( Gen 22:1-15 ) - [ Deutsch ]
Dear Congregation, how do you imagine God? How does he meet you? That's what I ask Konfis. That's what I'm asking you this morning.
(1st picture) In Psalm 23, God is described as the shepherd. I won't miss anything with him. (2nd picture) God, depicted as an eye. One who sees everything, each and every one of us. (3rd image)God, the light of the world, who makes his way through all the clouds and darkness. (4th picture): God as a source that provides water so that people, animals, plants can live. Our conceptions of God are diverse. In the course of a lifetime, they change several times. God is love, it says briefly and clearly and unambiguously in the 1st Letter of John. (Fig. 5) Love incarnate in Jesus Christ. In the text of the sermon we encounter God. Different from what I would like it to be. And certainly different from what you would like. I read from the book of Genesis in the 22nd chapter.
Read the Bible text aloud
Dear Congregation, this is a fierce story. There is resistance in me to such a God. Because he demands such an impossible thing from a human being. To sacrifice one's own son. It's unbelievable that God can ask for such a thing. And as if that wasn't cruel and pointless enough, Isaac is the only son of Abraham. All hopes rest on Isaac.
Dear congregation, I can't understand Abraham either. He doesn't fight back at all. He says to everything: Here I am.
It's not about a trifle, it's about Abraham's only child. That he loves. I want to shake him and shout this to him.
Everything in me revolts against such an image of God and against such obedience on the part of Abraham.
Dear Congregation,
In this story, I meet a god that I have to nibble on. I have to deal with that, it triggers resistance in me. That's the power of this story. I won't be able to get rid of them anytime soon. What is also strong about this story is that it is close to reality. Because even today, children are sacrificed.
E.g. out of ambition, because all the exaggerated dreams that one could not realize in one's own life must now be realized by this ONE child – no matter how.
Or out of stubbornness, because the parents dictate the child's path, whether it wants to or can or not.
Then there is the perversion of adults who claim their victims among children. Child pornography, child abuse, child abuse. And finally, children are also sacrificed out of negligence. Today, in our modern 21st century, exactly the same sacrifices are happening as 4000 years ago. The methods are different, but a victim remains a victim and a destroyed life remains a destroyed life.
History holds up a mirror to us, a mirror of our time.
Nevertheless, I nibble at the way God shows Himself here. And how Abraham shows himself here. I wish Abraham would take up the fight against God's command. I wish he would succeed in this fight so that the possible sacrifice of Isaac could not happen in the first place.
Nevertheless, I will try to make sense of Abraham's actions. Why does he do what he does? He does not contradict God. He obeys him. Not because he doesn't care about his son. I don't want to accept that.
Abraham may know that there is no point in contradicting God. Think of Moses, who argues with God for a long time and then goes to Pharaoh. Or Jonah, who ran away from God and yet could not escape Him. There were attempts to disobey God. It didn't help.
Abraham obviously spares himself. He saves his strength for the difficult walk he has to take. And here Abraham is like Jesus in Lent: outwardly he was serene and resigned to his fate, inwardly he may have seethed. Or maybe everything was gray and dreary and empty because he knew, "If what is about to happen to me comes true, then not only will my son's life be over, but my own life will be over as well."
Dear congregation, this story is really an imposition. But when I think of Abraham like that, I feel somehow close to him. And maybe you experience it in a similar way: that there are situations in life and I ask: how can God expect me to do that? For me, that's one reason why I find this story incredibly exciting: because it's so unsparing. And yet so honest, so true-to-life. There are such situations. And they don't come from a blind fate or an evil devil. They come from God. Phew
God is love. This is very hard to believe in such situations. But it is also—at least a glimmer of hope—that nothing will happen that is beyond God's control. There's a lot I can't understand. And yet God accompanies us in this. God knows why He expects us to do this and that. We can't expect everything to happen exactly the way we want it to.
And I should not forget: No one understands me better than God himself. For he himself, in his Son Jesus Christ, did not shy away from suffering.
A woman once told me: with all the strokes of fate that have happened to me in life, I have never asked why. But always: what for? And I have to say in retrospect: it all made sense.
I would like to show you a picture. (Fig. 6) God's hand. Ready to catch us when we fall. Ready for the human child to lean on and receive protection. We can know that we are safe. We have to go our way of life. Despite all the hardships we have to bear, I hope that we can recognize, at least in retrospect, that we did not walk this path alone. That God was there for us. When we are in such life-threatening situations and we are driven by the question: God, why? How can you? Remember the end of the story. Isaac did not die. Sometimes signs and wonders actually happen, just when we no longer expect them. God, who expects us to do the unreasonable, can also get us out of the unreasonable. He doesn't always do that. Many people suffer and have to endure it to the last. We don't know why. Maybe you discover "what for", but everyone has to find that out for themselves. And maybe you don't realize it. I am sure that one day we will be able to ask God all these open questions. But many people have also experienced God's help and salvation from their misery. When they had already given up all hope. Just like Isaac when he lay bound on the altar. Just like Abraham did when he reached for the knife. And when everyone involved thought: Now it's over. But it wasn't over. Amen.