The "Sacrifice" of Isaac

This is yet another story from the Bible that I'm well acquainted with, which is to say, I could tell someone that: God told Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac; Abraham was gonna do it, but an angel stopped him at the last minute; Abraham instead sacrificed a ram that was caught in the bushes nearby; everyone lives happily ever after.

In Sunday School, way back in the day (first grade stuff), I remember the little old lady that taught the class handed out coloring sheets and a box of crayons. What we were to color in was a sketch of the near sacrifice of Isaac. It was fairly accurate with the story in the Bible, but without the knife mentioned in scripture. I didn't care; I was eight, I just wanted to color.

Anyway, the little old lady began to tell us the story of the meaning behind the coloring. She told us that Abraham was a great man and loved God, and God loved him. Abraham wanted a son, so God gave him Isaac. Then, some time down the road, God asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac back to him. The way my Sunday School teacher explained this "sacrifice" part was that Abraham was going to take Isaac to an alter up the hill and God was going to take Isaac to heaven.

Well, that's not so bad. I'd been taught that heaven was a pretty neat place, so what would be so bad about that? Well, Abraham was sad, but did what he was told. He took Isaac to the altar, and was about to give him back to God, when an angel swooped down and told Abraham he didn't have to! Abraham was very happy with this, and there was a ram in the bushes for Abraham to sacrifice instead. Abraham kept his son, and God got a sheep.

Alright, as long as everyone is happy, I guess that's considered a happy ending. "Why did God lie to Abraham," I asked my teacher. *Shock and awe* "Well, he didn't! God doesn't lie!! He knew what was going to happen, so he wasn't lying to Abraham at all!" Well, I accepted her answer, cause I was pretty sure if I asked another question I was gonna get a nice smack by the ruler and my parents would hear about my disruption. Now we don't want that, do we?

The fact remains: Why did God test Abraham? Well, if you just view it from the flat page, it was to test Abraham and his faithfulness. Pass. But, I think I'm going to chalk the reason up to the bipolar disorder of The Old Testament God. After dealing with the whole Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel crap, I'd be a little testy too. Well, like I said during my presentation on Tuesday, I'm just a human, God is God, and who am I to even comprehend how the almighty thinks and operates. I'm actually glad he's running the show, Lord knows I couldn't!