Seems strange to me that a “loving father” would withhold the most vital resource from his creatures. A human father who wouldn’t give water to his thirsty kids would be in jail.

The idea of having to beg and plead for water is abhorrent to me. Either God cares,or he doesn’t. In our case, he certainly doesn’t! Eildon Dam once held EIGHT times the volume of Sydney Harbour! Yes, I know. Mind-boggling, if you know the size of the harbour. Now it’s all gone. So much for the Lord being so good that he lets rain fall on the good and bad alike. Ha!

Next time you chat with him, let him know that we need 3 years of continuous soaking.

I take the story literally, but, for me, it is far from a “ghastly, celestial joke.” It is rather an amazing object lesson, which indeed did have its symbolic significance.

God, the Heavenly Father, was, way back at this stage of history, preparing the way for His children to understand something entirely mind-blowing and humanly incomprehensible that theologians call “substitutionary atonement.”

The amazing thing is not the apparent “blood-thirsty character” of God, but rather the great love of God toward us who was willing to do, and followed through with, the very thing He asked Abraham to do: sacrifice His own Son. Of course, Jesus, as the 2nd member of the Trinity, and member of the Godhead, voluntarily shared in this decision as well. He laid His own life down willingly, out of love for you and me.

The ram caught in the thicket shows us that, although each and every one of us, due to our rebellion against the One who created us, deserves to die, God who is rich in mercy, has provided a Substitute, so that we wouldn’t have to pay the consequences of our rebellion.

Also, Abraham, who, if you read the whole story in context, loved his son, Isaac, very, very deeply, and was tremendously affected by what happened, was also the “father of faith,” and, as such, is an example to us in learning to take God at His word, and not put our human emotions and reasoning ahead of His divine wisdom and guidance in our life.

If you take that story literally, then you’ve still got a problem with this order being indicative of God’s bloodthirsty character, haven’t you?

What I find truly chilling is that Abraham seemd devoid of paternal feeling. Not a whimper of protest, not a squeak of horror. No. Furthermore, he didn’t have to ask for instructions, which seems to indicate that he was accustomed to human sacrifices. Shudder!

Abraham and Isaac would have needed years of intensive therapy upon learning that it was all a ghastly, celestial joke:)

.

Eeeeewwwww, spooky stuff. Voice of God, or just schizophrenia? I have often wondered how many “religious” experiences are caused by abnormal brain activity, or just our all-too-human dark side.

Years ago, I was boastfully told by a Seventh Day Adventist that he woud unhesitatingly kill another human being if so commanded by the Almighty. I asked him why God couldn’t do his own butchery, thereby enabling his followers to obey the commandment which forbids murder. He didn’t like that one scrap. I also asked him how he distinguished the voice of God from the usual chatter that goes on inside his own head and he didn’t like that, either!