When God Tests you - It Requires You to Test God

When God Tests you -

It Requires You to Test God

 

I once struggled with a harden roll pin.

I tried everything in my tool box to get it out.

Penetrating oil, drill bits that would break, even torches.

I finally went to a tool store and ask for a carbon tipped bit. 

 This one bit cost $20 and if it was to catch it would break.

Even after I bought it, I continued to hammer on the pin to drive it out.

I was afraid to use the new carbide bit.

I finally agreed to forget the cost and test it.

What I worked on for hours and gave up on,

took 3 times and it was out in seconds!

Are you ready to test God’s Word? 

 

  God had told Abraham to go to a mountain and sacrifice his son.

The very son God said would be the one to receive his inheritance

and give him offspring to become a mighty nation.

I do not know of any place in the world where

you would not be arrested for doing what Abraham did.

It may be easy to read this story and apply nice applications to it

that help us with life, but there was nothing easy about this story.

Face it, if this happened today you would be enraged.

You would try to reason with Abraham,

remind him he had plenty of sheep he could use to worship God with.

You might even buy him a paraphrase Bible

to help him understand God’s Word better.

(I do love paraphrase Bibles.)

Abraham’s knowledge of God had to be proven.

God’s Word tells us to

“Prove (or test) ALL things and hold fast to that which is good.”

1 Thessalonians 5:21

The Bible is not a book of theory and nice stories-

It is God’s Word! 

It was written for us to act upon.

When God put Abraham in a place of testing,

Abraham had to test God.

In Hebrews 11:19, we are told Abraham reckoned God

could raise his son from the dead.

Abraham would have never known that God’s Word was really true

until he acted upon it.

Acting on God’s Word for Abraham, as well as,

for you and I comes with a great risk.

Abraham could have played it safe and continued to sacrifice his sheep,

not a big deal for a man who had as many sheep as Abraham.

What challenge or test are you going through?

There are a lot of products, nice sounding things out there on the market.

May even be some sheep in your back yard that will take care of everything.

But you hear God say,

‘Try My product.’

‘Check it out; prove My Word.’

Develop a faith of substance!

Abraham’s faith had substance.

When he acted on God’s Word

he experienced God as

Jehovah-jireh -“God will provide” Genesis 22:14

Hebrew 11:1 KJV

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for,

the evidence of things not seen.”

Scripture Reading

Genesis 22:1-18 NIV

22:1 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, "Abraham!"

"Here I am," he replied.

2 Then God said, "Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love,

and go to the region of Moriah.

Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about."

3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and saddled his donkey.

He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac.

When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering,

he set out for the place God had told him about.

4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.

5 He said to his servants, "Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you."

6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac,

and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together,

7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, "Father?"

"Yes, my son?" Abraham replied.

"The fire and wood are here," Isaac said, "but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"

8 Abraham answered, "God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering,

my son." And the two of them went on together.

9 When they reached the place God had told him about,

Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it.

He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.

10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.

11 But the angel of the LORD called out to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!"

"Here I am," he replied.

12 "Do not lay a hand on the boy," he said. "Do not do anything to him.

Now I know that you fear God,

because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son."

13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns.

He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.

14 So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said,

"On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided."

15 The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time

16 and said, "I swear by myself, declares the LORD,

that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son,

17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore.

Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies,

18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed,

because you have obeyed me."