Reflection on the Word for the Sunday of January 15, 2023
The Lamb of God – John 1-29-31
The next day, he saw Jesus coming to him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who is preferred before me, for he was before me.’ I didn’t know him, but for this reason I came baptizing in water: that he would be revealed to Israel.” ……………………………………………………………………………
The so called Akedah is one of the most known and famous stories told in the Book of Genesis. In the text, allegedly, God told Abraham that you have to take your son Isaac and as a sacrifice you have to kill him on the mount of Moriah, because that will please God.
It is clearly written by an unknown author in the Book of Genesis, still it might have never happened in that way. It may have happened in the religious reality, which is sometimes also in the same realm where dreams exist and visions dominate, but it is not exactly the physical reality.
It is not only logic, which says, but it is also morally incomprehensible that God would have ever told Abraham, that you have to butcher your son, and then burn his body on an altar, because that is the right thing to do, if you want to please God. It is obviously never happened. God had just never ever said that.
The story still has a very important message and actually that is the very point of it. Almost all ancient cultures on Earth, especially the epic ones, like Mesopotamia, Egypt, Persia, Greece, Rome, they all practiced human sacrifices to please, to plead, to manipulate the gods. Especially, the children were in grave danger by this worldwide practice, but not only.
Thus, Abraham, as a well respected righteous man and a warlord in the Levant, had a dilemma of what is the right thing to do regarding the human sacrifices. Because not only that all the surrounding nations in Canaan, but his own too, practiced the sacrificial killing of the first born son. That was the religious norm of the day.
Not expecting an inch perfect BBC accuracy in an ancient telling of the events, but we can say that not God, but the religious norm told Abraham in his mind, that the blood sacrifice of your son Isaac is a religious must.
The story says that he was willing to obey the will of God, however it is obvious, that God never wanted human sacrifice as form of worshiping, as all understanding in the Bible shows that it was declared as an abomination. So what happened? If it was declared an abomination after the Akedah event, then it must have been an abomination even before.
Unlike the earthly ethical and cultural standards, the moral standards in Heaven never change. Consequently, God never demanded evil from Abraham as a test of his faith.
According to the Bible story, Abraham was willing to murder his son on the Altar, but the Angel of God stopped him.
That is a point making style to wrap the particular reality there, that Abraham was the very person who mistakenly thought, that the right thing to do was to follow the religious standards of the surrounding nations at that time to please God by committing human sacrifices.
However, in the last moment, like an enlightenment, he realized that God does not want human sacrifices from the believers, because it is not only not pleasant to God, but it is a despicable abomination, practiced by the pagans.
Thus, instead of his son, he butchered a ram. The religious practice of the Abrahamic tribal structure changed to the replacement sacrifice, where the first born sons were replaced by lambs on the altars, and later, occasionally, by money offerings.
However, some descendants of Abraham are still claiming that Abraham was great because he was willing to give up his own son to God, but they are wrong.
Abraham was great only, because he understood that offering children up or in general the human sacrifices are an abomination to God, and the human sacrifice is an abomination in itself, even if God would not have said it so. Thus, the lamb offering stayed as a replacement for millennia.
Ezekiel wrote, that everybody is responsible for his or her sins.
It means that the parents and the grandparents are not responsible for the sins of their children and grandchildren, neither the children and the grandchildren are responsible for the sins of their parents and grandparents. The very soul who sinned must die because of his or her own sins.
As it is written in the Book of Ezekiel, chapter eighteen, that " The soul who sins, he shall die: the son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son; the righteousness of the righteous shall be on him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be on him."
We should note the Ezekiel talks about the death of an unrepenting soul, where the Book of the Revelation reads in its chapter two that " He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies. He who overcomes won't be hurt by the second death. "
In order to live every soul must repent. Nobody can substitute anybody in repentance, neither children or parents, grandchildren or grandparents, siblings or cousins or friends, good or bad neighbors, fellow citizens, fellow humans or fellow creatures in the universe.
We have to do all the repentance by ourselves, as it is written in the book of Ezekiel chapter 18: " But if the wicked turn from all his sins that he has committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die."
According to the old tradition there is no need for a mediator between the creature and the Creator, between the human being and God, the Master of the Universe.
Despite the detailed sacrificial system established in the Jerusalem Temple, according to Prophet Ezekiel, in order to receive from God the very forgiveness of sins there is no need for temple, no need for priesthood, no need for burnt sacrifices.
Regarding forgiveness only full repentance is needed, where biblical repentance is a little bit more than the Western concept, because it includes not only the remorse over someone’s sins and transgressions and iniquities, but also the very making of the amendments, and then comes the full change of life for the better and then the devotion to keep all of God's commandments and statutes.
The prophets, like Hosea, warned the people on multiple occasion that God says that “For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.”
It might then come the understanding that regarding the forgiveness of sins there is no need for a sacrificially meant Lamb of God, because God, in his oneness, alone has more than enough power to wipe away sins and iniquities.
So then what is about the very role of Jesus?
He was sent from Heaven to call us to repent. Exactly, that was his preaching, when he left the desert, when he hear that John the Baptist was thrown into prison, as it is written that From that time on Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
And he told the Apostles, that come and follow me, to teach the people to keep the commandments. We need Jesus, as students need a teacher, disciples a master, the sick need the doctor healer, the lost need the guide, the flock needs the shepherd, the confused people need the true leader, the forgetful needs the reminder, the great commission needs the Great Commissioner.
God sent the only begotten Son, to embody the Spirit of God on Earth. He did not run away from the threats and sufferings, he obeyed his Father in Heaven, the Creator of the Universe even through death and the cross.
May we follow and obey our Master and teacher, our brother and King, wherever he sends us, whatever he wants us to do in order to keep the commandments for the always greater glory of God, whose will be done by the Holy Spirit, now and always, Amen.
https://korakowa.blogspot.com/p/sunday-sermons.html
