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Evening Devotion for September 30, 2022

Sacrifice of Isaac, Caravaggio ca. 1603.

Prayers

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Lord's Prayer

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

Amen.

Glory to God

Glory be to You, mighty God, for calling me into being;
Glory to You, for showing me the beauty of the universe;
Glory to You, for spreading out before me heaven and earth
Like the pages in a book of eternal wisdom.

Glory be to You for Your eternity in this fleeting world;
Glory to You for Your mercies, seen and unseen;
Glory to You through every sigh of my sorrow;
Glory to You for every step of my life's journey
For every moment of glory.

Glory to You, O God, from age to age.

Amen.

from Orthodox Ikos 1 6/3/2017

Confession

Have mercy on me, Oh Lord, for I am a humble and miserable sinner. [At this point, pause to remember specific sins you have committed during the day and speak or think them.] I renounce all of these sins, heavenly Father, and repent of them, and I promise to make every effort not to repeat them.

Have mercy on me, I pray; pardon me for these offences and any I might have omitted from forgetfulness or ignorance; in the name of Jesus Christ, my Lord and Savior, I pray for forgiveness. And I pray that your Holy Spirit may dwell with me in the coming day, to comfort me, to give me strength against temptation, and to guide me into the path of righteousness.

Amen.

Prayer for the Neglected

Almighty and most merciful God, I remember before you all poor and neglected persons whom it is so easy for me to forget: the homeless and the destitute, the old and the sick, those who repel others by their appearance or personality, and all who have none to care for them. Help me to heal those who are broken in body or spirit, and to turn their sorrow into joy. Grant this, Father, for the love of your Son, who for our sake became poor, Jesus Christ our Lord,

Amen.

Book of Common Prayer mod. RMB 4/2019

Meditation

“The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood.”

~ John 7:18

Benediction

May I go in peace, with God and with his other children, and may we love one another as Christ taught us. May I follow the example of good men of old, and may God comfort and help me and all who believe in Him, both in this world and in the world which is to come.

Amen.

Think of the day ahead in terms of God with you, and visualize health, strength, guidance, purity, calm confidence, and victory as the gifts of His presence.

Kathleen Battle’s angelic voice fits this Ave Maria perfectly. (The melody is taken from the opera Cavalleria Rusticana, by Pietro Mascagni.) Something gorgeous for “Classical Friday.”

Scripture

Psalm 24:3-6 (NKJV)

Genesis 22:5-8 (ESV)

The Story of Abraham [36] - Isaac

hen Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy will go over there and worship and come again to you.” And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together.

And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “There are the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?”

Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together.

Notes on the Scripture

God’s law, stated in the Old Testament (right in the same books as the Ten Commandments), requires burnt offerings. Why, then, do we no longer make them? Christ did not abolish the law; and yet, I doubt many of us have burned an animal carcass or measure of wheat on a fire, as God commands, or even overcooked a hamburger on our grill as a sacrifice to the Lord. Why not? Our duty to do so is right there in the Bible.

Today’s passage provides one answer. Abraham still believes that God has required him to kill his son, Isaac, and burn his body as a sacrifice to Him. So he does not fully understand the prophetic truth of his words: “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering”.

Isaac has, in fact, been “provided by God” even more than most children, for he was born to a man and woman far past child-bearing age. So Abraham thinks God’s provision of a lamb is Isaac; he does not fully appreciate his own prophecy, for God will supply a ram to Abraham and His own Son, Jesus Christ, to the world.

This is the first unmistakable prophecy of Christ in the Bible. As unwitting as it is, the remark is profound. We often call Christ “the lamb of God,” or even “lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world,” without fully remembering its meaning.

Burnt offerings were made as a sacrifice for sin. Technically, our duty to make this sacrifice still exists. But we no longer do it, because God Himself has provided the lamb for the sacrifice. Christ was the “lamb of God”; our duty to sacrifice, as detailed throughout the Old Testament, was satisfied by Christ’s suffering and death. He gave His own body as a perfect sacrifice, sufficient for all time for those who would believe in Him.

It is important to understand this. It is like there is a mortgage on our house, but someone pays the bill every month. It is easy to forget the debt exists and to think that we are debt-free, but this is wrong. Like the person whose mortgage is paid by someone else, we are not debt-free. Our constant sin creates a debt, and the requirement of sacrifice to atone for our sins still exists. The only reason we do not make these sacrifices is that someone who loves us, utterly and completely, has paid the debt for us in advance.

In this, as in many other ways, Christ did not come “to abolish the law, but to fulfill it.” (Matthew 5:17-18)

Daily Inspiration

“Transformation”

The Sacrifice of Isaac, by Philippe de Champaigne, ca. 1650.

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