Nothing’s Too Hard

“I am the LORD, the God of all the peoples of the world. Is anything too hard for me? Jeremiah 32:27

Have you ever stopped to consider what is harder for God to do, forgive our sins and save us, or give us abundant overflowing life? Certainly at first thought, my answer would be to save us from eternal damnation would be the hardest. The Apostle Paul makes a great point in Romans 8:32 as he sets out to answer this question. His conclusion is that “Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else?”

When Jesus uttered the words “It is finished” as he breathed His last breath on Calvary, could He have been saying that not only was He the last and final sacrifice for the forgiveness of our sins, but that He was also the last and final provision for the abundant life we would ever need? After all, it was Jesus Himself that coined the phrase “Abundant Life” in John 10:10. (The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.)

Abraham had a first hand encounter with “The God that provides.” It was on that day that he was headed up the mountain to sacrifice his only son, when he met God in a whole new way. All Abraham knew was that God had promised him, through a sworn covenant, that his son Issac would be the first of many generations. Now for some reason unbeknownst to Abraham, God was asking Him to sacrifice that precious boy.

Interestingly, even though Abraham didn’t have the benefit of reading the whole story in Genesis 22 like we do, he had faith and trust in God. And for some reason, he called this blind trust in a God he could not see with his own eyes, worship. The writer of Hebrews 19 tells us that “Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able to bring him back to life again. And in a sense, Abraham did receive his son back from the dead.”

Sure enough, as Abraham and Isaac were headed up one side of the mountain, their provision, a ram (not a lamb), was headed up the other side of the mountain. As the angel of the Lord stopped Abraham from taking Isaac’s life, he showed Abraham a ram caught in the brush to be sacrificed instead.

That day Abraham came to know this God that he had a covenant with in a whole new way, and Abraham lovingly referred to Him as Jehovah- jireh, which means “The Lord Will Provide.” Abraham continues by prophetically proclaiming “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.” Abraham had no way of knowing that on that same hill, the only Son of God would be sacrificed some two thousand years later as “The Lamb of God,” and in doing so Jesus would not only provide the forgiveness of sins, but also all you and I need for an abundant life through Him.

You can rest assured today that regardless of what you may need, that on the mountain of the Lord (Calvary), God has already provided through the Lamb.

Today’s Thought: Considering He spared not His Son, nothing is too hard for God in providing Abundant Life for you!