Once upon a time there was this little girl. All she ever wanted was a strand of pearls. So as her and her mother were out in town one day, she spotted a strand of dollar store pearls which she begged her mother for. Her mother relinquished and bought them for her. She adored them and she wore them all day, even when she went to bed she wore those pearls with a bright smile.
One night her dad came into her room to tuck her in like he always did and he asked her “Sweetheart do you love me?” She responded with “of course I do daddy.” He then in turn asked her “do you love me enough to give me your pearls?” She laughed at him and said “oh daddy you don’t mean that.”
This conversation took place every night for about 6 days and every time she would laugh at him not believing he would ask her such a thing, knowing how much she loved those pearls. Till on the 7th night her father came in to tuck her in and this time he found her crying with her pearls in her hand and when she looked up at him she lifted her pearls to him and said ” Here daddy I love you so much more than these pearls, you can have them.”
Her father took the dollar store pearls and placed them in his jacket pocket, and from the other pocket he pulled out a velvet box with a beautiful strand of real salt water pearls inside. Her very own. She was beside herself with happiness.
That’s the picture that God paints in Genesis 22 with Abraham and Isaac. Abraham and Sarah had prayed and waited for years for God to bless them with Isaac. In Genesis 22 God asks Abraham to bring his son Isaac as a burnt offering to Him. When Abraham had Isaac on the alter and his hand was in the air with the knife, he was ready to take his sons life. In that moment the angel of the Lord stopped him, and the Lord provided Abraham with a ram that was stuck in a bush right behind him for the offering. He saw that Abrahams heart was a heart of obedience and that he truly loved the Lord enough to do whatever He told him too.
You see God didn’t want Isaac, no. God wanted Abraham. He wanted his whole heart, his obedience, his love.
We all have desires, relationships, children, jobs, family, and other things that are so very precious to us that we could never fathom giving them up for anything. But sometimes those things become idols in our lives and they become things that we focus on instead of focusing on the Lord and His will for us.
Before coming on the race I so bad wanted to find “the one”. I wanted a relationship with a man so bad. To the point that I put my relationship with God second. God is a very jealous God. He wants to be the center of your life. Your soul focus. He wants you to be married to Him first before being married to someone He has designed for you.
So He called me to a year of being single. To walking deeper and deeper into intimacy with Him. A year of journeying with Him to understand that NO man will EVER love me the way God loves me. He asked me to lay that Isaac down at His feet. Not because he wanted my Isaac, oh no, God wanted me! ALL OF ME! He doesn’t want pieces of my heart, He wants all of my heart. The Father doesn’t give His heart in pieces so why should we give ours in pieces to Him?
So I ask you today….what is your Isaac that God has asked you to lay down? What is it that you are putting before the Father and His will for you? Does He have your whole heart or does He just have pieces?
Sit down and ask Him. He wants to talk to you and He wants to step into deeper intimacy with you. He loves you and He always will.
