God is Jehovah Jireh – The LORD Will Provide

God is Jehovah Jireh – The LORD Will Provide

“Abraham called the name of that place The LORD Will Provide, as it is said to this day, “In the mount of the LORD it will be provided.” (Genesis 22:14)

There are many names that describe the attributes of God’s character and today we are looking at Jehovah Jireh. We see it first used by Abraham when he named a place that the Lord had sent him to sacrifice his son Isaac. He named that place Jehovah Jireh, the Lord will provide.

The story begins when Abraham and his wife Sarah left their home and traveled to a land that the Lord would show them. Along the way God promised that Abraham would be the father of many nations. Abraham was probably puzzled by this promise as Sarah was a barren woman and could not have a child. Abraham believed God and took Him at His Word and had faith that he would someday be the father of many nations. In a moment of error Abraham did have a son by his wife’s maid servant Hagar but God came and told him that this was not the child. God again told Abraham that the child would be born of his wife Sarah and that it would happen within the year. Abraham and Sarah was well advanced in years but they had faith in the promise of God’s Word.

Within the year Abraham and Sarah had the promised son and his name would be Isaac. It was through Isaac that the promises of God would be realized. Through Isaac the Hebrew nation of Israel would be born. It was through Isaac that the promise of the coming Messiah would come. And it was through Isaac that the Christian Church would be founded through Jesus Christ that the gates of Hades would not prevail against it.

Then the story of Abraham and Isaac took a strange twist. God commanded Abraham to take his son Isaac to a place that He would show him and sacrifice him unto the Lord. In faith in God’s Word Abraham packed up some wood, a knife, and took his son to a place called Mount Moriah. This must have been very hard for Abraham to understand. He knew the importance of his son Isaac to fulfill the promises of God. The question, “Why” must have weighed heavy on his mind. But Abraham believed that God would provide a way and that the promises God had made him were true, and in faith in God’s Word Abraham obeyed.

As Abraham and Isaac neared the place that the Lord was sending them, Isaac was filled with question. Isaac knew the sacrificial procedures, he knew what he and his father were about to do, and he wondered where the sacrificial lamb was. “Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” And he said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” So the two of them walked on together.” (Genesis 22:7-8)

When Abraham and Isaac arrived at the place God had directed them on Mount Moriah Abraham built an altar. He bound his son and placed him upon the altar and prepared to slay Isaac with his knife. As Abraham was about to do what was an unthinkable command from God he heard the voice of an angel of the Lord. “He said, “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.” (Genesis 22:12)

Abraham then looked up and there caught in the thicket was a ram to be sacrificed. Because of Abraham’s faith God had provided the sacrifice that He had required of Abraham. Abraham in his joy and relief praised the Lord and named the place “The Lord Will Provide.” In the New Testament we read in the book of Hebrews that all though this ordeal Abraham believed that God would raise Isaac from the dead. “He considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead, from which he also received him back as a type.” (Hebrews 11:19)

Hundreds of years later King Solomon was privileged by the Lord to build the Temple of the Lord. His father David provided much of the resource but was denied the privilege and God chose Solomon to build the Temple. The Temple was built on the same place that Abraham had offered his only son as a sacrifice to God, but God our provider gave the sacrifice. “Then Solomon began to build the house of the LORD in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the LORD had appeared to his father David, at the place that David had prepared on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.” (2 Chronicles 3:1)

What happened on Mount Moriah so many years ago is more than a demonstration of faith and obedience. It is historic but it is also a never ending promise of God’s grace and provision. Jehovah Jireh is not spoken as the Lord did Provide as Abraham said the Lord will provide. God is an eternal being and has provided in the past, He is providing in the present, and He will provide throughout eternity.

On Mount Moriah God provided the sacrifice for Abraham, and on that spot the Temple of the Lord would be built. God’s provision is not limited to just Mount Moriah nor to anywhere in His creation. Not far from Mount Moriah is another hill called Calvary. It is just beyond the old Jerusalem wall and a place of great suffering from many a man during the Roman Empire. Calvary is the place where God provided the perfect sacrifice for the sin of the world, your sin and mine. It was on Calvary that the Son of God was nailed to a Roman Cross and died. Jehovah Jireh gave His only begotten Son that you and I may live eternally in His Kingdom. “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:32)

Abraham was a man of extreme faith in God. In faith in God he was willing to sacrifice his son in belief that God would restore him. In faith that God’s plan was greater than any doubt that man could have. In faith “we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28) This faith we see in John the Baptist who exclaimed when He saw Jesus, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29)

A God that would provide His Son to pay our debt of sin that we could be freed from its bondage of death, a God that would raise Him from the grave defeating death our greatest enemy that we could have everlasting life, is a God who loves us His creation. The Lord is our provider and there is nothing too great for Him to accomplish. Where else could we go but to the Lord, where else should we place our faith? “And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:19)

Thomas N Kirkpatrick

First Baptist Church of Durant, January 22, 2016