Listen Carefully

I am not wise to know
nor sure of foot to go.
What is so clear to Thee,
Lord, please make clear to me.

So we hear from the Lord and He directs us. We think, I've got it! I know what He wants me to do!. But if we aren't careful, we will presume that He has told us His entire plan and hold on to that plan—though unbeknownst to us, it may only be a partial plan—for dear life. Then something goes awry and we think God changed His mind or we didn't hear clearly or missed a door. Something went wrong!

In Genesis Chapter 22:2, God gives Abraham a direct command: Offer your beloved son, Isaac, to Me as a burnt offering. Too often we hurry on to the next verse. Read Verse 2 again and put yourself in Abraham's place. There are emotions between every word—incredibly deep, agonizing emotions that caused Abraham to gasp with horror, to fall to his knees, unable to stand with the weight of the words he had just heard. He was nauseated, sick in heart and mind, unable to speak, shaking so badly that he could hardly rise to his feet, but early the next morning he headed for the place to which God had directed him to offer his precious sacrifice.

I don't think he hurried going up the hills; I don't think he hurried as he built the altar; he didn't hurry as he placed the wood on the altar. He would stop and shake his head and look with confusion at the stalwart young man by his side. He was moving as if in a trance. Finally, everything was ready. Isaac was tied on the altar and Abraham had his dagger poised above his beloved son's heart.

Lord God, I do not comprehend, but I will be obedient. You gave Isaac to me and now You are taking him from me. He belongs to You. Empower me, Lord, to do this thing that You have told me to do

And then a thought came to Abraham: Stop! Don't do this, Abraham!

That can't be the voice of the Lord—He told me to sacrifice Isaac.

But he hesitated—just long enough to hear a noise behind him and when he turned to look, there was a ram in the thicket.

We must always remember to be very sensitive to His voice. Yes, Abraham received a direct command from the Lord, but it was NEVER God's plan that Abraham would sacrifice Isaac. It seems clear to us and it seemed to Abraham that this was His complete plan. If he had not realized that God doesn't always paint the full picture for us—that He sometimes adds or deletes—he would have been stubbornly obedient and carried out the tragic sacrifice.

No, we do not always know His complete plan and we should not operate thinking that we do—prying doors open, walking blindly, pursuing irrationally the plan that we believe He has shared fully with us. He is omniscient. He knows everything concerning us—from the moment we breathe our first gasp of earth-air, to the moment we gasp and draw our last breath of earth-air.

So what do we do? We test the plan according to His Word—His revealed will. We seek advice from others who have walked with Him much longer than we have and—we listen very carefully—there may be a ram in the thicket.

The Lord tells us in Isaiah 55:8-9: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways," declares the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways And My thoughts than your thoughts.”

The full story is in Genesis 22:1-19

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