Principle
God never asks us to do something He is unwilling to do.
Explanation
In Genesis 22, GOD tested Abraham by telling him to sacrifice Isaac, the son through whom GOD said He would bring about His promises to Abraham—promises that were the very reason behind Abraham's long journey with GOD in the first place!
1 Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham! Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” 2 Then He said, “Take now your beloved son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a whole burnt offering on one of the mountains I tell you.”
(Genesis 22:1-2 OSB)
Mount Moriah, where GOD told Abraham to offer Isaac, would later become the very site where the Israelite temple would be built, in the then-future city of Jerusalem.
GOD told Abraham to offer up his son through whom the promises were to be realized.
17 By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, 18 even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” 19 Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.
(Hebrews 11:17-19 NIV)
Some 2,000 years later, GOD would offer His Son, through whom the promises to Abraham were to be realized, near, if not upon, this very mountain just outside the gates of Jerusalem.
GOD knows all things, even the future. Therefore, GOD foreknew that He would do the very thing that Abraham was being asked to do.
And for all the similarities, there were differences as well. Abraham was stopped from slaying Isaac; GOD did not stop the slaying of His Son. Abraham was tested, Isaac was tested, and Jesus was tested, all to bend to the will of the Father. And yet, Abraham and Isaac's test resulted in no bloodshed or death; Jesus suffered both.
GOD knows our weakness and He will not ask us to do anything that we are unable to do (with His help), nor will He ask us to do anything that He has not already done.
As the psalmist said:
10 He did not deal with us according to our sins,
Nor reward us according to our transgressions;
11 For according to the height of heaven from earth,
So the Lord reigns in mercy over those who fear Him;
12 As far as the east is from the west,
So He removes our transgressions from us.
13 As a father has compassion on his children,
So the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him,
14 For He knows how He formed us;
He remembers we are dust.
15 As for man, his days are like grass,
As a flower of the field, so he flourishes;
16 For the wind passes through it, and it shall not remain;
And it shall no longer know its place.
17 But the mercy of the Lord is from age to age upon those who fear Him,
And His righteousness upon children’s children,
18 To such as keep His covenant
And remember His commandments, to do them.
(Psalm 102 [103]:10-18 OSB)
