Heart Tracks - Laying Down Isaac

      Isaac was the long promised son of Abraham.  He was precious beyond words to both His father and mother, Sarah.  God had given them so many good things, but none of His gifts came close to the joy and wonder of this son given to them in their old age.  Yet, one day, Abraham heard the voice of God speaking to him, "Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, 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."  Perhaps you've read this passage many times, but has your heart ever really understood what must have been the heart state of both Abraham and Sarah?  Sarah, as she watched her husband take the joy of her heart to what she knew would be his death.  Abraham, asked to give up what had been the rich fulfillment of the Father's promise.  God was calling each to "lay down their Isaac," to give him to Himself, without explanation, and without any sense of why He would do so.  Have you ever been there?  Are you there now?

    Many years ago, the Father allowed such a situation to be mine.  I had been in the ministry for a little over 5 years and truly loved my calling.  Then, like the tragedies of Job, everything began to come crashing down.  My wife left to seek another life for herself, one that didn't include me.  The home and family I loved and found great security in were gone.  Along with that, I was forced to resign my ministry.  Not only did I love it, I found my identity in it.  I was no longer a husband and pastor.  If I wasn't those things, what was I?  More, though I knew I hadn't been perfect in either role, I also knew I had been faithful in both, had "done everything right," as far as I knew and saw things.  Why had He allowed this?  Why was He not working to bring it all back?  Why was He absent?  Just where was He in all of it?  Like Jacob, I wrestled with Him.  No, more than wrestled.  The Father and I were engaged in a knock-down, drag-out slugfest.  I was angry, resentful, over what had been lost.  He owed me...big time.  I had given Him, in my eyes, everything.  In the same way, by my eyes, He had given me nothing.  I wanted answers, and He wasn't supplying them.  The fight went on.  For some, this fight with God never ends.  Mercifully for me, by His grace, it did, at least on this front.
    In the battle with Him, He eventually broke through all the emotions and was able to show me how I had made my ministry, even my marriage and family, my own Isaac.  They had become gods to me, and I worshipped them.  I wasn't really conscious of this, and if I had been, surely would not have admitted it to anyone.  Yet it was true, and when this truth came to light for me, my only choice was to either lay this Isaac down, at the foot of the cross, or clutch it to myself, as it continued to eat away the very fabric of my soul till there was nothing left but the bitterness, emptiness, joylessness, and grief.  Aware of the loss of His gifts, but unaware of the loss of the greatest gift which is Himself.  Faced with that choice, finally, I laid my Isaac down.
It would not be the last time.  He would reveal other Isaac's in my life, desire for success, recognition, and applause.  Desire for life to go as I thought it should, for people to do what I thought they should, and all the frustration that came about when of course, it, they, didn't.  Each time, eventually, I had to lay my Isaac down.  I know that such times still lay ahead.  It's the way of the Father, the way of the cross.  Are you walking in that way today?

    T. Austin-Sparks asks, "Have we made the choice that no matter what, whether we see, understand, agree, or not, we are going on with God?  This is faith.  We put over to Him, our mistakes, failures, and trust Him with them, and go on."  We lay down our Isaac.  What is your Isaac?  What disappointment, sorrow, loss do you continue to cling to?  More, what good gift, blessing, place, ministry or person have you made your Isaac and refuse to surrender to Him?  God gave back to Abraham his son.  He gave back to me my ministry.  Neither of us had a guarantee that He would.  In the end, all we have is the guarantee of His goodness and His love.  It must be enough.  Is it for you, for me?  Can we lay down our Isaac?

Blessings,

Pastor O