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Humble Hero
for the world, so great that He gave His only Son to raise the world
from its degradation.
By making an entire surrender, Abraham saw that when God
gave His only Son to save sinners from eternal ruin, He was making
a greater and more wonderful sacrifice than any human could ever
make.
When God provided a sacrifice instead of Isaac, He was declaring
that no one could atone for his own guilt, that the pagan system of
sacrifice was wholly unacceptable to God. No father was to offer
up his son or daughter for a sin offering. The Son of God alone can
bear the guilt of the world.
Christ’s words concerning Abraham did not seem deeply signifi-
cant to His hearers. The Pharisees saw in them only fresh ground
for arguing. They retorted with a sneer, as if they would prove Jesus
to be a madman, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen
Abraham?”
With solemn dignity Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to
you, before Abraham was, I AM.”
Silence fell on the large gathering. This Galilean Rabbi had
claimed the name of God, given to Moses to express the idea of the
eternal presence. He had announced Himself to be the self-existent
One, He “whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting.”
Micah 5:2
.
Again the priests and rabbis cried out against Jesus as a blasphe-
mer. Because He was, and proclaimed Himself to be, the Son of
God, they were bent on destroying Him. Many of the people sided
with the priests and rabbis and picked up stones to throw at Him.
“But Jesus hid Himself and went out of the temple.”
The Man Born Blind
“As Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth.
And His disciples asked Him, saying, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man
or his parents, that he was born blind?’ Jesus answered, ‘Neither
this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be
revealed in him. ...’
“When He had said these things, He spat on the ground and
made clay with the saliva; and He anointed the eyes of the blind man