Sacrificing to the gods
Gordon Scantlebury
June 29, 2014
Genesis 22
How strange and bizarre is this ancient story: – horrific and terrible to call for human
sacrifice.
Is this really our God? Is this recognisable as the God of Jesus Christ: - a god who
would call on Abraham to murder and sacrifice his own son?
If someone were to deliberately kill another person in our day, particularly to sacrifice
their own child, we would rightly name them evil.
- and if they said they were doing it because they thought “God had told them so”,
then we would know them to be insane as well;
- an ISIS Jihadist, or an extremist from Nigeria, - the Jonestown massacre,
or Waco in Texas.
Surely this is human insanity speaking and not God at all. Surely our God would not
call us to sacrifice the ones we love, and especially not our own children!
It’s April 25th, 2014 and I’m gathered at a community ANZAC service in Donnybrook,
- just one of thousands held in every city and every country town in Australia.
And we hear of the bravery of those who died in various wars, and the word
‘sacrifice’ is definitely used, and more than once. Indeed. You could say it was the
main theme!
And some sacrifices were made to ‘win a nation’, and some to bring peace; some to
end tyranny, for sure; others more ideological – to stop the march of communism in
Korea or Vietnam. Some were for peace keeping. And the most recent, a war of
cultures: - a war against terrorism in Iraq and Afghanistan – a ‘war against the axis of
evil’.
And surely some of our battles and wars have been quite justified, though others
arguably have not. But either way, we paid a price: - often with our sons, but also
with our daughters, and families and communities, and money and equipment and
energy and time.
And what gods were we worshipping when we went to war? Was it the real God? I
hope so. But was it also the gods of nationalism, or of fear, or of power, or
arrogance, or even greed. And what was the cost we paid, and whose children were
we prepared to sacrifice?
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It’s June, 2014 and one of the debates around at the moment is about paid parental
leave and child care support. And both of these have their place and can be
necessary. There was a female journalist last week on the ABC program ‘The Drum’
arguing against paid parental leave, saying that the money should instead be put into
childcare. “We can’t have women out of the workforce for 6 months,” she said.
“Women should be working, not wasting their time at home!”
And I’m thinking, “what about the two or three month old babies? Don’t they need
their mum or their dad at home to nurture them? Isn’t that more important than the
economy?”
And from the age of 4 we send our children to school, often for 12 or 13 or 14 years
or more. And we do so for lots of good reasons, but uppermost in our society is that
they should also come out able to get a job and be a productive member of the
workforce.
And we place our kids in day care so we can pay off the mortgage, or get a new car,
or advance our careers. And some families have to manage that way. I know. – I’m
not wanting to dump on people because they put their kids in care.
But what is the god we are worshipping here as a society? Is it the real God, or are
they rather the gods of the economy, and our lifestyle and our wealth? And what is
the price we are prepared to pay to these gods, and who are the children we are
willing to sacrifice?
It’s May, 2014 and the government announces triumphantly, “We’ve stopped the
boats”. And there is no doubt that asylum seekers attempting to reach Australia in
crowded, unseaworthy fishing boats is fraught with danger and shouldn’t happen.
And as Australians we can be rightly satisfied that the boats have stopped,
but at what cost?
At what cost?

A thousand young men rotting in a concentration camp on Manus Island.
(collateral damage you might say)

Children and women spiralling deeper into mental illness on Nauru.

Thousands despairing with no visas, no money, no jobs, no hopes in
Australia.
What is the cost, not merely in money, but in Australia’s reputation as we break
international law in acts of piracy and inhumane thuggery? What is the cost when
any voice Australia had about human rights abuse is now laughable, or a cause for
lament in every corner of the world. And what is the cost to ourselves when our own
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sense of an Australian ‘fair go’ and compassion has become so twisted and
diseased?
Oh yes, we’ve stopped the boats, but which gods are we trying to placate here? The
gods of ‘security’, of ‘nationalism’, of political ideology and public opinion? And what
cost are we paying. And who’s children are we sacrificing in order to maintain such
brutality?
It’s 2014 and Australia is just coming off the back of another mining boom. And we
Australians have one of the wealthiest lifestyles on the planet. We have the highest
per-capita uptake of mobile phones and home computers. Most of us eat well. We
have great roads. We can fly return to Bali for just a couple of hundred bucks. Life’s
pretty good – well, …. for a lot of us at least, it’s pretty good.
But we Australians also have the highest per-capita production of CO2 on the planet.
We want to grow the coal industry by dredging channels through the Great Barrier
Reef. We continue to offer fuel subsidies to BHP, Rio Tinto and Gina Rhinehart, so
they can keep their struggling billion dollar profits alive. Governments want to de-list
world heritage areas to better get at their resources. And fracking – pressure
fracturing underground to get out that last bit of coal seam gas, is all the rage,- if you
don’t mind what it does to the underground aquifers.
And the thing is, it all has to be done now! This generation. God forbid that we
should leave something in the ground if we can make money out of it now!
But who are the gods we are worshipping here? The gods of greed and gluttony,
and avarice and envy? And what are the costs we are paying for our blissful
lifestyle? – the atmosphere, the oceans, the climate, biodiversity, animal extinctions,
wilderness areas and places of wonder, perhaps good farmland or sites of cultural
heritage? And in the process, are we really prepared to sacrifice the futures of our
children and our grandchildren?
We are rightly horrified by this story of Abraham and Isaac. But don’t be! Don’t you
know that the gods always require sacrifices! Always! And often as not, we end up
paying that sacrifice with our children. It can be our own child that we bind up and
place on that pile of wood!
Yet in the story of Abraham and Isaac there is a different outcome.
God says, “Stop! You’ve got it wrong. I don’t want your child. I want you!
I want you. – Totally and utterly – your faith, your loyalty, your truth, your heart and
your soul.”
Just as Jesus said, “whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not
worthy of me.” It is a whole sacrifice.
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This free gift of God demands all that we have to offer. But when you pay that price,
make sure it is you who is paying it, and not someone or something else, and
especially, not your own children.
Do not be the one to drive that bronze dagger into your own child’s heart.
For that is the difference between the demonic gods of this world and the One true
and Living God.
- the demonic gods don’t care who pays. “Just put it on the credit card,” they say. “
Let the environment pay, or some third world country in Africa, or the poor in your
suburbs, or refugees, or leave it to the future. Or you can even pay with your
children, if that’s easier for you. It’s all negotiable!”
Those false, lying gods will tell you, “you can buy now. Enjoy it now. Pay later. We
can wait.”
But the voice of the Living God is not like that. The Living God instead tells you to
“stop! I don’t want your child”.
And in fact, it is the Living God who provides the lamb for the sacrifice. It is God who
has already paid the hardest price.
And so Jesus died on the cross: - not because God demanded it of him. No! Never
that! But because Jesus knew that the cost of this life and truth and love was
everything he had to give. And he was not prepared for someone else to pay that
price. He did not opt out and let others pay, but he paid it himself.
And so to Jesus was given the ‘crown of glory’.
To Abraham was given the blessing of a future as limitless as the heavens.
And to us is given the reward of Christ and the gift of life eternal.
Who is the god that you really worship? And what is the price that is being asked of
you?
May your god always be the Living God, the God of Jesus Christ, and may you know
that the price is never one that can be paid with the sacrifice of our children.
Amen.
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