I find it hard to relate to Jesus on the cross. I mean, it’s almost too great to grasp: The suffering of it all, being nailed to a cross, left to die in agony, taking on the sins of the whole world, yet being totally without sin. I have a hard time to relate to it on a more personal level. Somehow I feel it is easier for me to understand Mary’s pain in this. I can relate to her sufferings, because I can put myself in her shoes, kneeling by the cross, crying for her son. But I can’t grasp the suffering of Christ himself.
Another part of the bible that is difficult to comprehend is when poor Abraham are asked to sacrifice his only son. Everybody with children can relate to this tremendous proffer. I doubt I would be able to do what Abraham was prepared to do. I have asked myself how God could ask this of him, and why. I can’t understand how a loving God can ask this of a parent.
In the passion I can understand why, but I can’t really relate to the emotional side. In Abraham’s sacrifice I can relate to the emotional perspective, but I can’t understand why. And yet, Abraham’s sacrifice and the Passion of Christ is very similar parts of the bible: The father sacrifices his only son.
When I think of God’s great sacrifice for us in these terms, I can suddenly grasp what God have done and how he could ask this of Abraham. But God, in his great compassion gave Abraham a way out: He let Abraham keep his son and further let him have many more. God could ask this of Abraham because He could do the same for Abraham. He asked for Abraham’s sacrifice but did not fulfill his request. In the end Abraham did not sacrifice his son, but God did sacrifice his. The question should not be how he could ask this of Abraham, but how he could ask this of himself. And then the answer is more evident: For the love of us.
It is in this context, someone simpleminded as me, actually can grasp the passion of Christ and the endless love God has for us. God actually sacrificed his only son for us, for his people, for my family, for me…
The universal bias of God for each and one of us is important here. “Dieu nous aime d’un amour universellement partial” – God loves us with a love which is universally partial, as Gabriel Marcel puts it. The personal bond which He has, with each and one of us. The greatest sacrifice is universally done for us as individuals. The son of God died upon the cross for my sins, for your sins, for the sins of Abraham and his son. For all our personal sins, individually.
There you have it. How could one be indifferent for this great sacrifice? Someone has given us his only son to help us gain our lives.
- How, on earth, could we not take him up on his offer?
April 22, 2007 at 10:21 pm
going back to abrahams days, scrafing your only son means to put an end to you bloodline. people always wanted to have sons instead of doughters, because they kept your bloodline alive and the existance of your clan (kin). correct me if i am wrong, but abraham is called father of israel. abrahams sacrifice is even harder.
about jesus and sacrifing himself for mankind. well, in the garden gezemane he prays to his father not to hang him at the cross. jesus fears his early death, but in the end he fullfils his fathers death. same with abraham. both are willing to serve god on a greater level.
April 23, 2007 at 2:17 am
God didn’t ask Abraham to do that. Lucifer did, cloaked in the robe of God. The God of the OT is Lucifer, not the true God.
Good one huh.
April 23, 2007 at 2:39 am
The son of God died upon the cross for my sins, for your sins, for the sins of Abraham and his son. For all our personal sins, individually.
There you have it. How could one be indifferent for this great sacrifice? Someone has given us his only son to help us gain our lives.
- How, on earth, could we not take him up on his offer?
“If Christ be not risen from the dead, then our preaching is vain, and your faith is also vain.”
1 Corinthians 15:14
See that is what I would be asking myself.Does God need a “blood atonement”?
April 23, 2007 at 12:55 pm
I had never really thought about the passion reflecting Abraham’s (near) sacrifice. Thanks for your thoughts on it.
April 23, 2007 at 11:59 pm
Thanks all for taking your time to read and comment my pondering. It is always nice when someone read what you wrote.
- Neither have I before, Therese, I think it is a very fruitful comparison.
As lounge404 pointed out there are other aspects too, I thank you Lounge, for the input, I will surely contemplate this.
Sheree I don’t know if you are serious, but if you are, it’s a dangerous path. To me, Gnosticism is very close to elitisms. And honestly, elitisms is quite unattractive.
Ummadam, I’m afraid I do not really understand your comment. St Paul said this in a context: To believe in the scriptures without believing that Jesus died for our sins is a faith in vain, but St Paul was very firm in the belief of the resurrection of Christ, as I’m sure you are aware of. However, I feel this is somewhat a different discussion (If I interpret you correctly).
May 18, 2007 at 4:56 pm
I sometimes think about Abraham. And my conclusion is that I am weaker. I couldn’t offer my son. Hopefully God didn’t want me to, like He didn’t want Abraham to kill Isaak.
May 18, 2007 at 5:03 pm
Yes, it’s so hard to comprehend how strong Abraham was in his faith. He put all his trust in God.
Hug Luukas from me.
February 15, 2008 at 6:39 am
Actually he didn’t sacrifice his son. We just went over this in my church last week in fact. God needed to test Abrahams faith so he told him to take him to a mountain which he directed him too along with a donkey a servant some rope and wood to make an altar for the sacrifice. Right before Abraham did it God basically told him to stop and in a thicket there was a ram with its horns caught in the thorns and God told him to sacrifice the lamb instead. Thats all right and you can quote me on that and read the bible if you dont trust me
February 15, 2008 at 6:57 am
I dont think i explained that very well lol. First of all God made the ram appear, second of all its not like God told him to sacrifice his son because he had nothing else to put on the altar, and third of all that has to be true because from Abraham came two nations. One from Isaac and the other Jacob (later renamed Israel). Jesus was a different case anyway. God gave him to as a gift (the greatest one in fact). Since back in the times of the old testiment, before jesus, forgivness wasn’t granted unless a burnt offering (thats right burnt not burned) or a ram or lamb or calf was sacrificed to the Lord. The more valuable the offering the more forgivness that was granted. The logic is when Jesus came around he died for us and was basically our ram. Since he was infinately pure (being the son of God) he pretty much had infinate value. Because of this infinate value he basically gave us a never ending well of forgivness. This is the reason why every human being is forgiven and no matter how many times they sin they are forgiven. Its basically a “season pass” for forgivness rather than a “one time ticket”…. Hope I could help everyone, im pretty confident im right about this. And thanx for reading this long thing lol
February 15, 2008 at 10:47 am
Thanks for you concern Avery.
I wrote this because it’s interesting comparing these two parts of the Bible.
February 8, 2009 at 10:15 pm
I think that abraham and his children (nation) have since that time been suffering becuase abraham got it wrong.
Regardless of whether it was god or anti-god that compelled abe to try to murder his son is irrelevant. abe got it wrong.
wrong answer
would you like to try for double jeopardy (in comes moses)
wrong again .
Last life line (in comes jesus) …
wrong again.
the jewish people have been and are still being punished for it to this day.
Now i don’t think its god who actually doing the butt kicking . I actually believe god does not interfere in the affairs of humans. I think that the interpretation of the lessons are being twisted by men who believe themselves in authority to interpret them.
When i meditate about it and i think of the teachings of moses and jesus, i remember that these enlightened spiritual leaders basically attempted to educate the jewish people not to place faith in the teachings of men and not to pray to god through a proxy. why, because if it is by proxy , then you are not praying to god even if the proxy says you are.
Since then god has chosen children of abraham to be the metaphorical whipping boy of humanity , until they learn. The jewish people i know tell me about mitzvah’s these actions , tasks , that a faithful jew must do. My jewish friends tell me gentiles do not have to do them. Only the chosen need to. Are these mitzvahs to make up for the original sin of abraham to try to kill his child.
fyi i think christians got it wrong too. remember jesus taught his followers how to pray directly to god. jesus did not invent priests ,or bishops or popes. The sanhedrin killed him for it, becuase it subverted their authority .
then christianity got politicized and christians are now getting all the wrong answers too.
god bless you all and good luck
I think if any who read this really learn to pray you will understand the truth.
February 9, 2009 at 2:08 am
Thanks for your input. Obviously I don’t agree with you. I do think God interferes.
March 30, 2009 at 7:58 am
ABRAHAM KNEW THAT JEHOVA HAD PROMISED HIM THAT FROM HIS BLOOD LINE WILL COME THE NATION OF GOD..{ISRAEL)…DEEP DOWN INSIDE HE TRUSTED YAWEH AND KNEW THAT HE WAS TESTING HIS FAITH…REMEMBER THAT ABRAHAM DIDN’T HAVE ANY OTHER KIDS AND THAT HIS SON WAS A MIRACLE BECAUSE HIS WIFE NEVER COULD HAVE HAD KIDS WITH OUT GOODS HELP…THE PROMISE WAS MADE BY GOD TO HIM…SO HE TRUSTED GOD BUT NEVER QUESTIONED WHAT GOD WAS REQUESTING OF HIM…
March 30, 2009 at 8:24 am
Thanks for your input.
October 17, 2009 at 12:40 am
http://mytheological.blogspot.com/
The one and only son of God
Many challenges. If Jesus is not God, he can redeem no man for it is written:
Psalm 49:8-10 “A man can not at all redeem (release) a brother (from the righteous demands of the law); and give not to God a ransom (a sacrificial payment) for him- for the redemption of their soul (from the consequence of sin) is precious, and it (the unredeemed soul) ceases forever- for he (the redeemed man) shall yet live forever; not he shall see corruption (of the soul in the grave).”
This is the dilemma the early Christians faced.
Let’s go back to where it all began in the Garden of Eden. Virtually God said to Adam and Eve via the judgment, “the wage of sin, is eternal death.” The sin is identified as “disobedience” to God. God then become the standard, His word then paramount.
With the Fall of Man comes the problem of how to obtain eternal life. The thing to prevail over forth ward is the “eternal death sentence” for both saint and sinner. Someone must pay the price for the Fall of Man, or there is no hope for eternal life.
The Israelites tried to deal with the daily sins of man by the Sacrifice which God declared to be an “iniquity”, placing the burden of guilt upon the priesthood.
(Quoted Out of Context) “To believe in the crucified one is to want no other victims of ritual killing. To depend on the blood of Jesus is to refuse to depend on the sacrificial blood offerings of the Levitical priesthood. It is to swear off scapegoats. Sacred redemption promises offerings of future atonement within the priesthood in accordance to righteousness.”
“Seen from this perspective, the somewhat obscure actions of Christ make complete sense. Jesus, in the role of a victorious Messiah defeated the opposing evil of the “iniquitous gift” by a direct battle. God would never build a new world on “ritual murder”. God found a way- once and for all- to turn to good what man had founded in evil.”
“Jesus steps into this double bind and overcome it. No other than the Messiah could. This task is appointed to him alone. No ordinary victim could change the process, could uncover what was obscured in the constant practice of scapegoating.”
“To submit passively to the sacrificial mechanism would do nothing to change it. That only smoothes the way for future victims and condemns them to invisibility. Such is the dilemma, the malignant wisdom of an evil that we seem doomed to serve whichever way we turn. Humanity is caught in this bondage, caught without even being able to name it directly. We know not what we do.”
“Redemptive violence- was a means of overcoming eternal punishment for the sin, removing the pollution and punishing the transgression on the people that has brought disaster on the community. The sin that the Messiah overcame was the offense of the scapegoat, for it was the sin of the one that jeopardized the many.”
“Only a Jew, representing the “guilt” of the nation of priests could undeniably vindicate many, by suffering this sacrifice, to reverse it. The work of the cross is the work of a transcendent (awe-inspiring) God, breaking into a cycle we could not change alone. It is a saving act of God, a victory over the powers of this world, a defeat of death.”
God hates the plunder in a burnt offering.
The Lamb of God
Jesus is the Christ, yet a man born through the blood-line of David, a necessary requirement for the fulfillment of scripture. Thusly, his humanity is established. At most at this stage he could only be deemed half a God. We are confronted with many sons of God but only ONE son of God. The One son of God is the Mighty God, manifesting the ucorruptible Word of God and His plan for Salvation.
Jesus set the way, as witnessed through the salvation of God, manifest in his ascension, thusly, becoming the way to truth and life walking in the way of righteousness, along the paths of justice.
JESUS TAUGHT – Matthew 9:13 “…’No need have those being strong of a healer, but those having (physical, spiritual, or moral) illness. But learn what it is: ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice;’ for not I (Jesus) came to call righteous (ones) but sinners to repentance.’”