AFTER this Abraham journeyed south and sojourned at Gerar. For the second time he denies the relationship with his wife, and says, “She is my sister.” He had gone aside, for the time, from the path of simple faith and dependence on God. To apply the principle to ourselves, the same danger exists for us as did for the saints at Colosse to whom the apostle wrote, of “not holding the Head”: for the Christian is united to a risen Christ, and it is easy to forget this and lose the consciousness of our union with Him. Still, here God in grace comes in again and speaks to Abimelech in a dream He acknowledges Abraham as a prophet and preserves him. Though he had departed from the place of obedience for the moment, God even tells Abimelech that Abraham will intercede for him― “he shall pray for thee” ―and on his supplication Abimelech’s household is healed.
At last the time comes that the promise is fulfilled, and Isaac, the true heir, is born. The son of Hagar was born after the flesh, but Isaac was the child of promise. How wonderfully the Divine Word of God is interwoven together, and how far beyond man’s thoughts and conceptions God’s ways are! The Epistle to the Galatians shows that these things had an allegorical sense and represented the two covenants: that of law, under which Israel put themselves; and that of free grace and promise, the blessings of which belong to believers now, for we are the children of promise. Isaac was the type of Christ, the true seed, and the One in whom all the promises of God are yea and amen―they are verified and made good in Him, He is the center of all God’s counsels and ways, as well as the One through whom all blessing comes, whether to us or to Israel in the millennial day of manifested glory.
Abimelech now owns that God is with Abraham, and Abraham reproves even this great one of the earth on account of a well of water which his servants had violently taken away. Then they make a covenant at Beersheba, the well-of-the-oath; and Abraham plants a grove there, marking out the boundary of the land, and calls upon the name of Jehovah, “The Eternal God.” Here we have another title of God, He is the unchanging One; not only “The Almighty,” but the One in whose hands all the blessings connected with the promised seed will certainly be made good.
After these remarkable revelations of Himself which God had vouchsafed to Abraham, there still remained one great trial of faith, far severer than anything which had yet arisen in his path.
It came to pass “after these things” ―all these wonderful experiences and revelations of what He was in unchanging and faithful grace―that God tried Abraham. “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.” God says, “thine only son.” It is true that Ishmael was his son also, but not at all in the sense Isaac was, for he was the special subject of God’s intervention in grace; the child so long promised, and in whom all the promises centered for the time; besides being the particular object of Abraham’s affections. Abraham does not say, “O Lord, how then can the promises respecting the seed be fulfilled?” No, he goes off at once in unwavering and unquestioning obedience. What a wonderful example of faith in the God whom he had learned and trusted! Arrived near the place, Abraham says to his young men, “Abide ye here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again.”
We know from the Epistle to the Hebrews that he firmly believed that even if he offered up his son, God was able to raise him again from the dead, and therefore he can say, “I and the lad will... come again to you.” Then he takes the wood and the fire and a knife, and “they went both of them together.” This remarkable expression which occurs twice in the chapter, reminds us of the wonderful antitype of what is prefigured in the scene before us. There was perfect unity of purpose, counsel, and thought between God the Father and the Son, concerning the sacrifice offered up on Calvary. He could say, “Lo, I come... to do Thy will, O God”; when, looking forward from that bye-gone eternity, He undertook to accomplish all that the will of God required; to offer Himself without spot to God, in the body prepared for Him. This is a blessed fact for us; for God’s will was our salvation, and Christ was the willing victim― the only One competent to settle the great question of sin, to God’s glory and our eternal blessing; yea, not ours only, but the blessing also of Israel and the Gentiles in the future day.
The voice of the angel of the Lord stays the hand of Abraham, just as he was about to slay his son; morally, he had really offered him up and the act was complete. Isaac was, doubtless, of an intelligent age at this time; he says, “Behold the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” and then, after Abraham’s answer, we have the words, “so they went both of them together.” Josephus says he was twenty-five years old at this time. However this may be, he yields himself to do the will of Abraham in simple obedience, and thus furnishes a striking type of Him who was “obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”
It is interesting to notice here, that in the Septuagint, or Greek translation of the Old Testament, the same word “spared” is twice found, which the apostle employs in Romans 8. God says to Abraham, “For My sake thou hast not spared thy beloved son”; and in Romans 8. we read, “He that spared not His own Son but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?” So far as Abraham’s faith and Isaac’s willingness were concerned, the test was complete; all was done morally, but, in fact, Isaac was spared, whilst the Lord Jesus had to pass through the dark waters of death and judgment in all their terrible reality. The God who gave this great pledge of His love will surely, with Him, give us all things.
Abraham then returns to the Well-of-the-Oath. Sarah dies; and Abraham, who has no possession in the land, buys the field of Machpelah from Ephron the Hittite, in the presence of the sons of Heth. He insists on paying for this field, although it was only for a sepulcher; for, as before he would accept nothing from the King of Sodom, so now he will not accept from the inhabitants of the land, but remains a pilgrim and a stranger in it. Abraham, as a man of faith, has the mind of God, and the right judgment which accompanies a walk with God. He makes his servant swear that he will not take a wife for his son Isaac from amongst the Canaanites, but from his own kindred; and he was in no wise to bring him back to Ur of the Chaldees, from whence he came out. In type, Isaac prefigured the risen Christ, for whom the true servant, the Holy Spirit, is providing a bride, His Church; and He is conducting her home to meet Him, and to be presented in His presence according to the desires of His heart, without “spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.”
Here the inspired record, of Abraham’s life closes―he dies in a good old age, and is buried in the field which he purchased from the sons of Heth. God confirms the promises to Isaac; that to his seed He would give all these countries, and in his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. The reason He assigns is quite in keeping with what has been before us― “Because that Abraham hearkened to My voice,” &c.; and again, “I am with thee, and will bless thee, and multiply thy seed, for My servant Abraham’s sake.” How exceedingly precious in God’s sight is whole-hearted, implicit confidence and faith in Him as the God to be trusted and counted on!
And now God has revealed Himself in a closer and more intimate relationship than ever He did in Old Testament times; for He has come out in all the fullness of His grace in Christ, brought us into the place of children, and given us the Holy Spirit,