{"id":15908,"date":"2025-08-12T10:34:03","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T15:34:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/?p=15908"},"modified":"2025-08-15T10:36:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T15:36:09","slug":"question-concerning-genesis-221","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/15908\/question-concerning-genesis-221\/","title":{"rendered":"Question concerning Genesis 22:1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pastor John,<\/span><\/p>\n

What is your take on this?\u00a0 The Bible calls it Abraham tempted\/tested, but my question is was it really a test?\u00a0 Just the knowledge that God promised Abraham to be father of nations through Isaac his son, (then where was the test?)<\/span><\/p>\n

Genesis 17:19 KJV<\/span><\/p>\n

[19] And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him.<\/span><\/p>\n

Genesis 22:2-3 KJV<\/span><\/p>\n

[2] And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0[3] And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and clave the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up, and went unto the place of which God had told him.<\/span><\/p>\n

Steve<\/span><\/p>\n

==========<\/span><\/p>\n

Hi Steve.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

That is sort of a philosophical question,\u00a0to wit,\u00a0if God had already promised Abraham that his posterity would come through Isaac, then where was the test?\u00a0 The short answer is that we are never established in the promises\u00a0of God until we are tried\/tested to prove our faith in them.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

As you have heard me say, we do not want to have a “take” on any subject of significance, which this is.\u00a0 I remember that one of my prayers when I was young in the Lord was that he would save me from my\u00a0own \u201ctake\u201d (opinion) on things.\u00a0 I love it every time the\u00a0Spirit does that for\u00a0me.\u00a0 The\u00a0knowledge of God relieves us of the\u00a0burden of trying to figure things out.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This is what our translation of Genesis 22:1a says: \u201cAnd it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham\u2026.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0The King James Version uses the word \u201ctempted\u201d instead of \u201ctested\u201d, but the Hebrew word can be translated either way.\u00a0\u00a0The relevant point here is that half a century ago, when I read that verse with faith in Jesus to save me from my own opinion, what it said ended any opinion I may have had on the subject.\u00a0\u00a0If the Bible said God tested\/tempted Abraham, then He did.\u00a0\u00a0That, for me, was, and is, the end of the matter.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Let it be the end of the matter for you, too,\u00a0and hold on to\u00a0that attitude as you read through the Bible.\u00a0 You will have questions along the way; we all do.\u00a0 And it is good to ask them.\u00a0\u00a0But remember that in this life, I am sure they will not all be answered to the satisfaction of the human mind.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Thank you for the question.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Pastor John<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Pastor John, What is your take on this?\u00a0 The Bible calls it Abraham tempted\/tested, but my question is was it really a test?\u00a0 Just the knowledge that God promised Abraham to be father of nations through Isaac his son, (then where was the test?) Genesis 17:19 KJV [19] And God said, Sarah thy wife shall […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-qa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15908"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15908"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15909,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15908\/revisions\/15909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pastorjohnshouse.com\/mailbag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}