tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4663208125956442279.post2589842390990795436..comments2023-10-25T05:52:17.030-07:00Comments on Scandalous Grace: isaacJim McNeelyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09205828653643715184noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4663208125956442279.post-79268490111038363342009-09-30T19:41:53.073-07:002009-09-30T19:41:53.073-07:00Also, thanks for posting Jen, I never really got t...Also, thanks for posting Jen, I never really got to know you guys very well but I still really loved you guys and miss you.Jim McNeelyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09205828653643715184noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4663208125956442279.post-52868231364794679152009-09-30T19:38:27.741-07:002009-09-30T19:38:27.741-07:00OK, more thoughts: people always get mixed up wond...OK, more thoughts: people always get mixed up wondering how Abraham could be certain he heard God. This is not the right question, it never is the right question. As Jesus said, "If any man is willing to do His will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it is of God." It isn't a question of revelation or insight, it is a question of raw will to heed faith.<br /><br />These are the deep waters that the casual can't fathom, when God asks us to sacrifice what is good, what is hopeful, and our only response can be the raw willingness to believe and obey in the face of apparent terror and ugliness. Of course, every story and every hero and every humble work carries the seed of this.<br /><br />Isn't it awesome that Kierkegaard saw these things and it served as the intellectual seedbed for a great deal of the philosophy of the modern age? Modernism sacrificed the symbols of beauty, the woman, the Christ, whatever, hoping beauty could rise from the dead ashes of pure form, yet unable to escape the screaming need of everyone to BELIEVE, to love.<br /><br />We are each shut up inevitably to faith, and it is only in sacrificing our beautiful Isaac, our hope and identity and promise, that we find our freedom and substance.Jim McNeelyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09205828653643715184noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4663208125956442279.post-72233385812493619342009-09-30T19:22:21.617-07:002009-09-30T19:22:21.617-07:00The truly telling thing is that sacrificing Isaac ...The truly telling thing is that sacrificing Isaac was not a moral decision. God crafted this to strip it of morality, meaning, hope, down to absolutely raw faith. Perhaps He asks us, at a pivotal time, to take that one hopeful right thing, and slay it. To trudge 3 days up the mountain and deliberately slay our one good thing. Yet, it is our secret love, our trust, our hope in this one thing, that is the one idol that enslaves us; facing this one great loss is the great liberator, the great prover of us, the great maker of substance. Losing our very identity, we become real.<br /><br />This story is a part of the deep hidden secret part of the human experience. We see science slaying meaning and God yet hoping that somehow morality and meaning will shine through anyway.Jim McNeelyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09205828653643715184noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4663208125956442279.post-88383897148974809112009-09-30T19:03:27.606-07:002009-09-30T19:03:27.606-07:00OK - this is freaking awesome! Sacrifice of self ...OK - this is freaking awesome! Sacrifice of self to live as a servant... takes all the trust I have, and more because I don't live in that state. I go in and out of life being about me, and life being about whatever God wants in the moment... thanks for the inspiration :)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com