God Commands Abraham to Offer Isaac

22 ^(A)Some time later God tested Abraham; he called to him, “Abraham!” And Abraham answered, “Yes, here I am!”

^2 (B)“Take your son,” God said, “your only son, Isaac, whom you love so much, and go to the land of Moriah. There on a mountain that I will show you, offer him as a sacrifice to me.”

³ Early the next morning Abraham cut some wood for the sacrifice, loaded his donkey, and took Isaac and two servants with him. They started out for the place that God had told him about. ⁴ On the third day Abraham saw the place in the distance. ⁵ Then he said to the servants, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there and worship, and then we will come back to you.”

⁶ Abraham made Isaac carry the wood for the sacrifice, and he himself carried a knife and live coals for starting the fire. As they walked along together, ⁷ Isaac spoke up, “Father!”

He answered, “Yes, my son?”

Isaac asked, “I see that you have the coals and the wood, but where is the lamb for the sacrifice?”

⁸ Abraham answered, “God himself will provide one.” And the two of them walked on together.

^9 (C)When they came to the place which God had told him about, Abraham built an altar and arranged the wood on it. He tied up his son and placed him on the altar, on top of the wood. ¹⁰ Then he picked up the knife to kill him. ¹¹ But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, “Abraham, Abraham!”

He answered, “Yes, here I am.”

¹² “Don't hurt the boy or do anything to him,” he said. “Now I know that you honor and obey God, because you have not kept back your only son from him.”

¹³ Abraham looked around and saw a ram caught in a bush by its horns. He went and got it and offered it as a burnt offering instead of his son. ¹⁴ Abraham named that place “The Lord Provides.”^[a] And even today people say, “On the Lord's mountain he provides.”^[b]

Abraham

^19 (A)Abraham was the great ancestor of many nations; his reputation was faultless.^{[a] 20} He kept the Law of the Most High and made a covenant with him, a covenant marked on his body. When he was put to the test, he was found faithful. ²¹ And so the Lord made him a solemn promise that his descendants would be a blessing to the world; that their number would be countless, like the dust of the earth; that they would be honored more than any other people on earth; and that their land would extend from sea to sea, from the Euphrates to the ends of the earth.