9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”

“Here I am,” he replied.

12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.” Genesis 22:9-12

It’s easy to read this and not feel the tension that must have occurred between father and son. We know how it ends. Both Abraham and Isaac didn’t know how it ended.

Isaac may not have known that the Lord had told his father to do this so he was completely in the dark.

(As an aside, modern psychologists would argue that after this incident, the boy might have trust issues!)

Hopefully Isaac too was able to hear the angel of the Lord when he called out.

I’ve never considered this until now, but our view of this situation has always been from that of Abraham and his reaction to God, but what about Isaac? I suspect he was terrified at what his father was doing to him. What’s it like for a little boy to watch his executioner – his own father – kill him. That has to mess with the mind a bit!

Fortunately we get to follow Isaac as he grows and matures. We’ll get to see if that one event changed him forever.

Stay tuned.