Jehovah-Jireh

 Genesis 22:14, “So Abraham called that place THE LORD WILL PROVIDE. And to this day it is said, ‘On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided’” (NIV).

Abraham had obeyed God’s command to offer his son as a sacrifice. As they climbed the mountain where the sacrifice was to be offered, his son asked him about the sacrifice. They had the wood and the means for making an altar, but where was the sacrifice? Abraham’s reply was that God would provide the sacrifice.  It appears that Abraham believed that if his son must be sacrificed, God would raise him from the dead. When Isaac was placed on the altar and Abraham was about to kill him with a knife, God spoke to him and told him not to sacrifice his son, but sacrifice the ram that had been caught in a thicket nearby.  Abraham called the place, “Jehovah-

Jireh,” which means, the Lord will provide.

Where does God Provide for us today? He will provide for us in the mount, or in the place of obedience.  Too often we want God to provide when we see the mount in the distance.  After Abraham had done all that God commanded him to do and had the knife in hand to slay his son, God intervened. A man can sit outside a baker's shop, and starve to death.  A man can go broke if he never enters the bank where his money is.  We need to ascend the hill of the Lord and absolutely commune with Him.  Lovingly obey Him and He will provide. A woman who was 75 years of age was asked how God provides.  She responded, "...It is in the last pinch that God comes to the relief..."  She told of a time when she had no flour in the house.  She set the table at noon with nothing to put on it; but five minutes to one a loaf of bread came.  Her son was sick.  She prayed for him to get well.  The doctors gave him up; they all gave him up.  While they were whispering about the funeral arrangements, some perspiration appeared on his brow showing that his fever had broken.  In a few days he was completely well.  She continued, "Whenever you get into a tough place, and your heart is breaking, if you will look a little farther into the woods, you will see caught in the branches, a substitute and a deliverance.

Adam Clark says, “But all this seems to have been done under a divine impulse, and the words to have been spoken prophetically; hence, Houbigant and some others render the words thus: Dominus videbitur, the Lord shall be seen; and this translation the following clause seems to require, as it is said to this day, ‎b­har ‎‎Yahweh ‎‎yeeraa°eh‎, "ON THIS MOUNT THE LORD SHALL BE SEEN." From this it appears that the sacrifice offered by Abraham was understood to be a representative one, and a tradition was kept up that Jehovah (Yahweh) should be seen in a sacrificial way on this mount. And this renders the opinion stated on verse 1 more than probable, viz., that Abraham offered Isaac on that very mountain on which, in the fullness of time, Jesus suffered. Paul, the Apostle, wrote this encouragement to persecuted Philippian believers, “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”