On June 17 last year we baptized Victoria Rose Gilbert.  The Old Testament lesson that day was the story of David and Bathsheba, which ends with God killing the child of their union as punishment for their affair.  At the time I thought that there couldn’t possibly be a worse lesson to read at a baptism, but I was wrong.  Today’s Old Testament lesson is certainly the worst possible story to read at a baptism.  The lesson from the Book of Genesis is the story traditionally known as the Binding of Isaac, in which God asks Abraham to build and altar and sacrifice his beloved son.  At the very last moment, as Abraham is about to slit his son’s throat, an angel stops him and a ram miraculously appears to be used in Isaac’s place.

As you can well imagine, this story has been interpreted many, many different ways.  The most common interpretation is that this is yet another example of Abraham’s extraordinary faith.  God called Abraham from his homeland and promised him a new land and that he would be the father of many nations, and Abraham trusted God.  Then God promised Abraham and Sarah a child in their old age, and Abraham trusted God.  Finally, God asks Abraham to sacrifice his beloved child – his heir and the child of the promise – and Abraham trusts God.  So we could interpret this story as an example of Abraham’s great faith.

Another interpretation set this story in the context of other ancient Middle Eastern religions.  Other nations around Israel practiced child and human sacrifice but Israel did not.  In fact, the Old Testament is adamant that any kind of human sacrifice is an abomination to the Lord.   In this story we see God refusing a human sacrifice and, more than just refusing, also supplying an acceptable alternative.

In the Christian tradition, the Binding of Isaac has been seen as prefiguring the Crucifixion.  There are a few details that in the story are reminiscent of Holy Week.  First there is the three day journey, which calls to mind the three days Christ spent in the tomb.  Next there is Isaac carrying the wood for the sacrifice, which is reminiscent of Christ carrying the cross.  Finally, there is the common theme of a father willingly sacrificing his son.  Each of these elements makes Christian commentators see Isaac as prefiguring Christ.

Each of these traditional interpretations gives us insight into the story, but each of these interpretations is also strangely passionless.  None of these interpretations acknowledges the absolute horror of God asking a father to kill his beloved son.  And, if this is a test, what kind of sick test is it?  Some have argued that God is some kind of abusive parent who demands outrages proofs of love.  Some have argued that it was really the devil who tempted Abraham and that we don’t hear God’s true voice until the very end of the story.  And some have argued that Abraham simply misunderstood God, because God would never ask a parent to sacrifice a child as proof of love and obedience to God.  Agree or disagree with any of these ideas, but they are all ways of recognizing the deep pathos of the story.  What did Abraham and Isaac talk about on the trip up the mountain?  What did they talk about on the way home?

This morning, in the context of baptism, I would very gingerly propose that in this story we might see a kind of archetype.  Almost every religion has some ceremony or rite to dedicate children to God.  In those ceremonies we acknowledge that children are a gift from God who are only temporarily in our care.  We make this acknowledgement by ritually giving the children back to God.  Baptism is more than this, but part of what we do in baptism is give our children back to God.  Of course, we do this in a bloodless way.  Just as we say that the Eucharist is our bloodless sacrifice – we call it our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving – in baptism we bloodlessly die with Christ in a death like his so that we can rise in a Resurrection like his.

From our perspective baptism, and I would suggest maybe even the story of Abraham and Isaac, are archetypes of dedicating children to God.  But from God’s perspective, perhaps these are stories about welcome.  In today’s Gospel lesson Jesus says, “’Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.’”  In baptism we welcome people into the fellowship of faith, the household of the Church.  Today Nigel and Cathy give Damalie back to God, who, we are assured, welcomes her as his beloved child. Amen.