Salty Zebra

  “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.”  Genesis 22:12  I learned so many new things about this familiar story this week as I studied this chapter. Old assumptions were corrected. New insights were gained. I can’t wait to share it all with you! Today we consider the story of Abraham being instructed by God to sacrifice his son, Isaac. As a child, this story was frightening. As a parent, horrifying. But looking at it closer, I now see it as reassuring, hopeful, and an exhortation and incitement to trust God and live my life for Him.  At the beginning of Genesis 22 , we read that Got set about to test Abraham. God tells him that he is to take his son, his only son, whom he loves and sacrifice him on Mount Moriah. Yes, Abraham had another son, Ishmael, but at this point in the narrative, Ishmael has been banished, removed from the family, and ...

  Then the Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really have a child, now that I am old?’ Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year, and Sarah will have a son.”  Genesis 18:13-14  When Stephen was being questioned in Acts 7:2-4 , he told us that Abraham was called out of the land of Ur. This would have been his ancestral home, the only one he had ever known. Generations of his family lived here, as denoted in Genesis 11 , and it would have been entirely counter-cultural for him to leave, but he did. He and Sarah (then Sarai) picked up and moved their entire household across the known world. Yes, he originally brought his dad with him, and they stopped over in Haran for a long time, likely decades, until he passed, but eventually they all ended up in Canaan, the land that God showed him. Abraham had to believe that God was calling him to move across the world, and show that belief with action. He then h...

  On that very day Abraham took his son Ishmael and all those born in his household or bought with his money, every male in his household, and circumcised them, as God told him. Genesis 17:23  Over the last several years, God has taught me that when I know I need to do something, I should do it right away . This started out because I might get distracted, or the action would fall to the bottom of my to-do list. These days, it has a lot more to do with memory. If I don’t do it right now, I won’t do it at all because I’ll likely not recall that I’m supposed to! Every once in a while, I really don’t want to do something and I put it off, and God keeps bringing it up to me, reminding me either internally or externally through those around me. But realistically, when I feel like God is instructing me to do something, I either stop what I’m doing and take care of it right away, or else I set a calendar or phone reminder to do it at the appropriate time if necessary. I actually jus...

  Then the LORD’s angel said to her, “Return to your mistress and submit to her authority. I will greatly multiply your descendants,” the LORD’s angel added, “so that they will be too numerous to count.”   Genesis 16:9-10  In Genesis 16, two women are highlighted: Sarai and Hagar. These two women found themselves confronted with the option to believe and obey God, or not, and they made different choices. Neither was perfect, neither did exactly as she should have, but we can learn from them both.   Sarai was Abram’s wife and had traveled with him across the known world. Presumably, she knew about the promises God had made to Abram in Genesis 12:2,7 , Genesis 13:14-16 , and Genesis 15:4 , but ten years had passed since they entered the land that God had called them to, and still she had no children. It would make perfect sense for her to determine that she couldn’t have children as she was well past the child-bearing age and had not conceived. But this is where ...

   By this time, my husband had the opportunity to see the house. In fact, the previous owners were very gracious and allowed us to have a fence installed before closing. This made it so much simpler to have kids and a dog down there! Our first visit to the house as its official owners was a quick one. It was just the kids and I since, again, my husband was busy with work. He was very possibly still on his trip to India. We went down for less than 24 hours to do a quick inventory. You see, the house had been sold to us with all its accoutrements: all the furniture, the dishes, the linens, even the paper towels and toilet paper! I wasn't sure exactly what was there, so we went down to take stock and see what we might need to bring down with us to make our first official trip comfortable.  That was a quick, but exhausting trip. I was up late going through drawers, cupboards and closets and writing it all down. How many towels? Sheets? Spoons? It was a beautiful gift as ...

  The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.”   Genesis 12:1  This study is focusing on obedience, and Abram, later Abraham, is one of the cornerstone stories of obedience in the Bible. Chapter11 of Hebrews is referred to as the “Hall of Faith.” In it, the author catalogs highlights from the past of people who followed God in extreme situations. Obedience is the result of faith. You won’t obey someone you don’t trust. And, interestingly, obedience leads to deeper faith. When we trust God enough to do what He tells us to, and things work out in incredible ways we couldn’t have imagined, we trust God even more.   I had always remembered the story of Abraham as him being called to leave Ur, his ancestral home, but as I was reading today in Genesis 11, it was actually his father, Terah, that initially picked up his family and moved. He left Ur with the intention of going to Canaan ( Genesis...