07/09/2024 – Day 037 – Genesis – Chapters 20 – 23 – See Spurgeon quote – 21: 16-19: “…Even the common sorrows of our race suffuse our eyes with tears, but the eternal sorrow, the infinite lake of misery — he who grieves not for this, write him down a demon, though he wear the image and semblance of a man.”
The post last cycle : Dated 04/05/2022, covering Chapter 22, God’s “testing” of Abraham.
The quotes this morning are from the commentary footnotes in “The Evidence Bible”:
“21: 16-19 It was love that drove Hagar to cry out to God for the child. How can love not compel us to lift up our voices and weep, given the impending deaths of multitudes around us? God has opened our eyes to see the wells of salvation in Christ, so we must lead sinners by the hand to him who cried. ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to Me and drink” (John 7:37).”
“I could abundantly justify compassion for perishing men, even on the ground of natural feelings. A mother who did not, like Hagar, weep for her dying child — call her not ‘mother,’ call her ‘monster.’ A man who passes through the scenes of misery which even this city presents in its more squalid quarters, and yet is never disturbed by them, I venture to say he is unworthy of the name of man. Even the common sorrows of our race may well suffuse our eyes with tears, but the eternal sorrow, the infinite lake of misery — he who grieves not for this, write him down a demon, though he wear the image and semblance of a man.” Charles Spurgeon
A key point I believe in 22: 15,17 (from the Apologetics Study Bible footnotes):
“To note that God blesses Abraham because of his obedience does not alter the fact that God’s covenant with Abraham is unconditional — based on God’s promise rather than Abraham’s fulfillment of some obligation. But a covenant is, first of all, a relationship between persons — in this case, human and divine. Within that framework, obedience always brings about divine blessing and disobedience always results in the enactment of a curse, or judgment.”
Thoughts?
Soli Deo Gloria!