Abraham and Isaac

God tested Abraham's faith by asking him to sacrifice his son. Abraham was willing to do this and almost succeeded when an angel suddenly stopped him from killing Isaac.

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I've tried to hold back from sharing what I really think about Christianity, the Bible, and others' blog posts. I guess I didn't want to look like the obnoxious little religious boy who complains about everything. I've been afraid of judgment from my classmates, ironically from those who like to think they're open and accepting of everyone. But now I've come to the conclusion that I just don't care what people think, so I'm just gonna go for it.

I'm nowhere close to perfect, and neither is my religion. Christianity is a vast and complex belief system that is hard for anyone to understand. I was raised Christian and began really identifying myself as one when I was baptized in the 6th grade. I learn new things about my religion each and every day and I love digging into the true meaning and purpose of Christianity, including both the good and bad aspects.

This is why it saddens me to read a lot of the posts on this blog. I've spent my life trying to understand the Bible and its teachings, so it sucks seeing people tearing them apart week after week. I completely respect others' opinions and I believe that we should be able to post whatever we want on this blog, but I don't feel that respect coming back my way. I know people don't target me personally, but I can't help let the judgment and resentment that is conveyed in many posts get to me. I'd never rant about another religion or the lack of one because I know I can't understand it due to the way I live my life. No, I may not agree with whatever it is, but I have enough consideration to realize that it could be a very large aspect of someone's life and to not use my words to tear it down.

You'd never open a page of a book, read one passage, and make judgments about the book based the small fraction that you read. The stories of the Bible come together to paint the huge picture that is my religion, and the ones we've read only touch on a tiny piece of it. Yeah, some parts of them suck. Simply reading the passages and not having background knowledge of Christianity, you'd think God is this evil being who hates his followers (which I know is what many of you think). But I promise you that that's not the case. God didn't ask Abraham to sacrifice Isaac just for kicks. Faith (which is incredibly hard to understand, often even for me) is the backbone of Christianity, and God was testing Abraham's faith with his request. It's more than just Abraham attempting to murder his son. It's the fact that Abraham was willing to give up what meant the most to him in order to be obedient to God. I think that's pretty amazing.

I know many of you don't agree with that, and that's completely fine. But I promise that looking deeper into Bible stories and not taking them so literally will open your eyes to the ways of thinking of others and will help make some of your posts not sound so unfortunately ignorant.

I guess I just sacrificed an hour of my night to write this post. Fingers crossed it's worth it!

Happy bday meredith ily  

Abraham and Isaac

One day -- as Abraham was living his peaceful existence in perfect contentment, minding his own business like usual -- God decided to make life more interesting, for both Abraham and himself. When Abraham was alone, God appeared before him and commanded him to travel to a certain mountain in the land of Mori'ah, where Abraham would then offer Isaac, his only son, as a sacrifice to God. Abraham willingly obeyed, and he soon departed for the land of Mor'ah along with Isaac and two other "young men." Once the part arrived at the foot of the specified mountain in Mori'ah, Abraham directed the two other men who had traveled with him to remain at the bottom of the mountain while had Isaac journeyed to the mountain's peak to worship and pray to God. The two men conceded, and Abraham was therefore free to, according to the common expression, "lead the lamb (his own son) to the slaughter." Even before he and his father reached the mountain's peak, Isaac suspected some foul play. Noticing that his father had not brought along a lamb to sacrifice, Isaac voiced his observation to Abraham, who proceed to tell him that "God [would] provide himself a lamb for a burnet offering." Satisfied, Isaac did not question his father any further. When they reached the top of the mountain, Abraham built an altar and then apprehended Isaac by binding him with rope. As Abraham laid Isaac upon the altar and drew a knife to kill him, he was suddenly prevented from committing the act by an angel, who told him that God had never actually intended Abraham to offer Isaac as a sacrifice. Rather, had fabricated this pretense of sacrificing Isaac as means to test Abraham's loyalty to God's will. Apparently, Abraham passed the test with flying colors. God then revealed to Abraham the real offering, a ram caught in a bush, so Abraham sacrificed this ram in his son's place. And so Isaac soon forgave his father for nearly killing him and the two lived happily ever after.

I would not say that I am exactly experienced when it comes to true sacrifice. Although I have face many situations in my life where I have had to choose among a myriad of possible life-altering decisions, all of which had an equally significant impact on my life, such situation cannot even begin to compare to the sacrificed made everyday by those serving in the military. I have the utmost respect for such individuals. After all, I could never sacrificed my life to defend my country's interests and well-being; I am not nearly brave enough to do so. Risking one's life to defend others' lives represents the ultimate sacrifice. By that respect, those who serve in the military are perfect illustrations of true sacrifice.

The Marine Corps War Memorial: Honoring those who have served in the military.

Abraham and Isaac

I don't think that this is even remotely a reasonable story. God commands Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac, in what apparently amounts to a test. Abraham seems pretty game, so he prepares some wood for burning his son's corpse and sets off for Moriah to engage in some classic filicide. He binds his unwitting son (clearly trying to prevent him from escaping like any reasonable murderer would do). He takes the knife "to slay his son" (beautiful word choice here) but God reveals it all to be a big prank. Ashton jumps from the bushes. Abraham looks afraid and then laughs to himself, claiming he knew all along. The clip goes down in MTV history. Well, more accurately, life just goes on. God is glad to know that Abraham "fears" him (notice the word isn't "believes in" or the like). He gives him an actual offering which kind of seems to defeat the purpose of the sacrifice in the first place. Then he tells Abraham that because he was such an eager murderer, his descendants will be "as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore", which is a tall order still waiting to be filled.

True sacrifice isn't murdering someone you love. Their life was never yours to sacrifice. A true sacrifice is an act done against one's own interest in the duty of others - especially allowing oneself to die.

...but you don't understand

The story of Isaac and Abraham is one of my favorites in the Bible. There are a lot of details along with it, but the gist is that God wanted to test Abraham's faith and asked him to sacrifice his only son. He was willing, but only moments before, God didn't make him.

As soon as I read this post's topic, I immediately thought of this clip from The Bible series... please watch it for a little more emotion in your posts. Helen described my thoughts (as a Christian) perfectly. This is a little bit of a rant and share in my own faith. There are so many people, who never having read the Bible before, have no sense of what these stories mean. That's okay...I'm seriously not saying anything about anyone who hasn't read the Bible before. But what makes me frustrated is that is ACTUALLY someone's faith. This is what I've dedicated my whole life to living out, so when I see people that have only taking an ounce of what they think and turning it into a whole post of making fun of the Bible, it hurts me. This text that you're taking out of context are the the basis and soul of my being. I've read the Bible my whole life, and seeing things that take an ancient line and turn it into what someone wants to say really gets me going. Sure, that's what interpretation, analysis, and opinion is, and I'm fine with that. I'm open to that, and I'm open to talking about what each of us thinks it means, because goodness knows that I'm no Bible scholar.

So what does this story mean in the context of the Christian religion? Faith. That's what it means. It doesn't have anything to do with crazy fathers, murder, or God overall sucking. I promise. Because when you really look into the background and the emotion of why this story was put into the Bible, it's proving a point about having faith and showing true sacrifice. The ENTIRE basis of Christianity is God sacrificing His only son, which also happens to be extremely similar to this story. The Bible is based around a whole set of parables, not necessarily a thorough historical analysis. This didn't happen all the time.. God did this so that people today could read about how He made the point of being a completely selfless, serving disciple of Christ. If you look into the story, it's not about Abraham just being like, "Yeah, sure God, I'll kill my son!"...it was a true sacrifice that he didn't want to make. But Abraham was serving as an all-faithful leader that was living his life out for Christ, so he went along with it. He was willing to sacrifice the thing that meant the MOST to him because he knew that it was God's plan. It's a parable because God's trying to show that we, as followers of Christ, need to act in ways that glorify Him and are with His plan. 

God's not a murderer.

I never thought that I'd be defending Christianity like this...I just can't get over how sacred of a text this is and how my life, morals, and existence are based on something that you're just trying to get a joke out of or follow along with the crowd. Yeah, it's easy to laugh and go, "OH faith, what a silly thing! So old-fashioned!"... I don't blame you for seeing the easy way out, not one bit. What does hurt is that there are so many not willing to accept different opinions and not willing to be just a tad bit more open-minded. I'm not trying to look like a baby who can't take criticism, or an upset little Christian girl who only does what her parents tell her to (I've been called all of those), I'm trying to share that talking about Biblical references is only going to make you better as a writer if you understand what it means in an allegorical sense or in the background of the faith that it's being represented in. Think what you want to think, do what you want to do. Write what you want to write (because I clearly have), but keep in mind that when you write things that bash an entire religion, it looks a little ignorant.

And my true sacrifice? Probably my well-being in writing this post. Maybe it's my calling to share my thoughts on an AP Lit blog. Who knows? I'm sacrificing something right here.

Abraham and Isaac

One day, God spoke to Abraham calling upon him to sacrifice his son Isaac. Abraham was extremely distraught and probably deeply shaken by this request, but he proved his faith to God because he went through with God's request up until the very last second. Then God commanded Abraham to stop, announced it was only a test, and provided a lamb for Abraham to sacrifice instead. I can only imagine how awkward the walk down the mountain was for father and son.

True sacrifice is hard to make. Giving it all for someone other than yourself is naturally against human instinct. To do in on a larger scale with even more of a sacrifice is that much more commendable. But I think the people that make the most difference, other than giving your life for a cause, are those that make little sacrifices every day. A combination of little things can go a long way over time. Like giving a little of your time to help someone with their homework, or asking your sibling how their day was. We make much more of a difference in each others lives than we can ever know, and it is always worth sacrificing a part of your day.

Abraham and Isaac

Summarized in haiku format for your enjoyment.

God was like "Hey, Abe.
Go and sacrifice your son.
I will show you where."

It was the third day,
For Abe had been traveling.
But then, Isaac said -

"Dad, where is the lamb?"
To which Abraham replied,
"God will provide it."

Isaac was tied up.
Abe had the knife to slay him,
But an angel screamed -

"Stop! Do not kill him!"
And Abe came to his senses.
So he killed a ram.

This sounds pretty wild,
But God was just testing Abe.
He had total faith.

True sacrifice? Yikes. That's a big commitment. I'll try to stray away from religious examples and focus on others. A police man sacrificing his life for his community, a soldier sacrificing his life for his country, a mother sacrificing her life for a child.. those are all commendable acts, if you ask me.True sacrifice is doing an action in a selfless manner without expecting anything back. Imagine what our lives would be like without the sacrifices of others.

Abraham and Isaac

Abraham has a son named Isaac. God decides he wants to test Abraham's faith, and demands that Isaac be sacrificed. Abraham travelled 50 miles to a mountain where he was supposed to kill Isaac as an offering. As Abraham was about to stab his only child to death, an angel popped out telling him to stop because he had shown his fatih by getting this far. God blessed Abraham and his descendants.

Every time I do one of these blogs it shows me what an ass God is. I've literally never read the Bible and when I read it for these assignments, I don't understand how anyone could follow it like it was sacred. If you want to, go for it, but it literally makes zero sense to me.

True sacrifice sadly happens all the time. Innocent men, women, and children are murdered or assaulted daily. While some people may argue that "everything happens for a reason" and that "they're in a better place now", I think it's just downright horrible and there's no way to justify it or make it better.