All tagged sacrifice
Easter morning has arrived, and the tomb of Jesus Christ stands empty; the sorrow of Good Friday, and the solemn silence of yesterday is over because Jesus Has Risen! This moment is the pinnacle of our faith on earth. Can we carry it with us always; even into our various valleys… into the valley of the shadow of death?
This morning I am considering the abandonment of things and people associated with our old life when we are reborn and accept Jesus as our savior. Is it a requirement of salvation, and if not, why do we abandon these things at all? Let's look at those old life things we give up along the way of faith and why we are asked to do so.
When we deal in the world we expect to receive a product or service for a fair and equitable price. When we give a dollar for loaf of bread we expect that loaf to be of a certain size, and exactly what we have bargained for, but when we obey God, and do the things He has asked of us we don’t receive a fair price; no, He gives to us in abundance, and far more than we can imagine. Are we ready to answer “Here am I”, and receive the overflowing blessing of the Lord in return?
When we are asked to pray for something, or someone, do we do so right away? Do we stop whatever we are doing at that moment to offer those prayers? Is our answer to this question “Sometimes, it depends on what I am doing at that moment.”? Well we would be more responsive in prayer if we would simply realize one fact… prayer is an offering, and more than that it is a sacrifice. All manner of prayer requires that we sacrifice… even in praise!
Today is Good Friday, a day that God chose to bring His love for man to a crescendo through the sacrifice of His beloved Son. For His part, Jesus begins this day as a captive of religious men who claim to worship God, and yet whose eyes are covered, and sins are brought to the forefront through the bitter and self-serving treatment of God’s Son; their Messiah. Do we begin our day as Christians contemplating the horrors and humiliation of our Lord Jesus Christ, or the amazing love of God that His suffering reveals to us? Today the time is right, and has reached its fullness; God, after centuries of preparation, reveals His plan for our redemption to us.
Good Friday, and the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. We like to focus our eyes on the resurrection story of Easter morning, and sing of the blood that has washed away our sin, but what of the body that was scourged, and hung outside the walls of Jerusalem just days prior? What of the corpse that laid in a dark tomb far from the temple mound? Do we relate to the true suffering, and understand what was required of Christ as He became our sin offering? When Jesus tells us to pick up our cross and follow Him it isn’t to the whipping post where His blood was shed... it is to Calvary, a place of ridicule, shame, and suffering unto death; a desolate place, separated from the gold candlesticks, and far from the altars of the temple.
Before coming to know Christ, acknowledging Him as the Son of God, and accepting His sacrifice for our sins, our consciences convict us, and to ease it we seek to be moral, and do good things. We do this in an effort to please, and appease, God. Some of us want to earn His acceptance like a man gains another’s friendship... as an equal. But, our God is above all things, and only our faith in the blood of His Son Jesus Christ can redeem us, make us righteous, and bring us into a true relationship with Him.
As Easter draws closer day by day does the power of God rise up in us as we contemplate Calvary, and the cross on which Jesus was nailed for us? How is it that these two pieces of rough wood, and three Roman nails, can become the battery that electrifies one’s faith, and saves those who believe, yet means nothing to others who are dying in their disbelief?
Do we live in the fear of failing to adhere to the old written law, or have we grasped hold of the new message of Christ, that is... we are to live in the hope and love of God by serving Him in the way of the Spirit? Woe are we who depend on our own abilities by attempting to follow the letters of the law rather than by partaking of God’s grace through Jesus Christ who has fulfilled the law, and through whom we are now the children of God.