(Excerpt from “Searching for Israel”)
Genesis 22:16-18 records God’s embellishment of the promise on the occasion of Abraham’s “sacrifice” of his son Isaac:
“By Myself I have sworn, says the Lord, because you have done this thing, and have not withheld your son, your only son, in blessing I will bless you, and in multiplying I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the heaven and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies. In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.”
God promises to multiply Abraham and to give him control of strategic military and commercial positions, “gates,” in his enemies’ territories. As we will see, this promise speaks of the geopolitical advantage God later gave Abraham’s descendents. God bases this promise on Abraham’s obedience of the command to sacrifice his son, Isaac, a sacrifice God of course stopped just before the knife fell. Note, too, that this promise has the effect of an oath, in that God swears by Himself.
Since this is the last recorded promise to Abraham, it is fitting that God should refer to His first promise, recorded in Genesis 12:1-3. God reminds Abraham of His promise that his seed would be a blessing to all nations. In Galatians 3:16, Paul makes it plain that this “Seed” is Christ. Christ, who is in the lineage of Abraham, blazed a trail by which all peoples could ultimately develop a relationship with the Father. Christ’s work makes it possible for God to be our God, according to the promise of Genesis 17:7-8. Christ is indeed a blessing to all nations.
I believe that the Lord is saying in this sign in the heavens that the sin of abortion, the taking of innocent blood, is a direct cause of the loss of our militiary strategy, power, and favor in our nation. Abraham was willing, as an act of obedience to the Lord to sacrifice his son, but He heard the Lord’s promise of another sacrifice, a perfect sacrifice, Jesus Christ.
Deuteronomy 19:9, 10 If you keep all these commandments to do them, which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God and to walk always in His ways, then you shall add three other cities to these three, Lest innocent blood be shed in your land, which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance, and so blood guilt be upon you.
Ps 106:37, 38 Yes, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons And shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; and the land was polluted with their blood.
Joel 3:19 Egypt shall be a desolation and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness for their violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land. |
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