Day 10 Part 2 The God who provides/sees

There is so much in these readings....and Abrahams test by fire can't be read without mention.
The theme for Abraham the patriarch, is "seeing", and with the aid of Everett Fox's knowledge of Hebrew we can also see clearer as we read the Word.

It seems that Sarah and Abraham are not together at this point. There seems to be a number of years between Gen 21 and 22.(Abraham living in the land of the Philisitnes Gen21v 34 and Sarah Gen23v2 in Hebron where she died and Abraham travels to mourn for her).

When I look at Abraham, who haggles over wells, negotiates with angels over family members, works life with local rulers, he is silent when asked to sacrifice his son. We are told how distressed he was over Ismael, so he wasn't a callous man.

Gen 22 The events are placed in the region of Moriah, which means "seeing".
Isaac will probably be about 37 years old at this point and he accompanies Abraham up to the mountain range of "seeing" When Isaac asks about the sacrifice, Abraham responds with V 8 "God will see-for-himself to the lamb of the offering-up" or in our NIV translation "God himself with provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son". I was struck by the connection with God's provision, the act of seeing, the name place of sacrifice, and what God was testing Abraham for. Verse 12 After Abraham is successul God says "Now I know that you are in awe of God because you have not withheld the son of your love".
When we are in "awe" of something, we look at it with wide eyes, have a sense of amazement and have a humility of how great the other is in comparison to self.
God sees us, but often we fail to really see him because the "son of our love" is bigger in our
eyes than He is.
Abraham lifted up his eyes and seen a ram in the thicket. Abraham knew he was to sacrifice his "lamb" 37 years old or not, Isaac was still his "lamb". God provided a ram on that day, not a lamb. His Lamb of God would be provided on another day and fulfill verse8 "God will see-for-himself to the lamb for the offering-up". Siobhan