<p>8:56 <i>Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it, and rejoiced</i>- This is surely an allusion to how he laughed for joy at the promise of Isaac. He &quot;gladly received the promises&quot; (Heb. 11:17 RV). And realizing that through baptism the promises are made to us ought to inspire a deep seated joy too. The only time Abraham is recorded to have laughed and been glad was when he was given the promise that he would have a seed; he understood that ultimately that promise had reference to Jesus (Gen. 17:17). Abraham &ldquo;saw&rdquo; ahead to Christ through the promises made to him concerning Jesus. He cryptically commented about the future sacrifice of Jesus: &ldquo;In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen&rdquo; (Gen. 22:14). It was in this sense that Jesus speaks of Abraham as having seen him. It is in this context of speaking about the promises that Jesus could say &ldquo;Before Abraham was, I am&rdquo;. He appreciated that God&rsquo;s promises to Abraham were revealing the plan about Jesus which God had known from the beginning of the world. That purpose, which had been &ldquo;before Abraham was&rdquo;, had been revealed to Abraham in the promises to him, and was now being fulfilled in the eyes of the Jews of the first century, as they stood in a ring around Jesus, &ldquo;the word (of promise) made flesh&rdquo;.</p><p>It seems reasonable to conclude that Isaac was offered on or near the hill of Calvary, one of the hills (Heb.) near Jerusalem, in the ancient &ldquo;land of Moriah&quot; (cp. 2 Chron. 3:1). The name given to the place, Yahweh-Yireh, means &lsquo;in this mount I have seen Yahweh&rsquo;. The events of the death and resurrection of the Lord which Isaac&rsquo;s experience pointed forward to were therefore the prophesied &lsquo;seeing&rsquo; of Yahweh. When Abraham &lsquo;<i>saw</i> the place of Isaac&rsquo;s intended sacrifice afar off&quot; (Gen. 22:4), there is more to those words than a literal description. Heb. 11:13 alludes here in saying that Abraham <i>saw</i> the fulfilment of &ldquo;the promises&quot; &ldquo;afar off&quot;. The Lord in Jn. 8:56 says that Abraham <i>saw</i> His day or time usually a reference to His sacrifice. And yet that place of offering was called by Abraham &lsquo;Jehovah Jireh&rsquo;, &lsquo;Jehovah will be <i>seen</i>&rsquo;. Note the theme of <i>seeing</i>. In some shadowy way, Abraham understood something of the future sacrifice of the Lord Jesus; and yet he speaks of it as the time when Yahweh Himself will be &lsquo;seen&rsquo;, so intense would the manifestation of God be in the death of His Son. See on Jn. 19:19.</p>