Homily for Good Friday

Our Genesis passage tells the well-known story known traditionally by its Hebrew name, the “Aqedah” which refers to the binding of Isaac, Abraham’s only son. As the story goes, Abraham hears the call of God to take Isaac, and to offer him as a sacrificial burnt offering on the mountaintop.

Every parent in here shudders at the terror of this story. You are not alone – this story has puzzled men for as long as it’s been told. And in hearing the story, our imagination is stoked. We try to comprehend what was going through Abraham’s mind in those moments. We have… a lot of questions – so many questions? How can we describe the mind of anyone in the place of Abraham as anything but darkness? To be in Abraham’s place in this story is to be surrounded in darkness.

And this moment of darkness and terror, where Abraham is undergoing the trial of God, Abraham proves himself as a man of remarkable faith. This is clear from the fact that, in the face of darkness and terror, Abraham is oriented upwards, towards the heavens. Deeper and deeper Abraham travels, higher and higher into the mysterious darkness of the divine call. Verse 3 tells us that Abraham “rose” early and then he cut wood for the burnt offering and again, he “arose” and went to the place that God had called him to. Verse 4 says that, on the third day, Abraham began to see, “lifting up his eyes,” that he could begin to see the place that God had called him to, though it was still quite far off. And with even this glimmer of vision, this ounce of clarity, on the basis of this, Abraham dismissed his servants while he and his son marched on, higher and higher.

The holocaust, or “burnt offering” as it is often translated, is itself an ascension. The holocaust is sometimes known more literally as the “ascension offering,” referring to the smoke of the burning of the sacrifice as a “going up” to God, symbolizing God’s acceptance of the sacrifice as a something pleasing to him, the smoke representing his Spirit communing in the presence of the fiery sacrifice.

And that’s just where faithful Abraham marched, towards an ascension into the pleasing presence of a God on high, who took joy in the sacrifice of a faithful man who would keep his eyes looking to the heavens, into a deeper and deeper darkness – mysteriously, a darkness that calls a man to abide more and more deeply by the divine light of faith.

And at that great, climactic moment, the moment where the tension and terror wrack our souls in their depths, as Abraham raises the knife to slay his son, his only son, he hears the heavenly voice call to him, calling only his name. And Abraham’s immediate response: “Here I am.” He offers himself.

This is key: At the pinnacle of this journey, at the top of the mountain of faith, we find that the call of God on Abraham hardly had anything at all to do with Isaac, or burnt offerings, or mountains. The test of Abraham was a true test of devotion – not a devotion that looks for trinkets and parcels to placate an angry God – but a purity of devotion, where the servant of the Lord looks so longingly into the darkness of God; so raptly smitten by the vision of God; delighting in the beauty of God, which radiates out from his being; contemplating the goodness of God through the light of a faith that God indeed becomes the only vision – and in being so deeply beholden by the beauty of this God, by his infinity and his purity, the only rational choice is to offer oneself as a true icon of that glory, worshipping the Lord in the beauty of holiness.

And once Abraham comes to this point, where the only holocaust that God required was his own soul lit aflame by zeal for the Most High, at that point the light makes plain what can only be seen retrospectively – that God provides all that he requires. Verse 13 tells us that Abraham continued to look up – and as he did, God showed him a ram in a thicket which would serve for the sacrifice of the burnt offering that God had called for. Abraham named that site, “On the mount of the Lord there is vision.” Hebraically, this reads more like, “On the mount of the Lord, God will show us his provision,” “God will provide.” But the Greek sense of the name is relevant, too, indicating that, “On the mount of the Lord – God will be seen.”

…

The author of Hebrews speaks of the Torah as a collection of shadows, of vague, dark images that show us representations or “types” of the clear reality that is to come through the New Covenant. In the light of the Gospel of Christ, the substance that underpins the darkness of the Old Testament, especially stories as hauntingly dark as the story of Abraham – only in the light of Christ, do these images sensibly demonstrate the character of God to us, who he is towards us, and how he has provided for us.

Christ exceeds Abraham in every way. As the Son of God, he could inwardly see the beatific simply by looking into himself, the perfect image of the unoriginate Father.

The Old Testament vision of the perfect image of God is in the burning bush, the tree at Sinai, lit aflame by the glory of the God who, to Moses, was nameless. The bush burned in fiery glory atop the mountain of God, and Moses’ response was to leave his path and to stare into it. And just as Abraham fixed his eyes into the heavens and heard “Abraham! Abraham!” responding “Here I am!”, so did Moses hear his own name called out from the God whose name he did not know. “Moses! Moses!” And Moses’ response was the same “Here I am!”

Both the story of Abraham and Moses go on to tell of great things that were done through them – but the stories as well note their failures. Despite the integrity of their wills and the holiness of their lives, they remained corruptible in their flesh. And as such, they could not bear the weight of the holiness of God.

We see this in every burnt offering, that no matter how good and pleasing it is to the Lord, eventually it burns down to ashes and dust, and the smoke and the incense go away. Not so with the burning bush. Scripture tells us that the bush burned with divine flame, but that it was not consumed. The holiness of God had made that bush incorruptible, capable of burning forever with the glory of God. And in the midst of that burning tree, we see the messenger of the Lord, one in the form of an angel, speaking God’s words to men.

When Abraham offered up himself, God showed him a substitute in the bushes next to him, one who would suffice to burn for now. In the bushes, Abraham looked up and saw a ram. The life of the ram, of course, was corruptible. It would burn for a time, and then the offering would end. But through faith, Abraham saw a mysterious truth, that on the mount of the Lord, God would provide.

Christ is that provision.

On behalf of Abraham, and Isaac, and Moses, Christ offers himself up as a holocaust, a burnt offering to God. Rather than hearing his name called out from heaven “Jesus! Jesus!” he heard only silence, for he himself was that messenger of the Lord that would call out. He himself is the Divine Word. And as such, the incorruptible eternal God, took on our corruptible human nature, and offered it up on our behalf – “Here I am!” – as a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice.

As Abraham’s faith was shown true, the author of Hebrews sees in that moment, an image of Resurrection, that Isaac was dead, and then made alive again. As Good Friday ends, and we enter into the somberness of Holy Saturday, where the Divine Word lay dead in the grave, we wonder, Did the offering upon the wood of the Cross burn out? Did the incorruptible Word take on our corruptible flesh, only to have that, too, smolder and return to dust? Has the holy tree of God been in fact consumed by the fire of his holiness? Has the Divine Word been silenced once and for all?

To that question, we only have to look upward, to the Cross, and contemplate the God who will be seen through the darkness by the light of faith. So we look, and we watch, and we pray.