ANOTHER BIBLE SECRET REVEALED
By Gary Miller
September 25, 2003
Genesis:22:8:
“And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering: so they went both of them together.”
As often as I have read the above scripture, I had always accepted it at face value, as I also accept and believe the Holy Bible to be the Word of God; the absolute truth.
One very obvious lesson taught in Genesis: chapter 22, is that of faith and unbending obedience to the Most High God.
When God tested Abraham’s faith by commanding him to sacrifice his only son as a burnt offering, I can only begin to imagine the sorrow that must have pierced Abraham’s heart as he and his son, Isaac, began that three day journey to the site where the sacrifice was to take place. But praise be to our loving God, who sent an angel to intervene so that the young boy would be spared. But this lesson in faith and obedience is not the only truth to be gained from this scripture, as I recently learned from one of our church missionaries from Brazil.
A woman from his congregation had married a man who was born and raised as an orthodox Jew, and needless to say, he had nothing to do with Christianity as a “religion,” let alone the true story of the Son of God, the living Christ, our savior. Whatever witnessing or Bible teachings were presented to this man, he merely turned a deaf ear in defiance.
Then one day, the missionary asked the man if he would do him a favor in reading some Old Testament passages, and then translate them back into the Hebrew language, and give an honest interpretation of them, and also express what the message may lay upon his heart. So, the Jewish fellow agreed to help the missionary on the translation assignment, which began with the 22nd chapter Genesis.
When the man had read the passages and completed the translation, it was revealed to him that there was a message there that many of us have missed completely. When he found that the original Hebrew scriptures told that “God would supply [the] sacrifice,” it immediately struck his heart that it was meant to reveal that God would give us the Messiah to save us. And it did not take him long to figure out that the Messiah had already come. The Messiah, Jesus, was the final blood sacrifice for the forgiveness of sin. God’s only begotten son. When the Lord laid that on his heart, he knew that he now must believe and trust in Jesus, and asked to be led in the sinner’s prayer of salvation.
This man, knowing that his obedience to the Lord would cost him greatly in his relationship with his own Jewish family, stepped forward in faith to accept the true Messiah. But God has provided him with a new family now... he has been welcomed in love by his Christian brothers and sisters. And who knows, maybe someday he will ask a favor of another Jew to translate some Bible passages into original Hebrew, and another man or woman will be enlightened by God’s spirit to obtain the true knowledge of Jesus Christ, and receive Him as Lord and Savior.
The Lord does in fact, work in mysterious ways.
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