How to Read the Bible

In our Sunday school class circle we were discussing Genesis 22, the account of God coming to Abraham and telling him to take his beloved son, Isaac, and offer him as a sacrifice. "I have always struggled with this story," one man in the class said. "I just can't understand how God could ask Abraham to do that. It just seems so cruel."

Many of us have struggled to understand what seems like an outrageous request... perhaps we're meant to feel a bit appalled. Perhaps it is not until we feel a sense of outrage over these seemingly unfair requests that we can be prepared to feel an appropriate sense of wonder when we begin to see what we're meant to see in these difficult-to-swallow scenarios. When we begin to see what God intends for us to see, our outrage gives way to adoration, consternation gives way to worship, and horror melts into humility before a God who, rather than asking the unthinkable of us, has done the unimaginable for us.

Why would God ask Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice? Is God trying to teach us that we should be willing to sacrifice what is most precious to us? No. This story is not recorded to inspire sacrifice to God. Instead, it paints in vivid colours the sacrifice of God. The point of this story is not to convince you that you must be willing to sacrifice to God what is most precious to you, but rather to prepare you to take in the magnitude of the gift when you see that God was willing to sacrifice what was most precious to Him - His own beloved Son - for you...

If we read the Bible assuming that we are expected to follow in the footsteps of those who are featured in its pages, we will find ourselves always trying harder to sacrifice and obey but never measuring up. We'll assume that God asks us to do things that will make us miserable just to put us through a test of our allegiance - diminishing, rather than magnifying God in our hearts.

But when we read the Bible recognising that it is not about what we must do for Him, but about what He has done for us through Christ, rather than being offended by what we fear He may ask of us, we find rest in what He has done for us.

- Nancy Guthrie, How Could God Ask That?