Recklessness
Today’s scripture lesson is an uncomfortable one for many people for a variety of reasons. This past week as I thought about this scripture passage there was this song that kept coming to mind. It is a song by Jars of Clay called Like a Child and I’d like to read a few of the lyrics to you. The song goes something like this:
They say that I can move the mountains
And send them falling into the sea
They say that I can walk on water
If only I would follow and believe
With faith like a child.
Sometimes when I feel miles away
And my eyes can’t see your face
I wonder if I’ve grown to lose the recklessness
I walked in light of you.
Let me reread those last two lines:
I wonder if I’ve grown to lose the recklessness
I walked in light of you.
What a powerful image that song leaves with me, the image of one walking recklessly in light of God. It is what kept coming to my mind this past week because the recklessness this song talks about having lost, is exactly the way Abraham responds to God in the scripture passage for today.
To most people even the thought of sacrificing their child seems reckless and I’m sure it did to Abraham too. We can tell just from the way God commands Abraham that this is something difficult and painful. If you don’t mind, grab the pew bible in front of you and flip to pg 19. Let’s look again at what God says to Abraham. Genesis 22:2 reads
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.”
As God gives Abraham his instructions, God almost seems to be dwelling on the difficult and the negative. God doesn’t just tell Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, God tells Abraham to sacrifice his son, his only son, whom he loves. Each phrase God uses to describe Isaac becomes more intense and, I would imagine, more difficult for Abraham to hear.
It is indeed a painful command to hear. After all, this is the son that Abraham and Sarah have been waiting their whole lives for. This is the son, the heir, that God promised Abraham. This is the son that was too good to be true, that was too ridiculous to believe possible that both Abraham and Sarah laughed at God’s promise to give them a son. This was the son through whom God had promised to make Abraham a great nation. Isaac was the fulfillment of God’s promise, the sign of God’s faithfulness, and the opening into the future God had promised.
Now God was asking Abraham to give all of that up. God was asking Abraham to recklessly follow God, even when it seemed like it would undo all of God’s promises. And on top of that God wants Abraham to go to a distant mountain but doesn’t even tell him which specific mountain to go to! Instead God essentially points Abraham in the right direction and says, “I’ll point it out when you get there.”
I can’t imagine how difficult those words must have been for Abraham to hear. But as difficult as it is for me to imagine how Abraham must have felt, it’s even more difficult for me to imagine Abraham’s response. Abraham doesn’t say anything. Not a word. A few chapters ago Abraham was willing to negotiate with God. He’s willing to challenge God on the justice of God’s actions towards complete strangers. But when faced with the sacrifice of his son, Abraham is silent! He doesn’t try to bargain. He doesn’t whine or make excuses either. Instead his response isn’t a response of words at all but a response of trust-filled action.
Verse three of the passage says that early the next morning Abraham got all of the necessary things together, loaded them on a donkey, and then set out with Isaac and two young men in the direction God had told him. Abraham doesn’t waste any time. He gets up early the next morning and sets about the task God’s given him. The only thing we are told about the journey is that it took three days. Three days. How long must that journey have seemed to Abraham? How often must he have been given the opportunity to doubt? Those three days must have been long and difficult for him, yet he never loses faith and he doesn’t turn back.
On the third day, Abraham and his son go on alone to the place God had shown Abraham. He tells the men with him that both he and Isaac will return after they have worshipped God. And Isaac, noticing there was no lamb for the burnt offering asks his father about it. Abraham’s response is simple, “God will provide.” Even in the very midst of something that seemed entirely reckless Abraham’s response is one of trust and faith in God. Abraham trusted God would not lead him in the wrong direction.
Abraham even went so far as to bind Isaac and put him on the alter. Abraham trusted God right up to the end and, in the end, God does exactly what Abraham said. God provides Abraham with a ram to sacrifice instead of Isaac.
Abraham was able to follow God even when it seemed reckless to others. But I think Abraham realized something most of us often forget. What God was asking Abraham to do seemed reckless in our limited human perspective but Abraham trusted that God would be true to God’s promises and that ultimately God’s purposes would be fulfilled. Abraham trusted even when he was being led into places that were really uncomfortable.
When God called Abraham, he responded not by making excuses, and not even by trying to bargain with God as he had before. Instead Abraham’s response is not one of words at all but one of trust and willingness to walk recklessly in the light of God.
Just like Abraham, we are called to have faith like a child in God, even when it seems reckless, perhaps especially when it seems reckless. I think that’s the real reason that this passage is so uncomfortable for so many of us. It’s not Abraham’s silent obedience that’s uncomfortable; it’s the still audible voice of God. For the God who called Abraham, who makes profound promises, and who asks Abraham to walk so recklessly, is still speaking today. Perhaps what is most uncomfortable is that God asks us too to walk recklessly in the light of God.
As the church, the community trying to live in faithful relationship to God, God is always calling us to grow. Often that growth is difficult and at times, it seems like God is asking us to do something seemingly reckless. To many people, doubling the number of people Calvary serves in the next ten years is reckless. It seems like a huge and daunting task but it is what God is calling us to do. God is calling us to recklessly reach out, that other might come to know God more fully.
God also calls us individually to different things. Are you one of the people God is calling to ordained ministry? If so, it can feel like a really reckless thing to do. Maybe you haven’t even made it out of high school yet and accepting a call to ministry feels like such a huge task. Maybe you’re already actively at work in another career, and it feels reckless to take a pay cut and go back to school. But if God is calling you to it, God will provide even when things seem reckless. Are you one of the people God is calling to ministry?
Or is God calling you to recklessly risk your popularity at school by befriending the uncool kid? Maybe God’s calling you to reach out to the person at work who’s going through a divorce, or the person who always eats lunch alone. Maybe it’s your popularity God’s calling you to risk.
God is calling all of us, individually and collectively to so fully trust in God that we are willing to walk recklessly in the light of God. God called Abraham to walk recklessly in the light of God, and calls all of us to the same type of recklessness. Just as God provided for Abraham, so too God will provide for us when we recklessly follow God.
But the really amazing part is that we worship a God who not only calls us to walk recklessly in light of God, but we worship a God who loves us recklessly. God loves us so recklessly that God sent God’s son to be with us and ultimately to die for us. God sacrificed God’s son, God’s only son Jesus, whom God loves, for us. Imagine how recklessly God would need to love us to be willing to do something like that. God loves us recklessly and calls each of us to walk recklessly in the light of God. If God loves us so recklessly as to die for us, then certainly we can recklessly trust in God.
How is God calling you to recklessly walk in light of God?
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