Hi how are you all? As some of you may be aware this is a weekly blog but sometimes life gets in the way and so does fatigue. So this week you get an extra post to make up for one I have missed so far this year? Does life ever get in the way of your good intentions?
I want to continue on the steps of faith. This is the last step. However for each situation we face, we go through these steps nearly every time. Sometimes we may miss a step because of the grace and mercy of God but sometimes we don’t. But this last step is a little different. Most of the time when we are believing for healing or finances, once our need is met in step 6, we don’t need step 7.
Step seven is for those times in our lives when God tests us to see whether He is more important in our lives than the promise. He is not trying to take the promise off us but rather He is testing our motives and our loyalty.
Let’s look at Genesis 22. Isaac has now been born and is around his teen years when in verse 2, God asks Abraham to sacrifice his son. We know from verse one that this was a test.
Did Abraham falter in obeying God? Would you and I have? It would have been hard. But Abraham didn’t as the next morning, they set out. Verse 5 is where we see Abraham’s faith really stand out. He told his young men to stay with the donkeys whilst him and Isaac would walk further on to worship and then they both would return. Hang on, isn’t this contrary to what God said. Yes but Abraham also had a promise from God which was confirmed numerous times. So he chose to keep believing that promise.
In verse 7, Isaac asks where the lamb is for a burnt offering and in verse 8 Abraham makes a profound statement:
God will provide for Himself the lamb for a burnt offering.
Abrahams’s faith was so strong for his present circumstances but it was also a prophetic statement that God would provide Jesus for a sacrifice. Abraham bound Isaac and laid him on the altar but before the knife went in, the Angel of the Lord stopped him. What He said to him, God is saying to us- your promise is yours for now I know you fear God and have loved Me more than you love your promise.
Abraham looked around and there was a ram in the thicket which he sacrificed instead. His promise was spared but more than that his relationship and faith in God were strengthened.
This story goes on to state in verse 14, that Abraham called the place The Lord will Provide or God is Jehovah Jireh our Provider.
Have you been in a place where your promise was tested? If so, you are in good company. Like Abraham let’s make sure we are trusting more in God than in our promise. Let’s know in our hearts that God is our provider but He desires to be our Lord first.
Have a great week and keep living the life God intended for you,
Bless you heaps
Karen
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