When God’s Gift Becomes An Idol

When we think of the story of God telling Abraham to sacrifice Isaac (Genesis 22:1-19), I wonder if we don’t forget there was another most significant individual who was involved and very much a part of the experience and what was taking place. I’m talking about the woman, Sarah, Abraham’s wife and Isaac’s mother. The Bible is awkwardly silent on her reaction, thoughts, feelings, input when her husband woke up that fateful day saddled the donkey, grabbed the knife and left with her son. And how might you have responded if your spouse told you God said to kill your child? “Now, wait a minute. Are you sure it was God and not the pizza you ate?” “But this was God’s gift to us. Why would He give it and then take it away.” “No, no. I will not let you do this. Kill me, but you will never kill my son.” Might these have been some of Sarah’s reactions? I think they could have been. Of course, one of the lessons of the story of Abraham and Isaac has to do with idolatry. And how even something good ~ a gift from God as it were ~ we can become so attached to it to the point that it usurps/replaces the very Jesus who is to be the center of our life. If the potential existed with Abraham, if the potential existed with Sarah, you better believe the potential exists with us. Is there something in your life that you couldn’t live without if God asked you to? “Little children, guard yourselves from idols.” (1 John 5:21)