In the Mount of the Lord, it shall be Provided!
Murray McLellan
I can think of no more delightful subject upon which to meditate than the
work of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is why such joy floods my soul in the
study of God’s Word. The very heart of the Bible is the unfolding theme
of God’s gracious work to glorify himself in bringing about our salvation
in and through the Lord Jesus. Our glorious God reigns supreme. To bring
glory to his name, God purposed and planned a creation and a history in
which he might show forth the exceeding riches of his grace throughout
the ages to come. This redemptive history flows throughout the Scriptures.
God, therefore, was not merely a spectator in the creation and the fall,
the onward march of time, and the history of humankind, but the designer
and the administrator of it all.
Throughout history, God was showing that the promised blessings of his
favor come upon a sinner only through the grace and wisdom of God. In fact,
everything in redemptive history was working toward the glorious fulfillment
of God’s promise in Christ. Everything was moving toward that "fullness of time" when "God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem
those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons" (Gal. 4:4-5). In particular, events were moving toward the day of
the cross, when man manifested what he was and God manifested what he was.
The day of crucifixion was the day that the Lord had made. God made the
day of salvation when he established the chief cornerstone from the stone
that the builders rejected (see Psalm 118:22-24).
At Pentecost, Peter made it very clear that the event of the cross was
the eternal purpose of God. "Him, [Jesus of Nazareth] being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you
have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death; whom God
raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible
that He should be held by it" (Acts 2:23-24). God purposes and no one can thwart his plans or stay his
hand. In fact, God providentially directs and uses even the evil plans
of his enemies to work out his good pleasure—to their condemnation and
his glory. The early church recognized this and rejoiced in it. We hear
them pray in Acts 4:27-28, "For truly against Your holy Servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both
Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were
gathered together to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose determined
before to be done." They had meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.
The Lamb of God, purposed to be slain from the foundation of the world,
set his face like a flint and offered himself as the atonement for sin.
In this, he magnified the God of incredible grace and wonder through the
salvation of a people who would know and experience the wonder of that
grace, and who forever would exist to the praise of the glory of that grace.
God reveals himself throughout his Word as both the one who established
the plan and the one who sees it to its fulfillment.
But our God is in heaven; He does whatever He pleases. (Ps. 115:3)
‘ … My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure’ … Indeed I have
spoken it, I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it, I will also
do it. (Isa. 46:10-11)
… [God] works all things according to the counsel of His will. (Eph. 1:11)
Somebody is in charge of the universe! God rules all that is going on.
Though there are millions of billions of seemingly isolated circumstances,
they do not function randomly. There is a design and a Designer, a purpose
and a goal, and an intention in all of it.
How God takes the infinite number of circumstances, attitudes, and events
that exist in both the natural and demonic world and pulls them all together
to work out his will is beyond our comprehension. The limits of our own
imaginations and the words of God himself confirm that God is beyond us:
"For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher
than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts." (Isa. 55:9)
Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the LORD,
the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary. His
understanding is UNSEARCHABLE." (Isa. 40:28, emphasis added)
Job tells us that the sum of what we are able to comprehend of God is but
"the mere edges of His ways" (Job 26:14).
I love a God I cannot fully comprehend—who is far above me. That is a God
worthy of my praise, my worship, and my trust. A god who is entirely understandable
by human beings is intrinsically no bigger than those human beings are.
Why should we worship someone who is just like us?
We can identify the ways that God accomplishes his plan by sorting how
he rules in the world into two categories: visible and invisible. Miracles
are visual evidence of God at work, and providence is an invisible means
through which God fulfills his purposes.
Miracles amaze us by drawing our attention to God and away from the everyday
world. God has designed nature so that it runs along observable and predictable
lines, but nature does not make its own laws. It is always subject to God’s
control. To accomplish his purposes, there are times when God interrupts
the observable natural course of events. Several well-known biblical miracles
occur in Genesis and Exodus:
• the flood
• the plagues in Egypt
• the parting of the Red Sea
• manna in the wilderness
• water from the rock
Providence lies behind miracles and is not observable, although the results
of it often are discernable. Because it is an invisible means through which
God works, many people do not think about it. God, in an unseen way, controls
all things that happen in the universe. God oversees all, invisibly orchestrating
all the seemingly natural occurrences. To me, it is even more amazing than
miracles.
When I ponder God, providentially working out his purposes, I am amazed.
When I think of billions of people, all pursuing their own agendas, and
God overruling them all, I am awestruck. He restrains. He lets go. He oversees
and controls it all.
Jesus reigns and will continue to do so until all his enemies are brought
under his feet to serve as his footstool (1 Cor. 15:25 cf. Ps. 110:1).
(Not all believe he is Lord, but one day all will know the truth … and every
knee will bow and every tongue confess the truth that Jesus Christ is Lord.)
He is a king over molecules and mountains. He does all his good pleasure
and no one thwarts his hand.
The lot is cast into the lap but its every decision is from the Lord. (Prov. 16:33)
Not one sparrow falls to the ground apart from the Father’s will. (Matt. 10:29)
We have a limited understanding of control; we can comprehend it only from
a creature’s perspective. For us, absolute control means that those on
the receiving end would be like puppets on a string or programmed computerized
robots. This is the only way we can control. God, however, is not like
a man. He can control all and, at the same time, allow people to make decisions
and choices for which they are completely responsible. The consequences
of those choices will not prevent God from accomplishing his glorious purposes.
Thus, men do what they want to do—and all the while, they are overruled
and are fitting into a grander scheme that is being worked out by an infinitely
wise, holy and powerful God. The supreme biblical example of this is the
Crucifixion.
As the Scripture unfolds from Genesis to Revelation, we discover that Jesus’
work on the cross in particular is central to the Bible and to all of human
history—a work first promised and then fulfilled in time. The fall of man
in the Garden of Eden did not take God by surprise, nor did it cause him
to alter his original plan. God always intended to send the Son to earth
to rescue sinners, and his promises reflect that intention. In the rest
of this article, we will trace the biblical development of that promise.
When God makes a promise, nothing can change it. "God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should
repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He
not make it good?" (Num. 23:19). The Lord stated in Isaiah 46:11b, "‘Indeed I have spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed
it; I also will do it.’" What was God’s expressed purpose? God made a promise to a man named Abram
that through him, a Seed would come—a Redeemer—to conquer sin, Satan, death,
and hell. The Seed would come to gather a people who forever would be a
testimony to the incredible grace of God.
Some time after the original promise, God changed Abram’s name to Abraham,
which means ‘father of a multitude,’ as a testimony to the promise. God
had come to Abram when Abram was still an idolater in the land of the Chaldeans,
in Ur. This promise was one of pure grace from beginning to end. God set
apart this pagan from Ur, and told him that he was going to bless him.
God was going to bless Abraham in the promised Seed, in whom Abraham the
sinner would be justified in the sight of God. Abraham would not be alone
in this blessing. God also promised to make a great nation who would be
God’s special blessed people. It was God’s own good pleasure to do so,
for his own glory—to display his grace and goodness.
Throughout his life, Abraham repeatedly experienced the reality that God
is true to his Word, no matter how strange that word seemed. Though his
wife, Sarah, had been barren and well past her childbearing years, had
she not, at the age of ninety, given miraculous birth to the promised son,
Isaac? God manifested his glory as a promise-keeping God of awe-inspiring
power. In Genesis 22, God repeats and clarifies his amazing promise. The
ultimate fulfillment of this promise would involve another Son whose birth
would come about in a miraculous way—a Seed in whom were bound all the
promises—a Seed in whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed.
Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said
to him, "Abraham!" And he said, "Here I am." Then He
said, "Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and
go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one
of the mountains of which I shall tell you." (Gen. 22:1-2)
It is important to notice that God does not ask Abraham to murder his son,
but to offer him—to sacrifice him as a burnt offering. God is not commanding
Abraham to commit a crime, but rather to execute due judgment. The wages
of sin is death and God can justly require the death of any sinner at any
time. The fact that God does not execute all of us, but suffers long with
sinners, is because of his great mercy. God’s request is a great test of
Abraham’s faith. Isaac is the son of promise; he is the miraculous gift
of God, given to Abraham in his old age. Isaac was Abraham and Sarah’s
only son and the one through whom the promised Messiah would come. The
promise of God and this commandment of God seem to be at odds, yet Abraham
obeys.
So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two
of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for
the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told
him. Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar
off. (Gen. 22:3-4)
Though Abraham did not understand, he trusted the God who had given him
this son in a miraculous way. He trusted God’s goodness, and thus, he obeyed
the word of the Lord. Abraham knew that God deserves total trust. He did
not try to figure out all that God was doing. Neither Abraham nor we who
come after him have the ability to comprehend all of God’s actions. However,
like Abraham, we too are called to rest in God, even when we cannot see
or understand what he is doing. Obedient faith reveals a genuine work of
God.
Abraham’s obedience took him to the place of which God had told him. When he was almost there, he lifted his eyes
and saw the place in the distance. Before moving on to verse 5, I would like you to take
note of the fact that along with faith and obedience, God makes a pointed
reference to a particular spot. Why is it so important to God for Abraham
to go to this particular mountain? I will comment on this shortly. For
now, hold this question in your "memory bank."
In verse 5, we encounter more evidence of Abraham’s faith in a supremely
powerful and trustworthy God.
And Abraham said to his young men, "Stay here with the donkey; the
lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you." (Gen. 22:5, emphasis added)
In light of Hebrews 11:17-19, this is not a statement of deception; rather,
it is evidence of faith. Abraham knows that whatever happens on the mountain,
God is going to have to do something to get that son back. He is convinced
that the promise of God cannot fail.
So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his
son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife, and the two of them
went together. But Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, "My
father!" And he said, "Here I am, my son." Then he said,
"Look, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?"
And Abraham said, "My son, God will provide for Himself the lamb for
a burnt offering." So the two of them went together. (Gen. 22:6-8)
Abraham believes that the Lord will provide. He may have no clue as to
how, but he knows God. He has confidence in God. As we shall see, Abraham’s
confidence is well founded. God does indeed provide.
Then they came to the place of which God had told him. And Abraham built
an altar there and placed the wood in order; and he bound Isaac his son
and laid him on the altar, upon the wood. And Abraham stretched out his
hand and took the knife to slay his son. But the Angel of the LORD called
to him from heaven and said, "Abraham, Abraham!" So he said,
"Here I am." (Gen. 22:9-11)
I am sure that Abraham was very glad to respond, "Here I am!"
The biblical account emphasizes the location as significant to God.
And He said, "Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him;
for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son,
your only son, from Me."
Then Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram
caught in a thicket by its horns. So Abraham went and took the ram and
offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son. And Abraham called
the name of the place, The-LORD-Will-Provide; as it is said to this day,
"In the Mount of the LORD it shall be provided." (Gen. 22:12-14)
To be continued.
Presented by Murray McLellan, an unworthy sinner upon whom the kindest
of Kings has poured grace unimaginable. May it please God to use the preceding
article to advance the faith and joy of his people. My foremost desire
is to magnify and exalt the Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been
crucified to me, and I to the world. Unto him belong glory and dominion
forever and ever. Amen.
It is my sincere desire that the presentation of these truths will advance
your faith and joy in the glorious God of heaven and earth, and in his
amazing salvation rooted in the Lord Jesus Christ. MLM
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