This is The Living Word for Sunday, July 2, 2023 based on the set Bible readings in the shared interdenominational scheme.
Theme: Living in partnership with God is the way to true reward
Genesis 22:1-14 — A severe test shows Abraham’s extreme trust in God
Matthew 10:40-42 — To look after the messenger is to welcome Jesus
Romans 6:11-23 — Be free from sin’s pull and fervent about God
Psalm 13
1 How long, Lord? Will You forget me forever? How long will You hide your face from me?
2 How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?
3-4 Look on me and answer, Lord my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death, and my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,” and my foes will rejoice when I fall.
5 But I trust in Your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in Your salvation.
6 I will sing the Lord’s praise, for He has been good to me.
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Genesis 22:1-14 — A severe test shows Abraham’s extreme trust in God
• He hears God expecting him to obey in two ways he could not reconcile
1 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love — Isaac — and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”
“Your son, your only son” — after the sending away of Ishmael, emphasising Isaac as the “only son” of the promise, Gen. 21:12, Gal. 4:23.
“Region of Moriah” — which later became the temple mount in Jerusalem, 2 Chron. 3:1.
3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about.
“Early the next morning” — Abraham’s prompt and unquestioning obedience is as astounding as the test.
4-5 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”
“We will come back” — Abraham heard God order him to sacrifice Isaac, although God had promised to fulfil the covenant through Isaac. He trusted God to resolve this apparent contradiction.
6-7 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?”
“Yes, my son?” Abraham replied.
“The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
8 Abraham answered, “God Himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.
“God Himself will provide” — trust in God’s provision although Abraham had no idea how, defines his faith.
9-10 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son.
11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
“Laid him on the altar” — Isaac here is a type, or prefigure, of Christ and His sacrifice.
12 “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.”
“Do not do anything to him” — God intervenes, making it clear He never intended for Isaac to be sacrificed.
“You have not withheld from Me” — God needed to see the surrender and sacrifice of Abraham’s will.
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.
14 So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
“To this day it is said” — referring to the time of the monarchy when the temple was functioning in Jerusalem.
• For further study, Psalm 24:3; Isaiah 2:3, 30:29; Zech. 8:3.
Reflection
SUMMARY This is the story of Abraham’s trust in God, despite being put in an impossible situation. As he obeyed, it became clear that this was God’s toughest test of him yet.
APPLICATION God expects us to hear Him and obey beyond what we can know or understand. It’s called faith.
QUESTION When have you sensed God leading in a difficult direction?
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Matthew 10:40-42 — To look after the messenger is to welcome Jesus
• There’s a blessing just for receiving the person the Lord has sent
40 Jesus said: “Anyone who welcomes you welcomes Me, and anyone who welcomes Me welcomes the One who sent Me.
“Welcomes you welcomes Me” — respect for an ambassador was a measure of the respect for the sender. Christ lives in His people, who go out in His name. How they are received or rejected, is how Christ is received.
• For further study, see Matthew 18:5, 25:45; Luke 9:48; 2 Cor. 5:20.
41 Whoever welcomes a prophet as a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person as a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward.
“Whoever welcomes a prophet” — those who support and look after God’s people are welcoming not just them, but the Good News itself — and will receive spiritual blessing.
42 And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is My disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward.”
“One of these little ones” — Jesus’ followers generally had little social standing.
• For further study, see Matthew 5:3, 18:1-5, also 6:5, 23:5-12.
Reflection
SUMMARY In the first century, the church’s teachers travelled to share their teaching and gifts. They were to be honoured as those sent by Christ Himself.
APPLICATION The way Christians who bring their gifts to a different area are welcomed, is a reflection of how open people are to Christ Himself and His message of love.
QUESTION Who has the Lord brought to my workplace or church fellowship? Are they a gift or a threat?
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Romans 6:11-23 — Be free from sin’s pull and fervent about God
• Staying on a sinful path leads to death and denies the gift of life in Jesus
11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
“Count yourselves dead to sin” — first step in living free from sin’s pull is seeing ourselves in a new way, recognising that sin’s power was broken the moment we gave our life to Jesus. The old self, that liked its own independent and selfish way of living, has died, Romans 6:2-7.
“In Christ Jesus” — Paul’s way of expressing our oneness with Christ. An enabling, practical description, not just a theological one.
12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires.
“Do not let sin reign” — second step in defeating sin is being intentional about practising right attitudes and actions, free to choose and able to say ‘no’ to temptations, judgments and resentments that don’t fit with new life in Jesus.
13 Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to Him as an instrument of righteousness.
“Offer yourselves to God” — third step is to resolve before God every day not to help the author of sin e.g. not offering ears to hear or entertain gossip, nor the tongue to participate in it.
14 For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.
“Not under… law but… grace” — the Old Covenant was an external, rule-based system that pointed out sin, without any help in dealing with it. Under the New Covenant in Jesus the Holy Spirit puts the sense of right and wrong in a regenerated, sensitised heart and also helps us make good choices.
15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means!
16 Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey — whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness?
17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance.
“Used to be slaves to sin” — Paul warned the church in Galatia against constructing a new religion of rules cancelling out the freedom of choosing to live for God and returning to a system that condemns: rather than growing in what is life-giving.
“Come to obey from your heart” — early church believers knew the life of the Spirit and its freedom. They practised an intuitive “from the heart” kind of obedience which was responsive to God.
18 You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
“Set free from sin” — rather than slaves to sin, v.16. Slavery in the ancient world was about being owned, and one’s obligations to whoever (or whatever) owned you.
19 I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness.
“Human limitations” — a fair paraphrase of sarx, flesh. Paul is attempting to describe in everyday human life terms, something discerned spiritually, which he knows is inadequate. The believer in Jesus, released from the bondages of the old life, is now free to make good choices and grow in Christ and holiness, or sanctification.
20 When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness.
21 What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death!
“Result in death” — our choices are crucial. Influenced by the Holy Spirit they are upbuilding and life-giving. If not, the opposite, spiritually deadening.
22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.
“Result is eternal life” — eternal life is an unearned gift of God (v.23) that comes through faith in Christ and nothing else; transformation through being reborn spiritually, John 3:3, 16. Our destiny is settled then. Something more is set in progress, sanctification, which is not a condition for new birth nor an instant result of it. It grows as the Holy Spirit has more and more of us. Those who have been justified will show it by lives growing in holiness, Hebrews 12:14.
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
“Wages… gift of God” — the two allegiances contrasted, one building up the debt of sin that brings progressive spiritual death, the other the gift of a one-time release into eternal life.
• For further study read Ephesians 2:8-9, Titus 3:5-7.
Reflection
SUMMARY An important passage in which Paul contrasts the difference between trying (and often failing) to keep an external framework of rules; and being set free from sin, able to choose to ‘obey from the heart’, following Christ and helped by the Holy Spirit.
APPLICATION We enter into a relationship with God through believing and trusting in Christ, free to make good choices. That’s different from a framework of rules which are choices that have been made for us, which is what formal religion offers.
QUESTION How would you explain God’s grace working in your life, helping you to make good choices for Him?
PRAYER Lord, as we come to You in Jesus, we admit confusion from news and opinions and the many voices speaking.
And, if we are honest, we may seek hope in these things first, rather than the work of discerning Your voice in all the clamour.
Help us to hear You afresh, to make good choices for you — and to honour those you bring across our path to share Your word and bring Your truth that we so need to hear. Amen.
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