By the great tree of Moreh at Shechem, Genesis 12:6, “the Lord (YHWH) appeared to Abram” to promise that land to his offspring (7). And what was Abram’s response? “So he built an altar there to YHWH who had appeared to him.”

But why an altar (cairn of rocks)? Because in Abraham’s mind it marked that spot as sacred to both himself and to YHWH. Sacred to himself because it was on this spot that YHWH had personally sealed his promise to Abraham and his offspring, that through them he would “bless all peoples on earth” (3). And sacred to YHWH because that was the spot where he planted his flag on this planet, staking his claim to blessing it, and now with a solid visual marker too.  

The altar could be viewed as both a personal and a political statement, therefore – personal in Abraham’s own expression of thanks to YHWH for choosing him, but also political, in stamping God’s presence and purpose on the planet in his committed promise to bless it.    

Abraham then built a second altar in “the hills east of Bethel” (8), but this time he “called on the name of the Lord” too. Unlike the first altar – that marked the spot where YHWH spoke his promise to him – this altar marked the spot where Abraham spoke his faith in that promise to YHWH. 

In the building of these two altars, therefore, we can see what knowing YHWH did to Abraham. 

It made him deeply thankful, first of all, that YHWH had chosen him and his offspring as the means by which he was going to bless all nations, and for the huge influence he promised they would have (verse 3). It also made him want to stamp YHWH’s presence and his greatness on this planet through a visual means. It also made him want to call on YHWH by name, on realizing how much he and his offspring would need him in fulfilling their part in his purpose.      

But how does all this relate to us now? Well, as Paul writes in Galatians 3:7, we are now “the children of Abraham,” so will knowing God as YHWH do the same three things to us? 

To the next blog, then: “How do Abraham’s altars play out in our lives?”

In Genesis 13:4, Abraham “called on the name of Lord,” the Hebrew word for “Lord” in that verse being YHWH. 

So Abraham clearly knew God as YHWH. But in Exodus 6:2-3, “God also said to Moses, ‘I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord (YHWH) I did not make myself known to them.’” So in Genesis 13:4 Abraham does know YHWH, but in Exodus 6:3 he doesn’t. Is there a contradiction here?

Which would be good to know, because with Abraham being the father of us all and us being his offspring, his relationship with God gives us clues as to what our relationship with God is like too. And Abraham knowing God as YHWH ties in with that. 

Israel knowing God as YHWH tied in with that too, because it got the same point across to them about the caring, relational God that Abraham knew him as. We see that in YHWH personally telling the Israelites through Moses that he’d “heard their groaning,” Exodus 6:5, he’d “free them from being slaves” and “redeem them with an outstretched arm” (6), and “I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God” (7). 

It was this deeply caring, rescuing, redeeming, personal YHWH side of him that God wanted the Israelites to know. They were about to see his “mighty hand” (1) ripping them out of Egypt, just as Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had known God as “God Almighty” (3) – El Shaddai in Hebrew – but God wanted the Israelites to know him as YHWH, and “be remembered by (that name) from generation to generation” (3:15).  

In context, then, God was introducing himself to the Israelites as both El Shaddai and YHWH, the same way he’d introduced himself to Abraham – as El Shaddai in Genesis 17:1, and as YHWH in Genesis 15:7. But how to make sense of Exodus 6:3, that sounds like Abraham didn’t know God as YHWH? 

In the context of what God was up to here, it would make sense if verse 3 was phrased: “I appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai, and by my name YHWH did I not make myself known to them?” In other words, “as to my name YHWH, was I not known by that too?” Because he WAS known by that name too, so calling him YHWH should be nothing strange for the Israelites, and especially since knowing him as YHWH was what God wanted most for them.   

It was also what God wanted most for Abraham, so next blog: “What did knowing YHWH do to Abraham?”

In Galatians 3:14, Paul says it’s “by faith that we receive the promise of  the Spirit.” Which ties in perfectly with Abraham because, verse 9, Abraham is called “the man of faith.” 

So did Abraham receive the Spirit because of his faith too? It would seem odd if he didn’t, because he is “the father of us all” and “our father in the sight of God” (Romans 4:16, 17). So if we, as “Abraham’s offspring” (16) receive the Spirit by faith, then surely he as our father and “man of faith” would have received the Spirit too. 

But why is this important? Because if Abraham did have the Spirit, then what the Spirit did in his life would give us some clues as to what the Spirit does in our lives. Which, according to Galatians 3:9, was meant to be, because “those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham,” so what he was blessed with we are blessed with too. 

Can we see signs of the Spirit at work in Abraham’s life, then, that show the Spirit at work in our lives too? 

There’s a clue in Genesis 13:4, when Abraham returns to Bethel “where he had first built an altar, and there Abraham called on the name of the Lord.” But why on “the name of the Lord”? Why not just “on the Lord”? Or was there something special about “the name” in Abraham’s mind?   

The Hebrew name of the Lord in that verse is YHWH, first used in Genesis 2:4. In verses 2 and 3, “God” is ELOHIM, the supreme and mighty one, but when dealing directly with humans in verse 4 the name YHWH is added to Elohim. Elohim emphasizes the creative power and sovereignty of God, but YHWH emphasizes the relational God, the great I AM in Exodus 3:14 who’s always “watching over us” (verse 16) caring and rescuing us and answering our call for help (as he did for the Israelites), and that’s the name he wants to be known by “from generation to generation” (15). 

And that’s the name Abraham knew him by. Which strongly suggests Abraham had the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit emphasizes the relational God for us today too. In Romans 8:16, for instance, “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children,” so that God to us becomes “Abba Father” (15). 

Which begs the question: Since the Holy Spirit is doing the same for us that he did for Abraham, are there examples in Abraham’s relationship with God that clue us in to what happens in our relationship with God too?  

But another question first: “Is there a contradiction about YHWH in Exodus 6:3?”…(next blog)

Paul gave us a clue as to how we know Jesus is talking to us in Galatians 3:14, when he wrote that “Jesus redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus.” And what Paul meant by “the blessing coming to us Gentiles” was “the promise of the Spirit.” 

So right back in Abraham’s day, God was already looking ahead to the time when the Holy Spirit would be given. And what would the Spirit’s purpose be? Jesus answered that for us in John 14:26 when he told his disciples, “the Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” 

So Jesus would continue talking to his disciples – as he had done while he was with them in person (verse 25) – but now through the Holy Spirit instead. And they’d know it was Jesus’ words they were hearing because as Jesus said in John 15:26, “When the Counsellor comes….he will testify about me,” and in John 16:13-14, the Spirit “will speak only what he hears…by taking what is mine and making it known to you.”

The Holy Spirit, therefore, would do the same for people today that Jesus did for the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, when “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets,” Luke 24:27, “he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.” And what was the reaction in the disciples on Jesus doing that for them? Verse 32: “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”

And there’s our clue as to how we know Jesus is talking to us: it’s by the Holy Spirit now doing for us what Jesus did for those two disciples – and for his other disciples too, by “opening their minds so they could understand the Scriptures” about himself (verses 45-46). 

And it was all contained in “the promises spoken to Abraham and to his seed,” Galatians 3:16, the “seed meaning one person, who is Christ.” The promise of the Holy Spirit, then, was to make that “one person, Christ” and what he said and taught so real, that for millions of us Gentiles it would seem like Jesus is “walking the road to Emmaus” and talking to us too. And in such a way our “eyes are opened” (Luke 24:31) so we know it’s him talking to us and it’s his words we’re hearing.   

Which raises the question: If this amazing promise of the Spirit was given to Abraham, “Did Abraham have the Holy Spirit?” too…(next blog)

Abraham had much the same start in life that many of us probably had, with little to no understanding of, or even interest in, God. And for Abraham it lasted for the first seventy years of his life too, because his father, who ruled the family roost, “worshipped other gods.” 

And maybe we grew up in a culture that focused our minds on “other gods” too, like materialism, self image, and personal gain. So wouldn’t it have been nice if God had done for us what he did for Abraham?

Like, for instance, God speaking in person to us, just as he did to Abraham in Genesis 12:1, when “the Lord said to Abram.” And later in verse 7, “the Lord appeared to Abram” too.  

And in Genesis 13:14-17, God pronounced amazing promises in person to Abraham too. He also encouraged Abraham “in a vision,” Genesis 15:1. And when Abraham needed further assurance that God would fulfill his promises to him in Genesis 15:8, God responded in the most remarkable way. He had Abraham “bring a heifer, a goat and a ram” in verse 9, and told him in verse 10 to “cut them in two and arrange the halves opposite each other.” And that evening in verse 17, “a smoking fire pot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces,” to get the point across to Abraham, that if he, God, broke his covenant to bless Abraham’s descendants as promised (in verses 18-20), then he, God, should be cut in two like those animals. 

Talk about dramatic visuals, but that’s how God helped Abraham to know him. So does God do the same for us? 

Yes he does, Hebrews 1:1-2 – “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son.” God still speaks, just as he did “in the past,” but he’s updated his way of speaking in our day through Jesus. 

And that would include appearing to us in Jesus too, because as Jesus himself said in John 14:21, “He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him.” 

Which he did in person to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and “their eyes were opened and they recognized him,” Luke 24:31. So they knew it was Jesus talking to them. 

But “How do we know Jesus is talking to us?”…(next blog)

By the time God told Abraham to sacrifice his son as a burnt offering in Genesis 22, Abraham had known God for at least fifty years. Twenty five of those years were between the time God first spoke to Abraham in Genesis 12:1, to the time Isaac was born. Then another twenty-five years (or more) to the day Isaac was to be sacrificed, just before the death of Sarah, Abraham’s wife, in Genesis 23:1. She was 127 years old when she died, so Isaac was 37, or close to it, when Abraham was told to sacrifice him in the previous chapter. 

For at least fifty years, then, Abraham had known God. And during that time God had made himself known to Abraham, and well enough for Abraham to know it was God too. Which is extraordinary, because Abraham had been brought up in a family led by a hierarchical outrightly pagan father who “worshipped other gods,” Joshua 24:2. 

It was only because “The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia (Iraq),” Acts 7:2 – when Abraham was already at least seventy years old – that any knowledge or relationship with God began for him. It was totally by God’s doing and calling, therefore, that Abraham came to know God at all (Isaiah 51:2) – and even then it took another five years for Abraham to be released from his pagan father and finally get to Canaan by age 75 (Genesis 12:4-5). 

And in Canaan that’s when God told him, “I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees to give you this land to take possession of it,” Genesis 15:7. “I am the Lord” was the first and major point God had called Abraham to know about him. And Abraham got it, because in verse 8 he replies, “O Sovereign Lord,” in clear recognition and understanding that God was the supreme power, majesty and ruler in his life now. 

Which was good, but at this point in his life Abraham didn’t know God that well, because he asks in verse 8, “how can I know that I will gain possession of it (the land of Canaan)?” To which God replies in verse 13, “You’ll know for certain.” And in an amazing combination of visual and vision in verses 9-17, God then helps Abraham know for certain. So again, it’s by God’s doing that Abraham came to know him so well. 

Which is encouraging, because we’re now “children of Abraham” (Galatians 3:7), and equally called by God to know him (John 17:3) – so we can expect God to do the same for us that he did for Abraham. 

To the next blog, then: “How does God help us to know him?” 

What God was asking of Abraham in Genesis 22 was (humanly speaking) completely nuts, because it meant Abraham having to give up everything God had promised him. So what was God’s point in promising incredible blessings to Abraham in Genesis chapters 12, 15, 17 and 18, when a few chapters later it would all go up in smoke (literally) with the death of Isaac in a burnt offering? 

It does say in Genesis 22:1, though, that God was “testing Abraham.” But what a strange test, and with no explanation as to the purpose of it either. So what made Abraham obey God so willingly, or at least humbly and without question? 

It wasn’t because of any benefit to him personally, because there was no pre-promise from God that “If you obey me there’ll be a reward waiting.” Quite the opposite: if Abraham obeyed God he’d not only lose his much loved son, but all that God had promised to his son too.  

For the first time in Abraham’s relationship with God, therefore, there was nothing to be gained from trusting him. Up to this point it had been nothing but huge and extremely positive blessings for Abraham – reason enough for him to obey; but not this time. 

Which was much the same situation Job found himself in, and at roughly the same time Abraham was faced with his situation in Genesis 22. The question asked of Job in his case was: “Does Job fear God for nothing?” (Job 1:9). If there’s no personal gain, in other words, why obey? 

There was no personal gain for Jesus either, in giving up everything to become a human and be “overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death” in Mark 14:34 – much like Abraham must have felt at the thought of killing his son. So what enabled Jesus to obey in a similarly excruciatingly painful test? 

Two words in verse 36: “Abba, Father.” His Father was the reason Jesus obeyed, because he knew his Father (John 10:15). Which was the same point God brought Job to, where Job could at last say, “now my eyes have seen you” (Job 42:5). And God made sure Abraham came to know him over many decades as well, so that when tested beyond his human ability to cope, Abraham had a clear reason for obeying, and that was the God he’d come to know so well. It was God himself, therefore – above all the promises and blessings God had given him – that made Abraham obey him so willingly.      

Next blog, then: “How did Abraham come to know God so well?” 

For Abraham it all started with obedience in Genesis 12:1 when “The Lord said to him. ‘Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.’” “So,” verse 4, “Abram left, as the Lord had told him.” 

It was Abraham’s obedience, then, that got God’s great plan to “bless all peoples on earth” started. This is how and when the plan of salvation and rescuing us humans from the mess Adam and Eve made began – in Abraham doing what he was told by God. 

But it took another test of Abraham’s obedience for him to picture the level of obedience that God required. And that test came in Genesis 22:2 when God told Abraham to kill his son. Because for Abraham to properly represent and picture Jesus, the ultimate source of salvation, nothing less than being “obedient to death” would suffice. 

What God required of his own son – to “humble himself and become obedient to death” in Philippians 2:8 – meant, therefore, that Abraham needed to humble himself and become obedient to death too. That’s why God required Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. It was a test of obedience, at the level Jesus would willingly go through later. 

And the parallel with Jesus on this score is made even more apparent in the response that Abraham and Jesus both had to what God wanted them to do. 

Because when God planned to test Abraham in Genesis 22, Abraham’s immediate response in verse 1 was: “Here I am.” And what was Jesus’ response to God wanting him to die in a human body for our salvation? “Here I am,” Hebrews 10:7, “I have come to do your will, O God.” 

So – in both attitude and action – Abraham and Jesus did what God required for the blessing and salvation of the human race. And it was because both Abraham and Jesus “reverently submitted” to God’s will, and never questioned it, that God, in response to their obedience, “exalted Jesus to the highest place” (Philippians 2:9), and swore to Abraham he would bless “all nations on earth, because you have obeyed me” (Genesis 22:18). 

It was their obedience, therefore, that reversed the devastation that Adam and Eve’s disobedience had caused. Which is why the salvation of us messed up humans started with obedience.

But next blog: “What made Abraham obey God so willingly?”

When God told Abraham to sacrifice his son as a burnt offering, what he wanted to know from Abraham was that Abraham feared him. 

Because, again, this was a perfect parallel with Jesus who, “During the days of his life on earth, offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission (or godly fear),” Hebrews 5:7. 

And it was because of his godly fear that Jesus stuck to obeying God perfectly through excruciating physical and mental suffering (verse 8), the result of which was him “becoming the source of eternal salvation,” verse 9.

Godly fear, therefore, was attached directly to Jesus becoming the greatest blessing of all to the human race, pictured perfectly by Abraham sticking to obeying God perfectly through his excruciating suffering too, the result of which, Genesis 22:16, was God “swearing by myself, that because you have done this and not withheld your only son, I will surely bless you….and through your offspring (verse 18) all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”  

So just as Jesus’ obedience resulted in him becoming the greatest blessing for the whole human race, Abraham’s obedience resulted in him becoming the source of blessing for all nations too. And the reason for God enabling them both to be such a massive blessing for us humans was their godly fear.  

And God certainly tested them both on that score, because it was only after he knew that they feared him that he opened up his amazing promises to them. For Jesus the test came in the Garden of Gethsemane when he cried out in agony, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but yours be done,” Luke 22:42. For Abraham the test came in Genesis 22:2, when God told him to sacrifice Isaac as a burnt offering, and Abraham didn’t question it. 

What made them both succeed in their test was their absolute and total reverence for God. When Abraham was told, “Now I know that you fear God,” the Hebrew word for “God” there is Elohim, the great majestic “King above all gods” (Psalm 95:3). That’s the God they both saw. No wonder they both obeyed him without question. 

To the next blog, then: “It all starts with obedience”  

So much of what happened in Genesis 22 pictured Jesus. I imagine Jesus referring to it on his walk with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24:27, when “beginning with Moses and all the Prophets he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.”

Like the story in Genesis 22 of God telling Abraham to “Take your son, your only son, whom you love,” clearly picturing Jesus as God’s only son whom he loved. And telling Abraham to “go to the region of Moriah” to sacrifice Isaac “as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about,” an obvious parallel with Jesus being crucified on Mount Moriah, where Jerusalem was built.  

And carrying right on with the parallels in verse 3, we have Abraham saddling up his donkey and taking two servants with himself and Isaac to the place where Isaac would be sacrificed – just as Jesus (in Matthew 21:1-2) sent two disciples to fetch a donkey for him to ride on his way to Jerusalem where he would be sacrificed. 

And in verse 4, it was “On the third day” that “Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.” That links to Jesus too, when he “began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem….to be killed but on the third day be raised to life again” (in Matthew 16:21). So Jesus knew on the third day he’d be raised back to life again, which is interesting because it was on the third day Abraham told his servants that “we will come back to you.” “WE will,” he said, meaning that both he and Isaac would be returning, so Abraham had grasped that if Isaac was to be sacrificed he would also be raised back to life again – and on the third day too. 

And then in verse 6, “Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac,” a direct parallel with Jesus having to carry his own wooden cross. And just like Jesus’ cross, the wood that Isaac had to carry was heavy too. For a burnt offering to totally consume a body (which it was meant to do) it took about 60 pounds of wood, which suggests Isaac was more than a youngster (“boy” in verse 5 can also mean young man). 

Which meant that Isaac was also strong enough to resist the very old Abraham sacrificing him, but like Jesus he willingly submitted (verses 8-10). 

So many parallels – and one more in the next blog too, in the statement to Abraham in verse 12: “Now I know that you fear God”…