Hebrews 11:17-18

By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son, of whom it was said, "Through Isaac shall your offspring be named."

Here is a conversation I often have with my Bible student, “Do you believe in Yeshua the Messiah?” When they reply positively I then say, “That means that you believe in a man who resurrected from the dead” I then say. Do you really believe that God can resurrect someone from the dead?” They say yes a bit less self-assured. I then ask, “What then if today God would say to you, “I want to use you for a little skit that will teach the generations to come about resurrection. Take your little sister, put her on a table, stab her with a knife and burn her. Don’t worry because I will resurrect her right away. You do believe I can resurrect her right?”” There is usually a silence among the students then I ask again, ‘Do you believe in the bodily resurrection of Yeshua the Messiah? After all, you bank your whole faith system on that very fact!”

Much ink has been shed about God asking Abraham to sacrifice His favorite son Isaac. Most of what is written denotes of the extreme love of Abraham had for God, love that gave him the strength to sacrifice the most precious thing he owned: his precious son Isaac. This story is usually offered to encourage people of whom God seems to require great loss or sacrifice. There is a problem with this idea though, because human sacrifice is not acceptable to God. The Father defined what He wanted as offering and humans are off the list. They are actually forbidden, non-kosher, not fit for offering. That’s the whole idea; that’s why we need the blood mediation of a fit animal. Abraham also knew that one of the main differences between the God heaven and earth and the idols of his days, is that God abhorred human sacrifice.

What Adonai was asking of Abraham was not a proof of his love by giving up Isaac, but a proof of his faith by believing in resurrection. When he went up the mountain Abraham said to his servants, "Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you (Genesis 22:5)." The Hebrew there is specific; it says, “We will come again to you.” The author of the Book of Hebrews tells us that Abraham considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back (Hebrews 11:19). (The Greek for ‘figuratively speaking’ says: ‘as in a parable’; referring to an ancient Hebrew parable on the potential death and resurrection of Isaac).

In this case, Abraham, the father of all believers in the Messiah, of Jews and non-Jews, believed in God in the same way that we do now: through believing in a non-human mediated resurrection.