Firstfruits opens the flow for seconds, thirds, and more. From Genesis to Jesus, we see that offering firstfruits to the Lord not only honors God, but it opens a flow of heaven’s resources and heaven’s promises to us (look at chapters two and three of my book for an understanding of this principle.) I recently noticed yet another interesting example. Look at this:
Genesis 22 describes the challenging story of the Lord asking Abraham to sacrifice on the altar his promised son Isaac. Isaac was not only a miracle son, but he was the only tangible evidence of God’s crazy declaration that Abraham’s descendants would outnumber the stars of the sky. God tested Abraham’s faith — faith in his God even above his hope fulfilled through Isaac. Abraham passed the test, and God provided a ram to be sacrificed instead.
What’s interesting is the last paragraph of the chapter. After Abraham and Isaac return from the mountaintop, they (and we, the reader) learn that Abraham’s brother also has had a number of children. It appears to be simply a record of lineage which we can (and usually do) glaze right over. However, in the list of names is Rebekah, Isaac’s future wife and mother to all the descendants to come.
Isaac was the firstfruit of the promise to Abraham. In fact, he was the firstfruit of God’s plan to redeem mankind. That is why the Lord required Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, sacrifice the firstfruit. Abraham’s willingness to lay down even the very gift from God opened the flow for the promise to be fulfilled. As soon as the firstfruits offering was sacrificed to the Lord, we see the way (Rebekah) for the coming of the second, third, and more…all the way to Jesus, and now to everyone who is born into or grafted into the family of God.
What would have happened if Abraham had not been willing to sacrifice Isaac? I don’t know. I can see him still finding a wife and having descendants. But I’m confident that even if family existed, it would not have been the anointed fulfillment of the promise of the Lord to bring forth his redemptive plan. It was precisely in the sacrifice of firstfruits that opened the flow from which we still inherit today.
–Wesley Zinn