Gen. 21-22:
“Isaac Is Born And Ishmael Cast Out / Abraham Is Told To Sacrifice His Son”
By
1.
INTRO:
1.1.
In our last study
we looked at chapters 19-20 of Genesis.
1.1.1. We discussed the destruction of
1.1.2. Then, we saw more of result of the disobedience of
1.1.3. Finally, we saw that Abraham had his wife Sarah once
again lied and say she was his sister (and now at the age of 90 and probably
pregnant with Isaac), then king Abimelech took her to be his wife. However, as happened 25 years earlier with
Pharaoh the king of
1.2.
In our study
today, we are going to look at chapters 21-22 of Genesis.
1.2.1. We are going to see that Isaac is finally born just as
the angels had told Abraham and Sarah it would be, one year after their last
appearance.
1.2.2. The day Isaac is weaned his half-brother Ishmael is
mocking him and Sarah tells Abraham to cast Hagar out. At first Abraham is reluctant to do this,
however after the Lord speaks to him and tells him to do this he sends away the
lad and his mother on the next morning.
1.2.3. We will see in chapter 22 that the Lord commands
Abraham to go to the mountains of Moriah and offer up his son Isaac to the
Lord. We will look at the testing of a
man’s faith and how that this story was meant by the Lord to be a type of the
Lord lifting up His Son to be sacrificed.
2.
VS 21:1-7 - “1
Then the Lord took note of
Sarah as He had said, and the Lord
did for Sarah as He had promised. 2 So Sarah conceived and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the
appointed time of which God had spoken to him. 3 Abraham called the name of his son who was born to
him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac. 4 Then Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God
had commanded him. 5 Now Abraham was one
hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. 6 Sarah said, “God has made laughter for me;
everyone who hears will laugh with me.” 7 And she said, “Who would have said to Abraham that
Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”” - Sarah finally gives birth to a son, he is
circumcised on the eighth day, and Abraham and Sarah name him Isaac
2.1.
We saw earlier
that the Lord had told Abraham and Sarah that the name of their child would be
‘Isaac,’ and that the name means “laughter.” Abraham and Sarah would always think of the
shock and irony of having a son at their old age after all of their prayers
which they had prayed for all of those many years, and “laughter” would come
to their minds.
2.2.
In a sense shock
and irony are at the heart of humor, this too was created by the Lord and
memorialized in the birth of a son whom the Lord said should be named “Laughter.” Do you think that God has a sense of
humor? I know what Abraham and Sarah
would tell you.
2.3.
We are told here
Abraham’s age was ‘one hundred years’ so the angels who had appeared to
Abraham and Sarah were right on time with their previous prediction of the
birth of this son being one year later.
3.
VS 21:8-13 - “8
The child grew and was weaned, and Abraham made a great feast on the day
that Isaac was weaned. 9 Now Sarah saw the son of
Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, mocking. 10 Therefore she said to Abraham, “Drive out this maid
and her son, for the son of this maid shall not be an heir with my son Isaac.” 11 The matter distressed Abraham greatly because of
his son. 12 But God said to Abraham,
“Do not be distressed because of the lad and your maid; whatever Sarah tells
you, listen to her, for through Isaac your descendants shall be named. 13 “And of the son of the maid I will make a nation
also, because he is your descendant.”” - This next
event that occurs in the life of Abraham and Sarah because the day that Isaac
is weaned, and this was also the day that it was determined and confirmed by
the Lord that Ishmael was to be driven out of their household
3.1.
We don’t know the
exact age of Isaac here when he was ‘weaned’ from depending upon his
mother’s breast milk, but he was probably a couple or few years old.
3.2.
Ishmael at this
time may have been somewhere around 16 years old or so.
3.3.
On this day,
Ishmael, the son of Sarah’s maid Hagar who was fathered by Abraham but as a
result of Sarah scheming about how to bring about God’s plan in their lives,
began to act like a smart-aleck and was ‘mocking´ Isaac. This was not just a playful teasing that
Ishmael was doing this was some sort of very inappropriate harsh jesting.
3.4.
Here we see that it was Sarah that told
Abraham to ‘drive out’ or “cast or toss out” Ishmael from the
house. This word also signifies to “divorce”
according to R.A. Torrey’s Treasury Of Scriptural Knowledge.
3.5.
Sarah here
realizes and tells Abraham the reason for casting Hagar out is that Ishmael
would ‘not be an heir with my son Isaac.’
3.6.
There are a few
passages in the New Testament that refer to Isaac and Ishmael. One in
particular actually quotes Sarah here in this passage in Genesis and makes an analogy
between the two of them as representing the two covenants, the Old Testament
which was based upon Law and works (rules and checklists that can be completed
in the flesh) and the New Testament that is based upon promise and faith (that
which must be performed in the Spirit):
Galatians 4:22-31, “22 For it is written that Abraham
had two sons, one by the bondwoman and one by the free woman. 23 But the son by the bondwoman was born according to
the flesh, and the son by the free woman through the promise. 24 This is allegorically speaking, for these women
are two covenants: one proceeding from
3.6.1. Notice here that verse 29 in Galatians chapter 4 makes
the statement that it was not Isaac who was persecuting Ishmael, but Ishmael
who was persecuting Isaac, and then it is says, “so it is now also.” We mentioned earlier in our study that the
seed of the woman was Jesus Christ who would crush the seed of the serpent,
which He did on
3.7.
Abraham loved his
son Ishmael and struggled with the thought of turning him out. However, the Lord spoke to Abraham and told
him to listen to his wife because the covenant would be made not with Ishmael
but with Isaac.
3.8.
The Lord then
further assured Abraham to go ahead and cast out Ishmael telling him that he
would also make of Ishmael a nation because Ishmael was Abraham’s son.
4.
VS 21:14-21 - “14
So Abraham rose early in the morning and took bread and a skin of water and
gave them to Hagar, putting them on her shoulder, and gave her
the boy, and sent her away. And she departed and wandered about in the
wilderness of
4.1.
One of the things
we see over and over with this man Abraham is that when the Lord tells him to
do something he rises up first thing in the morning and gets it done. What an example of obedience Abraham is for
us to follow!
4.2.
Abraham gives
bread and water to Ishmael and Hagar and sent them away. Abraham was trusting them to the Lord to take
care of them, and the Lord had already promised that He would do just that.
4.3.
After wandering
around for quite a while as mother and son walked in the direction of
4.4.
The Lord has
compassion on Hagar and on her son. He
tells Hagar not fear and that He has heard the voice of the boy as well. Then, the Lord tells Hagar that her son He
will make into a great nation.
4.5.
Finally, the Lord
reveals to Hagar a well that had been there all of the time. She gets a drink and gives some water to her
son, and there are able to continue their journey.
4.6.
Finally, we see
that Ishmael marries an Egyptian woman, becomes an archer, and they all settle
in ‘Paran,’ which means “house of caverns.” Strong’s writes the following about this
place Paran, saying it is a : “wilderness
area bounded on the north by Palestine, on the west by the wilderness of Etham,
on the south by the desert of Sinai, and on the east by the valley of Arabah;
the exodus was through this area and probably all 18 stops were in this area.”
5.
VS 21:22-34 - “22
Now it came about at that time that Abimelech and Phicol, the commander of
his army, spoke to Abraham, saying, “God is with you in all that you do; 23 now therefore, swear to me here by God that you
will not deal falsely with me or with my offspring or with my posterity, but
according to the kindness that I have shown to you, you shall show to me and to
the land in which you have sojourned.” 24 Abraham said, “I swear it.” 25 But Abraham complained to Abimelech because of the
well of water which the servants of Abimelech had seized. 26 And Abimelech said, “I do not know who has done
this thing; you did not tell me, nor did I hear of it until today.” 27 Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to
Abimelech, and the two of them made a covenant. 28 Then Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock by
themselves. 29 Abimelech said to
Abraham, “What do these seven ewe lambs mean, which you have set by
themselves?” 30 He said, “You shall take
these seven ewe lambs from my hand so that it may be a witness to me, that I
dug this well.” 31 Therefore he called that
place
5.1.
This is possibly
a different Abimelech than the one that we read about in our previous study who
had taken Sarah to be his wife when Abraham had once again convinced her to lie
and tell others that she was his sister.
The word “Melech” means king and evidently many had this same
name in Abraham’s day.
5.2.
‘
5.3.
A well was very
hard to dig in Abraham’s day (it is even difficult to dig today) and also a
very important land marker, and, it was sort of a deed to the land on which the
well was located. Thus, though Abraham
was willing to make a truce, he wanted his well returned to him.
5.4.
Abimelech
realizes how powerful Abraham has become and he does not want to have trouble
with Abraham so he decides to try to enact some sort of treaty with
Abraham. However, Abraham first has to
deal with the fact that Abraham had dug a well but the servants of Abimelech
had seized it from Abraham. Abimelech
indicates that he had had no previous knowledge of this well being taken and
vows to give it back to Abraham in order to seal this truce he is enacting.
5.5.
We will see in
chapter 26 of Genesis that Isaac has to re-dig these wells dug by his father
because the Philistines had filled them up.
6.
VS 22:1-5 - “1
Now it came about after these things, that God tested Abraham, and said to
him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” 2 He said, “Take now your son, your only son, whom
you love, Isaac, and go to the
6.1.
When we come to
this story in chapter 22, we are in a chapter that presents one of the greatest
difficulties in understanding. Many
skeptics have claimed offense at this chapter indicating that it indicates that
the God of the Bible requires human sacrifice, something which is deplorable
and actually condemned many times in the scripture. They would ask how a loving God could require
a man to kill his child, especially his only child? However, we have to realize first of all that
the angel of the Lord actually stopped Abraham from performing this act of
killing his son, and that God never told Abraham that he would have to kill
Isaac. The Lord told Abraham to go and
offer Isaac up a sacrifice. Abraham had
to be willing to slay the boy, but this was never allowed nor intended by the
Lord.
6.2.
Some question how
the God of the Bible if He is loving could give His only begotten Son up for
crucifixion.
6.3.
The sacrifice of
his son which Abraham was commanded to do on this day is a symbol of that
sacrifice that the Lord made of His only begotten Son 2,000 years ago to die
upon the cross of
A switchman sat in a small shack on one side of the
river where he operated the controls to turn the bridge and lock it into place
when the train crossed. One evening when
the switchman was waiting for the last train of the day to come, he looked off
into the distance through the dimming twilight and caught sight of the train's
light. He stepped to the controls and waited until the train was at a
prescribed distance when he was to turn the bridge. He turned the bridge into position, but to
his horror, he found that the locking control didn't work. If the bridge was not locked securely into
position, it would wobble back and forth at the ends when the train came to it,
causing the train to jump the track and go crashing into the river. This would be a passenger train with many
people aboard.
He left the shack with the bridge turned across the
river and hurried to the other side of the river where there was a lever which
he could use to operate the lock manually.
He could hear the rumble of the train now and leaned back-ward to apply
his weight to it, locking the bridge.
Many lives depended upon this man's strength.
Then, coming across the bridge from the other
direction, he heard a sound that made his blood run cold. "Daddy, where are you?" His four-year-old son was crossing the bridge
to look for him. His first instinct was to cry out to the child, "Run!
Run!" But the train was too close.
The tiny feet would never make it across the bridge in time. The man almost left the lever to run and
snatch up his son and carry him to safety, but he realized he could not get
back to the lever in time. Either the people on the train or his son must
die. He took just a moment to make his
decision.
The train sped swiftly and safely on its way and no one
on board was even aware of the tiny, broken body thrown mercilessly into the
river by the rushing train. Nor were they aware of the pitiful figure of a
sobbing man still clinging tightly to the locking lever long after the train
had passed. They didn't see him walking
home more slowly than he had ever walked to tell his wife how he had sacrificed
their son.
Now, if you can comprehend the emotions which went
through this man's heart, you can begin to understand the feelings of our
Heavenly Father when He sacrificed His Son to bridge the gap between us and
eternal life. Can there be any wonder
that he caused the earth to tremble and the skies to darken when His Son
died? And how does it feel when we speed
along life without giving a thought to what was done for us through Jesus
Christ?”
6.4.
What the Lord was
doing on this day was putting Abraham to the test. Was Abraham really willing to fully give back
his son to the Lord, and was he willing to do whatever the Lord wanted him to
do with his son? This would test the
true motives of the heart of Abraham.
James 1:13-14 tells us that the Lord tempts no man (13 Let no one say when he is
tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He
Himself does not tempt anyone. 14
But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust.), and the Lord was not tempting Abraham here rather
He was putting him to the test.
6.5.
We can imagine
that though Abraham seems in all points in this story to be trusting the Lord,
even believing that if he was required to kill Isaac that God would have to
raise him from the dead in order fulfill the promises He had made to Abraham,
that this was no cake walk. All of
Abraham’s and Sarah’s joys and hopes were wrapped in this son whose name meant
“laughter.”
6.6.
The scripture
tells us that the trials that the Lord causes us to go through do a great work
in our lives, for instance:
6.6.1. 1 Peter 1:6-7 tells us that the testing of our faith
is something that is actually more precious than gold because of the good fruit
that it will produce that will enjoyed for eternity, “6 In this you greatly
rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been
distressed by various trials, 7
so that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which
is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and
glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
6.6.2. James 1:2-4, “2 Consider it all joy, my brethren,
when you encounter various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. 4 And let endurance have its perfect result,
so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”.
6.7.
The Lord puts His
people to the test in order to purify and reveal their character. The testing isn’t to reveal to Him where they
are at but rather to perform this work in their hearts and to reveal to them
where they are at.
6.8.
We know at this
point in time that it had been a number of years since the Lord had last
appeared to Abraham. Isaac could have
been as old as 30 years here. Abraham
and Sarah had been blessed greatly to finally have a child of their own, even
if he came in their old age.
6.9.
Notice here that
the Lord tells Abraham to, ‘Take your son, your only son.’ The Lord did not acknowledge Ishmael at all
since Ishmael had come about as a result of the scheming of Sarah and Abraham,
and Ishmael was never intended to be the child of promise from the Lord.
6.10. Notice Abraham’s obedience again revealed here, just
as when he was told to circumcise all of the males in his household and did so
the next morning, here we see that Abraham ‘rose early in the morning’
to get about to his task he was given of sacrificing Isaac.
6.11. Notice here that it is the Lord who tells Abraham that
he is to go to ‘the
6.12. Mount ‘Moriah’ is on the eastern side of
6.13. In the scriptures we see that Isaac is taught to be a
type of Christ, and really every aspect of this story reveals that truth: Hebrews 11:17-19, “17 By faith Abraham, when he
was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was offering
up his only begotten son; 18 it was he to whom it was said, “In Isaac
your descendants shall be called.” 19 He considered that God is able to raise people
even from the dead, from which he also received him back as a type.”
6.14. Notice in this story that Isaac is a willing
participant all throughout this story, and even when Abraham ties him onto the
wood for the sacrifice, though Isaac is stronger than his father and could of
resisted him he did not do so. This was
just like Jesus Christ who willing went straight up to
6.15. Note that this is the first mention of the word ‘love’
in the scripture, and it is significant that it is mentioned in reference of a
father’s love of his son. Henry Morris
has noted that the first three gospel writers first mention of love is at
Jesus’ baptism when the Father speaks to Jesus from the sky mention His love
for His son. But, that the first mention
of love in the fourth gospel is John 3:16 which speaks of God so loving the
world that He gave His only begotten Son to be a sacrifice for our sins… Therefore, he tells them they will both
return.
6.16. The faith of Abraham.
Notice here that when Abraham leaves these men to tend to his donkey he
tells him that he and the lad are going to worship for awhile and that they
will return to them. Abraham truly
believed that if he were to slay his son for this sacrifice that the Lord was
going to have to raise him from the dead because God had given him promises
that he knew the Lord would have to fulfill.
7.
VS 22:6-8 - “6
Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son,
and he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So the two of them walked on
together. 7 Isaac spoke to Abraham
his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” And he
said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt
offering?” 8 Abraham said, “God will
provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” So the two of
them walked on together.” - When they
arrived at the mountain that the Lord had designated, Abraham had the two
servants wait there and then took the wood and laid it on Isaac while he
carried the fire and the knife, and when Isaac asked his father where the lamb
for the burnt offering was, Abraham told him that God would provide Himself the
lamb for the burnt offering
7.1.
As was mentioned,
Isaac is fulfilling being a type of Christ here in this chapter. We see him here carrying the wood for the
sacrifice just in the same manner that Jesus Christ carried the cross of wood
on his back as he headed up to
7.2.
Abraham here is
carrying the fire and the knife for this sacrifice. It would interesting if Abraham actually
carried a fire all of the way from
7.3.
Many believe here
that the language of the text of Abraham in verse 8 as he answers Isaac’s
question about the lamb should be, “The Lord will provide Himself the lamb.” In other words, the Lord will be that lamb.
7.4.
Note here that it
is the lamb that becomes the substitute for Isaac, just as the real Lamb of God
is the substitutionary sacrifice for all mankind.
8.
VS 22:9-14 - “9
Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and Abraham built
the altar there and arranged the wood, and bound his son Isaac and laid him on
the altar, on top of the wood. 10
Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!”
And he said, “Here I am.” 12 He said, “Do not stretch out
your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear
God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.” 13 Then Abraham raised his eyes and looked, and
behold, behind him a ram caught in the thicket by his horns; and Abraham
went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the place of
his son. 14 Abraham called the name
of that place The Lord Will
Provide, as it is said to this day, “In the mount of the Lord it will be provided.”” - When they got to where the Lord was leading
Abraham, he stopped and built an altar there, then he laid his son on top of
the altar and raised up his knife to kill the boy, but the Lord stopped Abraham
from carrying out the act and showed him a lamb that was caught by the horns in
a thicket, and Abraham offered the lamb instead of his son
8.1.
Abraham had built
many altars however this was the first altar that the Lord led his precise
steps in where to build.
8.2.
Notice that Isaac
is willingly allowing himself to be laid and tied up on the altar of wood here,
again just as Jesus Christ willing laid down His life in order to die on the
cross for our sins.
8.3.
We see here that
the angel of the Lord calls out to Abraham before he plunges the knife down
into the heart of his son. We can
imagine the tears that must have been in his eyes as he prepared to carry out
this deed that would cause such horrible pain to his son.
8.4.
This story
teaches us how much it cost the Lord to purchase the sins of mankind. There was nothing more precious or important
in Abraham’s life than his very son, his only son, and in the same way there
was nothing more precious and important to the Lord than His only begotten Son,
the one whom He spoke on at least three occasions in men’s hearing saying that
this one was His beloved Son in whom He is well pleased.
8.5.
Abraham named the
place where he offered up his son, ‘Jehovahjireh’ which means ‘The
Lord will provide,’ for “In the mount of the Lord
it will be provided,”
9.
VS 22:15-18 - “15
Then the angel of the Lord
called to Abraham a second time from heaven, 16 and said, “By Myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this thing
and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will
greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is
on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of their enemies. 18 “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall
be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.”” - The angel of the Lord called out to Abraham
and told him that because he was willing to offer up his son as the Lord had
commanded him that the promises which the Lord had previously made to him He
would fulfill, multiplying his seed as the stars of the heavens and the sand on
the sea shore, causing them to possess the gate of their enemies, and being a
blessing to all of the nations of the earth
9.1.
The Lord
reiterates the covenant that He made to Abraham telling him this time that it
is because he has ‘done this thing’ (been willing to life up his son to
the Lord in sacrifice) that the Lord will indeed keep His side of the
covenant: multiply His seed greatly, the
seed shall possess the gate of their enemies, be a blessing to all of the
earth.
9.2.
Note that this is
the first mention in the scripture of “obedience.” The Lord desires and deserves the obedience
of His people, as this story reveals.
9.3.
In Abraham’s day
with the naked eye one could only see maybe 3,000 stars, so it is only with the
advent of the telescope in modern times that we are impressed with the
immensity of the descendants that are promised to Abraham. However, in order to emphasize how great that
amount is the Lord says that the number will also be like ‘the sand that is
on the seashore.’
10.
VS 22:19-24 - “19
So Abraham returned to his young men, and they arose and went together to
10.1. So we see that after the events of our story that
Abraham returns to the city of
10.2. The author concludes here telling us about the
blessings of Nahor, Abraham’s brother, of his wife and children and
grandchildren, and even of his concubine and the children born to her.
11.
CONCLUSIONS:
11.1. Never forget what it cost God to give up His Son as a
sacrifice.
11.2. Are you willing to give back to God your most precious
possessions if required? Will you give
your best to Him because He gave His best for you?
11.3. Are you obedient as was Abraham?