Without warning

Something I wrote for our 9 Lessons: One Story service last night at Belle Vue Baptist Church.

Without warning
no expectation
no anticipation
God speaks.
God speaks to Abraham
That he will be blessed.
This Abraham is
Without children
No reproduction
No future generation
But God speaks
God speaks you will be blessed
To be a blessing

With hope unswerving
With trust unfailing
Abraham believes.
Abraham believes
That like stars in the sky
And sand on the beach
Will his descendants be

This aged man and his wife
Past child-bearing years
Are promised a son
And the God who spoke blessing
The God who made a promise
Is faithful to his word
Is truthful to his word
A child is given
A son is born
Isaac
A one and only
A one and only and much loved
Son

Without warning
no expectation
no anticipation
God speaks.
God speaks to Abraham
Take your son, your only son
Up the mountain
and there give his life as a sacrifice.
Without reason
No explanation
No justification

Abraham does as he is told
And he takes his
One and only
One and only and much loved
Isaac
With him up the mountain

Without warning
no expectation
no anticipation
as Abraham is ready to strike
God speaks.
God speaks to Abraham
That he should refrain
And go no further
The one and only
The one and only and much loved
Son is spared

God speaks
God speaks again to Abraham
Because you have not withheld
Your one and only and much loved
Son
You will be blessed
With a family
More numerous than the stars in the sky
More numerous than the sand on the beach
You will be blessed
To be a blessing

Another child is given
Another son is born
One of Abraham's family
The Father's one and only
One and only and much loved
Son
Born to be a blessing

And God did not withhold
His one and only
But gave him up for all of us
God's love revealed:
He sent is
one and only and much loved
Son
Into the world
That we might have life
That we might be blessed
To be a blessing