Bible Text: Genesis 22:2 | Speaker: Dr. Harold J. Sala | Series: Guidelines For Living |

Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go…sacrifice him there as a burnt offering. Genesis 22:2

“Love is not easy or simple,” says physician and marriage counselor, Dr. Ed. Wheat, “it is an art that I must want to learn and pour my life into.” It is that, plus a great deal more. A study of the original blueprint for family living which you will find in the pages of the Bible will lead you to conclude that God intended the family to be a foretaste of heaven on earth, not a bit of hell on earth as it often is. His plan was for the family–your family–to be a miniature of the kingdom of God on earth, and what God expects of us in relationship to Himself, He expects of each other in a given family.

Stop and think for a moment. Do you happen to recall the first mention of the word love in the Bible? You find the first mention of this word in the context of the family where God speaks of the love of a father toward his son. The father was the progenitor of two great races of people, the Jews and the Arabs. His name was Abraham, and his son was Isaac. God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go…sacrifice him there as a burnt offering” (Genesis 22:2).

Remembering that Jesus stressed the importance of love in the family, keep in mind the fact that Jesus grew up in a normal family. Based upon what Matthew tells us in Matthew 13, it is certain that following the birth of Jesus, Mary and Joseph came together as husband and wife and parented at least seven children who were half-brothers to Jesus. As the oldest brother in a family of at least eight, Jesus experienced all the frustrations of family living which put us under stress today.

In families today most arguments start over trivial things–like who didn’t clean up the mess in the kitchen, or who squeezed the toothpaste in the middle–or worse, threw the cap away so whoever uses it gets the dried blurb on the end. Why is it that love should often stop at the front door? Why should we feel that we can speak to each other at home when if we spoke to our neighbors in the same tone of voice, we’d probably get our noses broken? Why is it that we often feel family members don’t count when it comes to demonstrating and showing love–Christian love and commitment? There is no questioning that Jesus taught love as the acid proof of the fact God has touched a life with His presence. In the upper room, immediately before His ascension to heaven, Jesus said, “Love each other as I have loved you” (John 15:12). In the same message He said, “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another” (John 13:35).

The definition of love that I like the best is that love is an unconditional commitment to an imperfect individual to meet the needs of a person in such a manner that will require personal sacrifice. Real love–the kind that holds our families together–is giving, not getting; it embraces sacrifice, not simply indulgence. This is not to suggest for a moment that in the beautiful relationship of marriage love should not be expressed in the warmth and intimacy of sexual relations–it’s right and normal. But love goes much further than sex.

Love in the family is kept alive through little acts of kindness and thoughtfulness. The sign which hangs in the kitchen reading, “DIVINE SERVICE PERFORMED HERE DAILY”, has the right idea. Love is a commitment, it is a journey–not a destination–a way of life, a sacrament, a glue that holds families together. It is God’s program for the global family today.

Resource reading: 1 Corinthians 13