving others and loving you at the same time. Thank you that you call us to be royal priests who minister to you and to others. As we go forward from this place, we’ll continue to worship. Worship doesn’t stop here. In Jesus’ name, amen.